BENOÎT XVI
AUDIENCE GÉNÉRALE
Mercredi 18 juin 2008
L'enseignement de saint Isidore de Séville sur les relations entre vie active et vie contemplative
Chers frères et sœurs,
Je voudrais parler aujourd'hui de saint Isidore de Séville: il était le petit frère de Léandre, évêque de Séville, et grand ami du Pape Grégoire le Grand. Ce fait est important, car il permet de garder à l'esprit un rapprochement culturel et spirituel indispensable à la compréhension de la personnalité d'Isidore. Il doit en effet beaucoup à Léandre, une personne très exigeante, studieuse et austère, qui avait créé autour de son frère cadet un contexte familial caractérisé par les exigences ascétiques propres à un moine et par les rythmes de travail demandés par un engagement sérieux dans l'étude. En outre, Léandre s'était préoccupé de prédisposer le nécessaire pour faire face à la situation politico-sociale du moment: en effet, au cours de ces décennies les Wisigoths, barbares et ariens, avaient envahi la péninsule ibérique et s'étaient emparé des territoires qui avaient appartenu à l'empire romain. Il fallait donc les gagner à la romanité et au catholicisme. La maison de Léandre et d'Isidore était fournie d'une bibliothèque très riche en œuvres classiques, païennes et chrétiennes. Isidore, qui se sentait attiré simultanément vers les unes et vers les autres, fut donc éduqué à développer, sous la responsabilité de son frère aîné, une très grande discipline en se consacrant à leur étude, avec discrétion et discernement.
Dans l'évêché de Séville, on vivait donc dans un climat serein et ouvert. Nous pouvons le déduire des intérêts culturels et spirituels d'Isidore, tels qu'ils apparaissent dans ses œuvres elles-mêmes, qui comprennent une connaissance encyclopédique de la culture classique païenne et une connaissance approfondie de la culture chrétienne. On explique ainsi l'éclectisme qui caractérise la production littéraire d'Isidore, qui passe avec une extrême facilité de Martial à Augustin, de Cicéron à Grégoire le Grand. La lutte intérieure que dut soutenir le jeune Isidore, devenu successeur de son frère Léandre sur la chaire épiscopale de Séville en 599, ne fut pas du tout facile. Peut-être doit-on précisément à cette lutte constante avec lui-même l'impression d'un excès de volontarisme que l'on perçoit en lisant les œuvres de ce grand auteur, considéré comme le dernier des Pères chrétiens de l'antiquité. Quelques années après sa mort, qui eut lieu en 636, le Concile de Tolède de 653 le définit: "Illustre maître de notre époque, et gloire de l'Eglise catholique".
Isidore fut sans aucun doute un homme aux contrastes dialectiques accentués. Et, également dans sa vie personnelle, il vécut l'expérience d'un conflit intérieur permanent, très semblable à celui qu'avaient déjà éprouvé Grégoire le Grand et saint Augustin, partagés entre le désir de solitude, pour se consacrer uniquement à la méditation de la Parole de Dieu, et les exigences de la charité envers ses frères, se sentant responsable de leur salut en tant qu'évêque. Il écrit, par exemple, à propos des responsables des Eglises: "Le responsable d'une Eglise (vir ecclesiasticus) doit d'une part se laisser crucifier au monde par la mortification de la chair et, de l'autre, accepter la décision de l'ordre ecclésiastique, lorsqu'il provient de la volonté de Dieu, de se consacrer au gouvernement avec humilité, même s'il ne voudrait pas le faire" (Sententiarum liber III, 33, 1: PL 83, col 705 B). Il ajoute ensuite, à peine un paragraphe après: "Les hommes de Dieu (sancti viri) ne désirent pas du tout se consacrer aux choses séculières et gémissent lorsque, par un mystérieux dessein de Dieu, ils sont chargés de certaines responsabilités... Ils font de tout pour les éviter, mais ils acceptent ce qu'ils voudraient fuir et font ce qu'ils auraient voulu éviter. Ils entrent en effet dans le secret du cœur et, à l'intérieur de celui-ci, ils cherchent à comprendre ce que demande la mystérieuse volonté de Dieu. Et lorsqu'ils se rendent compte de devoir se soumettre aux desseins de Dieu, ils humilient le cou de leur cœur sous le joug de la décision divine" (Sententiarum liber III, 33, 3: PL 83, coll. 705-706).
Pour mieux comprendre Isidore, il faut tout d'abord rappeler la complexité des situations politiques de son temps dont j'ai déjà parlé: au cours des années de son enfance, il avait dû faire l'expérience amère de l'exil. Malgré cela, il était envahi par un grand enthousiasme apostolique: il éprouvait l'ivresse de contribuer à la formation d'un peuple qui retrouvait finalement son unité, tant sur le plan politique que religieux, avec la conversion providentielle de l'héritier au trône wisigoth, Ermenégilde, de l'arianisme à la foi catholique. Il ne faut toutefois pas sous-évaluer l'immense difficulté à affronter de manière appropriée les problèmes très graves, tels que ceux des relations avec les hérétiques et avec les juifs. Toute une série de problèmes qui apparaissent très concrets aujourd'hui également, surtout si l'on considère ce qui se passe dans certaines régions où il semble presque que l'on assiste à nouveau à des situations très semblables à celles qui étaient présentes dans la péninsule ibérique de ce VI siècle. La richesse des connaissances culturelles dont disposait Isidore lui permettait de confronter sans cesse la nouveauté chrétienne avec l'héritage classique gréco-romain, même s'il semble que plus que le don précieux de la synthèse il possédait celui de la collatio, c'est-à-dire celui de recueillir, qui s'exprimait à travers une extraordinaire érudition personnelle, pas toujours aussi ordonnée qu'on aurait pu le désirer.
Il faut dans tous les cas admirer son souci de ne rien négliger de ce que l'expérience humaine avait produit dans l'histoire de sa patrie et du monde entier. Isidore n'aurait rien voulu perdre de ce qui avait été acquis par l'homme au cours des époques anciennes, qu'elle fussent païenne, juive ou chrétienne. On ne doit donc pas s'étonner si, en poursuivant ce but, il lui arrivait parfois de ne pas réussir à transmettre de manière adaptée, comme il l'aurait voulu, les connaissances qu'il possédait à travers les eaux purificatrices de la foi chrétienne. Mais de fait, dans les intentions d'Isidore, les propositions qu'il fait restent cependant toujours en harmonie avec la foi pleinement catholique, qu'il soutenait fermement. Dans le débat à propos des divers problèmes théologiques, il montre qu'il en perçoit la complexité et il propose souvent avec acuité des solutions qui recueillent et expriment la vérité chrétienne complète. Cela a permis aux croyants au cours des siècles de profiter avec reconnaissance de ses définitions jusqu'à notre époque. Un exemple significatif en cette matière nous est offert par l'enseignement d'Isidore sur les relations entre vie active et vie contemplative. Il écrit: "Ceux qui cherchent à atteindre le repos de la contemplation doivent d'abord s'entraîner dans le stade de la vie active; et ainsi, libérés des scories des péchés, ils seront en mesure d'exhiber ce coeur pur qui est le seul qui permette de voir Dieu" (Differentiarum Lib II, 34, 133: PL 83, col 91A). Le réalisme d'un véritable pasteur le convainc cependant du risque que les fidèles courent de n'être que des hommes à une dimension. C'est pourquoi il ajoute: "La voie médiane, composée par l'une et par l'autre forme de vie, apparaît généralement plus utile pour résoudre ces tensions qui sont souvent accentuées par le choix d'un seul genre de vie et qui sont, en revanche, mieux tempérées par une alternance des deux formes" (o.c., 134: ibid., col 91B).
Isidore recherche dans l'exemple du Christ la confirmation définitive d'une juste orientation de vie: "Le sauveur Jésus nous offrit l'exemple de la vie active, lorsque pendant le jour il se consacrait à offrir des signes et des miracles en ville, mais il montrait la voie contemplative lorsqu'il se retirait sur la montagne et y passait la nuit en se consacrant à la prière" (o.c. 134: ibid.). A la lumière de cet exemple du divin Maître, Isidore peut conclure avec cet enseignement moral précis: "C'est pourquoi le serviteur de Dieu, en imitant le Christ, doit se consacrer à la contemplation sans se refuser à la vie active. Se comporter différemment ne serait pas juste. En effet, de même que l'on aime Dieu à travers la contemplation, on doit aimer son prochain à travers l'action. Il est donc impossible de vivre sans la présence de l'une et de l'autre forme de vie à la fois, et il n'est pas possible d'aimer si l'on ne fait pas l'expérience de l'une comme de l'autre" (o.c., 135: ibid., col 91C). Je considère qu'il s'agit là de la synthèse d'une vie qui recherche la contemplation de Dieu, le dialogue avec Dieu dans la prière et dans la lecture de l'Ecriture Sainte, ainsi que l'action au service de la communauté humaine et du prochain. Cette synthèse est la leçon que le grand évêque de Séville nous laisse à nous aussi, chrétiens d'aujourd'hui, appelés à témoigner du Christ au début d'un nouveau millénaire.
* * *
Je suis heureux d’accueillir ce matin les pèlerins de langue française. Je salue particulièrement les étudiants de l’Institut de philosophie comparée, de Paris, la paroisse de Rodez, et tous les jeunes. Je vous invite à faire dans votre vie l’unité entre la contemplation de Dieu et le service de vos frères. Avec ma Bénédiction apostolique.
© Copyright 2008 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana
contra judaeos " à sa soeur, sainte Florentine. Abbaye de Corbie. VIIIe
Saint Isidore, évêque et docteur de l'Église
Isidore de Séville (560-636)
est le grand docteur de l'Espagne. Successeur de son frère Léandre comme évêque
de Séville (601), il travailla à organiser l'Eglise dans le royaume
wisigothique, spécialement en tenant des Conciles. Il aimait par-dessus tout
enseigner. La somme des connaissances qu'il a recueillies servit de manuel
scolaire durant des générations.
José Alcoverro, Isidore
de Seville, statue, 1892, Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid.
St Isidore de Séville, évêque, confesseur et docteur
Innocent XIII inscrivit sa fête comme docteur, au rite double, en 1722.
Leçons des Matines avant 1960
Au deuxième nocturne.
Quatrième leçon. Isidore, Docteur illustre, était Espagnol de nation ; il naquit à Carthagène ; son père, Sévérien, était gouverneur de la province. Les saints Évêques, Léandre de Séville, et Fulgence de Carthagène, ses frères, prirent soin de lui enseigner la piété et les lettres. Formé aux littératures latine, grecque et hébraïque, et instruit dans les lois divines et humaines, il acquit à un degré éminent toutes les sciences et toutes les vertus chrétiennes. Dès sa jeunesse, il combattit avec tant de courage l’hérésie aérienne, depuis longtemps déjà répandue chez les Goths alors maîtres de l’Espagne, que peu s’en fallut qu’il ne fût mis à mort par les hérétiques. Léandre ayant quitté cette vie, Isidore fut élevé, malgré lui, au siège épiscopal de Séville, sur les instances du roi Récarède, avec l’assentiment unanime du clergé et du peuple. On rapporte que saint Grégoire le Grand ne se contenta pas de confirmer cette élection par l’autorité apostolique, mais qu’il envoya, selon l’usage, le pallium au nouvel élu, et l’établit son vicaire ainsi que celui du Siège apostolique dans toute l’Espagne.
