CATALOGUE OF THE WORKS CONTAINED IN THIS VOLUME LVI.
Interpretation of the prophet Isaiah, 8 chapters. Homily VI on Uzziah, or on the Seraphim. Homily on that passage of Isaiah: "I am the Lord God, and there is none else; I form the light," etc. Homily on that passage of Jeremiah: "O Lord, the way of man is not in himself," etc. II Homilies on the obscurity of the prophecies. Interpretation of Daniel, 13 chapters. Homily on that passage of John: "The Son can do nothing of himself," etc. Homily on Melchizedek. Homily against games and theaters. Homily on that passage: "But know this," etc. Homily on perfect charity. Homily on continence. II Sermons on the consolation of death. Synopsis of the Holy Scripture. Homily on the birthday of Christ. Homily on the Legislator. Homily on that passage of Matthew: "By what authority doest thou these things?" etc. VI Homilies on the creation of the world. Homily on the serpent. Epistle to Theodore of Mopsuestia. Spurious works.
col. 11 93 141 153 163 193 247 257 263 271 279 291 293 313 385 397 411 429 499 517 517
ADVERTISEMENT
Perhaps you will wonder, benevolent Reader, why, while in all the preceding and following works of the Holy Fathers, including those of St. John Chrysostom, the Latin version accompanies the Greek text column by column, in this our edition of the same holy Doctor, the Latin page is placed only alongside the Greek page. This was the reason, and indeed the only one: that before we had the intention of constructing the entire tradition of the Holy Fathers of the Greek Church, fifteen years ago we had already published the works of St. J. Chrysostom separately in Latin only, and had committed them to permanent type. Since the situation was such that it was neither in our power to move the permanent type, nor in our intention to destroy nine volumes of this purely Latin edition which had already been entirely committed to permanent type and had cost more than sixty thousand francs, we hit upon this fortunate method—though not without labor and expense—of adapting these to this new edition, which is thus enriched with both the Greek and Latin languages.
From the press of MIGNE, at Petit-Montrouge.
not without labor and expense—of adapting these to this new edition, which is thus enriched with both the Greek and Latin languages. From the press of MIGNE, at Petit-Montrouge. and therefore he might have occupied his leisure with this work: but all these things are uncertain, and cannot be brought forward except by way of conjecture.
Why the work should have remained imperfect, who can ascertain even by conjecture? The parts that remain extend only to the middle of the eighth chapter. Here I would have you observe that the division into chapters, which is followed in these Commentaries, was introduced by a certain modern, according to the division of our contemporary Vulgate. For in former times, especially among the Greeks, other and different divisions into chapters held sway. I judge, indeed, that the Commentary was never completed and brought to perfection by Chrysostom; but that, having begun it with the intention of completing it, he was perhaps drawn away by pressing business.
Furthermore, we have rejected the Latin translation of Godefrid Tilmann, as it is adorned in a paraphrastic manner and redundant with useless words, and we have prepared a new one. Certainly, he seems to fight against reason who translates Chrysostom—than whom no one is richer in expression—out of Greek into Latin in such a way that a new redundancy of words appears in the interpretation.
As regards the Homilies on Uzziah and the Seraphim, we have nothing new to bring forward; rather, those things which we stated in the Monitum, col. 93-98, are sufficient. Nor is there anything that suggests itself to be added regarding the two following homilies to those things which we related individually in the Monita there; and the same we say concerning the two Homilies on the Obscurity of the Prophecies.
We have placed the Commentary on Daniel among the genuine works of our John not without some misgivings. The diction is certainly that of Chrysostom; the manner of interpreting does not depart from the custom of Chrysostom, but you would scarcely find such a summary narrative in the works of the holy doctor; he is not, indeed, accustomed to discourse so jejunely and meagerly. Wherefore we must say, with Cotelier and Tillemont, that the work was attempted by Chrysostom, but not completed. Yet I do not think this opinion of ours is such that it can remove every adverse suspicion.
As to the two following homilies, which not long ago the learned Benzelius had unearthed from Manuscripts, we have said as much as was sufficient in the Monita. One thing it is pleasant to add: that we have edited the former, which is to be numbered among the most excellent, based on the Ottobonian Codex, from which I copied it at Rome, which Codex is far more accurate than the English one which Benzelius used.
