{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/208/2080062.htm","path":"chr/ecf/208/2080062.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/208/2080062.htm","text":"p. 51 Introduction to the Hex\u00e6meron.\nThe Hex\u00e6meron is the title of nine homilies delivered by St. Basil on the cosmogony of the opening chapters of Genesis. When and where they were delivered is quite uncertain. They are Lenten sermons, delivered at both the morning and evening services, and appear to have been listened to by working men. (Hom. iii. 1.) Some words in Hom. viii. have confirmed the opinion that they were preached extempore, in accordance with what is believed to have been Basil\u2019s ordinary practice. 1361 Internal evidence points in the same direction, for though a marked contrast might be expected between the style of a work intended to be read, like the De Spiritu Sancto, and that of the orations to be spoken in public, the Hex\u00e6meron shews signs of being an unwritten composition.\nIn earlier ages, it was the most celebrated and admired of Basil\u2019s works. Photius (Migne, Pat. Gr. cxli) puts it first of all, and speaks warmly of its eloquence and force. As an example of oratory he would rank it with the works of Plato and Demosthenes.\nSuidas singles it out for special praise. Jerome (De Viris Illust.) among Basil\u2019s works names only the Hex\u00e6meron, the De Sp. Scto, and the treatise Contra Eunomium.\nThat Basil\u2019s friends should think highly of it is only what might be expected. \u201cWhenever I take his Hex\u00e6meron in hand,\u201d says Gregory of Nazianzus, (Orat. xliii. 67) \u201cand quote its words, I am brought face to face with my Creator: I begin to understand the method of creation: I feel more awe than ever I did before, when I only looked at God\u2019s work with my eyes.\u201d\nBasil\u2019s brother Gregory, in the Pro\u0153mium to his own Hex\u00e6meron, speaks in exaggerated terms of Basil\u2019s work as inspired, and as being, in his opinion, as admirable as that of Moses.\nThe Hex\u00e6meron of Ambrose is rather an imitation than a translation or adaptation of that of Basil. Basil\u2019s Hex\u00e6meron was translated into Latin by Eustathius Afer (c. A.D. 440) and is said to have been also translated by Dionysius Exiguus, the Scythian monk of the 6th C. to whom is due our custom of dating from the Saviour\u2019s birth.\nMore immediately interesting to English readers is the Anglo-Saxon abbreviation attributed to \u00c6lfric, Abbot of St. Albans in 969, and by some identified with the \u00c6lfric who was Archbishop of Canterbury from 996 to 1006. This is extant in a MS. numbered Junius 23 in the Bodleian Library, and was collated with the MS. Jun. 47 in the same, a transcript of a MS. in the Hatton Collection, by the Rev. Henry W. Norman for his edition and translation published in 1848. It is nowhere a literal translation, but combines with the thoughts of St. Basil extracts from the Commentary upon Genesis of the Venerable Bede, as well as original matter. It is entitled\nSTI Basilii Exameron, ?eet Is Be Godes Six Daga Weorcvm.\n\u201cL\u2019Hexam\u00e9ron,\u201d writes Fialon, \u201cest l\u2019explication de l\u2019\u0153uvre des six jours, explication souvent tent\u00e9e avant et apr\u00e8s Saint Basile. \u2018Il n\u2019est personne parmi les hommes, disait Th\u00e9ophile d\u2019Antioche au deuxi\u00e8me si\u00e8cle, qui puisse dignement faire le r\u00e9cit et exposer toute l\u2019ecomomie de l\u2019\u0153uvre des six jours; e\u00fbt il mille bouches et mille langues\u2026.Beaucoup d\u2019ecrivains ont tente ce r\u00e9cit; ils ont pris pour sujet, les uns la cr\u00e9ation du monde, les autres l\u2019origine de l\u2019homme, et peut-\u00eatre n\u2019ont ils pas fait jaillir une \u00e9tincelle qui f\u00fbt digne de la v\u00e9rit\u00e9.\u2019 1362 Nous ne pouvons savoir ce que fut l\u2019Hexam\u00e9ron de Saint Hippolyte et nous ne savons gu\u00e8re qu\u2019une chose de celui d\u2019Orig\u00e8ne: c\u2019est qu\u2019il d\u00e9naturait completement le r\u00e9cit mosa\u00efque et n\u2019y voyait que des all\u00e9gories. L\u2019Hexam\u00e9ron de Saint Basile, par la puret\u00e9 de la doctrine et la beaut\u00e9 du style, fit disparaitre tous ceux qui l\u2019avaient pr\u00e9c\u00e9de.\u201d 1363 So, too, bishop Fessler. \u201cSapienter, pie, et admodum eloquenter p. 52 ist\u00e6 homil\u00e6 confect\u00e6 sunt; qu\u00e6dam explicationes physic\u00e6 profecto juxta placita scienti\u00e6 illius \u00e6tatis dijudicand\u00e6 sunt.\u201d 1364 On the other hand the prominence of the \u201cscienti\u00e6 illius \u00e6tatis\u201d is probably the reason why the Hex\u00e6meron has received from adverse critics less favour than it deserves. \u201cDiese letztern,\u201d i.e. the Homilies in question, says B\u00f6hringer, \u201cerlangten im Alterthum eine ganz unverdiente Ber\u00fchmtheit\u2026.Die Art, wie Basil seine Aufgabe l\u00f6ste, ist diese; er nimmt die mosaische Erz\u00e4hlung von der Sch\u00f6pfung Vers f\u00fcr Vers vor, erkl\u00e4rt sie von dem naturhistorischen Standpunkt seiner Zeit aus, wobei er Gelegenheit nimmt, die Ansichten der griechischen Philosophen von der Weltsch\u00f6pfung u. s. w. zu widerlegen, und schliesst dann mit moralischer und religi\u00f6ser Nutzandwendung, um den Stoff auch f\u00fcr Geist und Herz seiner Zuh\u00f6rer fruchtbar zu machen. Es braucht indess kaum bemerkt zu werden, dass vom naturwissenschaftlichen wie exegetischen Standpunkt unserer Zeit diese Arbeit wenig Werth mehr hat.\u201d The Three Cappadocians, p. 61. But in truth the fact that Basil is not ahead of the science of his time is not to his discredit. It is to his credit that he is abreast with it; and this, with the exception of his geography, he appears to be. Of him we may say, as Bp. Lightfoot writes of St. Clement, in connexion with the crucial instance of the Ph\u0153nix, \u201cit appears that he is not more credulous than the most learned and intelligent heathen writers of the preceding and following generations.\u201d He reads the Book of Genesis in the light of the scientific knowledge of his age, and in the amplification and illustration of Holy Scripture by the supposed aid of this supposed knowledge, neither he nor his age stands alone. Later centuries may possibly not accept all the science of the XIXth.\nTheophilus of Antioch, ii. Ad Autolycum.\n51:1363 52:1364\nInst. Pat., Ed. B. Jungmann 1890.","title":"Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Ser. II, Vol. VIII: The H...","type":"page"}