Cinquième leçon. On ne peut dire combien Isidore fut, durant son épiscopat, constant, humble, patient, miséricordieux, zélé pour !a restauration des mœurs chrétiennes et de la discipline ecclésiastique, infatigable à les soutenir par ses paroles et ses écrits, remarquable enfin par l’éclat de toutes les vertus. Ardent promoteur et propagateur des institutions monastiques en Espagne, il construisit plusieurs monastères et édifia également des collèges, où, se livrant à la science sacrée et à l’enseignement, il instruisit un grand nombre de disciples qui affluaient vers lui, et parmi lesquels brillèrent saint Ildephonse, Évêque de Tolède, et saint Braulion, Évêque de Saragosse. Dans un concile rassemblé à Séville, il réprima et écrasa par une discussion vive et éloquente l’hérésie des Acéphales déjà menaçante. Isidore acquit auprès de tous une telle renommée de sainteté et de science, que seize ans à peine après sa mort, au milieu des applaudissements de tout un synode réuni à Tolède et composé de cinquante-deux Évêques, et avec le suffrage de saint Ildephonse, il mérita d’être appelé un Docteur excellent, la gloire la plus récente de l’Église catholique, l’homme le plus docte de la-fin des temps ; et les Prélats déclarèrent que son nom ne devait être prononcé qu’avec respect. Saint Braulion ne se contente pas de le comparer à saint Grégoire, mais il estime que le ciel l’avait donné à l’Espagne pour l’instruire, et tenir la place de l’Apôtre saint Jacques.
Sixième leçon. Isidore composa des livres sur les Étymologies, sur les Offices ecclésiastiques, et beaucoup d’autres ouvrages si utiles pour la discipline chrétienne et ecclésiastique, que le Pape Léon IV n’a pas hésité à écrire aux Évêques de Bretagne, que l’on doit faire le même cas des paroles d’Isidore que de celles de Jérôme et d’Augustin, lorsqu’il se présente une difficulté nouvelle qui ne peut être résolue par les Canons. On voit plusieurs sentences tirées de ses écrits placées parmi les lois canoniques de l’Église. Le saint Évêque de Séville présida le quatrième concile de Tolède, le plus célèbre de tous ceux d’Espagne. Enfin, après avoir banni de l’Espagne l’hérésie arienne, prédit publiquement sa mort et la dévastation du royaume par les armées des Sarrazins, et gouverné son Église environ quarante ans, il mourut à Séville l’an six cent trente-six. Son corps fut d’abord inhumé, comme lui-même l’avait demandé, entre son frère Léandre et sa sœur Florentine. Ferdinand Ier, roi de Castille et de Léon, l’ayant racheté à grand’peine d’Enète prince sarrazin alors maître de Séville, le transporta à Léon, et l’on a élevé en son honneur une église où ses miracles l’ont rendu célèbre, et où le peuple l’honore avec une grande dévotion.
Au troisième nocturne.
Lecture du saint Évangile selon saint Matthieu. Cap. 5, 13-19.
En ce temps-là : Jésus dit à ses disciples : Vous êtes le sel de la terre. Que si le sel perd sa vertu, avec quoi le salera-t-on ? Il n’est plus bon qu’à être jeté dehors et foulé aux pieds par les hommes. Et le reste.
Homélie de saint Isidore, Évêque.
Septième leçon. Celui qui a la charge d’instruire les peuples et de les former à la vertu doit de toute nécessité, avoir une sainteté accomplie, et se montrer absolument irrépréhensible. Car pour reprendre les pécheurs, il faut qu’il soit lui-même exempt de péché. Comment, en effet, oserait-il reprendre ses subordonnés, exposé qu’il serait à s’entendre répondre : Commencez par adresser à vous-même vos leçons de vertu. Celui qui se propose d’enseigner aux autres à bien vivre doit donc d’abord régler sa propre conduite. Qu’en tout il se montre un modèle de bonne vie, et que ses exemples comme sa doctrine engagent au bien tous les hommes. La science des Écritures lui est également nécessaire. Car la sainte vie de l’Évêque toute seule, ne serait profitable qu’à lui-même, mais s’il y joint la science et la parole, il pourra encore instruire les autres, donnant l’enseignement aux fidèles et combattant les ennemis de la foi qui, s’ils ne sont réfutés et convaincus de fausseté, peuvent trop facilement tromper les simples.
Huitième leçon. La parole de l’Évêque doit être pure, simple, claire, pleine de gravité et de noblesse, pleine de douceur et de grâce ; il doit traiter des mystères de la loi, de la doctrine de la foi, de la modération chrétienne, des règles de la justice. Son langage doit varier avec la profession, la qualité, les mœurs de ses auditeurs ; il doit à l’avance mesurer Si>n enseignement quant à l’objet, au temps, à la manière et aux personnes. Avant tout, il doit, pour accomplir son office, lire la sainte Écriture, étudier les Canons, imiter les exemples des Saints, s’adonner aux veilles, au jeûne, à la prière ; il doit garder la paix avec tous ses frères, et ne blesser aucun des membres du corps dont il est le chef, ne condamner personne sans preuve, n’excommunier personne sans examen. Il doit unir dans la prélature l’humilité à l’autorité ; qu’une humilité indiscrète ne favorise pas les vices de ses subordonnés, qu’une sévérité immodérée n’accompagne point l’exercice de sa puissance ; mais qu’envers ceux qui lui sont confiés, il se montre d’autant plus rempli de sollicitude qu’il doit redouter du Christ lui-même un examen plus sévère de sa vertu.
Neuvième leçon. Il conservera la charité, cette vertu qui s’élève au-dessus de tous les dons, et sans laquelle toutes les autres ne sont rien. Il mettra sa chasteté sous la garde de la charité ; et le lieu où cette gardienne habitera sera l’humilité. Il aura donc parmi tous ces biens l’excellence de la chasteté, afin que son âme, donnée entièrement à Jésus-Christ, soit pure et libre de toute souillure de la chair. Cependant il devra, prudent dispensateur, prendre soin des pauvres, nourrir les affamés, vêtir ceux qui sont nus, recevoir les étrangers, racheter les captifs, protéger les veuves et les orphelins montrer en tout une vigilante sollicitude, une prudence pleine de discrétion dans les distributions de chaque jour. Il exercera excellemment l’hospitalité, recevant toute sorte de personnes avec bonté et chanté ; car si tous les fidèles désirent entendre cette parole de l’Évangile : « J’ai été sans asile et vous m’avez donné l’hospitalité », combien plus l’Évêque, dont la demeure doit être un abri ouvert à tous ?
Entre toutes les provinces du Christianisme, il en est une qui a mérité par excellence le nom de Catholique : c’est l’Espagne. Dès le commencement du VIIIe siècle, la divine Providence la soumit à la plus dure épreuve, en permettant que l’inondation sarrasine la submergeât presque tout entière : en sorte qu’il fallut à ses héroïques enfants huit siècles de combats pour recouvrer enfin leur patrie. Les vastes contrées de l’Asie et de l’Afrique qui, à la même époque, subirent l’invasion musulmane, sont demeurées sous le joug de l’Islamisme. D’où vient que l’Espagne a triomphé de ses oppresseurs, et que le sentiment de la dignité humaine ne s’est jamais éteint dans la race qui l’habite ? La réponse est facile à donner : l’Espagne, au moment de l’invasion, était catholique ; la vie catholique animait cette vaste région ; tandis que les peuples qui succombèrent sous le cimeterre musulman avaient déjà rompu avec la chrétienté par l’hérésie ou par le schisme. Dieu les délaissa, parce qu’ils avaient repoussé la vérité de la Foi, l’unité de l’Église ; ils ne furent plus qu’une proie, et n’offrirent presque aucune résistance à leurs farouches vainqueurs.
L’Espagne cependant avait couru un immense danger. La race des Goths, en la subjuguant, avait en même temps déposé l’hérésie dans son sein. L’Arianisme élevait dans l’Ibérie ses autels sacrilèges ; mais Dieu ne permit pas que cette terre privilégiée demeurât longtemps sous le joug de l’erreur. Avant l’arrivée du Sarrasin, l’Espagne était déjà réconciliée avec l’Église ; une famille aussi illustre que sainte avait eu la gloire de consommer ce grand œuvre. Le voyageur qui parcourt, de nos jours encore, l’Andalousie, remarque avec un pieux étonnement, à chacun des quatre angles des places publiques, une statue correspondant à trois autres : ces statues représentent trois frères et une sœur : saint Léandre, Évêque de Séville ; saint Isidore que nous fêtons aujourd’hui ; saint Fulgence, Évêque de Carthagène ; et leur sœur, sainte Florentine, vierge consacrée à Dieu. Par les efforts du zèle et de l’éloquence de saint Léandre, le roi Récarède et toute la nation des Goths se réunirent à la foi catholique, au concile de Tolède, en 589 ; la science et le grand caractère de notre Isidore consolidèrent cette heureuse révolution ; Fulgence la soutint par ses vertus et par sa doctrine ; et Florentine apporta à cette œuvre si féconde pour l’avenir de sa patrie le tribut de ses soupirs et de ses prières.
Isidore, Pasteur fidèle, le peuple chrétien honore vos vertus et vos services ; il se réjouit de la récompense dont le Seigneur a couronné vos mérites ; soyez-lui donc propice en ces jours de salut. Sur la terre, votre vigilance n’abandonna jamais l’heureux troupeau qui lui était confié ; regardez-nous comme vos brebis, défendez-nous des loups ravissants qui nous menacent sans cesse. Que vos prières obtiennent pour nous la plénitude tics grâces qui nous sont nécessaires pour achever dignement cette sainte carrière qui s’avance vers sa fin. Soutenez notre courage ; animez notre ardeur ; préparez-nous à la célébration des grands mystères qui nous attendent. Nous avons regretté nos offenses, expié, quoique bien faiblement, nos fautes ; l’œuvre de notre conversion a fait un pas ; il faut maintenant qu’elle se consomme par la contemplation des souffrances et de la mort de notre Rédempteur. Assistez-nous, ô Pontife du Christ qui l’avez tant aime ; vous dont la vie fut toujours si pure, prenez soin des pécheurs, et écoutez la prière de l’Église qui se recommande à vous aujourd’hui. Du sein des joies éternelles, souvenez-vous aussi de votre patrie terrestre ; bénissez l’Espagne qui vous conserve un culte si fervent. Rendez-lui l’ardeur primitive de la foi ; renouvelez en son sein les mœurs chrétiennes ; faites disparaître l’ivraie qui s’est levée parmi le bon grain. L’Église entière honore cette contrée pour sa fidélité dans la garde du dépôt de la doctrine du salut ; sauvez-la de toute décadence, et arrêtez les maux dont elle souffre ; qu’elle soit toujours fidèle, toujours digne du beau nom que vous l’avez aidée à conquérir.
Bhx Cardinal Schuster, Liber Sacramentorum
Le culte de ce vrai Patriarche (+ 636) de l’Espagne au temps de la domination visigothe est très ancien, et l’autorité dont il jouissait déjà dans l’Église durant le haut moyen âge fut si indiscutable que Bédé le Vénérable et les encyclopédistes de l’époque carolingienne lui sont en grande partie redevables de leur science ecclésiastique. Le VIIIe synode de Tolède en 653 fait l’éloge suivant de saint Isidore : Nostri saeculi doctor egregius, ecclesiae catholicae novissimum decus, praecedentibus aetate postremus, doctrinae comparatione non infimus, et, quod maius est, in saeculorum fine doctissimus [1].
