Jerome: His Life, Writings, and Controversies

I purchased this book for my twenty-three year old son for a gift, and he absolutely loved it.

It is difficult to imagine a more challenging task for a church historian to undertake than to write a biography of St. Jerome in only 353 pages. J.N.D. Kelly's biography is magnificent in the amount of material it covers, in very readable style, in so short a length.The difficulty of the biography is inherent in the diversity of Jerome's life. He spent time living in both the eastern and western empires, and he lived through a remarkable series of transitions in church and empire. He was educated in Rome in the middle of the fourth century. He spent two years with the desert fathers in Syria. He lived in Antioch during the time when the church in Antioch was divided among three factions. Returning to Rome, he became Bible teacher and spiritual advisor to a group of highly educated upper class Roman women. From there, he returned to the east, establishing a new monastery in Bethlehem, where one of the women he knew in Rome (Paula) established a convent. His life spanned a time frame from 331 to 420, ranging from a time of persecution, through controversy over the views of Arians, Origen and Pelagius, and through the siege of Rome in 410. He held opinions about St. Ambrose (whom he hated), St. John Chrysostom (a follower of a different bishop in Antioch and thus an adversary), and St. Augustine (who sought out Jerome through letters, taking great care to avoid offending the temperamental but warm hearted Jerome, and who encountered conflict nonetheless but eventually became a close friend and ally against the Pelagians). Kelly did an admirable job of assembling information from Jerome's extensive writings and from other historians' earlier work about Jerome. His book is remarkably well written and detailed, and it is nonetheless concise. However, in the process of covering Jerome's life and thought in so few pages, Kelly necessarily omitted much background material. Some of Jerome's life would seem almost nonsensical without knowing more of the historical context than is given in this biography. For example, Kelly described Jerome as moving into a Syrian desert monastic community with his ever expanding library and a group of copyists. To someone with a familiarity with the Egyptian desert hermits, thinking of them as solitaries who only interacted with each other on Sunday, that might sound preposterous. However, the Syrian monks of the same era were more communal than those in Egypt, meeting together every day for prayer. Kelly did not offer the pages of explanation of the desert fathers and mothers that would have helped to make sense of that. Similarly, Kelly devoted limited space to background information about the Roman education system. Kelly explained that Jerome would have studied rhetoric, and that he probably learned little Greek and little philosophy while in Rome. Later, Kelly discussed Paula, Marcella, and other upper class Roman ladies who were educated in the Latin and Greek poets and the Bible, and at least som

Having known Jerome as famous translator of Bible into Latin, this text intrigued because of subject and author. Neither disappointed.Jerome is fascinating and complex individual. Into himself, and wanting recognition, as we all do, Jerome realizes success and admiration from some circles, but resistance from others.His consistent ties to celibacy and monasticism were fascinating as well as his history with Origen.There is much to explore here in this well written work: the ties with Augustine and Pelagius are fascinating, as well as his commentaries. The student of early church history will find this intriguing and enlightening work to contemplate and encourage continued ventures into this period of church history.Kelly is major contributor of our times in this valuable area.

It's hard to imagine a more thorough treatment of the events in Jerome's life, and it's quite readable despite the author's overuse of parenthetical phrases. But at times I found myself wishing Kelly had spent less time speculating on details like the exact location of Jerome's monastery in Bethlehem, and more on the historical and religious context. For instance, the theological issues in the controversies that Jerome became embroiled in are hardly discussed at all, as it is the personal elements of the controversy that seem to have interested Kelly most. Also, despite the fact that most of our knowledge of Jerome comes from his own writings, they are never quoted except in brief snippets. Extended quotes would have made the portrait of the man -- one of the most interesting and outspoken characters of late antiquity -- far more vivid. This book should probably be read with a selection of Jerome's letters nearby, perhaps along with a survey of early Christian thought.The Hendrickson edition, by the way, is a very nice reprint, with a gorgeous cover.