{"id":14920,"date":"2015-07-06T22:06:08","date_gmt":"2015-07-06T21:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.roger-pearse.com\/weblog\/?p=14920"},"modified":"2015-07-06T22:06:08","modified_gmt":"2015-07-06T21:06:08","slug":"a-few-more-notes-on-asterius-the-sophist-and-the-commentary-on-the-psalms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/roger-pearse.com\/weblog\/2015\/07\/06\/a-few-more-notes-on-asterius-the-sophist-and-the-commentary-on-the-psalms\/","title":{"rendered":"A few more notes on Asterius the Sophist, Asterius the Homiletist, and the Commentary on the Psalms"},"content":{"rendered":"

After my post yesterday<\/a>, I did a google search and found a number of useful items of bibliography.\u00a0 It seems that there was further work on Asterius, after Marcel Richard’s edition.\u00a0 In particular there is a rather excellent work by Wolfram Kinzig[ref]Wolfram Kinzig, In search of Asterius: Studies on the authorship of the Homilies on the Psalms<\/em>, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht<\/span>, 1990.\u00a0 Google books preview here<\/a>.<\/span>[\/ref], whose conclusions<\/a> about this collection of 31 homilies on the Psalms (which he referred to as HomPs<\/em>) were as follows:<\/p>\n

\n

We are now in a position to collate all the evidence which has emerged from our study and to sum it up in five points:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The \u2018repair’ of the damaged text in 27.9-15 notwithstanding, the\u00a0HomPs<\/i>. as edited by Richard, form a unity. They were written by one single author.<\/li>\n
  2. The author’s name is Asterius.<\/li>\n
  3. He is not<\/i> identical with either Asterius the Sophist\u00a0or Asterius of Amasea.<\/li>\n
  4. The author is not an Arian, but an adherent of the Nicene Creed.<\/li>\n
  5. The HomPs<\/i> were composed in Palestine or, more likely, in western Syria (Antioch), probably between 385 and 410 A. D.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Hence Richard’s hypothesis that AS is the author of the HomPs<\/i> must be considered as having been refuted.<\/p>\n

    However, the positive<\/i> evidence for a different authorship is somewhat poor, especially if one considers the number of bearers of this name. Unfortunately, there is among them no bishop of Asterius of Antioch in the later fourth century.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

    \u00a0Kinzig’s work seems very thorough, and I think we may take his word for it.\u00a0 In a later article, he designated the author as “Asterius the Homilist”, which seems as good a designation as any.\u00a0 Aloys Grillmeier discusses Asterius, and gives a useful bibliography of articles around the subject, and the collection of homilies, here<\/a>.[ref]A. Grillmeier, Christ in Christian Tradition<\/em>, p.206.[\/ref]<\/p>\n

    A number of selections from the collection of sermons were included in the IVP academic volume of ancient commentary on Psalms 1-50 (Preview here<\/a>).[ref]Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture VII: Psalms 1-50<\/em>. Ed. Craig A. Blaising, Carmen S. Hardin. IVP, 2008.[\/ref]<\/p>\n

    In 1993 Markus Vinzent collected the fragments genuinely by Asterius the Sophist, and edited them with a German translation.[ref]M. Vinzent, Asterius von Kappadokien: Die theologischen Fragmente<\/span><\/span><\/em>.\u00a0 Brill, 1993. Google books preview here<\/a>.[\/ref]<\/p>\n

    Last, but by no means least, blogger Albocicade has been at work on Asterius in French.\u00a0 He added a couple of useful links to the French Wikipedia article on Ast\u00e9rios le Sophiste,<\/a> which I reproduce here because Wikipedia is so ephemeral:<\/p>\n