Cependant, son office liturgique dans le calendrier du Siège apostolique date seulement de la Renaissance parce que, non seulement saint Isidore n’est pas Romain, mais l’anniversaire de sa mort tombe presque toujours en Carême ou durant la semaine pascale.
La messe est celle du Commun des Docteurs.
A Rome, un monastère de Saint-Isidore est mentionné dans la biographie de Léon III, qui l’enrichit d’un coffret d’argent du poids de deux livres. Une autre église de Saint-Isidore existait derrière la diaconie de Sainte-Marie in Domnica, et elle est mentionnée dans une bulle d’Innocent III [2]. Enfin, un oratoire de Saint-Isidore, également détruit à présent, s’élevait près des thermes de Dioclétien là où, autrefois, étaient les dépôts de grains confiés au praefectus annonae. Il s’agit donc d’un culte ancien et assez répandu dont le saint Docteur était autrefois l’objet dans la Ville éternelle ; c’est pourquoi la Renaissance, en insérant saint Isidore dans le Calendrier romain, n’a fait que rétablir une vieille et traditionnelle dévotion envers ce grand docteur de la catholique Espagne.
[1] Mansi, SS. Conc. Coll., X, 1215.
[2] ARMELLINI, op. cit., 503.
Dom Pius Parsch, le Guide dans l’année liturgique
Recherchons l’enseignement liturgique.
Saint Isidore : Jour de mort : 4avril 636. — Tombeau : Il fut d’abord dans la cathédrale de Séville ; depuis 1063, il est dans l’église Saint-Isidore, à Léon (Espagne). Image : On le représente en évêque, souvent en compagnie de saint Léandre. Vie : Saint Isidore, frère du saint évêque Léandre, est considéré comme la figure la plus importante de l’Église d’Espagne à cette époque. Il fut, en raison de sa sainteté manifeste, très aimé de son peuple. On se pressait partout autour de lui dès qu’on l’apercevait. « Les uns venaient pour entendre son enseignement salutaire ; les autres, pour voir les miracles qu’il faisait au nom du Seigneur ; les malades venaient pour être guéris de leurs maux, car la force de Dieu sortait de lui et les guérissait tous » [3]. Il est considéré comme le restaurateur de l’Église d’Espagne après le retour des Wisigoths à la foi catholique. Il a aussi beaucoup fait pour la liturgie de rit espagnol. Isidore présida le quatrième concile provincial de Tolède (633), le plus important qui ait été tenu en Espagne. Il gouverna son Église pendant quarante ans et mourut, en 636, riche de mérites.
Pratique : L’oraison nomme saint Isidore un docteur de vie. Il fut, pour son temps, un interprète excellent et un docteur éminent de la liturgie, à laquelle il était attaché de toute son âme. C’est ce que nous voyons dans ses deux livres sur l’office liturgique. — La messe (In medio) est du commun des docteurs.
[3] Bollandistes, Avril I, 340.
SAINT ISIDORE
Archevêque de Séville
(mort en 639)
Saint Isidore, frère et successeur de saint Léandre sur le siège archiépiscopal de Séville, était de famille princière; il eut aussi pour frère saint Fulgence, et pour soeur sainte Florentine, vierge et religieuse, illustre par ses chants sacrés.
On rapporte que la nourrice d'Isidore l'ayant laissé seul un instant dans le jardin de son père, il fut environné d'un essaim d'abeilles, dont quelques-unes se posèrent sur son visage et sur ses lèvres sans lui faire aucun mal: présage des flots de persuasive éloquence qui devaient couler un jour de la bouche du grand Docteur.
Il fut confié, jeune encore, à son frère aîné, Léandre, qui l'aimait comme un fils, mais qui usa envers lui d'une grande sévérité. Un jour, Isidore, découragé par l'insuccès de ses efforts et rebuté par les énergiques corrections de l'archevêque, s'enfuit de l'école de Séville. Après avoir erré quelque temps dans la campagne, exténué de soif et de fatigue, il s'assit auprès d'un puits et se mit à regarder avec curiosité les sillons qui en creusaient la margelle. Il se demandait d'où provenait ce travail, lorsqu'une femme qui venait chercher de l'eau au puits, touchée de la beauté et de l'humble innocence de l'écolier, lui expliqua que les gouttes d'eau, en tombant sans cesse sur le même endroit, avaient creusé la pierre. Alors l'enfant rentra en lui-même et se dit que si la dureté de la pierre se laissait ainsi creuser goutte à goutte par l'eau, son esprit finirait bien aussi par subir l'empreinte de l'enseignement.
Il retourna auprès de son frère et acheva son éducation de façon à posséder bientôt le latin, le grec et l'hébreu, et à devenir le collaborateur actif de Léandre dans l'oeuvre de la conversion des ariens. Son zèle et sa science irritèrent tellement ces hérétiques, qu'ils résolurent de le tuer; mais la Providence le tira de leurs mains. C'est alors que, pour approfondir encore davantage la science de la foi, il entra dans un monastère, où il s'adonna autant aux vertus religieuses qu'à l'étude.
A la mort de Léandre, il fut élu à sa place aux unanimes applaudissements du peuple. Pendant que tous se réjouissaient de son élévation, lui seul pleurait. Dès qu'il eut ceint la mitre et pris en main la houlette pastorale, sa vie ne fut plus qu'un perpétuel sacrifice, et il ne cessa de se dépenser pour son troupeau, au point qu'il est incompréhensible comment la vie d'un homme si occupé par le ministère extérieur a pu suffire à tant de savants écrits.
Prévenu par le Ciel de son prochain trépas, il se fit porter à l'église, se fit donner un cilice et mourut sur la cendre.
Abbé L. Jaud, Vie des Saints pour tous les jours de l'année, Tours, Mame, 1950.
SOURCE : http://magnificat.ca/cal/fr/saints/saint_isidore_de_seville.html
Un saint pour l'internet. Saint Isidore de Séville
Le service d'observation d'internet, promu par le Vatican, a mené une enquête et a choisi comme saint patron, le plus apprécié dans le monde des informaticiens, Saint Isidore de Séville né en Espagne au VIème siècle : http://www.inxl6.catholique.fr/article1884.php
***
"Le désir de savoir était intense chez les peuples jeunes qui avaient envahi l’Empire romain; le premier qui s’efforça d’y satisfaire fut saint Isidore de Séville.Par son père, Sévérianus, gouverneur de Carthagène, Isidore descendait peut-être de l’antique race gréco-latine; mais sa famille avait mêlé son sang au sang visigoth; le roi des Visigoths, Léovigilde, avait épousé la sœur aînée d’Isidore.Isidore avait été instruit par son frère aîné Léandre; moine, évêque de Séville, apôtre de la conversion des Visigoths ariens, Léandre était allé à Byzance, afin de demander à l’empereur des secours pour les chrétiens contre la persécution des Ariens; à Byzance, Léandre prit contact avec la culture antique, et il voulut que son jeune frère n’ignorât ni le grec ni l’hébreu.En 601, Isidore succéda à son frère Léandre sur le trône épiscopal de Séville qu’il devait occuper jusqu’à sa mort, survenue en 636. Le souci de maintenir la foi contre les hérésies, de fixer la liturgie en constituant le rite mozarabe, ne nuisit pas, en lui, au désir de transmettre aux Visigoths ce qu’avaient conquis la philosophie et la science antiques; ce désir se marque par le décret que rendit, à son instance, le quatrième concile de Tolède; l’étude du grec et de l’hébreu, déjà florissante à Séville, fut étendue à toutes les églises épiscopales de l’Espagne.L’ambition qu’avait Isidore de sauver, en faveur des Barbares, les épaves de la pensée hellénique et latine, d’instruire les Goths de ce que le passé avait connu, inspire bon nombre des écrits de l’évêque de Séville et, en particulier, le grand traité qu’il a intitulé Les Étymologies ou Les Origines.Nul livre n’était mieux fait pour plaire à des intelligences encore enfantines et avides de tout connaître que cette encyclopédie, où tout est enseigné en vingt livres que subdivisent des chapitres nombreux et concis.La grammaire est le sujet du premier livre des Étymologies; la rhétorique et la logique occupent le second; le troisième est consacré aux sciences mathématiques et astronomiques; la médecine, le droit auquel l’auteur adjoint l’étude du calendrier, précèdent, suivant un ordre dont la règle ne se laisse guère percevoir, les livres consacrés à Dieu et à l’Église; puis les sciences naturelles se développent; anthropologie, zoologie, cosmographie, géographie, minéralogie, géologie, agronomie et botanique se succèdent, et cèdent la place à des livres qui traitent vraiment de omni re scibili, qui enseignent jusqu’à la cuisine, jusqu’aux outils de jardinage et d’équitation, dont l’étude met fin aux Étymologies.Les Origines d’Isidore de Séville sont comme le type sur lequel se modèleront plusieurs traités du Moyen Age, et de ceux qui auront le plus de vogue; (…). Lorsqu’au XIIIe siècle, l’encyclopédie du grand évêque espagnol aura vieilli à l’excès, de nouvelles compilations analogues verront le jour; Barthélemy l’Anglais, le premier, composera son De proprietatibus rerum, puis Vincent de Beauvais écrira son Speculum triplex, naturale, historiale, morale; ces deux livres, dont la vogue sera extrême, ne se borneront pas à reproduire maint chapitre des Étymologies; ils procéderont du même esprit que le traité d’Isidore; ils rivaliseront de succès avec ce traité, parce que, comme lui, ils s’efforceront de satisfaire à un désir, toujours ardent chez un grand nombre d’hommes, celui de posséder un livre où toute la Science soit condensée et emmagasinée, où l’on trouve sans peine réponse à tout."
PIERRE DUHEM, L’astronomie latine au Moyen Age (suite). Reproduit à partir de l’édition: Paris, Hermann, 1958, p. 3-4
OeuvresTraductions françaises
OeuvresTraductions françaises
Étymologies (Etymologiae). Texte établi, traduit et commenté par Jacques André. Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1981.
Traité de la nature (De natura rerum) [suivi de l'Épître en vers du roi Sisebut à Isidore]. Édité par Jacques Fontaine. Bordeaux, Féret et fils, 1960.
SOURCE : http://agora.qc.ca/Dossiers/Isidore_de_Seville
Saint Isidore 4 avril
(Isis : déesse égyptienne et Doron : en grec : cadeau) Isidore est donc « cadeau d'Isis »
Il y a 13 saints Isidore dont saint Isidore Laboureur, fêté le 10 mai, et saint Isidore de Séville, fêté le 4 avril.Isidore de Séville naquit à Carthagène, en Espagne, en 556. Son père s'appelait Sévérien et sa mère Théodora.
Il eut deux frères : saint Léandre et saint Fulgence, ainsi qu'une sur : Florentine.
Il était encore bébé lorsqu'un jour, sa nourrice l'avait laissé à dormir dans le jardin, il fut entouré d'un essaim d'abeilles. Certaines entraient dans sa bouche pour y déposer du miel. Les autres couraient sur son visage sans lui faire de mal. Cette aventure fut interprétée comme préfigurant sa douceur et son éloquence.
Son frère Léandre était évêque de Séville. Il avait pris la charge de l'éducation d'Isidore. Mais il était si sévère qu'un jour, n'y tenant plus, Isidore s'enfuit.
