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''Institutiones Divinae'' (, ; ''The Divine Institutes'') is the name of a theological work by the Christian Roman philosopher
Lactantius
Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius (c. 250 – c. 325) was an early Christian author who became an advisor to Roman emperor, Constantine I, guiding his Christian religious policy in its initial stages of emergence, and a tutor to his son Cr ...
, written between AD 303 and 311.
Contents
Arguably the most important of
Lactantius
Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius (c. 250 – c. 325) was an early Christian author who became an advisor to Roman emperor, Constantine I, guiding his Christian religious policy in its initial stages of emergence, and a tutor to his son Cr ...
's works, the ''Divinae institutiones''the title of which was meant to correspond to the ''institutiones'' that expressed the workings of civil lawis both a systematic as well as apologetic work that, as Patrick Healy argues, "point out the futility of pagan beliefs and to establish the reasonableness and truth of Christianity."
[McDonald (1964a), p. xiv.] The work was the first full attempt to defend Christian theology in Latin, and it was likely written to appeal to and convince educated pagans.[ While Lactantius focused much of ''Divinae institutiones'' on combating the claims of pagan writers (who at the time were aiding the persecutors of Christianity by writing specialized attack pamphlets), the author also sought to make his work "sufficiently broad" so that it might stem criticisms from all directions.][
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Sources
Book VII of the work indicates a familiarity with Jewish, Christian, Egyptian and Iranian apocalyptic material, and alludes to the (now-lost) Oracle of Hystaspes.[McGinn (1998), p. 24.] The work also makes use of Sibyl
The sibyls (, singular ) were prophetesses or oracles in Ancient Greece.
The sibyls prophesied at holy sites.
A sibyl at Delphi has been dated to as early as the eleventh century BC by PausaniasPausanias 10.12.1 when he described local traditi ...
line sources as well as the ''Hermetica
The ''Hermetica'' are texts attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth. These texts may vary widely in content and purpose, but are usually subd ...
'' of Hermes Trismegistus
Hermes Trismegistus (from grc, Wiktionary:Ἑρμῆς, Ἑρμῆς ὁ Τρισμέγιστος, "Hermes the Thrice-Greatest"; Classical Latin: la, label=none, Mercurius ter Maximus) is a legendary Hellenistic figure that originated as a Syn ...
.[McDonald (1964a), p. xix.] Included in this treatise is also a quote from the nineteenth of the Odes of Solomon
The Odes of Solomon are a collection of 42 odes attributed to Solomon. The Odes are generally dated to either the first century or to the second century, while a few have suggested a later date. The original language of the Odes is thought to ha ...
, one of only two known texts of the Odes until the early twentieth century.
Reception
Patrick Healy notes, "The strengths and the weakness of Lactantius are nowhere better shown than in his work. The beauty of the style, the choice and aptness of the terminology, cannot hide the author's lack of grasp on Christian principles and his almost utter ignorance of Scripture."[Healy (2012) ]910
Year 910 ( CMX) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
__NOTOC__ Events By place Europe
* June 12 – Battle of Augsburg: The Hungarians defeat the East Frankish army under ...
Lactantius's mockery of the idea of a round earth
Spherical Earth or Earth's curvature refers to the approximation of figure of the Earth as a sphere.
The earliest documented mention of the concept dates from around the 5th century BC, when it appears in the writings of Greek philosophers. ...
was criticized by Copernicus
Nicolaus Copernicus (; pl, Mikołaj Kopernik; gml, Niklas Koppernigk, german: Nikolaus Kopernikus; 19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath, active as a mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic canon, who formulated ...
in the preface to his book ''De revolutionibus orbium coelestium
''De revolutionibus orbium coelestium'' (English translation: ''On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres'') is the seminal work on the heliocentric theory of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543) of the Polish Renaissance. The book, ...
'', in which the author writes, "Lactantius, the writer celebrated in other ways but very little in mathematics, spoke somewhat childishly of the shape of the earth when he derided those who declared the earth had the shape of a ball" (''Lactantium, celebrem alioqui scriptorem, sed Mathematicum parum, admodum pueriliter de forma terræ loqui, cum deridet eos, qui terram globi formam habere prodiderunt'').
According to the World Digital Library
The World Digital Library (WDL) is an international digital library operated by UNESCO and the United States Library of Congress.
The WDL has stated that its mission is to promote international and intercultural understanding, expand the volume ...
, ''Divinae institutiones'' was one of the first books to be printed in Italy, as well as the first Italian imprint to be dated.
References
Bibliography
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External links
Full text
at New Advent
''New Advent'' is a website that provides online versions of various works connected with the Catholic Church.
History
''New Advent'' was founded by Kevin Knight, a Catholic layman. In 1993, Knight, then a 26-year-old resident of Denver, Colorad ...
* Incomplete text at Wikisource
Wikisource is an online digital library of free-content textual sources on a wiki, operated by the Wikimedia Foundation. Wikisource is the name of the project as a whole and the name for each instance of that project (each instance usually rep ...
Scanned full text images
of a Latin incunable
In the history of printing, an incunable or incunabulum (plural incunables or incunabula, respectively), is a book, pamphlet, or broadside that was printed in the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500. Incunabula were pr ...
at World Digital Library
The World Digital Library (WDL) is an international digital library operated by UNESCO and the United States Library of Congress.
The WDL has stated that its mission is to promote international and intercultural understanding, expand the volume ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Divine Institutes, The
4th-century Christian texts
4th-century Latin books
Christian apocalyptic writings
Christian apologetic works
Christianity and paganism
Christian philosophy
Flat Earth
Italian manuscripts