Erasmus lived against the backdrop of the growing European religious reformations. He developed a biblical humanistic theology in which he advocated the religious and civil necessity both of peaceable concord and of pastoral tolerance on matters of indifference. He remained a member of the Catholic Church all his life, remaining committed to reforming the church from within. He promoted the traditional[citation needed][according to whom?] doctrine of synergism, which some prominent reformers such as Martin Luther and John Calvin rejected in favor of the doctrine of monergism. His influential middle-road approach disappointed, and even angered, partisans in both camps.
Life and career
Erasmus's almost 70 years may be divided into quarters.[note 2]
First was his medieval Dutch childhood, ending with his being orphaned and impoverished;
Second, his struggling years as a canon (a kind of semi-monk), a clerk, a priest, a failing and sickly university student, a would-be poet, and a tutor;
Third, his flourishing but peripatetic High Renaissance years of increasing focus and literary productivity following his 1499 contact with a reformist English circle notably John Colet and Thomas More, then with radical French Franciscan Jean Vitrier (or Voirier),[note 3] and later with the Greek-speaking Aldine New Academy in Venice; and
Fourth, his financially more secure Reformation years near the Black Forest: as a prime influencer of European thought through his New Testament and increasing public opposition to aspects of Lutheranism, first in Basel and then as a Catholic religious refugee in Freiburg.
Early life
Desiderius Erasmus is reported to have been born in Rotterdam on 27 or 28 October ("the vigil of Simon and Jude")[6] in the late 1460s.
He was named[note 4] after Erasmus of Formiae, whom Erasmus' father Gerard (Gerardus Helye)[7] personally favored.[8][9] Although associated closely with Rotterdam, he lived there for only four years, never to return afterwards.
The year of Erasmus' birth is unclear: in later life he calculated his age as if born in 1466, but frequently his remembered age at major events actually implies 1469.[10][11]: 8 (This article currently gives 1466 as the birth year.[12][13] To handle this disagreement, ages are given first based on 1469, then in parentheses based on 1466: e.g., "20 (or 23)".) Furthermore, many details of his early life must be gleaned from a fictionalized third-person account he wrote in 1516 (published in 1529) in a letter to a fictitious Papal secretary, Lambertus Grunnius ("Mr. Grunt").[14]
His parents could not be legally married: his father, Gerard, was a Catholic priest[15] who may have spent up to six years in the 1450s or 60s in Italy as a scribe and scholar.[16]: 196 His mother was Margaretha Rogerius (Latinized form of Dutch surname Rutgers),[17] the daughter of a doctor from Zevenbergen. She may have been Gerard's housekeeper.[15][18]
Although he was born out of wedlock, Erasmus was cared for by his parents, with a loving household and the best education, until their early deaths from the bubonic plague in 1483. His only sibling Peter might have been born in 1463, and some writers suggest Margaret was a widow and Peter was the half-brother of Erasmus; Erasmus on the other hand called him his brother.[11] There were legal and social restrictions on the careers and opportunities open to the children of unwed parents.
Erasmus' own story, in the possibly forged 1524 Compendium vitae Erasmi was along the lines that his parents were engaged, with the formal marriage blocked by his relatives (presumably a young widow or unmarried mother with a child was not an advantageous match); his father went to Italy to study Latin and Greek, and the relatives misled Gerard that Margaretha had died, on which news grieving Gerard romantically took Holy Orders, only to find on his return that Margaretha was alive; many scholars dispute this account.[19]
In 1471 his father became the vice-curate of the small town of Woerden (where young Erasmus may have attended the local vernacular school to learn to read and write) and in 1476 was promoted to vice-curate of Gouda.[7]
Erasmus was given the highest education available to a young man of his day, in a series of monastic or semi-monastic schools. In 1476, at the age of 6 (or 9), his family moved to Gouda and he started at the school of Pieter Winckel,[7] who later became his guardian (and, perhaps, squandered Erasmus and Peter's inheritance.) Historians who date his birth in 1466 have Erasmus in Utrecht at the choir school at this period.[20]
In 1478, at the age of 9 (or 12), he and his older brother Peter were sent to one of the best Latin schools in the Netherlands, located at Deventer and owned by the chapter clergy of the Lebuïnuskerk (St. Lebuin's Church).[12] A notable previous student was Thomas à Kempis. Towards the end of his stay there the curriculum was renewed by the new principal of the school, Alexander Hegius, a correspondent of pioneering rhetorician Rudolphus Agricola. For the first time in Europe north of the Alps, Greek was taught at a lower level than a university[21] and this is where he began learning it.[22] His education there ended when plague struck the city about 1483,[23] and his mother, who had moved to provide a home for her sons, died from the infection; then his father. Following the death of his parents, as well as 20 fellow students at his school,[11] he moved back to his patria (Rotterdam?)[7] where he was supported by Berthe de Heyden,[24] a compassionate widow.[11]
In 1484, around the age 14 (or 17), he and his brother went to a cheaper[25] grammar school or seminary at 's-Hertogenbosch run by the Brethren of the Common Life:[26][note 5] Erasmus' Epistle to Grunnius satirizes them as the "Collationary Brethren"[14] who select and sort boys for monkhood. He was exposed there to the Devotio moderna movement and the Brethren's famous book The Imitation of Christ but resented the harsh rules and strict methods of the religious brothers and educators.[12] The two brothers made an agreement that they would resist the clergy but attend the university;[24] Erasmus longed to study in Italy, the birthplace of Latin, and have a degree from an Italian university.[10]: 804 Instead, Peter left for the Augustinian canonry in Stein, which left Erasmus feeling betrayed.[24] Around this time he wrote forlornly to his friend Elizabeth de Heyden "Shipwrecked am I, and lost, 'mid waters chill'."[11] He suffered Quartan fever for over a year. Eventually Erasmus moved to the same abbey as a postulant in or before 1487,[7] around the age of 16 (or 19.)[note 6]