Il arriva près d'un puits dans lequel une dame avait jeté son seau pour y prendre de l'eau. Il fut frappé par les sillons creusés sur la margelle. La dame lui expliqua que les sillons étaient creusés dans la pierre par les gouttes d'eau qui coulaient toujours au même endroit.
Impressionné par l'obstination de l'eau, il pensa qu'elle pouvait lui servir de modèle et que l'assiduité à l'étude pouvait imprimer en lui la marque des sciences qu'on lui demandait d'apprendre.
Il retourna donc chez son frère qui le maintint longtemps en cellule afin qu'il ne soit pas distrait de ses travaux. Il travailla avec acharnement à l'étude des lettres latines, grecques et hébraïques.
Petit à petit, il devint très habile : remarquable orateur, savant philosophe, bon mathématicien et grand théologien.
Avec son frère Léandre, il combattit l'hérésie arienne.
Après l'affaiblissement des ariens, il se retira dans un monastère. Mais la mort de Léandre l'obligea à prendre en charge l'évêché de Séville, vers l'an 600.
La conduite excellente du diocèse ne l'empêcha pas de faire construire un grand collège et plusieurs monastères pour lesquels il composa une règle dite de saint Isidore. Il y prescrit l'étude obligatoire du grec et de l'hébreu.
Il présida le deuxième concile de Séville et le quatrième concile de Tolède.
Quatre jours avant sa mort il se fit conduire dans l'église de saint Vincent. Il donna la bénédiction au peuple puis se dépouilla de ses vêtements et revêtit le cilice en poils de chèvre et ceinture de crin.
Il fit venir tous ses débiteurs afin de leur remettre leurs dettes à condition que l'argent fût donné aux pauvres.
Les trois autres jours, il se fit porter à l'église. Le troisième jour il mourut devant une foule nombreuse. C'était le 4 avril 639.
Cet écrivain ecclésiastique fut un travailleur infatigable.
Prodigieusement érudit et orateur de premier ordre, il rédigea un ouvrage sur l'histoire des Goths, des Vandales et des Suèves. Vingt livres sur les Étymologies où il traite de la grammaire, de la logique, de l'astronomie, de la médecine, de l'agriculture, de la navigation, de la chronologie en passant par les outils de jardinage et l'équitation etc. Il y donne des définitions de chaque science puis les étymologies latines et grecques des mots.
Créateur de la liturgie Mozarabe, il écrivit sur les offices divins. Il écrivit d'autre part sur les différences et la propriété des verbes ou des discours ainsi que sur nombre d'autres thèmes.
Saint Braulion, un de ses collaborateurs et évêque de Saragosse dit de lui : « il avait une facilité d'élocution admirable et se proportionnait sans contrainte à l'intelligence de ceux qu'il avait à instruire. » Saint Ildefonse, évêque de Tolède ajoute « on aimait à l'entendre dire deux fois la même chose et quand même il l'aurait répétée plusieurs fois, on n'en eu pas été ennuyé. »
On lui a donné comme attributs les abeilles, une plume, un prince à ses pieds. Les abeilles symbolisent la douceur et le charme de sa parole en même temps sa diligence à butiner parmi les livres de l'Antiquité. La plume pour l'écrivain. Le prince à ses pieds représente le Goth arien réconcilié avec l'Église d'Espagne.
Depuis peu, on le désigne comme patron des informaticiens en raison de la logique de son oeuvre sur les étymologies.
SOURCE : http://carmina-carmina.com/carmina/Mytholosaints/isidores.htm
BENEDICT XVI
SOURCE : http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2008/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20080618_en.html
St. Isidore of Seville
Born at Cartagena, Spain, about 560; died 4 April, 636.
Works
SOURCE : http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08186a.htm
St. Isidore of Seville
St. Isidore was literally born into a family of saints in sixth century Spain. Two of his brothers, Leander and Fulgentius, and one of his sisters, Florentina, are revered as saints in Spain. It was also a family of leaders and strong minds with Leander and Fulgentius serving as bishops and Florentina as abbess.
This didn’t make life easier for Isidore. To the contrary, Leander may have been holy in many ways, but his treatment of his little brother shocked many even at the time. Leander, who was much older than Isidore, took over Isidore’s education and his pedagogical theory involved force and punishment. We know from Isidore’s later accomplishments that he was intelligent and hard-working so it is hard to understand why Leander thought abuse would work instead of patience.
One day, the young boy couldn’t take any more. Frustrated by his inability to learn as fast as his brother wanted and hurt by his brother’s treatment, Isidore ran away. But though he could escape his brother’s hand and words, he couldn’t escape his own feeling of failure and rejection. When he finally let the outside world catch his attention, he noticed water dripping on the rock near where he sat. The drops of water that fell repeatedly carried no force and seemed to have no effect on the solid stone. And yet he saw that over time, the water drops had worn holes in the rock.
Isidore realized that if he kept working at his studies, his seemingly small efforts would eventually pay off in great learning. He also may have hoped that his efforts would also wear down the rock of his brother’s heart. When he returned home, however, his brother in exasperation confined him to a cell (probably in a monastery) to complete his studies, not believing that he wouldn’t run away again.
Either there must have been a loving side to this relationship or Isidore was remarkably forgiving even for a saint, because later he would work side by side with his brother and after Leander’s death, Isidore would complete many of the projects he began including a missal and breviary.
In a time where it’s fashionable to blame the past for our present and future problems, Isidore was able to separate the abusive way he was taught from the joy of learning. He didn’t run from learning after he left his brother but embraced education and made it his life’s work. Isidore rose above his past to become known as the greatest teacher in Spain.
His love of learning made him promote the establishment of a seminary in every diocese of Spain. He didn’t limit his own studies and didn’t want others to as well. In a unique move, he made sure that all branches ofknowledge including the arts and medicine were taught in the seminaries.
His encyclopedia of knowledge, the Etymologies, was a popular textbook for nine centuries. He also wrote books on grammar, astronomy, geography, history, and biography as well as theology. When the Arabs brought study of Aristotle back to Europe, this was nothing new to Spain because Isidore’s open mind had already reintroduced the philosopher to students there.
As bishop of Seville for 37 years, succeeding Leander, he set a model for representative government in Europe. Under his direction, and perhaps remembering the tyrannies of his brother, he rejected autocratic decision- making and organized synods to discuss government of the Spanish Church.
Still trying to wear away rock with water, he helped convert the barbarian Visigoths from Arianism to Christianity.
He lived until almost 80. As he was dying his house was filled with crowds of poor he was giving aid and alms to. One of his last acts was to give all his possessions to the poor.
When he died in 636, this Doctor of the Church had done more than his brother had ever hoped; the light of his learning caught fire in Spanish minds and held back the Dark Ages of barbarism from Spain. But even greater than his outstanding mind must have been the genius of his heart that allowed him to see beyond rejection and discouragement to joy and possibility.
SOURCE : http://www.ucatholic.com/saints/st-isidore-of-seville/
Isidore of Seville B, Doctor (RM)
Born at Cartagena, Spain, c. 560; died in Seville, Spain, in April 4, 636; canonized by Pope Clement VIII in 1598; and declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Innocent XIII in 1722.
Saint Isidore was born into a noble Hispano-Roman family, which also produced SS. Leander, Fulgentius, and Florentina. Their father was Severian, a Roman from Cartagena, who was closely connected to the Visigothic kings. Though Isidore became one of the most erudite men of his age, as a boy he hated his studies, perhaps because his elder brother, Saint Leander, who taught him, was a strict task master.
It is probably that Isidore assisted Leander in governing his diocese, because, in 601, Saint Isidore succeeded his brother Leander to the archiepiscopal see of Seville. During his long episcopate, Isidore strengthened the Spanish church by organizing councils, establishing schools and religious houses, and continuing to turn the Visigoths from Arianism. He presided over the Council of Seville in 619 and that of Toledo in 633, where he was given precedence over the archbishop of Toledo on the ground of his exceptional merit as the greatest teacher in Spain.
Aware of the great boon of education, Isidore insisted that a cathedral school should be established in every diocese in Spain-- centuries before Charlemagne issued a similar decree. He thought that students should be taught law and medicine, Hebrew and Greek, as well as the classics. These schools were similar to contemporary seminaries.
For centuries Isidore was known as 'the schoolmaster of the middle ages,' because he wrote a 20-volume Etymologies or Origins, an encyclopedia of everything that was known in 7th century Europe. His Chronica Majora summarized all the events in the world from creation to his own time drawn from other church historians but with the addition of Spanish history. Another book completed Saint Jerome's work of biographies of every great man and woman mentioned in the Bible plus those of many Spanish notables. His history of the Goths and Vandals is very valuable today. He also wrote new rules for monasteries, including one that bears his name and was generally followed throughout Spain, and books about astronomy, geography, and theology.
While not an original or critical thinker, Saint Isidore's works were highly influential in the middle ages as demonstrated by the very large number of manuscripts of his writings. Dante mentions him in the Paradiso (x, 130), in the company of the Venerable Bede and the Scottish Richard of Saint-Victor. In fact, at the time of his death, Bede was working on a translation of extracts from Isidore's book On the wonders of nature (De natura rerum).
Isidore longed to convert the Spanish Goths, who were Arians. He rewrote the liturgies and breviaries of the Church for their use (known as the Mozarabic Rite, which had been began by Leander), and never wearied of preaching and teaching those in error during his 37 years as archbishop. He also sought to convert the local Jews, but by highly questionable methods.
This extraordinary man loved to give to the poor, and towards the end of his life scarcely anyone could get into his house in Seville, crowded as it was with beggars and the unfortunate from the surrounding countryside.
When he felt that death was near, he invited two bishops to visit. Together they went to the church where one of them covered him with sackcloth and the other put ashes upon his head. Thus clad in the habit of a penitent, he raised his hands to heaven and prayed earnestly for forgiveness. Then he received the viaticum, asked for the prayers of those present, forgave those who had sinned against him, exhorted all to charity, bequeathed his earthly possessions to the poor, and gave up his soul to God.
The archbishop of Seville was considered the most learned man of his century. Not only for the reason that the Church was able to proclaim him Doctor a short time after his death, or because he is the author of the Etymologies, but because knowledge permeated his whole being. The nexus of sanctity and learning gladdens this heart.
Learning did not turn Saint Isidore away from sanctity. Indeed, it was sanctity that surely made such a learned man of him. The saint, possessed by God, is full of gifts of the Holy Spirit; and learning is one of them. This learning, the true science which contains all other sciences, favors new discoveries and multiplies it in every domain that is approached.
Saints are most exclusively the savants of God and their private works are no less important. And savants are a type of saint because any discovery discloses something of God. The philosopher as well as the painter, the seeker as well as the poet, is a savant.
Recall another Spanish saint, John of the Cross, whose works nearly brought a contemporary philosopher to the edges of sanctity. The bird in Braque's last painting is a figure of grace. This revelation leads me to believe that the patient hand that was the means of painting could not have been anything other than that of a man on the way to sanctity. One can paint birds without making them suggest such a presence as Braque's painting does. This presence is not that of the artist, he has absolutely effaced himself; it is the presence of that which finally transcends him, the presence of God.
The most learned persons have perceived the richness, the 'odor' of sanctity. Our age may see it flower; how could it have a taste for anything else after having plumbed the depths of nothingness and despair, if, of course, it still wants something to which it can aspire. Our generation needs something solid, substantial. It is dying of weariness and thirst.
