Jean Hardouin
Jean Hardouin (also Harduin , Latinized Harduinus , born December 23, 1646 in Quimper , Brittany , France , † September 3, 1729 in Paris ) was a Jesuit , philologist and theologian .
Life
Born the son of a publisher, he began to deal with (among other things) theological topics at an early age.
On September 25, 1660 , he joined the order of the Jesuits as a novice . Father Charles Garnier used his help as a librarian at the Jesuit College of Louis XIV in Paris. After his death in 1683 Harduinus was his successor in this office. The following year he published Garnier's biography . He also held teaching positions in theology, literature of classical music and rhetoric .
In his scientific works he dealt with languages and antiquity, history , numismatics , philosophy and theology. His editions of ancient classics were particularly appreciated.
Works
Hardouin developed some unorthodox ideas in his scholarly works. One of these was that only Cicero's writings, Pliny 's Natural History , Virgil' s Georgica and Horace 's satires (to which he at times added Homer , Herodotus and Plautus ) were genuine works of classical antiquity, while all other supposedly ancient writers were forgeries by deceitful monks of the 13th century Century .
Likewise, he rejected almost all old works of art, inscriptions and coins , which correspond to the statements of old historians, as the work of a secret conspiracy against the pure, i.e. H. catholic christianity. He tried to prove that not only the Greek translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint ), but also the Greek original text of the New Testament was nothing more than the work of a scholar of later times. The confidence with which he made such allegations attracted a great deal of attention, and contemporaries suspected that his work was a result of Jesuit actions to combat the Protestants and Jansenists , who could hardly be more easily proven to have fallen from the true religion than by discrediting the sources on which they supported themselves.
With his theses, he also made opponents in the ranks of the Jesuit order - above all the editor of the Journal de Trévoux René-Joseph de Tournemine - so that in 1709 he had to write a revocation . Although he also questioned knowledge of numismatics and chronology in a bizarre way, his statements and explanations were of some value for science, as he also correctly recognized correct relationships and through persistent skepticism recognized and corrected many old errors.
With his chronologically arranged council collection Conciliorum collectio regia maxima or Acta conciliorum et epistolae decretates ac constitutiones summorum pontificum , which consists of twelve volumes and was financed with royal money, he met resistance from the Sorbonne, among others . It was therefore banned by a resolution of the parliament because it violated the rights of the Gallican Church vis-à-vis the Pope and, through additions and omissions, cast a falsified view of history. In 1725 the work was allowed again after a promise to append a volume with corrective notes.
Publications
- [William Bowyer (ed.)]: Joannis Harduini Jesuitae ad censuram scriptorum veterum prolegomena. Iuxta autographum. P. Vaillant, London 1766. ( online )
- English translation: The Prolegomena of Jean Hardouin. Translated by Edwin Johnson. Angus & Robertson, Sydney 1909. (New edition by Hermann Detering , BoD, Norderstedt 2010, ISBN 978-3-8391-8381-6 .)
See also
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Hardouin, Jean |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Harduinus |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French Jesuit, philologist and theologian |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 23, 1646 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Quimper , Brittany , France |
| DATE OF DEATH | September 3, 1729 |
| Place of death | Paris |