Gregory of Nyssa’s bearing in Qohelet 3:5b to wealth, rather than to the matrimonial “embrace”, is unusual by comparison withother ancient exegeses; it seems to be motivated not only by the acoluthia which characterizes his spiritual interpretation of the passage Qo. 3:2-8 (Sandro Leanza), but also by the crucial importance he gives to catharsis, as one the qualities he considered necessary for the exegete.

The phrase tempora christiana in Augustine has been studied from various points of view. This article illuminates the way in which it refers to the care of divine providence for individuals and society in the period when true worship is rendered to God through the Christian religion. Furthermore, we find Augustine proposing, using the idea of kairós, i.e. a new opportunity to be embraced, to create a new cycle of the human story, to which everyone will contribute.

This article proposes an interpretation of the use of the lemma ὁ κανὼν τὴς ἀληϑείας – regula veritatis in Irenaeus’ Adversus haereses. It is commonly interpreted as a compendium of the main items of Christian faith (more or less as a symbolum) or as indicating the wholeness of the faith (as synonym of veritas). These interpretations focuse themselves in terms of the “contents” of faith. We propose to understand it in a more formal way, as a lemma that indicates the formal structure of Christian truth (μορφή), the specific shape that keeps the objects of faith joined together.

The paper focuses on Rufinus’ translation of Eusebius’ Historia Ecclesiastica 1, 1-3, which discusses trinitarian and christological matters. Firstly, I will analyze how Rufinus amends or removes statements which are close to Origenism and Arianism, sometimes replacing them with orthodox ones; I will then examine Rufinus’ way of citing and interpreting the Bible, by correcting Eusebius’ reading, when it is suspected of heresy, or by explaining passages himself. This work of emendation reveals, on the one hand, Rufinus’ desire to give the readers a text which fits perfectly with the nicen-constantinopolitan creed, and, on the other hand, his aim of protecting himself from accusations.

Poem XXII of Paulinus Nolanus constitutes an important testimony to the saint’s personality and of his mystical experience. Reinterpreting classical poetry according to Christian faith, he expresses the bond of love between Christ and man through erotic symbols and classic metaphors. Through this union, Paulinus also clarifies the concept of divine immutability, fundamental to the patristic theology of the first centuries.

The present contribution proposes the study of the exegetical-soteriological assumption, elaborated by Clement of Alexandria in Str. 6, 15, 131, 1-5, where a passage taken from the Vis. II, 1, 3-4 of Hermas is reinterpreted. The Gnostic exegete, who professes the true gnosis, must be aware that while it is possible for everyone to read the sacrad Scripture “letter by letter”, not everyone will be in a position to undertake the “Gnostic explanation”, but only those to which faith has opened the depths of the text, “the elect”, so that they are able to progress from the “letter” to the “syllable” bringing to light the message that goes beyond the letter, which is already engraved in the “new heart” and now preserved in the book that has been “renewed” by the Savior, the Logos of God.

Augustine invites Christians to maintain a detached attitude towards this world, an invitation which is largely reflected in the Sermones ad populum. This article studies these sermons to highlight the understanding of the relationship of Christians with pagans who are ultimately called to convert. According to this study, it is through preaching that Augustine christianizes pagans without forgetting other means, especially dialogue and knowledge of the practices of peoples not yet educated in the faith.

The history of the relationship between Jerome and Augustine has often been studied; nevertheless it seems that, even after peace was made between the two, the Stridonian advanced some criticisms of Augustine in relation to the evangelical saying about the camel and the eye. He interprets this as an expression of an absolute impossibility, while for Augustine it indicates only the difficulty of an operation which can be overcome thanks to the intervention of God.

The Tritheism of the sixth century has not been widely studied. John Philoponus, the greatest exponent of the theory, developed the idea by applying Aristotelian realism to the doctrine of the Trinity and concluded that in the Trinity there are three hypostases and three natures, whence comes the name for those who hold this position: “Tri-theists,” since they divide the one nature and substance of God into three. This article sheds light on the earliest stage of the development of Tritheism beginning in the year 557, when we can date the first appearance of John Askotzanges in the sources, and goes up until the first Syndocticon, the agreement reached between the Tritheists and the Theodosians at Constantinople in the beginning of the year 567. After the death of Theodosius in 566, Tritheism no longer remained merely a local reality in Constantinople but spilled over the confines of the Imperial capital and spread throughout the East, especially in Egypt.

Following the example of classical literature, Christian texts of the fourth century portray dreams of pregnant mothers. In such dreams, the mother sees her son or daughter, and knows the name of the infant and the great future for which the infant is destined. The dreams of Emmelia, Nonna and Monica are described in the writings of their sons (Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory of Nazianzus and Augustine, respectively). Thanks to her visions and dreams about her child, each mother becomes a mediatrix of God.

The article outlines some aspects of the reception of the so-called four Father of the Latin Church in Renaissance Europe, as emerging in the prefaces of their Opera omnia edited in Basel during the end of the 15th and the first half of the 16th century. Through selected passages from the prefaces, the article discusses (§ 1) the relevance of these sources of old Christianity to the cultural and spiritual renewal many humanistic scholars aimed at; (§ 2) the importance of print in promoting the formation and circulation of patristic editions; finally (§ 3) it illustrates the philological approach to late Antique Christian texts, which was innovative in comparison to former methods of their transmissions and is still very instructive to this day.

