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PUBLICATION & ENGLISH
TRANSLATION PROJECT
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"Alcasar,
a Spanish Jesuit, taking a hint from
Victorinus,
seems to have been the first (AD 1614) to have
suggested that the Apocalyptic prophecies did not
extend further than to the overthrow of Paganism by
Constantine." // "It
has been usual to say that the Spanish Jesuit
Alcasar, in his
Vestigatio Arcani Sensus in Apocalypsi
(1614), was the
founder of the Præterist School.." Farrar |
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ENGLISH TRANSLATION
PROJECT EXCERPTS
A Latin Translator Has
Been Found! Project Underway in Earnest
15th (Decimaquinta) Preliminary Note
(pp. 56-57)
"I say a profound
philosophy teaches, that in the Creation of things it was
the intention of the Artificer and Builder, that in those
objects of Creation which come within the reach of our
vision, men might also be in possession of wonderful symbols
and hieroglyphics, serving to point out to them mystically
such lessons as would most highly concern them, viz., true
instruction in faith and morals.
Origen, after pursuing the
subject in a beautiful train of reasoning, concludes at last
with the following words, 'Therefore may all things be
referred upward from the visible to the invisible, from the
corporeal to the incorporeal, from the manifest to the
hidden ; so that the objects of the world may be understood
to be created by divine Wisdom according to such a divine
dispensation, as from visible things, by means of the things
and exemplars themselves, teaches us the invisible, and
transfers us from earthly things to those which are of
heaven.' Thus far Origen ; who doubts not that, in the
creation of things corporeal, it was the principal design of
the divine Artificer that they should be symbols and traces,
as it were, of the mysteries of our faith. Therefore
the merely natural office proper to every particular thing,
in virtue of which it ministers to other bodies, and in
which the philosophy of Aristotle rests, by no means
satisfies the infinite Wisdom of God, and His especial
providence in the salvation of souls ; nor indeed His own
wonderful counsel whereby He hath determined to raise us
from the corporeal to the incorporeal. It is probable,
therefore, that the omnipotence of God, when He had the
power of making infinite species of souls, plants, and
stones, selected and created out of the infinite things
which he had in his power, such as were the more apt to
signify the mysteries of our salvation, and a conformably
moral instruction. And this was accomplished in such a
manner, that the universal mechanism of things created
should maintain a most beautiful harmony with the wonderful
counsel of God in the salvation of men ; and that things
corporeal should subserve to the representation of those
which are spiritual." (Clissold's Translation)
Note 7, Chapter 1, Verse 7 (pp.
199-202)
"This
signification of clouds has in it such force, that
even if Christ should not come to Judgment in a material
cloud, it might nevertheless be truly and beautifully
said that He would come in clouds, according to the
language of Sacred Scripture. Not that I would deny
that there would be true material clouds at the Day
of Judgment ; for I have no mind to innovation in what
pertains to teaching : I only mean to assert, that so
beautiful and apt is the symbolical signification of
clouds, that although there should be no clouds
properly so called (viz. no material clouds), Christ might
nevertheless most truly and significantly be then said to
come in the clouds of heaven. And this I wish
to say rather, in order that it might be noted, that in the
symbol of the clouds there is latent a much greater
and more excellent mystery than any one might think, who
considered only the grammatical sense of the Word -- a sense
to which I see that some persons are too much addicted."
"Behold, the Apocalypse
sets before us the Advent of Christ in the clouds
of the preaching of the Gospel, by means of which God
pours down His heavenly shower, that is, the spirit of peace
and of prayer." (Clissold's
Translation)
SCREEN-RENDERED LATIN
TEXT EXCERPTS
"Arias vero in sua illa spirituali accommodatione, dum
Apocalypseos bella vult intra unius hominis pectus includere; non video, qua
ratione possit in bello illo spiritali, quod itra unius hominis pectus
geritur, distinguere duo veluti bella, quorum primum respondeat bello
Ierosolymae corruere; alterius vero, universam Babylonem conflagrare: atque
his succedre mille annorum pacem ; ac demum Antichristi bellum. Etenim,
licet mysticum duarum urbium praelium in hominis pectore pie meditari,
subtile sit inventum, nec improbandum ; ceterum ille trium bellorum ordo ad
mysticum hoc bellum transferri non potest. Nec contendit Arias omnia
per ordinem ad subtilissimam illam normam redigere. Posse vero multa
non ordinatim, sed promiscue, at absque filo accommodari, non inficior.
Quin imo existimo, si Arias suam illam applicatione in litterali sensu
stabiliret, multa praeterea illum ingeniose pro votis aptare potuisse.
