The topic that had inspired the letter by Augustine was a passage in the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians.
Therein Paul had to reprimand Peter for a mistake.
Jerome had come to the conclusion that this was role playing, that Peter could not have made an error.
Augustine responded with quiet logic that, if such were the case, then the Scripture would be lying.
Possibly Augustine had learned that it was advisable to interact with Jerome in a cautious way. Jerome hurled harsh words at correspondents in his disfavour.
For example, Jerome is on record for calling the arguments of his opponents "an infant's noises" and "vomit."
He also employed a bestiary of epithets for opponents: dogs, asses, pigs, snails, and snakes. Jerome called critics of his Latin (Vulgate) translation of the Bible "two-legged asses."
After the death of his supporter and protector, Pope Damasus, Jerome was verbally attacked in the same way that he attacked others.
His enemies called him "an infamous rascal, a slippery traitor, a speaker of lies who used Satanic arts to deceive."
Jerome decided to return to the East. He eventually settled in Bethlehem with a small community that he had formed. Jerome died in Bethlehem.
According to legend, at the time his head was resting in the place where Christ had been born.
In the year 392 Augustine requested biblical commentaries from Jerome.
They recommenced their corerespondence after the year 411, when this time they were in accord. The Council of Carthage in 411 had condemned the works of Pelagius, who then moved from Carthage to Rome.
Jerome in Jerusalem was also quick to condemn Pelagius, and in 415 received t6wo letters from Augustine regarding this matter. Jerome called Augustine "the second founder of the ancient faith" foir his success in discounting Pelagianism. Jerome's final letter to Augustine was written in 419, only months before Jerome died.
Jerome was one of the eight great scholars of the early Church: (Ambrose of Milan, Jerome, Augustine, Gregory the Great, Athanasius, John Chrysostom, Basil the Great, and Gregory of Nazianzus).
It is interesting that, when Augustine as a Manichee had first reached Rome in 383, both Pelagius and Jerome were as Catholic priests functioning as chaplains to rich families in Rome, but Augustine never met either of them face-to-face.
Augustine was to cross paths - and verbal swords - with both of them when later he was a Catholic bishop.
Links
Saint Jerome. A one-page biography from a very helpful web site of 4,00-plus pages entitled, The History Guide: Lectures on ancient and medieval European history.
Saint Jerome (c.342-420). He translated the Old Testament and New Testament into Latin. He accomplished this around 400, just ten years after Theodosius had declared the Christian religion to be the state religion of the Roman Empire.
Letter of Jerome to Augustine. This letter by Jerome is numbered 104 in his collection.
Jerome and the Vulgate Bible. Approximately four pages.
Painting: Jerome and Saint Nicholas of Tolentine. At the National Gallery of Art, London, England.
ID2205
