The ideas of interpres and of itit< rpntniio ^vere not confined among the Romans to saircil siilijcc ts, which, as we have seen, was the case among the (irccks with the corresponding Greek terms. The words interpres and interpretatio were not only, as among the Greelcs, ap])lied to the explanation of the laws, but also, in gen- eral, to the exiilanation of whatever was obscure, and even to a mere intervention in the settlement of affairs; for instance, we find in Livy (xxi, \T) paci^ interpres, denoting Alorcas, by whose instrumentality peace was offered. At an earlier period interpretes meant onlj' those persons by means of whom affairs between God and man were settled (comp. Yirgil, yEneid, x, 175, and Servius on this passage). The words interpretes and conjectores became convertible terms; "for which rea-
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INTERPRETATION
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INTERPRETATION
son the interpreters of dreams and omens arc called also conjvcturers" (Quintil. Instit. iii, C).
From what we have stated, it follows that t'^ljyijffiQ and intcrjwetatio were originally terms eonlined to the unfolding of supernatural subjects, although in Latin, at
! an early period, these terms were also applied to profane
' matters.
5. The Christians also early felt the want of an inter- pretation of their sacred writings, which they deemed to be of divine origin ; consequently they wanted inter- preters and instruction by the aid of which the true sense of the sacred Scriptures might be discovered. The right understanding of the nature and will of God seem- ed, among the Christians, as well as at an early period among the heathen, to depend upon a right understand- ing of certain external signs; however, there was a j)rngress from the miintelligible signs of nature to more intelligible written signs, which was certainly an im- portant progress.
The Christians retained about the interpretation of their sacred writings the same expressions which had been current in reference to the interpretation of sacred subjects among the heathen. Hence arose the fact that the Greek Christians employed with predilection the words i'S'/yj/irff and i^t}yi)ri]Q in reference to the inter- pretation of the holy Scriptures. But the circumstance
,^ that St. Paul employs the term in^rivdn yXwiyrTwv for
• the interpretation of the yXcjarraiQ XaXui/ (1 Cor. xii,
10; xiv, 26), greatly contributed to the use likewise •• of words belonging to the root tpinii'ivm: Accord-
ing to Eusebius (Nistoria Ecclesiaaticn. iii. li), raulus. bishop of Hierapolis, wrote, as early as abnut A.D. HH), a work under the title of Xoyiwv KvpidKwp ii,iiyi)aiv, which means an interpretation of the discourses of Je- sus. Papias explained the religious contents of these discourses, which he had collected from oral and ■\vritten traditions. He distinguished between the meaning of ih]yu.(jdai and lonrjvtvtiv, as aiTjoears from his observa- tion (preserved by Eusebius in the place quoted above), in which he says concerning the Koyia of Matthew, written in Hebrew, 'Ep/t/(i'{u« Si avru wq iSvvaro iko- <TTOQ, " Hut every one interpreted them according to his ability." In the Greek Church, 6 i^i]yT]Tr]Q and i^r)yi]- Tci'i Tov Xoyou were the usual terms for teachers of Christianity. (See Eusebius, llistoria Ecclesiasiica, vii, 30, and Heinichen on this passage, note 21 ; Photius, Bihlioth. Cod. p. 105 ; Cave, Hist. Liter, i, 146). Origen K called his commentary on the holy Scriptures i^riyrjri-
H Kct ; and Procopius of Gaza wrote a work on several j » books of the Bible, entitled rtxoXai t^rjytjTiKai. How-
ever, we find the word tp/.ii]i'iia employed as a synonyme of i^tjyrjdiQ, especially among the inhabitants of Anti- och. For instance, Gregorius Nyssenus says concern- ing Ephraem Syrus, rpa^t)v oXrjv dKpi(3wc Trpoc Af ?tJ' i'lPI-irivivaiv (see Gregory of Nyssa, Vita Ephraiini Syri, in Opera, Paris, ii, 1033). Theodore of Mopsucstia, Theodoret, and others, wrote commentaries on the sacred Scriptures under the title of tp^iiivtia (comp. A. H. Nie- mej-er, De Isidori Pelusiotm Vita, Scriptis, et Doctrina, Halffi, 1825, p. 207).
Among the Latin Christians the word interpres had a wider range than the corresponding Greek term, and the Latins had no precise term for the exposition of the Bible which exactly corresponded with the Greek. The interpretatio was applied only in the sense of occupa- tion or ACT of an expositor of the Bible, but not in the sense of contents elicited from Biblical passages. The words tracta7-e, tractator, and tractatiis were in prefer- ence employed M-ith respect to Biblical exposition, and the sense which it elicited. Together with these words there occur commentarius and expositio. In reference to the exegetical work of St. Hilary on IMatthew, the codices fluctuate between commentarius and tractatiis. St. Augustine's tractatus are well known ; and this fa- ther frequently mentions the divinarnm scripturarum tractatores. For instance, Betractationes, 1. 23, " Divi- uorum tractatores eloquiorum ;" Sulpicius Severus, Dial. IV.— K E
i, 6,"0rigines . . . qui tractator sacronun peritissimus habebatur." Vincentius Lirinensis observes in his Com- monitoi-ium on 1 Cor. xii, 28 : " In the third place, teach- ers who are now called tractatores; whom the same apostle sometimes styles prophets, because by them the mysteries of the prophets are opened to the people" (comp. Dufresne, Glossarium medice et infimce Latinita- tis, s. vv. Tractator, Tractatus ; and Baluze, ad Servat. Lupum, p. 479).
However, the occupation of interpres, in the nobler sense of this word, was not unknown to St. Jerome, as may be seen from liis rnpfafio in libros Samuelis {Opera, ed.Vallarsi, ix, 459) : " For whatever, by frequently trans- lating and carefully correcting, we have learned and re- tain, is our own. And if you have understood what you formerly did not know, consider me to be an expositor if you are grateful, or a paraphrast if you are ungrate- ful."