Euthalius

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Euthalius ( bl. Around 450) is the name given to an early Christian Bible commentator. His comments can be found in many Greek manuscripts of the New Testament , for example in the Codex Basiliensis ANIV.2 (= minuscule 1 eap ) and in the Codex Porfirianus .

Life

Only a few notes in medieval manuscripts of the New Testament have survived about his life. Such manuscripts often contain marginal notes consisting of chains ( Latin catenae ; ' Katenen ') of quotations from the Church Fathers . There is also extensive material for three sections of the New Testament: The Epistles of the Apostle Paul , the Acts of the Apostles and the Catholic Letters . There is a prologue to each of these passages, and the title of that prologue usually refers to a certain Euthalius as the author. For this reason, scientists call these prologues "Euthalic Apparatus (us)".

In some versions of the prologues it is said that Euthalius was a deacon in Alexandria , in others he is referred to as " Bishop of Sulca", although such a diocese is otherwise not known. Since the prologues refer to the ecclesiastical history of Eusebius of Caesarea , they must have been written after this, i.e. after the end of the 4th century. Hermann von Soden dated his lifetime in the 7th century and assumed Antioch as his place of activity .

Works

The prologue to the letters of Paul is divided into three sections, the first and the last offering a biography of the apostle, while the middle section summarizes the contents of all 14 letters (including the letter to the Hebrews ). Euthalius dates the martyrdom of Paul - unlike Eusebius and Hieronymus  - to the thirteenth year of the reign of Emperor Nero , d. H. to the year 67.

There is a later "Creed of Euthalius von Sulca" from the second half of the 7th century, which, however, probably does not come from the same author, although H. von Soden based his dating on this creed.

Long forgotten, the works of Euthalius were discovered and edited in 1698 by Lorenzo Alessandro Zaccagni , prefect of the Vatican Library in Rome.

Services

According to the prologues, Euthalius is said to have been the first to divide the Greek text of the New Testament, which had previously been written continuously without spaces or punctuation, into "engravings" ( Greek στίχοι ). He thus created the basis for the division of the Bible text into verses, which is still used today .

literature

  • James F. Driscoll:  Euthalius . In: Catholic Encyclopedia , Volume 5, Robert Appleton Company, New York 1909.
  • Louis Charles Willard: A Critical Study of the Euthalian Apparatus (= work on New Testament text research 41). De Gruyter, 2009, ISBN 978-3-11021567-0 .
  • Vemund Blomqvist: Euthalian Traditions. Text, Translation and Commentary. De Gruyter, 2012.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Willard: A Critical Study of the Euthalian Apparatus , p. 142, online in the Google book search.
  2. ^ A b Hermann von Soden : The writings of the New Testament. Pp. 637-649
  3. ^ Jack Finegan, Encountering New Testament Manuscripts. Eerdmans, 1980, ISBN 0802818366 , p. 45, online in the Google book search
  4. ↑ Lorenzo Alessandro Zaccagni (ed.): Collectanea Monumentorum Veterum Ecclesiæ Græcæ ac Latinæ. Vol. I. Rome 1698.
personal data
SURNAME Euthalius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION early Christian Bible commentator, deacon or bishop
DATE OF BIRTH 4th century or 5th century
DATE OF DEATH 5th century or 6th century