Primary source · Latin
The Prefaces to the Vulgate and Commentaries
Jerome · AD 383–420
What this text is
The working prefaces of the Bible's greatest translator — to Damasus on revising the Gospels, and to Isaiah with the sentence every lectionary remembers: ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.
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Interlinear passages
Word-for-word glosses of the original; the complete public-domain translation is linked below.
Prologue to Isaiah
IgnoratioIgnoranceScripturarumof the ScripturesignoratioignoranceChristiof Christestis
Public-domain translations
W. H. Fremantle (NPNF, 1893)
I follow the Apostle's rule… for if, as Paul says, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God, then ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ. (Prologue to the commentary on Isaiah.)
Manuscript witnesses
Codex Amiatinus and the Vulgate tradition
c. AD 700The prefaces travel at the head of the biblical books in the great pandects — Amiatinus first among them.
Provenance
Bethlehem, AD 390–405 — the prologues of the Vulgate translation
Editions & scholarship
Critical editions and standard translations behind the text above.
- Biblia Sacra iuxta Vulgatam versionemR. Weber & R. Gryson (eds.), 5th ed. 2007The critical Vulgate with all the prologues.
- Jerome (The Early Church Fathers)Stefan Rebenich, 2002Introduction with translated texts, prefaces included.