Vows, ordination and canonry experience
Bust by Hildo Krop (1950) in Gouda, where Erasmus spent his youth
Poverty[27] had forced the sickly, bookish, teenaged orphan Erasmus into the consecrated life, entering the novitiate in 1487[28] at the canonry at rural Stein, very near Gouda, South Holland: the Chapter of Sion community[note 7] largely borrowed its rule from the larger monkish Congregation of Windesheim who had historical associations with the Brethren of the Common Life, but also with the notable pastoral, mystical[29]: ch1 and anti-speculative post-scholastic theologians Jean Gerson[30]: 315 and Gabriel Biel: positions associated also with Erasmus.[31]: 46–48 In 1488–1490, the surrounding region was plundered badly by armies fighting the Squire Francis War of succession and then suffered a famine.[10]: 759 Erasmus professed his vows as a Canon regular of St. Augustine[note 8] there in late 1488 at age 19 (or 22).[28] Historian Fr. Aiden Gasquet later wrote: "One thing, however, would seem to be quite clear; he could never have had any vocation for the religious life. His whole subsequent history shows this unmistakably."[35] But according to one Catholic biographer, Erasmus had a spiritual awakening at the monastery.[36]
Certain abuses in religious orders were among the chief objects of his later calls to reform the Western Church from within, particularly coerced or tricked recruitment of immature boys (the fictionalized account in the Letter to Grunnius calls them "victims of Dominic and Francis and Benedict"): Erasmus felt he had belonged to this class, joining "voluntarily but not freely" and so considered himself, if not morally bound by his vows, certainly legally, socially and honour- bound to keep them, yet to look for his true vocation.[32]: 439
While at Stein, 18-(or 21-)year-old Erasmus fell in unrequited love, forming what he called a "passionate attachment" (Latin: fervidos amores), with a fellow canon, Servatius Rogerus,[note 9] and wrote a series of love letters[note 10][38] in which he called Rogerus "half my soul",[note 11] writing that "it was not for the sake of reward or out of a desire for any favour that I have wooed you both unhappily and relentlessly. What is it then? Why, that you love him who loves you."[39][note 12] This correspondence contrasts with the generally detached and much more restrained attitude he usually showed in his later life, though he had a capacity to form and maintain deep male friendships,[note 13] such as with More, Colet, and Ammonio.[note 14] No mentions or sexual accusations were ever made of Erasmus during his lifetime. His works notably praise moderate sexual desire in marriage between men and women.[40]
In 1493, his prior arranged for him to leave the Stein house[43] and take up the post of Latin Secretary to the ambitious Bishop of Cambrai, Henry of Bergen, on account of his great skill in Latin and his reputation as a man of letters.[44][note 16]
He was ordained to the Catholic priesthood either on 25 April 1492,[27] or 25 April 1495, at age 25 (or 28.)[note 17] Either way, he did not actively work as a choir priest for very long,[46] though his many works on confession and penance suggests experience of dispensing them.
From 1500, he avoided returning to the canonry at Stein even insisting the diet and hours would kill him,[note 18] though he did stay with other Augustinian communities and at monasteries of other orders in his travels. Rogerus, who became prior at Stein in 1504, and Erasmus corresponded over the years, with Rogerus demanding Erasmus return after his studies were complete. Nevertheless, the library of the canonry[note 19] ended up with by far the largest collection of Erasmus' publications in the Gouda region.[47]
In 1505, Pope Julius II granted a dispensation[48] from the vow of poverty to the extent of allowing Erasmus to hold certain benefices, and from the control and habit of his order, though he remained a priest and, formally, an Augustinian canon regular[note 20] the rest his life.[32] In 1517, Pope Leo X granted legal dispensations for Erasmus' defects of natality[note 21] and confirmed the previous dispensation, allowing the 48-(or 51-)year-old his independence[49] but still, as a canon, capable of holding office as a prior or abbot.[32] In 1525, Pope Clement VII granted, for health reasons, a dispensation to eat meat and dairy in Lent and on fast days.[50]: 410
↓Birth?
↓Orphaned
↓Vows
↓Ordained?
↓Julius II
↓Leo X
↓Clement VII
↓Death
↓
↓
↓Dispensations
Netherlands
France
Italy
England
Brabant
Basel
Freiburg
England
Brabant
England
France
Basel
Basel
England
Basel
England
Basel
│
1465
│
1475
│
1485
│
1495
│
1505
│
1515
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1525
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1535
Life timeline
Travels
Cities and Routes of Erasmus
Walsingham
Oxford, Cambridge
London
Reading
Canterbury
Deventer
Woerden
Calais
Stein, Gouda
Rotterdam
St Omer
's-Hertogenbosch
Cambrai/Bergen
Brussels, Antwerp
Paris
Louvain
Orléans
Lyon
Liège, Cologne
Mainz
Turin
Strasbourg
Bologna
Freiburg im Breisgau
Besançon, Basel †
Florence, Ferrara
Konstanz
Sienna,
Padua
Rome,
Venice
Cumae
Green: early life Dark circles: residence Thin line: alpine crossings Red and green lines: horseback, carriage Blue lines: Rhine and English Channel
Erasmus traveled widely and regularly, for reasons of poverty, "escape"[51]: 154 from his Stein canonry (to Cambrai), education (to Paris, Turin), escape from the sweating sickness plague (to Orléans), employment (to England), searching libraries for manuscripts, writing (Brabant), royal counsel (Cologne), patronage, tutoring and chaperoning (North Italy), networking (Rome), seeing books through printing in person (Paris, Venice, Louvain, Basel), and avoiding the persecution of religious fanatics (to Freiburg). He enjoyed horseback riding.[52]
Paris
In 1495 with Bishop Henry's consent and a stipend, Erasmus went on to study at the University of Paris in the Collège de Montaigu, a centre of reforming zeal,[note 22] under the direction of the asceticJan Standonck, of whose rigors he complained.[53] The university was then the chief seat of Scholastic learning but already coming under the influence of Renaissance humanism.[54] For instance, Erasmus became an intimate friend of an Italian humanist Publio Fausto Andrelini, poet and "professor of humanity" in Paris.[55]
During this time, Erasmus developed a deep aversion to exclusive or excessive Aristotelianism and Scholasticism[56] and started finding work as a tutor/chaperone to visiting English and Scottish aristocrats. There is no record of him graduating.