The present essay, starting from a close examination of the available sources, intends to retrace the historical dynamics of the controversy between Stephen of Rome and Cyprian of Carthage about single baptism. The analysis highlights more clearly than other studies the need to justify, because of the urgent context of the schism of Novatian, the legitimacy of the different traditions of the Churches, something previously taken for granted. The difficulty of this enterprise, combined with the imponderable human factor, represented by the personalities of the protagonists, generates misunderstandings. A further factor is the decisive role played by Dionysius of Alexandria in resolving the conflict, which confirmed the preferential relationship between Rome and Alexandria.

The aim of the paper is to reconsider the content of first two Visions of the Shepherd of Hermas and to decode some ficticious elements offered by the author at the beginning of his work. The study takes into consideration some recent textual discoveries concerning the first sentence of the Shepherd.

Peristephanon X, a hymn on the martyrdom of St. Romanus of Antioch, may be considered the masterpiece of Prudentius’ poetry on the Christian martyrs. Romanus is represented as a Christian hero. As a rhetor, he defends his faith against paganism as if he were a lawyer; as a martyr, he follows Christ’s example in accepting torture and death. Prudentius’ poetry aims to stimulate and revivify the Christian belief of his audience.

The paper focuses attention on Jerome’s interpretation of Ps. 15,8 in Tractatus in psalmum 15. After an introduction dealing with the right way to translate the verse according to Hebraica veritas, which shows his philological skills, he reveals his exegesis. The opening and concluding parts of this exegesis follow closely the Origen’s Homily on Psalm 15, but the long central section about the righteous highlights the particularity of Jerome’s exegesis; he uses other interpretations of Origen’s, but subordinates them to his own concerns to achieve original results. The study offers further proofs in favour of a proposal for dating this text.

In the Epistle to the Hebrews (10,1; cf. Hbr. 8,5; Col. 2,16-17) the terms σκιά and εἰκών are opposed, and most commentators have focused on the latter term, interpreting it as a Platonic allusion. If we consider in more detail the meanings of σκιά and σκιαγραφία, another interpretation appears more likely. Σκιαγραφία means “shading”, “silhouette” or “outline”, and finally “sketch” or – even better – “preliminary drawing”, “underdrawing”or “sinopia”. The last meaning is well attested in the sources at least since the late second or early third century AD and a number of passages in the Fathers alluding to the Epistle support the same conclusion. The term is common in the technical terminology of painters on wooden tablets and was a widely employed topos with different nuances according to different authors.

In Augustinian reflection, the main problem of the imago Dei is the renewal of its image through being healed from lust, so as to regain the ordo amoris destroyed by sin. Current research investigates what the gratia Christi and charity contribute to the renewal of the image of God, at the level of a marriage bond that human race was given as part of the act of creation. This emerges as a primary element, both in the original state of man and in his recovery through the gratia Christi.

The note reinterprets an important epigraphic testimony of the Ostrogoth age (ICUR I, 2794), published for the first time by Giovanni Battista de Rossi in 1894. It is a polymetric funeral eulogy commissioned among the Amali royal family, perhaps dedicated by Flavia Amala Amalafrida Theodenanda to one or more relatives, unless one wishes to identify her with one of the dedicatees of the eulogy. After a presentation of supportive material and a new edition of the text, the history of the discovery of the inscription is retraced, involving leading figures of the 19th century political and ecclesiastical culture including cardinal Vincenzo Vannutelli and H. Stevenson Jr., a pupil of de Rossi. The contribution dates the artifact between the end of the 5th century and the beginning of the 6th; it studies the hypothesis of identifying Amalafrida with one of the princesses in the family circle of King Theodoric and with the Ostrogothic wife of Flavius Maximus; it illustrates a hypothesis of the intended use of the epigraph for a funeral monument in the cemetery area of the Martyrial Basilica of S. Secondino on the Praenestina.

The present study, after a quick codicological investigation of the two surviving manuscripts of the De trinitate by pseudo-Didymus, in which it is concluded that one is a copy of the other, focuses on the lexical analysis of the first book of the mutilated trinitarian treatise. By showing divergences from the authentic works of Didymus, alongside parallels with the writings of the Cappadocian Fathers, Cyril of Alexandria, Theodoret, of other late patristic authors, as well as with those of the Neoplatonic philosophers, in particular Proclus, the author concludes that the chronological position of De trinitate should not be before the end of the 5th century, and suggests a possible origin from an environment of Antiochene influence.

In De immortalitate animae Augustine is not satisfied with completing his proof of the immortality of the soul – which had been left open in the second book of the Soliloquies –; he also answers some possible objections, demonstrating that the rational soul cannot cease to exist, it cannot die, nor can it change into an irrational body or soul. Furthermore, remaining faithful to the programmatic declaration of never wanting to stray from the authority of Christ (Acad. 3, 20, 43), he specifies the ontological status of the soul by affirming that it is, in itself, mutable and therefore not of a divine nature, as Varro had argued. Nor is it a substance foreign to the body, as the Platonists claimed, because the soul has an appetitus ad corpus and, if it questions itself, it easily discovers that it desires nothing else «except to do something, to know with intelligence or with the senses, or only to live, as far as this is in its power» (nisi agendi aliquid, aut sciendi, aut sentiendi, aut tantummodo vivendi in quantum sua illi potestas est).