A life-giving stream is still running, all we need to do is bend down to drink it in order to renew the ancient gestures and enter humbly, without hesitation or compromise, into that which does not go out of fashion and does not age: into this Church in which today we pray to Saint Isidore, who is the patron of savants. Saint Isidore, pray for us and for them (Attwater, Benedictines, Bentley, Delaney, Encyclopedia, Farmer, Walsh).
In art, Saint Isidore is an old bishop with a prince at his feet. At times he may be depicted (1) with pen and book (often his Etymologia); (2) with a beehive or bees (rare, but symbolizes oratorical eloquence); or (3) with his brothers and sister, SS. Leander, Fulgentius, and Florentina (Roeder).
SOURCE : http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/0404.shtml
Voir aussi : http://www.traditioninaction.org/SOD/j174sd_IsidoreSeville4-04.html
http://webs.advance.com.ar/pfernando/DocsIglMed/Isidoro_Sevilla_bio-bibliografia.html
SOURCE : http://agora.qc.ca/Dossiers/Isidore_de_Seville
Saint Isidore 4 avril
(Isis : déesse égyptienne et Doron : en grec : cadeau) Isidore est donc « cadeau d'Isis »
Il y a 13 saints Isidore dont saint Isidore Laboureur, fêté le 10 mai, et saint Isidore de Séville, fêté le 4 avril.Isidore de Séville naquit à Carthagène, en Espagne, en 556. Son père s'appelait Sévérien et sa mère Théodora.
Il eut deux frères : saint Léandre et saint Fulgence, ainsi qu'une sur : Florentine.
Il était encore bébé lorsqu'un jour, sa nourrice l'avait laissé à dormir dans le jardin, il fut entouré d'un essaim d'abeilles. Certaines entraient dans sa bouche pour y déposer du miel. Les autres couraient sur son visage sans lui faire de mal. Cette aventure fut interprétée comme préfigurant sa douceur et son éloquence.
Son frère Léandre était évêque de Séville. Il avait pris la charge de l'éducation d'Isidore. Mais il était si sévère qu'un jour, n'y tenant plus, Isidore s'enfuit.
Il arriva près d'un puits dans lequel une dame avait jeté son seau pour y prendre de l'eau. Il fut frappé par les sillons creusés sur la margelle. La dame lui expliqua que les sillons étaient creusés dans la pierre par les gouttes d'eau qui coulaient toujours au même endroit.
Impressionné par l'obstination de l'eau, il pensa qu'elle pouvait lui servir de modèle et que l'assiduité à l'étude pouvait imprimer en lui la marque des sciences qu'on lui demandait d'apprendre.
Il retourna donc chez son frère qui le maintint longtemps en cellule afin qu'il ne soit pas distrait de ses travaux. Il travailla avec acharnement à l'étude des lettres latines, grecques et hébraïques.
Petit à petit, il devint très habile : remarquable orateur, savant philosophe, bon mathématicien et grand théologien.
Avec son frère Léandre, il combattit l'hérésie arienne.
Après l'affaiblissement des ariens, il se retira dans un monastère. Mais la mort de Léandre l'obligea à prendre en charge l'évêché de Séville, vers l'an 600.
La conduite excellente du diocèse ne l'empêcha pas de faire construire un grand collège et plusieurs monastères pour lesquels il composa une règle dite de saint Isidore. Il y prescrit l'étude obligatoire du grec et de l'hébreu.
Il présida le deuxième concile de Séville et le quatrième concile de Tolède.
Quatre jours avant sa mort il se fit conduire dans l'église de saint Vincent. Il donna la bénédiction au peuple puis se dépouilla de ses vêtements et revêtit le cilice en poils de chèvre et ceinture de crin.
Il fit venir tous ses débiteurs afin de leur remettre leurs dettes à condition que l'argent fût donné aux pauvres.
Les trois autres jours, il se fit porter à l'église. Le troisième jour il mourut devant une foule nombreuse. C'était le 4 avril 639.
Cet écrivain ecclésiastique fut un travailleur infatigable.
Prodigieusement érudit et orateur de premier ordre, il rédigea un ouvrage sur l'histoire des Goths, des Vandales et des Suèves. Vingt livres sur les Étymologies où il traite de la grammaire, de la logique, de l'astronomie, de la médecine, de l'agriculture, de la navigation, de la chronologie en passant par les outils de jardinage et l'équitation etc. Il y donne des définitions de chaque science puis les étymologies latines et grecques des mots.
Créateur de la liturgie Mozarabe, il écrivit sur les offices divins. Il écrivit d'autre part sur les différences et la propriété des verbes ou des discours ainsi que sur nombre d'autres thèmes.
Saint Braulion, un de ses collaborateurs et évêque de Saragosse dit de lui : « il avait une facilité d'élocution admirable et se proportionnait sans contrainte à l'intelligence de ceux qu'il avait à instruire. » Saint Ildefonse, évêque de Tolède ajoute « on aimait à l'entendre dire deux fois la même chose et quand même il l'aurait répétée plusieurs fois, on n'en eu pas été ennuyé. »
On lui a donné comme attributs les abeilles, une plume, un prince à ses pieds. Les abeilles symbolisent la douceur et le charme de sa parole en même temps sa diligence à butiner parmi les livres de l'Antiquité. La plume pour l'écrivain. Le prince à ses pieds représente le Goth arien réconcilié avec l'Église d'Espagne.
Depuis peu, on le désigne comme patron des informaticiens en raison de la logique de son oeuvre sur les étymologies.
SOURCE : http://carmina-carmina.com/carmina/Mytholosaints/isidores.htm
BENEDICT XVI
GENERAL AUDIENCE
Wednesday, 18 June 2008
·
Saint Isidore of Seville
·
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
·
Today I would
like to speak about St Isidore of Seville. He was a younger brother of Leander,
Archbishop of Seville, and a great friend of Pope Gregory the Great. Pointing
this out is important because it enables us to bear in mind a cultural and
spiritual approach that is indispensable for understanding Isidore's personality.
Indeed, he owed much to Leander, an exacting, studious and austere person who
created around his younger brother a family context marked by the ascetic
requirements proper to a monk, and from the work pace demanded by a serious
dedication to study. Furthermore, Leander was concerned to have the wherewithal
to confront the political and social situation of that time: in those decades
in fact, the Visigoths, barbarians and Arians, had invaded the Iberian
Peninsula and taken possession of territories that belonged to the Roman
Empire. It was essential to regain them for the Roman world and for
Catholicism. Leander and Isidore's home was furnished with a library richly
endowed with classical, pagan and Christian works. Isidore, who felt
simultaneously attracted to both, was therefore taught under the responsibility
of his elder brother to develop a very strong discipline, in devoting himself
to study with discretion and discernment.
·
Thus a calm and
open atmosphere prevailed in the episcopal residence in Seville. We can deduce
this from Isidore's cultural and spiritual interests, as they emerge from his
works themselves which include an encyclopaedic knowledge of pagan classical
culture and a thorough knowledge of Christian culture. This explains the eclecticism
characteristic of Isidore's literary opus who glided with the greatest of ease
from Martial to Augustine or from Cicero to Gregory the Great. The inner strife
that the young Isidore had to contend with, having succeeded his brother
Leander on the episcopal throne of Seville in 599, was by no means unimportant.
The impression of excessive voluntarism that strikes one on reading the works
of this great author, considered to be the last of the Christian Fathers of
antiquity, may, perhaps, actually be due to this constant struggle with
himself. A few years after his death in 636, the Council of Toledo in 653
described him as "an illustrious teacher of our time and the glory of the
Catholic Church".
·
Isidore was
without a doubt a man of accentuated dialectic antitheses. Moreover, he
experienced a permanent inner conflict in his personal life, similar to that
which Gregory the Great and St Augustine had experienced earlier, between a
desire for solitude to dedicate himself solely to meditation on the word of God,
and the demands of charity to his brethren for whose salvation, as Bishop, he
felt responsible. He wrote, for example, with regard to Church leaders: "The
man responsible for a Church (vir ecclesiasticus) must on the one
hand allow himself to be crucified to the world with the mortification of his
flesh, and on the other, accept the decision of the ecclesiastical order - when
it comes from God's will - to devote himself humbly to government, even if he
does not wish to" (Sententiarum liber III, 33, 1: PL 83, col
705 B). Just a paragraph later he adds: "Men of God (sancti viri)
do not in fact desire to dedicate themselves to things of the world and groan
when by some mysterious design of God they are charged with certain
responsibilities.... They do their utmost to avoid them but accept what they
would like to shun and do what they would have preferred to avoid.
"Indeed, they enter into the secrecy of the heart and seek there to
understand what God's mysterious will is asking of them. And when they realize
that they must submit to God's plans, they bend their hearts to the yoke of the
divine decision" (Sententiarum liber III, 33, 3: PL 83,
coll. 705-706).
·
To understand
Isidore better it is first of all necessary to recall the complexity of the
political situations in his time to which I have already referred: during the
years of his boyhood he was obliged to experience the bitterness of exile. He
was nevertheless pervaded with apostolic enthusiasm. He experienced the rapture
of contributing to the formation of a people that was at last rediscovering its
unity, both political and religious, with the providential conversion of
Hermenegild, the heir to the Visigoth throne, from Arianism to the Catholic
faith. Yet we must not underestimate the enormous difficulty of coming to grips
with such very serious problems as were the relations with heretics and with
the Jews. There was a whole series of problems which appear very concrete to us
today too, especially if we consider what is happening in certain regions in which
we seem almost to be witnessing the recurrence of situations very similar to
those that existed on the Iberian Peninsular in that sixth century. The wealth
of cultural knowledge that Isidore had assimilated enabled him to constantly
compare the Christian newness with the Greco-Roman cultural heritage, however,
rather than the precious gift of synthesis it would seem that he possessed the
gift of collatio, that is, of collecting, which he expressed in an
extraordinary personal erudition, although it was not always ordered as might
have been desired.
·
In any case,
his nagging worry not to overlook anything that human experience had produced
in the history of his homeland and of the whole world is admirable. Isidore did
not want to lose anything that man had acquired in the epochs of antiquity,
regardless of whether they had been pagan, Jewish or Christian. Hence, it
should not come as a surprise if, in pursuing this goal, he did not always
manage to filter the knowledge he possessed sufficiently in the purifying
waters of the Christian faith as he would have wished. The point is, however,
that in Isidore's intentions, the proposals he made were always in tune with
the Catholic faith which he staunchly upheld. In the discussion of the various
theological problems, he showed that he perceived their complexity and often
astutely suggested solutions that summarize and express the complete Christian
truth. This has enabled believers through the ages and to our times to profit
with gratitude from his definitions. A significant example of this is offered
by Isidore's teaching on the relations between active and contemplative life.
He wrote: "Those who seek to attain repose in contemplation must first
train in the stadium of active life; and then, free from the dross of sin, they
will be able to display that pure heart which alone makes the vision of God
possible" (Differentiarum Lib. II, 34, 133: PL 83, col 91A).
Nonetheless, the realism of a true pastor convinced him of the risk the
faithful run of reducing themselves to one dimension. He therefore added:
"The middle way, consisting of both of these forms of life, normally turns
out to be more useful in resolving those tensions which are often aggravated by
the choice of a single way of life and are instead better tempered by an
alternation of the two forms" (op. cit. 134; ibid., col
91B).