"I can truly say that no place in the world has given me so many friends—true, learned, helpful, and illustrious friends—as the single city of London." Letter to Colet, 1509[35]
Erasmus stayed in England at least three times.[note 23] In between he had periods studying in Paris, Orléans, Leuven and other cities.
In 1499 he was invited to England by William Blount, 4th Baron Mountjoy, who offered to accompany him on his trip to England.[58] His time in England was fruitful in the making of lifelong friendships with the leaders of English thought in the days of King Henry VIII.
During his first visit to England in 1499, he studied or taught at the University of Oxford. There is no record of him gaining any degree. Erasmus was particularly impressed by the Bible teaching of John Colet, who pursued a style more akin to the church fathers than the Scholastics. Through the influence of the humanist John Colet, his interests turned towards theology.[58] Other distinctive features of Colet's thought that may have influenced Erasmus are his pacifism,[59] reform-mindedness,[60] anti-Scholasticism and pastoral esteem for the sacrament of Confession.[61]: 94
This prompted him, upon his return from England to Paris, to intensively study the Greek language, which would enable him to study theology on a more profound level.[62]: 518
Erasmus also became fast friends with Thomas More, a young law student considering becoming a monk, whose thought (e.g., on conscience and equity) had been influenced by 14th century French theologian Jean Gerson,[63][64] and whose intellect had been developed by his powerful patron Cardinal John Morton (d. 1500) who had famously attempted reforms of English monasteries.[65]
Erasmus left London with a full purse from his generous friends, to allow him to complete his studies. However, he had been provided with bad legal advice by his friends: the English Customs officials confiscated all the gold and silver, leaving him with nothing except a night fever that lasted several months.
Following his first trip to England, Erasmus returned first to poverty in Paris, where he started to compile the Adagio for his students, then to Orléans to escape the plague, and then to semi-monastic life, scholarly studies and writing in France, notably at the Benedictine Abbey of Saint Bertin at St Omer (1501,1502) where he wrote the initial version of the Enchiridion (Handbook of the Christian Knight.) A particular influence was his encounter in 1501 with Jean (Jehan) Vitrier, a radical Franciscan who consolidated Erasmus' thoughts against excessive valorization of monasticism,[61]: 94, 95 ceremonialism[note 24] and fasting[note 25] in a kind of conversion experience,[16]: 213, 219 and introduced him to Origen.[67]
In 1502, Erasmus went to Brabant, ultimately to the university at Louvain. In 1504 he was hired by the leaders of the Brabantian "Provincial States" to deliver one of his few public speeches, a very long formal panegyric for the Philip "the Fair", Duke of Burgundy and later King of Castille: the first half being the conventional extravagant praise, but the second half being a strong treatment of the miseries of war, the need for neutrality and concilliation (with the neighbours France and England),[68] and the excellence of peaceful rulers: that real courage in a leader was not to wage war but to put a bridle on greed, etc.[69]: 71 This was later published as Panegyricus. Erasmus then returned to Paris in 1504.
For Erasmus' second visit, he spent over a year staying at recently married Thomas More's house, now a lawyer and Member of Parliament, honing his translation skills.[57]
Erasmus preferred to live the life of an independent scholar and made a conscious effort to avoid any actions or formal ties that might inhibit his individual freedom.[70] In England Erasmus was approached with prominent offices but he declined them all, until the King himself offered his support.[70] He was inclined, but eventually did not accept and longed for a stay in Italy.[70]
In 1506 he was able to accompany and tutor the sons of the personal physician of the English King through Italy to Bologna.[70]
His discovery en route of Lorenzo Valla's New Testament Notes was a major event in his career and prompted Erasmus to study the New Testament using philology.[71]
In 1506 they passed through Turin and he arranged to be awarded the degree of Doctor of Sacred Theology (Sacra Theologia)[72]: 638 from the University of Turin[70]per saltum[73] at age 37 (or 40.) Erasmus stayed tutoring in Bologna for a year; in the winter, Erasmus was present when Pope Julius II entered victorious into the conquered Bologna which he had besieged before.[70]
Book printed and illuminated at the Aldine Press, Venice (1501): Horace, Works
Erasmus travelled on to Venice, working on an expanded version of his Adagia at the Aldine Press of the famous printer Aldus Manutius, advised him which manuscripts to publish,[74] and was an honorary member of the graecophone Aldine "New Academy" (Greek: Neakadêmia (Νεακαδημία)).[75] From Aldus he learned the in-person workflow that made him productive at Froben: making last-minute changes, and immediately checking and correcting printed page proofs as soon as the ink had dried. Aldus wrote that Erasmus could do twice as much work in a given time as any other man he had ever met.[35]
In 1507, according to his letters, he studied advanced Greek in Padua with the Venetian natural philosopher, Giulio Camillo.[76] He found employment tutoring and escorting Scottish nobleman Alexander Stewart, the 24-year old Archbishop of St Andrews, through Padua, Florence, and Siena[note 26] Erasmus made it to Rome in 1509, visiting some notable libraries and cardinals, but having a less active association with Italian scholars than might have been expected.
