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‘In nomine Dei summi’: Seven Hiberno-Latin Sermons

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 July 2017

Robert E. McNally
Robert E. McNally*
Affiliation:
Fordham University
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Extract

In two early medieval manuscripts, Vat. Pal. lat. 220 and Vat. Pal. lat. 212, there are contained seven short sermons or homilies which provide convincing evidence of being Irish in character. They are worthy of publication because the amount of homiletical literature coming from Irish circles at this early time is not very great, and because a careful consideration of them is apt to throw light on the Irish literary method. They reveal various internal characteristics which are known to be symptomatic of the Hiberno-Latin element; and they present sufficient material to allow one to study closely how the Irish used sources in the preparation of their homilies. The approach of our anonymous author to Scripture stands in the Antiochene rather than the Alexandrian tradition. Thus his interest is in the literal more than in the spiritual sense of the text; and in this he shows a certain affinity with the Irish exegetes of this period. I should like to reproduce here the text of these sermons and to elucidate their character by relating them in parallel fashion to other contemporary works that are known to be part of the Hiberno-Latin tradition.

Type
Articles
Information
Traditio , Volume 35 , 1979 , pp. 121 - 143
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 [At the time of his death, the author was] preparing for publication three very ancient collections of homilies or catecheses that represent the piety of the Old Irish Church : MSS Bibl. Capit. Cracow 43 pp. 1–199 (s. viii–ix); Bibl. Capit. Verona LXVII (64) fols. 33r–81v (s. viii–ix); and Vat. Reg. lat. 49 fols. 1r–53r (s. ix–x).Google Scholar

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