Article. Sutcliffe. The Venerable Bede’s Knowledge Of Hebrew. 1935.
The Venerable Bede’s Knowledge Of Hebrew.
E. F. Sutcliffe.
The question with which this short paper is concerned is this, Had the Venerable Bede in addition to his knowledge of Latin and Greek acquired a knowledge of Hebrew? There have not been wanting writers to affirm it. Roger Bacon, who had himself studied Hebrew and even attempted a Grammar of that language, implies that Bede was familiar with both Greek and Hebrew. He calls him literatissimus in grammatica et linguis in originali. This passage occurs in his Opus Minus , in which he enumerates the defects of the ecclesiastical studies of his day, deploring among other causes which hindered progress in the knowledge of the Scriptures the prevalent ignorance of Greek and Hebrew.
The great Humphrey Hody, Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Oxford and author of the book De Bibliorum Textibus originalibus, Versionibus Graecis, et Latina Vulgata , also implies that Bede read the Old Testament in the original Hebrew. He says that Bede drew up his work De Sex Aetatibus Mundi not according to the numbers given in the Septuagint, as had been done by previous chronographers following the lead of Eusebius, sed secundum Veritatem Hebraicam et Hieronymi Editionem. He further states : Versionem ipsam Hieronymi quandoque reiicit, tamquam Hebraico textui non satis congruentem. But it may be said at once that in the passages quoted Bede confessedly bases himself on Jerome’s own remarks about the Hebrew text and on the latter’s Liber Hebraicorum Nominum.
E. F. Sutcliffe. The Venerable Bede’s Knowledge Of Hebrew. Biblica, Vol. 16, No. 3, pp. 300-306. 1935.
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