In 1509, William Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, and Lord Mountjoy lured him back to England, now ruled by what was hoped would be a wise and benevolent king (Henry VIII) educated by humanists. Warham and Mountjoy sent Erasmus £10 to cover his expenses on the journey.[78] On his trip over the Alps via Splügen Pass, and down the Rhine toward England, Erasmus began to compose The Praise of Folly.[79]
Third visit to England (1510–1515)
In 1510, Erasmus arrived at More's bustling house, was confined to bed to recover from his recurrent illness, and wrote The Praise of Folly, which was to be a best-seller. More was at that time the undersheriff of the City of London.
After his glorious reception in Italy, Erasmus had returned broke and jobless,[note 27] with strained relations with former friends and benefactors on the continent, and he regretted leaving Italy, despite being horrified by papal warfare. There is a gap in his usually voluminous correspondence: his so-called "two lost years", perhaps due to self-censorship of dangerous or disgruntled opinions;[note 14] he shared lodgings with his friend Andrea Ammonio (Latin secretary to Mountjoy, and the next year, to Henry VIII) provided at the London Austin Friars' compound, skipping out after a disagreement with the friars over rent that caused bad blood.[note 28]
He assisted his friend John Colet by authoring Greek textbooks and securing members of staff for the newly established St Paul's School[82] and was in contact when Colet gave his notorious 1512 Convocation sermon which called for a reformation of ecclesiastical affairs.[83]: 230–250 At Colet's instigation, Erasmus started work on De copia.
Erasmus mainly stayed at Queens' College while lecturing at the university,[86] between 1511 and 1515.[note 30] Erasmus' rooms were located in the "I" staircase of Old Court.[87] Despite a chronic shortage of money, he succeeded in mastering Greek by an intensive, day-and-night study of three years, taught by Thomas Linacre, continuously begging in letters that his friends send him books and money for teachers.[88]
Erasmus suffered from poor health and was especially concerned with heating, clean air, ventilation, draughts, fresh food and unspoiled wine: he complained about the draughtiness of English buildings.[89] He complained that Queens' College could not supply him with enough decent wine[note 31] (wine was the Renaissance medicine for gallstones, from which Erasmus suffered).[90] As Queens' was an unusually humanist-leaning institution in the 16th century, Queens' College Old Library still houses many first editions of Erasmus's publications, many of which were acquired during that period by bequest or purchase, including Erasmus's New Testament translation, which is signed by friend and Polish religious reformer Jan Łaski.[91]
His residence at Leuven, where he lectured at the University, exposed Erasmus to much criticism from those ascetics, academics and clerics hostile to the principles of literary and religious reform to which he was devoting his life.[92] In 1514, en route to Basel, he made the acquaintance of Hermannus Buschius, Ulrich von Hutten and Johann Reuchlin who introduced him to the Hebrew language in Mainz.[93] In 1514, he suffered a fall from his horse and injured his back.
Quinten Matsys – Portrait of Peter Gillis or Gilles (1517), half of a diptych with a portrait of Erasmus below, painted as a gift from them for Thomas More.[94]
Erasmus may have made several other short visits to England or English territory while living in Brabant.[57] Happily for Erasmus, More and Tunstall were posted in Brussels or Antwerp on government missions around 1516, More for six months, Tunstall for longer. Their circle include Pieter Gillis of Antwerp, in whose house Thomas More's wrote Utopia (pub. 1516) with Erasmus' encouragement,[note 32] Erasmus editing and perhaps even contributing fragments.[96] His old Cambridge friend Richard Sampson was vicar general running the nearby diocese of Tournai.
In 1516, Erasmus accepted an honorary position as a Councillor to Charles V with an annuity of 200 guilders (over US$100,000), rarely paid,[97] and tutored Charles' brother, the teenage future Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand of Hapsburg.
In 1516, Erasmus published the first edition of his scholarly Latin-Greek New Testament with annotations, his complete works of Jerome, and The Education of a Christian Prince (Institutio principis Christiani) for Charles and Ferdinand.
In 1517, his great friend Ammonio died in England of the Sweating Sickness. In 1518, Erasmus was diagnosed with the plague; despite the danger, he was taken in and cared for in the home of his Flemish friend and publisher Dirk Martens in Antwerp for a month and recovered.[100]
By 1518, he reported to Paulus Bombasius that his income was over 300 ducats[note 33] per year (over US$150,000) without including patronage.[102]: 350 By 1522 he reported his annual income as 400 gold florins[103]: 50 (over US$200,000.)
Desiderius Erasmus dictating to his ammenuensis Gilbert Cousin or Cognatus. From a book by Cousin, and itself claimed to be based on fresco in Cousin's house in Nozeroy, Burgundy. Engraving possibly by fr:Claude Luc.
From 1514, Erasmus regularly traveled to Basel to coordinate the printing of his books with Froben. He developed a lasting association with the great Basel publisher Johann Froben and later his son Hieronymus Froben (Eramus' godson) who together published over 200 works with Erasmus,[107] working with expert scholar-correctors who went on to illustrious careers.[106]
His initial interest in Froben's operation was aroused by his discovery of the printer's folio edition of the Adagiorum Chiliades tres (Adagia) (1513).[108] Froben's work was notable for using the new Roman type (rather than blackletter) and Aldine-like Italic and Greek fonts, as well as elegant layouts using borders and fancy capitals;[106]: 59 Hans Holbein (the Younger) cut several woodblock capitals for Erasmus' editions. The printing of many his books was supervised by his Alsatian friend, the Greek scholar Beatus Rhenanus.[note 35]
In 1521 he settled in Basel.[109] He was weary of the controversies and hostility at Louvain, and feared being dragged further into the Lutheran controversy.[110] He agreed to be the Froben press' literary superintendent writing dedications and prefaces[35] for an annuity and profit share.[85] Apart from Froben's production team, he had his own household[note 36]with a formidable housekeeper, stable of horses, and up to eight boarders or paid servants: who acted as assistants, correctors, amanuenses, dining companions, international couriers, and carers.[112] It was his habit to sit at times by a ground-floor window, to make it easier to see and be seen by strolling humanists for chatting.[113]
In collaboration with Froben and his team, the scope and ambition of Erasmus' Annotations, Erasmus' long-researched project of philological notes of the New Testament along the lines of Valla's Adnotations, had grown to also include a lightly revised Latin Vulgate, then the Greek text, then several edifying essays on methodology, then a highly revised Vulgate—all bundled as his Novum testamentum omne and pirated individually throughout Europe— then finally his amplified Paraphrases.