·
Isidore sought
in Christ's example the definitive confirmation of a just orientation of life
and said: "The Saviour Jesus offers us the example of active life when
during the day he devoted himself to working signs and miracles in the town,
but he showed the contemplative life when he withdrew to the mountain and spent
the night in prayer" (op. cit. 134: ibid.). In the light of
this example of the divine Teacher, Isidore can conclude with this precise
moral teaching: "Therefore let the servant of God, imitating Christ,
dedicate himself to contemplation without denying himself active life. Behaving
otherwise would not be right. Indeed, just as we must love God in
contemplation, so we must love our neighbour with action. It is therefore
impossible to live without the presence of both the one and the other form of
life, nor can we live without experiencing both the one and the other" (op.
cit., 135; ibid. col 91C). I consider that this is the synthesis of
a life that seeks contemplation of God, dialogue with God in prayer and in the
reading of Sacred Scripture, as well as action at the service of the human
community and of our neighbour. This synthesis is the lesson that the great
Bishop of Seville has bequeathed to us, Christians of today, called to witness
to Christ at the beginning of a new millennium.
·
·
To special groups
·
I am pleased to
welcome the Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Apostles gathered in Rome for
their General Chapter, and the participants in the Rome Seminar of the
Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities. I also warmly greet a group
of survivors of the Holocaust who are present at today's Audience. Upon all the
English-speaking pilgrims, especially those from England, South Africa,
Australia, Vietnam and the United States, I cordially invoke God's blessings of
joy and peace.
·
Lastly my
thoughts go to the young people, the sick and the newly-weds.
We are on the threshold of the summer period, a season of tourism and of
pilgrimages, of holidays and of rest. Dear young people, as I think of
your peers who are already facing their exams, I hope that you who are already
on holiday will take advantage of the summer break for useful social and
religious experiences. I hope that you, dear sick people, will find
comfort and relief in the closeness of your relatives and to you, dear newly-weds,
I address the invitation to use this summer period to consider ever more
deeply the value of your mission in the Church and in society.
·
My thoughts now
go to those taking part in the International Eucharistic Congress which is
taking place in these days in Quebec City, Canada, on the theme: "The
Eucharist, gift of God for the life of the world". I make myself
present in spirit at this solemn ecclesial meeting, and I hope that for both
the Canadian Christian Communities and for the universal Church it will be a
powerful time of prayer, reflection and contemplation on the mystery of the
Holy Eucharist.
·
May it also be
a favourable opportunity to reaffirm the faith of the Church in the Real
Presence of Christ in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar. Let us also pray
that this International Eucharistic Congress will revive in believers, not only
in Canada but in so many other Nations of the world, the awareness of those
evangelical and spiritual values that have forged their identity throughout the
course of history.
·
·
© Copyright 2008 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana
St. Isidore of Seville
Born at Cartagena, Spain, about 560; died 4 April, 636.
Isidore
was the son of Severianus and Theodora. His elder brother Leander was his immediate predecessor in the Metropolitan
See of Seville; whilst a younger brother St. Fulgentius presided over the Bishopric of Astigi. His sister Florentina was a nun, and is said to have ruled over
forty convents and one thousand religious.
Isidore
received his elementary education in the Cathedral school of Seville. In this institution, which
was the first of its kind in Spain, thetrivium
and quadrivium were taught by a body of
learned men, among whom was the archbishop, Leander. With such diligence
did he apply himself to study that in a remarkably short time mastered Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Whether Isidore ever embraced monastic life or not is still an open question,
but though he himself may never have been affiliated with any of the religious orders, he esteemed them highly. On his elevation to the episcopate he immediately constituted himself
protector of the monks. In 619 he pronounced anathema against anyecclesiastic who should in any way
molest the monasteries.
On
the death of Leander, Isidore succeeded to the See
of Seville. His long incumbency to this office was spent in a period of
disintegration and transition. The ancient institutions and classic learning of
the Roman Empire were fast disappearing. In Spain a new civilization was beginning to evolve itself from the blending racial elements that made up its
population. For almost two centuries theGoths had been in full control of Spain, and their barbarous manners and contempt of learning threatened greatly to
put back her progress in civilization. Realizing that the spiritual as well as the material well-being
of the nation depended on the full assimilation of the foreign elements, St. Isidore set himself to the task of welding into a homogeneous nation the
various peoples who made up the Hispano-Gothic kingdom. To this end he availed
himself of all the resources of religion and education. His efforts were attended with
complete success.Arianism, which had taken deep
root among the Visigoths, was eradicated, and the new heresy of Acephales was completely stifled at the very outset; religious discipline was everywhere strengthened. Like Leander, he took a most
prominent part in the Councils of Toledo andSeville. In all justice it may be said that it was in a great measure due to the enlightened
statecraft of these two illustrious brothers theVisigothic legislation, which emanated from these councils, is regarded by modern historians as exercising a most important influence on the beginnings of
representative government. Isidore presided over the Second Council of Seville, begun 13 November, 619, in the reign ofSisebut. But it was the
Fourth National Council of Toledo that afforded him the opportunity of being of the greatest service to
his county. At this council, begun 5 December, 633, all
the bishops of Spain were in attendance. St. Isidore, though far advanced in years, presided
over its deliberations, and was the originator of most of its enactments. It
was at this council and through his influence that a decree waspromulgated commanding all bishops to establish seminaries in their Cathedral Cities, along the lines of the school already existing atSeville. Within his own jurisdiction he had availed himself of the resources of education to counteract the growing influence of Gothicbarbarism. His was the
quickening spirit that animated the educational movement of which Seville was the centre. The study of Greek andHebrew as well as the liberal arts, was prescribed. Interest in law and medicine was also encouraged. Through the authority of the fourthcouncil this policy of education was made obligatory upon all the bishops of the kingdom. Long before the Arabs had awakened to an appreciation of Greek Philosophy, he had introduced Aristotle to his countrymen. He was the first Christian writer to essay the task of compiling for his co-religionists a summa of universal knowledge. This encyclopedia epitomized all learning, ancient as
well as modern. In it many fragments of classical learning are preserved which
otherwise had been hopelessly lost. The fame of this work imparted a new impetus to encyclopedic writing, which bore abundant fruit
in the subsequent centuries of the Middle Ages. His style, though simple and
lucid, cannot be said to be classical. It discloses most of the imperfections
peculiar to all ages of transition. It particularly reveals a growing Visigothic influence. Arévalo counts in all Isidore's writing 1640 Spanish words.
Isidore
was the last of the ancient Christian Philosophers, as he was the last of the great Latin Fathers. He was undoubtedly the
most learned man of his age and exercised a far-reaching and immeasurable
influence on the educational life of the Middle
Ages. His contemporary and friend, Braulio, Bishop of Saragossa, regarded him as a man raised up
by God to save the Spanish people from the tidal wave of barbarism that threatened to inundate the
ancient civilization of Spain, The Eighth Council of Toledo (653) recorded its admiration of
his character in these glowing terms: "The
extraordinary doctor, the latest ornament of the Catholic Church, the most learned man
of the latter ages, always to be named with reverence, Isidore". This
tribute was endorsed by the Fifteenth Council of Toledo, held in 688.
Works
As
a writer, Isidore was prolific and versatile to an extraordinary degree. His
voluminous writings may be truly said to constitute the firstchapter of Spanish literature. It is not,
however, in the capacity of an original and independent writer, but as an
indefatigable compiler of all existing knowledge, that literature is most deeply indebted to him. The most important and by
far the best-known of all his writings is the "Etymologiae", or
"Origines", as it is sometimes called. This work takes its name from
the subject-matter of one of its constituent books. It was written shortly
before his death, in the full maturity of his wonderful scholarship, at the
request. of his friend Braulio, Bishopof Saragossa. It is a vast
storehouse in which is gathered, systematized, and condensed, all the learning
possessed by his time. Throughout the greater part
of the Middle Ages it was the textbook most in use in educational
institutions. So highly was it regarded as a depository of classical learning that
in a great measure, it superseded the use of the individual works of the classics themselves.
Not even the Renaissance seemed to diminish the high esteem in which it was held, and according
to Arévalo, it was printed ten times between 1470 and 1529. Besides these
numerous reprints, the popularity of the "Etymologiae" gave rise to
many inferior imitations. It furnishes, abundant evidence that the writer
possessed a most intimate knowledge of the Greek and Latin poets. In all, he quotes from one hundred and fifty-four authors, Christian and pagan. Many of these he had read in the
originals and the others he consulted in current compilations. In style this encyclopedic work is concise and clear and in
order, admirable. Braulio, to whom Isidore sent it
for correction, and to whom he dedicated it, divided it into twenty books.
- The first three of these books are taken up with
the trivium and quadrivium. The entire first book is devoted to grammar,
including metre. Imitating the example of Cassiodorus and Boethius he preserves the logical tradition of the schools by reserving the second book for rhetoric and dialectic.
- Book four, treats of medicine and libraries;
- book five, of law and chronology;
- book six, of ecclesiastical books and offices;
- book seven, of God and of the heavenly and earthly hierarchies;
- book eight, of the Church and of the sects, of which
latter he numbers no less than sixty-eight;
- book nine, of languages, peoples, kingdoms, and
official titles;
- book ten,
of etymology:
- book
eleven, of man;
- book twelve, of beasts and birds;
- book thirteen, of the world and its parts;
- book fourteen, of physical geography;
- book fifteen, of public buildings and roadmaking;
- book sixteen, of stones and metals;
- book
seventeen, of agriculture;
- book eighteen, of the terminology of war, of jurisprudence,
and public games;
- book nineteen, of ships, houses, and clothes;
- book twenty, of victuals, domestic and
agricultural tools, and furniture.
In
the second book, dealing with dialectic and rhetoric, Isidore is heavily indebted to translations from the Greek by Boethius. CaeliusAurelianus contributes generously to that part of the fourth book
which deals with medicine. Lactantius is the author most extensively
quoted in the eleventh book, concerning man. The twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth books are largely based on
the writings of Pliny andSolinus; whilst the lost "Prata" of
Suetonius seems to have inspired the general plan of the "Etymologiae", as well as many of its
details.
Similar
in its general character to the "Etymologiae" is a work entitled "Libri duo differentiarum".
The two books of which it is composed are entitled respectively, "De
differentiis verborum" and "De differentiis rerum". The former
is a dictionary of synonyms, treating of the differences of words with
considerable erudition, and not a little ingenuity; the latter an exposition of theological and ascetical ideas, dealing in particular
with the, Trinity and with the Divine and human nature of Christ. It suggests, and probably was inspired by, a similar work of Cato's, It is supplementary to the first two books of the
"Etymologiae". The "Synonyma", or, as it is sometimes
called on account of its peculiar treatment, "Liber lamentationum",
is in a manner illustrative of the first book of the "Differentiae".
It is cast in the form of a dialogue between Man and Reason. The general burden of the dialogue is that Man mourns the condition to which he has been reduced
through sin, and Reason comforts him with the knowledge of how he may still realize eternal happiness. The second part of
this work consists of a dissertation on vice and virtue. The "De natura
rerum" a manual of elementary physics, was composed at
the request of KingSisebut, to whom it is dedicated. It treats of astronomy, geography, and miscellanea. It is one of Isidore's best known books and enjoyed a wide
popularity during the Middle Ages. The authenticity of "De ordine
creaturarum" has been questioned by some critics, though apparently without good reason. Arévalo unhesitatingly attributes it to Isidore. It deals with
various spiritual and physical questions, such as the Trinity, the consequences of sin, eternity, the ocean, the
heavens, and the celestial bodies.