Nam in perfidae Ierosolymae bello adversus Dei Ecclesiam poterat contemplari,
quam acriter Deo conentur obsistere ii, qui semel fuerant illuminati et
gustaverant donum caeleste, et verbum Dei, et prolapsi sunt, ad Hebraecos
6.4. Quorum ex numero vix decima tandem pars, id est, perpauci sese
illi submittent. In bello etiam Romae ethnicae adversus Ecclesiam
gesto, idoneus sese dabat sermo de eorum de corum repugnantia" (Vestigatio,
Lyons, 1618, p. 19)
Engravings by Don Juan de Jauregui
"A Spanish painter and poet, born at Seville
c. 1570, or, according to some, as late as 1583; died at
Madrid c. 1640-1. His family, a northern one, was apparently
of noble rank, and he was early enrolled as a knight in the
Order of Calatrava. He made a sojourn in Rome, and there,
judging by what he says in his "Discourse on Painting", he
studied the old masters and formed his own pictorial
methods. At all events, report has it that he became
distinguished as a portrait painter. A current
interpretation of a passage in the prologue to the "Novelas
ejemplares" of Cervantes makes him out to have painted a
likeness of the famous novelist. As a poet, Jáuregui began
as a disciple of the Sevillian bard, Herrera. In point of
fact, he adheres in many of his compositions too closely to
the manner of his model, and hence a lack of originality in
them. Notable among his poetic endeavors in his versions in
blank verse of Tasso's "Aminta". It is deemed one of the
best foreign renderings of that eminent pastoral play. First
published in Italy, in 1607, it was included in the
collected "Rimas" of Jáuregui put forth at Seville in 1618.
In the same volume appeared various poetical pieces, among
them a specimen of a translation of Lucas, and certain
religious lyrics. In the earlier stages of his career,
Jáuregui was a stern opponent of Gongorism and its stylistic
excesses, as he clearly shows in his "Discurso poético
contra el hablar culto y estilo obscuro", but he later
succumbed to the influence of this noxious manner, amply
illustrating its peculiarities in his poem "Orfeo" (Madrid,
1624) and even defending it in a special dissertation. Of
the "Pharsalia" of Lucas, already attempted by him in his
youth, he made, late in life, a complete version, which,
however, was not published until 1684, and is over free in
its rendering of the original." (Catholic
Encyclopedia)
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Selected Engravings From Vestigatio in Apocalypsi |
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15 |
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17 |
207 |
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324 |
338 |
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349 |
354 |
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420 |
448 |
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450 |
452 |
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503 |
769 |
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781 |
928 |
WHAT OTHERS
HAVE SAID
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Made the seals the early expansion of apostolic
Christianity
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God’s longsuffering, warnings, and punishments were
allotted to the Jews
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The trumpets were judgments on fallen Judaism
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The two witnesses - the doctrine and holy lives of the
Christians
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After the persecutions Christianity would arise with new
glory and convert many Jews
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Revelation was the apostolic church, bringing forth the
Roman church
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The first beast of Revelation 13 declared to be the
persecuting arrogance of pagan Rome - the second beast, its carnal
wisdom
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Revelation 17, the mystical meaning of idolatrous
ancient Rome
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Revelation 18, its conversion to the Catholic faith
(LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Prophetic faith of Our Fathers, The
Historical Development of Prophetic Interpretation, volume 2, excerpts
from pages 464-532)
"A comprehensive commentary on the Book of Revelation by the Jesuit
theologian Ludovicus ab Alcasar (1554-1613) who dedicated the work to Pope
Pius V. In a curious introductory letter to the reader however, (by a
censor?) Father Antonius Padilla is described as having greatly stimulated
and furthered the edition of this commentary, and thus being de facto the
dedicatee. After a series of introductory essays and a detailed synopsis
follows the commentary, book by book, verse by verse. A concluding chapter
on biblical weights and measures closes the work. A Lyon edition followed in
1618. A supplementary volume discussing in more detail those passages from
Hiob, the Psalter, Canticles and Prophets quoted or alluded to in Revelation
was published only in 1631. See De Backer-Sommervogel I 145-146 who
incorrectly mention only 20 engravings.
Together with Ribeira, Alcasar is said to have introduced into the study of
Revelation the scientific historical method, approaching the work from the
viewpoint of the author and seeking the clue to his writings in the events
of his time.
"
Abbas Amanat
"The exegete who
set much of the agenda for the Catholic interpretation of the Apocalypse in
the seventeenth century was the Jesuit, Luis Alcasar (1554-1612), whose
Vestigatio arcani sensus in Apocalypsi first appeared posthumously in
Antwerp in 1614 and was immediately recognized as one of the most 'modern'
interpretations of John's mysterious revelation. Alcasar broke
with earlier Jesuits in stressing a preterite and historical reading that
held that everything in the Apocalypse, with the exception of the last three
chapters, had been fulfilled in the early centuries of the Church.