In 1522, Erasmus' compatriot, former teacher (c. 1502) and friend from University of Louvain unexpectedly became Pope Adrian VI,[note 37] after having served as Regent (and/or Grand Inquisitor) of Spain for six years. Like Erasmus and Luther, he had been influenced by the Brethren of the Common Life. He tried to entice Erasmus to Rome. His reforms of the Roman Curia which he hoped would meet the objections of many Lutherans were stymied (party because the Holy See was broke), though re-worked at the Council of Trent, and he died in 1523.[116]
Pope Adrian VI
As the popular and nationalist responses to Luther gathered momentum, the social disorders, which Erasmus dreaded and Luther disassociated himself from, began to appear, including the German Peasants' War (1524–1525), the Anabaptist insurrections in Germany and in the Low Countries, iconoclasm, and the radicalisation of peasants across Europe. If these were the outcomes of reform, Erasmus was thankful that he had kept out of it. Yet he was ever more bitterly accused of having started the whole "tragedy" (as Erasmus dubbed the matter).[note 38]
In 1523, he provided financial support to the impoverished and disgraced former Latin Secretary of Antwerp Cornelius Grapheus, on his release from the newly introduced Inquisition.[117]: 558 In 1525, a former student of Erasmus who had served at Erasmus' father's former church at Woerden, Jan de Bakker (Pistorius) was the first priest to be executed as a heretic in the Netherlands. In 1529, his French translator and friend Louis de Berquin was burnt in Paris, following his condemnation as an anti-Rome heretic by the Sorbonne theologians.
Freiburg (1529–1535)
Following sudden, violent, iconoclastic rioting in early 1529[note 39] led by Œcolampadius his former assistant, in which elected Catholic councilmen were deposed, the city of Basel definitely adopted the Reformation—finally banning the Catholic Mass on April 1, 1529.[119]
Erasmus, in company with other Basel Catholic priests including Bishop Augustinus Marius, left Basel on the 13 April 1529[note 40] and departed by ship to the Catholic university town of Freiburg im Breisgau to be under the protection of his former student, Archduke Ferdinand of Austria.[16]: 210 Erasmus wrote somewhat dramatically to Thomas More of his frail condition at the time: "I preferred to risk my life rather than appear to approve a programme like theirs. There was some hope of a return to moderation."[120]
In Spring early 1530 Erasmus was bedridden for three months with an intensely painful infection, likely carbunculosis, that, unusually for him, left him too ill to work.[121]: 411 He declined to attend the Diet of Augsburg to which both the Bishop of Augsburg and the Papal legate Campeggio had invited him, and he expressed doubt on non-theological grounds, to Campeggio and Melanchthon, that reconciliation was then possible: he wrote to Campeggio "I can discern no way out of this enormous tragedy unless God suddenly appears like a deus ex machina and changes the hearts of men"[121]: 331 and later "What upsets me is not so much their teaching, especially Luther's, as the fact that, under the pre-text of the gospel, I see a class of men emerging whom I find repugnant from every point of view."[121]: 367
He stayed for two years on the top floor of the Whale House,[122] then following another rent dispute[note 41] bought and refurbished a house of his own, where he took in scholar/assistants as table-boarders[123] such as Cornelius Grapheus' friend Damião de Góis, some of them fleeing persecution.
Despite increasing frailty[note 42] Erasmus continued to work productively, notably on a new magnum opus, his manual on preaching Ecclesiastes, and his small book on preparing for death. His boarder for five months, the Portuguese scholar/diplomat Damião de Góis,[117] worked on his lobbying on the plight of the Sámi in Sweden and the Ethiopian church, and stimulated[125]: 82 Erasmus' increasing awareness of foreign missions.[note 43]
There are no extant letters between More and Erasmus from the start of More's period as Chancellor until his resignation (1529–1533), almost to the day. Erasmus wrote several important non-political works under the surprising patronage of Thomas Bolyn: his Ennaratio triplex in Psalmum XXII or Triple Commentary on Psalm 23 (1529); his catechism to counter Luther Explanatio Symboli or A Playne and Godly Exposition or Declaration of the Commune Crede (1533) which sold out in three hours at the Frankfurt Book Fair, and Praeparatio ad mortem or Preparation for Death (1534) which would be one of Erasmus' most popular and most hijacked works.[127][note 44]
In the 1530s, life became more dangerous for Spanish Erasmians when Erasmus' protector, the Inquisitor General Alonso Manrique de Lara fell out of favour with the royal court and lost power within his own organization to friar-theologians. In 1532 Erasmus' friend, conversoJuan de Vergara (Cisneros' Latin secretary who had worked on the Complutensian Polyglot and published Stunica's criticism of Erasmus) was arrested by the Spanish Inquisition and had to be ransomed from them by the humanist Archbishop of Toledo Alonso III Fonseca, also a correspondent of Erasmus', who had previously rescued Ignatius of Loyola from them.[128]: 80
There was a generational change in the Catholic hierarchy. In 1530, the reforming French bishop Guillaume Briçonnet died. In 1532 his beloved long-time mentor English Primate Warham died of old age,[note 45] as did reforming cardinal Giles of Viterbo and Swiss bishop Hugo von Hohenlandenberg. In 1534 his distrusted protector Clement VII (the "inclement Clement"[129]: 72 ) died, his recent Italian ally Cardinal Cajetan (widely tipped as the next pope) died, and his old ally Cardinal Campeggio retired.