The
subjects of history and biography are represented by three important works. Of these the
first, "Chronicon", is a universal chronicle. In its preface Isidore acknowledges, his indebtedness to Julius Africanus; to St.
Jerome's rendering of Eusebius; and to Victor of Tunnuna. The "Historia de regibus Gothorum, Wandalorum, et Suevorum"
concerns itself chiefly with the Gothic kings whose conquests and government deeply influenced the civilization
of Spain. The history of the Vandals and the Suevi is treated in two short appendixes. This work is regarded
as the chief authority on Gothic history in the West. It contains the interesting statement that the Goths descended from Gog and Magog. Like the other Historical writings of Isidore, it is largely
based on earlier works of history, of which it is
a compendium. It has come down to us in two recensions, one of which ends at
the death of Sisebut (621), and the other continues to the fifth year of the reign of
Swintila, his successor. "De viris
illustribus" is a work of Christian biography and constitutes a most interestingchapter in the literature of patrology. To the number of
illustrious writers mentioned therein Braulio added the name of Isidore himself. A short appendix containing a list of Spanish theologians was added by Braulio's disciple, Ildephonsus of Toledo. It is the continuation of
the work of Gennadius, a Semipelagian priest of Marseilles, who wrote between 467 and 480.
This work of Gennadius was in turn, but the continuation of the work of St.
Jerome.
Among
the scriptural and theological works of St. Isidore the following are especially worthy of note:
- "De ortu et obitu patrum qui in Scriptura laudibus efferuntur" is a work that treats of the more notable Scriptural characters. It contains more than one passage that, in the light of modern scholarship, is naive or fantastic. The question of authenticity has been raised, though quite unreasonably, concerning it.
- "Allegoriae quaedam Sacrae Scripturae"
treats of the allegorical significance that attaches to the more
conspicuous characters ofScripture. In all some two hundred and fifty
personalities of the Old and New Testament are thus treated.
- "Liber numerorum qui in Sanctis Scripturis occurrunt" is a curious
dissertation on the mystical significance of Scriptural numbers.
- "In libros Veteris et Novi Testamenti
prooemia", as its name implies, is a general introduction to the Scriptures, with special
introductions for particular books in the Old and New Testament.
- "De Veteri et Novo Testamento
quastiones" consists of a series of questions concerning the Scriptures.
- "Secretorum expositiones sacramentorum, seu quaestiones in
Vetus Testamentum" is a mystical rendering of the Old Testamentbooks,
of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Josue, Judges, Kings, Esdras, and Machabees. It is based on the
writings of the early Fathers of the Church.
- "De fide catholica ex Veteri et Novo
Testamento, contra Judaeos"
is one of the best known and most meritorious of Isidore's works. It is of an
apologetico-polemical character and is dedicated to Florentina, his
sister, at whose request it is said to have been written. Its popularity
was unbounded in the Middle Ages,
and it was translated into many of the vernaculars of the period. It
treats of the Messianic prophecies, the passing of the Old Law, and of
the Christian Dispensation. The first part deals with the SecondPerson of the Blessed Trinity,
and His return for the final judgment.
The second part is taken up with the unbelief of the Jews, the
calling of the Gentiles, and the
passing of the Sabbath. In all,
it is an appeal to the Jews to accept Christianity.
- "Sententiarum libri tres" is a
compendium of moral and dogmatic theology. Gregory the Great and St.
Augustine are the most
generous contributors to its contents. The Divine attributes, creation, evil, and
miscellanea are the subjects treated in the first book. The second is of a
miscellaneous character;
whilst the third deals with ecclesiastical orders, the judgment and the chastisement of God. It is
believed that this work greatly influenced Peter Lombard in his famous "Book of Sentences",
- "De ecclesiasticis officiis" is divided
into two books, "De origine officiorum" and "De origine
ministrorum". In the first Isidore treats of Divine worship and particularly the old Spanish Liturgy. It also Contains a lucid
explanation of the Holy, Eucharist. The second treats of
the hierarchy of the Church and the various states of life. In it much interesting information
is to be found concerning the development of music in general and its
adaptation to the needs of the Ritual.
- "Regula monachorum" is a manner of life
prescribed for monks, and also
deals in a general way with the monastic state. The writer furnishes abundant proof of the true Christian democracy of the religious life by providing for the admission of men of every rank and station of life. Not even slaves were debarred. "God",
he said, "has made no difference between the soul of the slave and that of the freedman."
He insists that in the monastery all are equal in the sight of God and of the Church.
The
first edition of the works of Isidore was published in folio by Michael Somnius (Paris, 1580). Another
edition that is quite complete is based upon the manuscripts of Gomez, with notes by Perez and Grial (Madrid, 1599). Based largely upon the Madrid edition is that published by Du Breul (Paris, 1601; Cologne, 1617). The
last edition of all the works of Isidore, which is also regarded as the best,
is that of Arévalo (7 vols., Rome, 1797-1803). It is found in P.L., LXXXI-LXXXIV. The
"De natura rerum" was edited by G. Becker (Berlin, 1857). Th. Mommsen edited
the historical writings of St. Isidore ("Mon.
Germ. Hist.: Auct. antiquiss.", Berlin, 1894). Coste produced a Germantranslation of the "Historia de regibus Gothorum, Wandalorum et Suevorum" (Leipzig, 1887).
O'Connor, John Bonaventure. "St. Isidore of Seville." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 8. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910. 3 Apr. 2015 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08186a.htm>.
O'Connor, John Bonaventure. "St. Isidore of Seville." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 8. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910. 3 Apr. 2015 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08186a.htm>.
SOURCE : http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08186a.htm
St. Isidore of Seville
St. Isidore was literally born into a family of saints in sixth century Spain. Two of his brothers, Leander and Fulgentius, and one of his sisters, Florentina, are revered as saints in Spain. It was also a family of leaders and strong minds with Leander and Fulgentius serving as bishops and Florentina as abbess.
This didn’t make life easier for Isidore. To the contrary, Leander may have been holy in many ways, but his treatment of his little brother shocked many even at the time. Leander, who was much older than Isidore, took over Isidore’s education and his pedagogical theory involved force and punishment. We know from Isidore’s later accomplishments that he was intelligent and hard-working so it is hard to understand why Leander thought abuse would work instead of patience.
One day, the young boy couldn’t take any more. Frustrated by his inability to learn as fast as his brother wanted and hurt by his brother’s treatment, Isidore ran away. But though he could escape his brother’s hand and words, he couldn’t escape his own feeling of failure and rejection. When he finally let the outside world catch his attention, he noticed water dripping on the rock near where he sat. The drops of water that fell repeatedly carried no force and seemed to have no effect on the solid stone. And yet he saw that over time, the water drops had worn holes in the rock.
Isidore realized that if he kept working at his studies, his seemingly small efforts would eventually pay off in great learning. He also may have hoped that his efforts would also wear down the rock of his brother’s heart. When he returned home, however, his brother in exasperation confined him to a cell (probably in a monastery) to complete his studies, not believing that he wouldn’t run away again.
Either there must have been a loving side to this relationship or Isidore was remarkably forgiving even for a saint, because later he would work side by side with his brother and after Leander’s death, Isidore would complete many of the projects he began including a missal and breviary.
In a time where it’s fashionable to blame the past for our present and future problems, Isidore was able to separate the abusive way he was taught from the joy of learning. He didn’t run from learning after he left his brother but embraced education and made it his life’s work. Isidore rose above his past to become known as the greatest teacher in Spain.
His love of learning made him promote the establishment of a seminary in every diocese of Spain. He didn’t limit his own studies and didn’t want others to as well. In a unique move, he made sure that all branches ofknowledge including the arts and medicine were taught in the seminaries.
His encyclopedia of knowledge, the Etymologies, was a popular textbook for nine centuries. He also wrote books on grammar, astronomy, geography, history, and biography as well as theology. When the Arabs brought study of Aristotle back to Europe, this was nothing new to Spain because Isidore’s open mind had already reintroduced the philosopher to students there.
As bishop of Seville for 37 years, succeeding Leander, he set a model for representative government in Europe. Under his direction, and perhaps remembering the tyrannies of his brother, he rejected autocratic decision- making and organized synods to discuss government of the Spanish Church.
Still trying to wear away rock with water, he helped convert the barbarian Visigoths from Arianism to Christianity.
He lived until almost 80. As he was dying his house was filled with crowds of poor he was giving aid and alms to. One of his last acts was to give all his possessions to the poor.
When he died in 636, this Doctor of the Church had done more than his brother had ever hoped; the light of his learning caught fire in Spanish minds and held back the Dark Ages of barbarism from Spain. But even greater than his outstanding mind must have been the genius of his heart that allowed him to see beyond rejection and discouragement to joy and possibility.
SOURCE : http://www.ucatholic.com/saints/st-isidore-of-seville/
St. Isidore, Bishop of Seville
From his works and those of SS. Braulio and Ildefonse his disciples. His
life, compiled by Luke, bishop of Tuy, in Galicia, in 1236, extant in Mabillon,
Sæc. Ben. 2. shows not that accuracy and judgment which we admire in the books
of that author against the Albigenses: nor is it here made use of.
A.D. 606.
ST. ISIDORE is honoured in Spain as the most illustrious doctor of that
church, in which God raised him, says St. Braulio, 1 to stem the torrent of barbarism and ferocity which every where followed
the arms of the Goths, who had settled themselves in that kingdom, in 412. The
eighth great council of Toledo, fourteen years after his death, styles him “the
excellent doctor, the late ornament of the Catholic church, the most learned
man, given to enlighten the latter ages, always to be named with reverence.”
The city of Carthagena was the place of his birth, which his parents, Severian
and Theodora, persons of the first quality in the kingdom, edified by the
example of their extraordinary piety. His two brothers, Leander and Fulgentius,
bishops, 2 and his sister Florentina, are also honoured among the saints. Isidore
having qualified himself in his youth for the service of the church by an
uncommon stock of virtue and learning, assisted his brother, Leander,
archbishop of Seville, in the conversion of the Visigoths from the Arian
heresy. This great work he had the happiness to see perfectly accomplished by
his indefatigable zeal and labours, which he continued during the successive
reigns of the kings Reccared, Liuba, Witeric, Gundemar, Sisebut, and Sisemund.
Upon the decease of St. Leander, in 600, or 601, he succeeded him in the see of
Seville. 3 He restored and settled the discipline of the church of Spain in several
councils, of all which he was the oracle and the soul. The purity of their
doctrine, and the severity of the canons enacted in them, drawn up chiefly by
him, are incontestable monuments of his great learning and zeal. 4 In the council of Seville, in 619, in which he presided, he, in a public
disputation, convinced Gregory (a bishop of the Acephali) of his error, who had
come over from Syria; and so evidently did he confute the Eutychian heresy,
that Gregory upon the spot embraced the Catholic faith. In 610, the bishops of
Spain, in a council held at Toledo, agreed to declare the archbishop of that
city primate of all Spain, as, they say, he had always been acknowledged; which
decree king Gundemar confirmed by a law the same year; and St. Isidore
subscribed the same. Yet we find that in the fourth council of Toledo, in 633,
the most famous of all the synods of Spain, though Justus, the archbishop of
Toledo, was present, St. Isidore presided, not by the privilege of his see, but
on the bare consideration of his extraordinary merit; for he was regarded as
the eminent doctor of the churches of Spain. The city of Toledo was honoured
with the residence of the Visigoth kings.