But as regards the Homily against the Circensian games and the theaters, than which there is no finer work in the writings of Chrysostom, and which we have now published for the first time after having unearthed it, we have already said in the Monitum for it what we felt, and what we thought should be determined regarding the year—or rather, the day—on which it was delivered. But because second thoughts are often better, we have discovered a new and very serious difficulty concerning the time and day the sermon was delivered, arising from the very words of Chrysostom, a matter which now falls to us to address.
§ II. Inquiry concerning the time and day on which that excellent Sermon against the Circensian games and the theaters was delivered, which we have recently unearthed and published, col. 263 et sqq.
In order that it may be understood in what point the difficulty lies, those things which we stated in the Monitum must be retracted, and those things which are said at the beginning of the homily regarding the time and day of the delivered sermon must be repeated. Chrysostom had already passed one year in the episcopate of Constantinople; for at last a year had elapsed since I was brought to your city: since, therefore, he had been ordained in the year 398, and, as Socrates says, on the 26th of February, he was already passing his second year of episcopate. In that year, therefore, on the fourth day of a certain week, a heavy rain broke out, pulling everything along with it, and stealing from the mouth, so to speak, the food of the farmers, beating down the ripe ears of corn, and devastating everything else through the abundance of humid matter; litanies and supplications were held, etc.
But we said that these things happened after Chrysostom [became bishop]: for he says that, with only one day intervening after such a deluge, the Circensian games were held on Parasceve (Good Friday). Therefore, on Parasceve, some from the flock of Christians, having abandoned the sermon in the church, fled to the spectacle of the competing horses, and thus they acted in such an unrestrained manner that they filled the whole city with their voices and shouts... not even revering that very day on which the symbols of the salvation of our race were fulfilled. But on Parasceve (a), when your Lord was being crucified for the world, and such a sacrifice was being offered, Paradise was being opened, and the thief was being led back to his ancient homeland, the curse was being dissolved, sin was being blotted out, the long-standing war was being removed, and God was being reconciled with men, and all things were being changed: on that day on which it was fitting to fast, to confess, and to return thanks in prayer to Him who brought so many benefits to the world—then you, having abandoned the church and the spiritual sacrifice, and the assembly of the brothers, and the solemnity of the fast, were carried off by the devil to that spectacle.
Chrysostom expresses these things so pathetically that I have thought that that Parasceve, which he celebrates so much, is the Friday of Holy Week, and consequently all those things which the holy prelate recounts at length happened in Holy Week: and I confess to have embraced this opinion. But against it, very serious difficulties arise, the first of which I perceived and set forth in the Monitum, and it is of this kind: In the sermon Chrysostom says, "three days ago a heavy rain." But that rain fell on the fourth day of the week; nothing is mentioned as having happened on the fifth day; on Parasceve the equestrian games led many of the Catholics away; on the Sabbath those same Christians went to the spectacles of the theaters. Hence, indeed, it seems to follow that this homily was delivered on the Sunday itself, between which day and the preceding fourth day, counting backward, three intervene...
namely the Saturday, the Friday, and the Thursday. But if the homily was delivered on the holy day of Pascha, why is there not even a single word in the entire sermon concerning the resurrection of the Lord? For even if it could perhaps be said that Chrysostom delivered the sermon on that day in order to vent his indignation against those who had gone to the theaters on the holy days, and had nothing else in mind—could he nevertheless have failed to say absolutely anything at all about so great a celebration on the holy day of Pascha, not even in passing? If, however, we move the homily to the following day, another difficulty arises; for not three, but four full days would intervene. And although it might be said that Chrysostom spoke of "three days" not by calculation, but by assigning the approximate time, one could certainly hardly be brought to believe that Chrysostom, in addressing those who had rushed to the Circensian games on the Friday and frequented theaters full of obscene spectacles on the Saturday, would say nothing about the day of Pascha following that Saturday, if it had truly been that Holy Week.
Another difficulty, no less great, arises from the very words of Chrysostom. "That immense rain," he says, "was dragging everything along, beating down the ripened ears of corn," *stachyas komontas kataklizon*, that is, to follow the text, forcing the ripened ears to bend, by which words he indicates a storm close to harvest time (a). But how can this be understood as referring to fields such as they are at the beginning of April—filled, to be sure, with green grass, not with ripened ears—since this year, if we are to trust the Paschal Tables, Pascha falls on the sixth day of April? However that may be, ripened stalks cannot stand in the fields either at the beginning or in the middle of April.