As more friends died (in 1533, his friend Pieter Gillis; in 1534, William Blount; in early 1536, Catherine of Aragon;) and as Luther and some Lutherans and some powerful Catholic theologians renewed their personal attacks on Erasmus, his letters are increasingly focused on concerns on the status of friendships and safety as he considered moving from bland Freiburg despite his health.[note 46]
In 1535, Erasmus' friends Thomas More, Bishop John Fisher and Brigittine Richard Reynolds[note 47] were executed as pro-Rome traitors by Henry VIII, who Erasmus and More had first met as a boy. Despite illness Erasmus wrote the first biography of More (and Fisher), the short, anonymous Expositio Fidelis, which Froben published, at the instigation of de Góis.[117]
After Erasmus' time, numerous of Erasmus' translators later met similar fates at the hands of Anglican, Catholic and Reformed sectarians and autocrats: including Margaret Pole, William Tyndale, Michael Servetus. Others, such as Charles V's Latin secretary Juan de Valdés, fled and died in self-exile.
Erasmus' friend and collaborator Bishop Cuthbert Tunstall eventually died in prison under Elizabeth I for refusing the Oath of Supremacy. Erasmus' correspondent Bishop Stephen Gardiner, who he had known as a teenaged student in Paris and Cambridge,[131] was later imprisoned in the Tower of London for five years under Edward VI for impeding Protestantism.[note 48] Damião de Góis was tried before the Portuguese Inquisition at age 72,[117] detained almost incommunicado, finally exiled to a monastery, and on release perhaps murdered.[133] His amanuensis Gilbert Cousin died in prison at age 66, shortly after being arrested on the personal order of Pope Pius V.[112]
When his strength began to fail, he finally decided to accept an invitation by Queen Mary of Hungary, Regent of the Netherlands (sister of his former student Archduke Ferdinand I and Emperor Charles V), to move from Freiburg to Brabant. In 1535, he moved back to the Froben compound in Basel in preparation (Œcolampadius having died, and private practice of his religion now possible) and saw his last major works such as Ecclesiastes through publication, though he grew more frail.
On July 12, 1536, he died at an attack of dysentery.[134] "The most famous scholar of his day died in peaceful prosperity and in the company of celebrated and responsible friends."[135] His last words, as recorded by his friend and biographer Beatus Rhenanus, were apparently "Lord, put an end to it" (Latin: domine fac finem, the same last words as Melanchthon)[136] then "Dear God" (Dutch: Lieve God).[137]
He had remained loyal to Roman Catholicism,[138] but biographers have disagreed whether to treat him as an insider or an outsider.[note 49] He may not have received or had the opportunity to receive the last rites of the Catholic Church;[note 50] the contemporary reports of his death do not mention whether he asked for a Catholic priest or not,[note 51] if any were secretly or privately in Basel.
He was buried with great ceremony in the Basel Minster (the former cathedral). The Protestant city authorities remarkably allowed his funeral to be an ecumenical Catholic requiem Mass.[140]
Erasmus had received dispensations (from Ferdinand Archduke of Austria, and from Emperor Charles V in 1530) to make a will rather than have his wealth revert to his order (the Chapter of Sion), or to the state, and had long pre-sold most of his personal library of almost 500 books to Polish humanist Jan Łaski.[141][142]
As his heir or executor he instated Bonifacius Amerbach to give seed money[note 52] to students and the needy.[note 53] One of the eventual recipients was the impoverished Protestant humanist Sebastian Castellio, who had fled from Geneva to Basel, who subsequently translated the Bible into Latin and French, and who worked for the repair of the breach and divide of Western Christianity in its Catholic, Anabaptist, and Protestant branches.[143]
Thought and views
Biographers, such as Johan Huizinga, frequently draw connections between many of Erasmus' convictions and his early biography: esteem for the married state and appropriate marriages, support for priestly marriage, concern for improving marriage prospects for females, opposition to inconsiderate rules (notably, institutional dietary rules), a desire to make education engaging for the participants, interest in classical languages, horror of poverty and spiritual hopelessness, distaste for friars begging when they could study or work, unwillingness to be under the direct control of authorities, laicism, the need for those in authority to act in the best interest of their charges, a prizing of mercy and peace, an anger over unnecessary war, especially between avaricious princes, an awareness of mortality, etc.
Manner of thinking
Erasmus had a distinctive manner of thinking, a Catholic historian suggests: one that is capacious in its perception, agile in its judgments, and unsettling in its irony with "a deep and abiding commitment to human flourishing".[144] "In all spheres, his outlook was essentially pastoral."[16]: 225
Erasmus has been called a seminal rather than a consistent or systematic thinker,[145] notably averse to over-extending from the specific to the general; who nevertheless should be taken very seriously as a pastoral[note 54] and rhetorical theologian, with a philological and historical approach—rather than a metaphysical approach—to interpreting Scripture[147][note 55] and interested in the literal and tropological senses.[16]: 145 French theologian Louis Bouyer commented, "Erasmus was to be one of those who can get no edification from exegesis where they suspect some misinterpretation."[148]
A theologian has written of "Erasmus' preparedness completely to satisfy no-one but himself."[149] He has been called moderate, judicious and constructive even when being critical or when mocking extremes;[150][note 56] but thin-skinned against slanders of heterodoxy.[note 57]
Manner of expression
Irony
Erasmus often wrote in a highly ironical idiom,[144] especially in his letters,[note 58] which makes them prone to different interpretations when taken literally rather than ironically.
