"Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ" - St. Jerome

Last Wednesday we celebrated St. Jerome's feast day (September 30) and I should have taken at least a moment to note the fact. Jerome was one of the great ones: early Church Father, Doctor of the Church, perhaps the greatest of Scriptural scholars (certainly the first great one), monk, and most famous for his translation of Sacred Scripture from the original Hebrew and Greek. I still have my four-volume Latin Vulgate and every once in while, when I need a dose of humility, I struggle through a chapter in a vain attempt to exercise what little Latin I learned way back when.

Like St. Augustine, St. Jerome had somewhat of a misspent youth and as a young man took full advantage of the pleasures the world placed in his path. But also like Augustine, Jerome renounced his former life and dedicated himself to serving God. Born in present-day Croatia, Jerome was well-traveled and spent time in Gaul, Rome, Greece, the Holy Land, and all points in between. He spent his last years living in a cave in Bethlehem.

Jerome was widely regarded as a rather unpleasant person and his faults were enumerated by several of his contemporaries, both friends and enemies. This arose from the fact that he didn't suffer fools, or heretics, gladly. Many had tasted his biting sarcasm and his quick condemnation of those who would do evil. And although he was usually justified in his comments, his manner of delivering them was strongly resented, mostly by his targets. I must admit though, that this failing of Jerome has never really troubled me. The Early Church profited well from some of its more feisty members like Jerome and Athanasius, to mention just two; and I suspect we could use a Jerome or two today. I think our current shepherd, Pope Benedict XVI, would agree. At one of his general audiences in 2007, Pope Benedict stated, "Jerome refuted with energy and liveliness the heretics who contested the tradition and faith of the Church." Yes, indeed, "energy and liveliness" are good things especially when they serve the truth. Give me another Jerome any day. Give me someone who recognizes evil and error and dares to call them what they are, rather than someone who denies their very existence. Sadly, today we have all too many of the latter.

St. Jerome is also the patron saint of librarians, something that strikes a chord in my family. My wife and both my daughters have worked in libraries, I spent many years on the board of trustees of a local library, one of my sons-in-law works as a professional librarian...and so we have a close affinity for Jerome, a true family connection.

Considering he wrote in the late 4th and early 5th centuries -- Jerome was born in 347 and died in 420 -- it is remarkable how many of his works have survived. If you would like to work your way through some of his writings, click here and take your pick.

I opened this post with one of Jerome's more famous lines: "Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ." I will close with a rather lengthy quote from that same general audience of Pope Benedict (November 7, 2007) in which the Holy Father addresses what Jerome can teach us, specifically about Scripture:

"What can we learn from St Jerome? It seems to me, this above all; to love the Word of God in Sacred Scripture. St Jerome said: "Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ". It is therefore important that every Christian live in contact and in personal dialogue with the Word of God given to us in Sacred Scripture. This dialogue with Scripture must always have two dimensions: on the one hand, it must be a truly personal dialogue because God speaks with each one of us through Sacred Scripture and it has a message for each one. We must not read Sacred Scripture as a word of the past but as the Word of God that is also addressed to us, and we must try to understand what it is that the Lord wants to tell us. However, to avoid falling into individualism, we must bear in mind that the Word of God has been given to us precisely in order to build communion and to join forces in the truth on our journey towards God. Thus, although it is always a personal Word, it is also a Word that builds community, that builds the Church. We must therefore read it in communion with the living Church. The privileged place for reading and listening to the Word of God is the liturgy, in which, celebrating the Word and making Christ's Body present in the Sacrament, we actualize the Word in our lives and make it present among us. We must never forget that the Word of God transcends time. Human opinions come and go. What is very modern today will be very antiquated tomorrow. On the other hand, the Word of God is the Word of eternal life, it bears within it eternity and is valid for ever. By carrying the Word of God within us, we therefore carry within us eternity, eternal life."

God's peace...