But what if we say that these events do not refer to Holy Week, but to another week around the month of June, when ripened ears of corn are observed in fields around Constantinople? In this way, certainly, all difficulties would be solved. We must therefore see whether that *Parasceve* [Friday], in which the symbols of the salvation of our race, in which the Lord was crucified for the world, etc., could be understood as any Friday. Among the Greeks, in any case, *Parasceve* is taken to mean Friday, for Clement of Alexandria says that Friday is *Parasceve* (Stromata VII, p. 744). And a manuscript chronicle cited by Charles du Fresne du Cange in his Greek Glossary has this to say about Constantine the Great: "Constantine passed many laws for the Christians, and ordered that the *Parasceve* and the Lord's Day be honored—the former on account of the Lord's Cross, the latter on account of his resurrection." Here, certainly, Chrysostom seems to be speaking of a different *Parasceve* than the one celebrated in Holy Week; otherwise, when speaking of the following Saturday, on which part of the Christian populace turned to the theaters, would he not have been going to rebuke them for having repaired to those profane spectacles, full of licentiousness, on the very vigil of the most holy Pascha?
Concerning the other minor works that follow, and which were not extant in the Greek-Latin editions of Chrysostom, we have spoken sufficiently in the "Admonitions" (Monita) for each one. The prudent reader should not neglect to read these Admonitions; for they were composed with the intention that he might derive greater fruit from reading the homilies.
III. On the Synopsis of Holy Scripture, and why Chrysostom in his review of the books of the New Testament places Paul's Epistles before the Gospels.
We have taken the *Synopsis of Holy Scripture* from a certain Coislinian manuscript; however, that codex was mutilated in many places. For besides the fact that very much was missing in the Old Testament, the entire *Synopsis* of the New Testament was missing, even though the author himself testifies in the prologue that he had compiled it. Therefore, we left nothing undone, so that if any parts were lying hidden in other libraries, they might be copied and sent to us by the help of friends, so that by their addition we might provide a complete work. But when I discovered that another codex of the same *Synopsis* existed in the library at Leiden, which had once belonged to Isaac Vossius, I asked the most learned Abraham Gronovius to provide me with a copy of what was missing in our manuscript, noting most diligently what was contained in our manuscript. That erudite and most kind man diligently copied out everything missing in our codex in order to send it to me; but when the person to whom he had given his transcript to be sent to me had lost it through the greatest negligence, and had ruined it, that same man—to be praised more than I can say—undertook the same task again, completed it, and sent it, for which I owe him immortal thanks.
I therefore published the *Synopsis* excerpted from these two codices and prefixed to it a dissertation wherein I proved with many arguments that it contains many notes and indicators which suggest it is a genuine work of Chrysostom; yet I did not cast the deciding vote entirely on this matter, but as was proper, I professed that I was awaiting the opinion of learned men on it, so that the work might be attributed to Chrysostom not by my judgment alone, but by the judgment of men of letters throughout the world.
Moreover, I have put forward many good arguments for this; but one other thing remains that should not be omitted, and which should be brought forward because it bears upon itself a certain singularity. At the end of the prologue to the *Synopsis* of the books of the New Testament, Chrysostom begins his enumeration thus: "Now the books of the New Testament are the fourteen Epistles of Paul, the four Gospels, two by the disciples of Christ, John and Matthew, and two by Luke and Mark, of whom one was the disciple of Peter, the other of Paul." And thus he continues the catalogue to the end. Therefore, preparing a review of the books of the New Testament, he begins with the Epistles of Paul and counts the Gospels after those Epistles, contrary to what was observed in all other, even the most ancient, catalogues of Holy Scripture: for this order appears everywhere, that first the four Gospels are counted, then the Acts of the Apostles, afterwards the Epistles of Paul, and finally the Epistles which they called Catholic. For although all Scriptures are of equal authority and demand equal faith, as being...
(a) Who, indeed, takes Chrysostom’s translated language in its own proper sense? For in these orations you may find ripened ears of corn only when you reach June among the farmers.