Ulrich von Hutten claimed that Erasmus was secretly a Lutheran; Erasmus chided him saying that von Hutten had not detected the irony in his public letters enough.[113]: 27
Antagonistic scholar J.W. Williams denies that Erasmus' letter to Ammonius, "let your own interests be your standard in all things," was in apparent jest, as claimed by those more sympathetic to Erasmus.[151]
Erasmus' aphoristic quote on the persecution of Reuchlin, "If it is Christian to hate Jews, we are all abundantly Christians here," is taken literally by Theodor Dunkelgrün[152]: 320 and Harry S. May[153] as being approving of such hatred; the alternative view would be that it was sardonic and challenging.
He frequently wrote about controversial subjects using the dialogue to avoid direct statements clearly attributable to himself.[note 59] For Martin Luther, he was an eel,[154] slippery, evasive and impossible to capture.
Copiousness
Erasmus' literary theory of "copiousness" endorses a large stockpile of rich adages, analogies, tropes and symbolic figures, which leads to compressed communication of complex ideas (between those educated in the stockpile) but some of which, to modern sensibilities, may promote as well as play off stereotypes.
Erasmus' lengthy collections of proverbs, the Adagia, established a vocabulary he and his contemporaries then used extensively and habitually: according to philosopher Heinz Kimmerle,[155] it is necessary to know the explanations of various proverbs given by Erasmus' Adages to adequately understand many passages in Erasmus' and Luther's written debate on free will (see below).[156]
When Erasmus wrote of 'Judaism,' he most frequently (though not always) was not referring to Jews:[note 60] instead he referred to those Catholic Christians of his time, especially in the monastic lifestyle, who mistakenly promoted excessive external ritualism over interior piety, by analogy with Second Temple Judaism.
"Judaism I call not Jewish impiety, but prescriptions about external things, such as food, fasting, clothes, which to a certain degree resemble the rituals of the Jews."[157]
Erasmus' counter-accusation to Spanish friars of "Judaizing" may have been particularly sharp and bold, given the prominent role that some friars with the Spanish Inquisition were playing in the lethal persecution of some conversos.[note 61]
Terence J. Martin identifies an "Erasmian pattern" that the supposed (by the reader) otherness (of Turks, Lapplanders, Indians, Amerindans,[note 62] Jews, and even women and heretics) "provides a foil against which the failures of Christian culture can be exposed and criticized."[159]
In a 1518 letter to John Fisher, Erasmus wrote: "The cunning of princes and the effrontery of the Roman curia can go no further; and it looks as though the state of the common people would soon be such that the tyranny of the Grand Turk would be more bearable."[102]: 70
In de bello Turcico, Erasmus personifies that we should "kill the Turk, not the man.[...]If we really want to heave the Turks from our necks, we must first expel from our hearts a more loathsome race of Turks: avarice, ambition, the craving for power, self-satisfaction, impiety, extravagance, the love of pleasure, deceitfulness, anger, hatred, envy."[note 63]
Pacifism
Peace, peaceableness, and peacemaking, in all spheres from the domestic to the religious to the political, were central distinctives of Erasmus' writing on Christian living and his mystical theology:[160]"the sum and summary of our religion is peace and unanimity"[note 64] At the Nativity of Jesus"the angels sang not the glories of war, nor a song of triumph, but a hymn of peace.":[161]
He (Christ) conquered by gentleness; He conquered by kindness; he conquered by truth itself
Erasmus was not an absolute pacifist but promoted political pacificism and religious Irenicism.[162] Notable writings on irenicism include De Concordia, On the War with the Turks, The Education of a Christian Prince, On Restoring the Concord of the Church, and The Complaint of Peace. Erasmus' ecclesiology of peacemaking held that the church authorities had a divine mandate to settle religious disputes,[note 66] in an as non-excluding way as possible, including by the preferably-minimal development of doctrine.
In the latter, Lady Peace insists on peace as the crux of Christian life and for understanding Christ:
I give you my peace, I leave you my peace" (John 14:27). You hear what he leaves his people? Not horses, bodyguards, empire or riches – none of these. What then? He gives peace, leaves peace – peace with friends, peace with enemies.
A historian has called him "The 16th Century's Pioneer of Peace Education and a Culture of Peace".[note 67]
Erasmus' emphasis on peacemaking reflects a typical pre-occupation of medieval lay spirituality as historian John Bossy (as summarized by Eamon Duffy) puts it: "medieval Christianity had been fundamentally concerned with the creation and maintenance of peace in a violent world. "Christianity" in medieval Europe denoted neither an ideology nor an institution, but a community of believers whose religious ideal—constantly aspired to if seldom attained—was peace and mutual love."[164]
Historians have written that "references to conflict run like a red thread through the writings of Erasmus."[4]: 34 Erasmus had experienced war as a child and was particularly concerned about wars between Christian kings, who should be brothers and not start wars; a theme in his book The Education of a Christian Prince. His Adages included "War is sweet to those who have never tasted it" (Dulce bellum inexpertis from Pindar's Greek.)[note 68]
He promoted and was present at the Field of Cloth of Gold,[166] and his wide-ranging correspondence frequently related to issues of peacemaking.[note 69] He saw a key role of the Church in peacemaking by arbitration[168] and mediation,[4]: 50 and the office of the Pope was necessary to rein in tyrannical princes and bishops.[35]: 195
He questioned the practical usefulness and abuses[note 70] of Just War theory, further limiting it to feasible defensive actions with popular support and that "war should never be undertaken unless, as a last resort, it cannot be avoided."[169] Defeat should be endured rather than fighting to the end. In his Adages he discusses (common translation) "A disadvantageous peace is better than a just war", which owes to Cicero and John Colet's "Better an unjust peace than the justest war." Expansionism could not be justified.[note 71] Taxes to pay for war should cause the least possible hardship on the poor.[103]: 20 He hated sedition as, often, a cause of oppression.