Although he noted that a number of early commentators had taught that
Apocalypse 20 referred to the refrigerium sanctorum after Antichrist,
Alcasar had no sympathy for this view. He also launched an attack on
Joachim of Fiore, saying 'He who will may hold the Abbot Joachim to be a
prophet of God, but not I." (Imagining the End: visions of apocalypse
from the ancient Middle East to modern America, p. 165)
Thomas Kelly Cheyne
"Conspicuous
above all is the Vestigatio arcani sensus in Apocalypsi of Ludovicus
ab Alcazar. That writer was the first to carry out consistently the
idea that the Apocalypse in its earlier part is directed against Judaism,
and in its second against Paganism, so that in chaps. 12 f. we read of the
first persecution of the Christians in the Roman Empire, and in ch. 19 of
the final conversion of that Empire. He thus presents us with the
first serious attempt to arrive at a historical and psychological
understanding of the book. The idea worked out by Alcazar had
already been expressed by Hentenius in the preface to his edition of Arethas
(OEcumenii Commentar, ed. Morelius et Hentenius 2), and by Salmeron (Opera,
12, Cologne, 1614. 'In sacram Jo. Apoc. praeludia'). " (Encyclopedia Biblica:
A Critical Dictionary of the Literary Political and Religious History, p.
200)
F.W. Farrar
"It has been usual to say that the Spanish Jesuit Alcasar.. was the founder of the Præterist School.. But to me it seems that the founder of the Præterist School is none other than
St. John himself."
(The Early Days of Christianity
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PRÆTERIST INTERPRETATION |
FALL OF JERUSALEM |
APOCALYPSE)
James E. Force
"Ludovicus ab
Alcazar was even more disturbing. For his Vestigatio arcani
sensus in Apocalypsi (1614) he used methods normally associated with the
"Higher Criticism" of the nineteenth century. He applied the first
half of the Apocalypse to the Jewish Revolt and the second half to early
Roman persecution of Christians. While he owed his chronological
order to Lyra, he dropped ecclesiastical history and eschatology.
The whole book concerned events long ago and no longer served a prophetic
function. He supported his argument with the first complete survey of
Apocalypse criticism, from antiquity to the present, and Bousset still used
Alcazar to date many medieval works. In the North his followers
were Grotius, Hammond and Bousset. Newton cites approvingly his
reading of the wilderness where the woman hides, but attacks Alcazar's
approach, saying that those who apply Apocalypse to the Apostolic Age must
explain why their interpretations were not expressed then. (Because Alcazar,
like Ribera, does use patristic sources, Newton's criticism loses much of
its force)." (Newton and Religion, p. 208)
Timothy
James
"A Spanish Jesuit of Seville
named, Luis De Alcazar (1554-1613) invested forty years of his life to this
study which culminated in his 900 page commentary, "Vestigatio Arcani Sensus
in Apocalypsi (Investigation of the Hidden Sense of the Apocalypse). In this
work which was published posthumously in 1614, Alcazar made a new attempt
irrespective of both Catholic and Protestant views to interpret the
Apocalypse through the use of critical-historical methods. He concluded that
the Apocalypse describes the two-fold war of the Church in the first
century; one with the Jewish synagogue, and the other with paganism, which
resulted in victory over both adversaries. Frrom makes an interesting note
regarding Alcazar:
Alcazar was fully aware that he
contradicted certain of the fathers, differed from the Futurists Ribera and
Viegas, and was in conflict with Malvenda. While approving of the concept of
spiritual resurrection held by Augustine, he contended against his view of
the binding of Satan, as well as that of Ribera and Viegas. (Froom, LeRoy
Edwin. The Prophetic Faith of our Fathers, 3 vols. (Wash. D.C.: Review and
Herald, 1948), vol 2, p.509) (Preterist
Eschatology in the Sixteenth Through Eighteenth Centuries)
Moses Stuart
"Near the commencement of the seventeenth century
(1614), the Spanish Jesuit Ludovicus ab Alcasar published his Vestigatio
arcani Sensus in Apocalypsi, a performance distinguished by one remarkable
feature, which was then new. He declared the Apocalypse to be a continuous
and connected work, making regular advancement from beginning to end, as
parts of one general plan in the mind of the writer. In conformity with this
he brought out a result which has been of great importance to succeeding
commentators. Rev. v-vi, he thinks, applies to the Jewish enemies of the
Christian Church; xi-xix to heathen Rome and carnal and worldly powers,
xx-xxii to the final conquests to be made by the church, and also to its
rest, and its ultimate glorification. This view of the contents of the book
had been merely hinted at before, by Hentenius, in the Preface to his Latin
version of Arethas, Par. 1547. 8vo; and by Salmeron in his Preludia in Apoc.
But no one had ever developed this idea fully, and endeavoured to illustrate
and enforce it, in such a way as Alcasar ... Although he puts the time of
composing the Apocalypse down to the exile of John under Domitian, yet he
still applies ch. v-xi to the Jews, and of course regards the book as partly
embracing the past.
"It might be expected, that a
commentary that thus freed the Romish church from the assaults of the
Protestants, would be popular among the advocates of the papacy. Alcasar
met, of course, with general approbation and reception among the Romish
community. "'(Stuart, Moses, "Commentary on the Apocalypse", Allen, Morrill
and Wardell, Andover, 1845, Volume 1, p. 464.)
Release Notes for "Vestigatio Arcani Sensus in Apocalypsi"
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