St. Isidore, to extend to posterity the advantages which his
labours had procured to the church, compiled many useful works: in which he
takes in the whole circle of the sciences, and discovers a most extensive
reading, and a general acquaintance with the ancient writers, both sacred and
profane. In the moral parts his style is pathetic and moving, being the
language of a heart overflowing with sentiments of religion and piety: and
though elegance and politeness of style were not the advantage of that age, the
diction of this father is agreeable and clear. 5 The saint was well versed in the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages.
St. Ildefonse says, that this saint governed his church nearly forty
years, but cannot mean above thirty-six or thirty-seven. When he was almost
fourscore years old, though age and fatigues had undermined and broken his
health, he never interrupted his usual exercises and labours. During the last
six months of his life, he increased his charities with such profusion, that
the poor of the whole country crowded his house from morning till night.
Perceiving his end to draw near, he entreated two bishops to come to see him.
With them he went to the church, where one of them covered him with sackcloth,
the other put ashes on his head. Clothed with the habit of penance, he
stretched his hands towards heaven, prayed with great earnestness, and begged
aloud the pardon of his sins. He then received from the hands of the bishops
the body and blood of our Lord, recommended himself to the prayers of all who
were present, remitted the bonds of all his debtors, exhorted the people to
charity, and caused all the money which he had not as yet disposed of to be
distributed among the poor. This done, he returned to his own house, and calmly
departed this life on the fourth day after, which was the 4th of April, in the
year 636, as is expressly testified by Ædemptus, his disciple, who was present
at his death. His body was interred in his cathedral, between those of his
brother, St. Leander, and his sister, St. Florentina. Ferdinand, king of
Castile and Leon, recovered his relics from the Moors, and placed them in the
church of St. John Baptist, at Leon, where they still remain.
All who are employed in the functions of Martha, or of an exterior
active life, must always remember that action and contemplation ought to be so
constantly intermingled, that the former be always animated and directed by the
latter, and amidst the exterior labours of the active life, we constantly enjoy
the interior repose of the contemplative, and that no employments entirely
interrupt the union of our souls to God; but those that are most distracting
serve to make us more closely, more eagerly, and more amorously plunge our
hearts in Him, embracing him in himself by contemplation, and in our neighbour
by our actions.
Note 1. Prænot. lib. Isidor.
Note 2. F. Flores proves this St.
Fulgentius, bishop of Ecija, suffragan of Seville, to have never been translated
to the see of Carthagena, as Card. Belluga and some others have advanced upon
incompetent modern authorities. Flores, Espana
Sagrada, t. 5. p. 97. Dissertacion Critica sobre si S. Fulgencio fue Obispo de
Carthagena.
Note 3. Not in 595, as Cave, &c. say; for St. Gregory wrote to St. Leander
in 599. l. 9. ep. 60, 61.
Note 4. See on the councils the
dissertations of the learned cardinal d’Aguirre.
Note 5. The Latin and Greek languages are a necessary introduction to learning,
they are requisite to open to us the sources of sacred studies, and are adopted
by the church in her liturgies to prevent the inconveniences and dangerous
consequences of continual alterations and variations: they are likewise the key
which unlock to us the original and most accomplished masters of polite
literature, and almost all the sciences. These and other reasons moved St.
Isidore to cultivate the study of those languages. The Latin tongue, though
degenerating from its purity ever since the reign of Domitian, still continued
the living language among the old Roman inhabitants of Spain; but began to be
debased by the mixture of the Goths: and this alteration was afterward much
increased by the irruption of the Moors, and by the commerce of other barbarous
nations. To preserve the knowledge of the Latin tongue, St. Isidore wrote
several treatises on grammar. He compiled others on philosophy, on the holy
scriptures, and on various subjects of piety; as on prayer, penance, and the
contempt of the world. He has likewise left us a list of ninety-two
ecclesiastical writers from Pope Sixtus III. with whom St. Jerom concluded his
catalogue, a chronicle from the beginning of the world down to his own time,
and a history of the Goths. F. Flores has favoured us with a new complete
edition of St. Isidore’s book, De Viris Illustribus, with a preliminary
dissertation, in an appendix to the fifth tome of his Espana Sagrada, p. 440.
Also of this father’s Historia de Regibus Gothorum, Wandalorum et Suevorum,
ibid. t. 6. Append. 12. p. 474. The most famous of St. Isidore’s works are
twenty books of Etymologies, or Origins, in which he lays down the principles
of the different sciences, beginning from grammar. His three books of the
Sentences, or on the Summum Bonum, are a summary of theology on the divine
attributes, on virtues and vices, consisting of sentences gleaned from the
writings of SS. Austin, Gregory, &c. In his two books on the divine or
ecclesiastical Offices, he explains the canonical hours, ceremonies, feasts,
and fasts of the church. He says that our fathers established the festivals of
the apostles and martyrs to excite us to an imitation of their virtues, to
associate us to their merits, and that we may be assisted by their prayers; yet
to none of them do we offer sacrifice, but only to the God of martyrs. (l. 1.
c. 34.) Among the fast days he mentions two which are not now observed, viz. the
first days of January and November. His monastic rule, which he addressed to
the monks of Honori, resembles that of St. Bennet. In it he orders mass to be
said for every deceased brother, and on Monday in Whitsun-week for all the
faithful departed. He prescribes that the monks prostrate themselves at the end
of each psalm in the divine office. St. Isidore put the finishing hand to the
Mosarabic missal and breviary, which St. Leander had begun to revise. Le Brun
thinks it was compiled by the latter. Floras takes it to have been the ancient
Roman and African missal introduced among the Goths in Spain, by St. Leander,
with some few things from the old Spanish liturgy. See
Flores, Espana Sagrada, t. 3. De la Missa antiqua de Espagna, p. 187, 196. F. Lesley, a Jesuit, who has given a new
edition of the Mosarabic liturgy at Rome, in 1755, with curious notes, brings
many arguments to show that it was the old Spanish liturgy, used probably from
the beginning of that church, with some additions, which St. Leander adopted
for the use of the Goths. See Lesley, Præf.
ib.
Rev. Alban
Butler (1711–73). Volume IV: April. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
Isidore of Seville B, Doctor (RM)
Born at Cartagena, Spain, c. 560; died in Seville, Spain, in April 4, 636; canonized by Pope Clement VIII in 1598; and declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Innocent XIII in 1722.
Saint Isidore was born into a noble Hispano-Roman family, which also produced SS. Leander, Fulgentius, and Florentina. Their father was Severian, a Roman from Cartagena, who was closely connected to the Visigothic kings. Though Isidore became one of the most erudite men of his age, as a boy he hated his studies, perhaps because his elder brother, Saint Leander, who taught him, was a strict task master.
It is probably that Isidore assisted Leander in governing his diocese, because, in 601, Saint Isidore succeeded his brother Leander to the archiepiscopal see of Seville. During his long episcopate, Isidore strengthened the Spanish church by organizing councils, establishing schools and religious houses, and continuing to turn the Visigoths from Arianism. He presided over the Council of Seville in 619 and that of Toledo in 633, where he was given precedence over the archbishop of Toledo on the ground of his exceptional merit as the greatest teacher in Spain.
Aware of the great boon of education, Isidore insisted that a cathedral school should be established in every diocese in Spain-- centuries before Charlemagne issued a similar decree. He thought that students should be taught law and medicine, Hebrew and Greek, as well as the classics. These schools were similar to contemporary seminaries.
For centuries Isidore was known as 'the schoolmaster of the middle ages,' because he wrote a 20-volume Etymologies or Origins, an encyclopedia of everything that was known in 7th century Europe. His Chronica Majora summarized all the events in the world from creation to his own time drawn from other church historians but with the addition of Spanish history. Another book completed Saint Jerome's work of biographies of every great man and woman mentioned in the Bible plus those of many Spanish notables. His history of the Goths and Vandals is very valuable today. He also wrote new rules for monasteries, including one that bears his name and was generally followed throughout Spain, and books about astronomy, geography, and theology.
While not an original or critical thinker, Saint Isidore's works were highly influential in the middle ages as demonstrated by the very large number of manuscripts of his writings. Dante mentions him in the Paradiso (x, 130), in the company of the Venerable Bede and the Scottish Richard of Saint-Victor. In fact, at the time of his death, Bede was working on a translation of extracts from Isidore's book On the wonders of nature (De natura rerum).
Isidore longed to convert the Spanish Goths, who were Arians. He rewrote the liturgies and breviaries of the Church for their use (known as the Mozarabic Rite, which had been began by Leander), and never wearied of preaching and teaching those in error during his 37 years as archbishop. He also sought to convert the local Jews, but by highly questionable methods.
This extraordinary man loved to give to the poor, and towards the end of his life scarcely anyone could get into his house in Seville, crowded as it was with beggars and the unfortunate from the surrounding countryside.
When he felt that death was near, he invited two bishops to visit. Together they went to the church where one of them covered him with sackcloth and the other put ashes upon his head. Thus clad in the habit of a penitent, he raised his hands to heaven and prayed earnestly for forgiveness. Then he received the viaticum, asked for the prayers of those present, forgave those who had sinned against him, exhorted all to charity, bequeathed his earthly possessions to the poor, and gave up his soul to God.
The archbishop of Seville was considered the most learned man of his century. Not only for the reason that the Church was able to proclaim him Doctor a short time after his death, or because he is the author of the Etymologies, but because knowledge permeated his whole being. The nexus of sanctity and learning gladdens this heart.
Learning did not turn Saint Isidore away from sanctity. Indeed, it was sanctity that surely made such a learned man of him. The saint, possessed by God, is full of gifts of the Holy Spirit; and learning is one of them. This learning, the true science which contains all other sciences, favors new discoveries and multiplies it in every domain that is approached.
Saints are most exclusively the savants of God and their private works are no less important. And savants are a type of saint because any discovery discloses something of God. The philosopher as well as the painter, the seeker as well as the poet, is a savant.
Recall another Spanish saint, John of the Cross, whose works nearly brought a contemporary philosopher to the edges of sanctity. The bird in Braque's last painting is a figure of grace. This revelation leads me to believe that the patient hand that was the means of painting could not have been anything other than that of a man on the way to sanctity. One can paint birds without making them suggest such a presence as Braque's painting does. This presence is not that of the artist, he has absolutely effaced himself; it is the presence of that which finally transcends him, the presence of God.
The most learned persons have perceived the richness, the 'odor' of sanctity. Our age may see it flower; how could it have a taste for anything else after having plumbed the depths of nothingness and despair, if, of course, it still wants something to which it can aspire. Our generation needs something solid, substantial. It is dying of weariness and thirst.
A life-giving stream is still running, all we need to do is bend down to drink it in order to renew the ancient gestures and enter humbly, without hesitation or compromise, into that which does not go out of fashion and does not age: into this Church in which today we pray to Saint Isidore, who is the patron of savants. Saint Isidore, pray for us and for them (Attwater, Benedictines, Bentley, Delaney, Encyclopedia, Farmer, Walsh).
In art, Saint Isidore is an old bishop with a prince at his feet. At times he may be depicted (1) with pen and book (often his Etymologia); (2) with a beehive or bees (rare, but symbolizes oratorical eloquence); or (3) with his brothers and sister, SS. Leander, Fulgentius, and Florentina (Roeder).
SOURCE : http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/0404.shtml
Voir aussi : http://www.traditioninaction.org/SOD/j174sd_IsidoreSeville4-04.html
http://webs.advance.com.ar/pfernando/DocsIglMed/Isidoro_Sevilla_bio-bibliografia.html