Erasmus was highly critical of the warlike way of important European princes of his era, including some princes of the church.[note 72] He described these princes as corrupt and greedy. Erasmus believed that these princes "collude in a game, of which the outcome is to exhaust and oppress the commonwealth".[98]: s1.7.4 He spoke more freely about this matter in letters sent to his friends like Thomas More, Beatus Rhenanus and Adrianus Barlandus: a particular target of his criticisms was the Emperor Maximilian I, whom Erasmus blamed for allegedly preventing the Netherlands from signing a peace treaty with Guelders[170] and other schemes to cause wars in order to extract money from his subjects.[note 73]
One of his approaches was to send and publish congratulatory and lionizing letters to princes who, though in a position of strength, negotiated peace with neighbours, such as King Sigismund I the Old of Poland in 1527.[125]: 75
Erasmus "constantly and consistently" opposed the mooted idea of a Christian "universal monarch" with an over-extended empire who could supposedly defeat the Ottoman forces: such universalism did not "hold any promise of generating less conflict than the existing political plurality;" instead, advocating concord between princes, both temporal and spiritual.[4]: 44, 45 The spiritual princes, by their arbitration and mediation do not "threaten political plurality, but acts as its defender."[4]: 50
Intra-Christian religious toleration
He referred to his irenical disposition in the Preface to On Free Will as a secret inclination of nature that would make him even prefer the views of the Sceptics over intolerant assertions, though he sharply distinguished adiaphora from what was uncontentiously explicit in the New Testament or absolutely mandated by Church teaching.[171] Concord demanded unity and assent: Erasmus was anti-sectarian[note 74] as well as non-sectarian.[172] To follow the law of love, our intellects must be humble and friendly when making any assertions: he called contention "earthly, beastly, demonic"[173]: 739 and a good-enough reason to reject a teacher or their followers. In Melanchthon's view, Erasmus taught charity, not faith.[136]: 10
Portrait of Erasmus, after Quinten Massijs (1517)
Certain works of Erasmus laid a foundation for religious toleration of private opinions and ecumenism. For example, in De libero arbitrio, opposing particular views of Martin Luther, Erasmus noted that religious disputants should be temperate in their language "because in this way the truth, which is often lost amidst too much wrangling may be more surely perceived." Gary Remer writes, "Like Cicero, Erasmus concludes that truth is furthered by a more harmonious relationship between interlocutors."[174]
In a letter to Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, Erasmus lobbied diplomatically for toleration: "If the sects could be tolerated under certain conditions (as the Bohemians pretend), it would, I admit, be a grievous misfortune, but one more endurable than war."[citation needed] But the same dedication to avoiding conflict and bloodshed should be shown by those tempted to join (anti-popist) sects:
"Perhaps evil rulers should sometimes be tolerated. We owe some respect to the memory of those whose places we think of them as occupying. Their titles have some claim on us. We should not seek to put matters right if there is a real possibility that the cure may prove worse than the disease."
— Erasmus, The Sileni of Alcibiades (1517)
Heresy and sedition
Erasmus had been involved in early attempts to protect Luther and his sympathisers from charges of heresy. Erasmus wrote Inquisitio de fide to say that the Lutherans (of 1523) were not formally heretics: he pushed back against the willingness of some theologians to cry heresy fast in order to enforce their views in universities and at inquisitions.
For Erasmus, punishable heresy had to involve fractiously, dangerously, and publicly agitating against essential doctrines relating to Christ (i.e., blasphemy), with malice, depravity, obstinacy.[note 75] As with St Theodore the Studite,[176] Erasmus was against the death penalty merely for private or peaceable heresy or for dissent on non-essentials: "It is better to cure a sick man than to kill him."[177] The Church has the duty to protect believers and convert or heal heretics; he invoked Jesus' parable of the wheat and tares.[16]: 200
Erasmus' pacificism included a particular dislike for sedition, which caused warfare:
It was the duty of the leaders of this (reforming) movement, if Christ was their goal, to refrain not only from vice, but even from every appearance of evil; and to offer not the slightest stumbling block to the Gospel, studiously avoiding even practices which, although allowed, are yet not expedient. Above all they should have guarded against all sedition.
Erasmus allowed the death penalty against violent seditionists to prevent bloodshed and war: he allowed that the state has the right to execute those who are a necessary danger to public order—whether heretic or orthodox—but noted (e.g., to fr:Noël Béda) that Augustine had been against the execution of even violent Donatists: Johannes Trapman states that Erasmus' endorsement of suppression of the Anabaptists springs from their refusal to heed magistrates and the criminal violence of the Münster rebellion not because of their heretical views on baptism.[175] Despite these concessions to state power, Erasmus suggested that religious persecution could still be challenged as inexpedient (ineffective).[179]
Outsiders
Most of his political writing focused on peace within Christendom with almost a sole focus on Europe. In 1516, Erasmus wrote, "It is the part of a Christian prince to regard no one as an outsider unless he is a nonbeliever, and even on them he should inflict no harm", which entails not attacking outsiders, not taking their riches, not subjecting them to political rule, no forced conversions, and keeping promises made to them.[4]: 50, 51
In common with his times,[180] Erasmus regarded the Jewish and Islamic religions as Christian heresies (and therefore competitors to orthodox Christianity) rather than separate religions, using the inclusive term half-Christian for the latter.[note 76]
However, there is a wide range of scholarly opinion on the extent and nature of antisemitic and anti-Moslem prejudice in his writings: historian Nathan Ron has found his writing to be harsh and racial in its implications, with contempt and hostility to Islam.[182]
Turks
In his last decade, he involved himself in the public policy debate on war with the Ottoman Empire, which was then invading Western Europe, notably in his book On the war against the Turks (1530), as the "reckless and extravagant"[183] Pope Leo X had in previous decades promoted going on the offensive with a new crusade.[note 77] Erasmus re-worked Luther's rhetoric that the invading Turks represent God's judgment of decadent Christendom, but without Luther's fatalism: Erasmus not only accused Western leaders of kingdom-threatening hypocrisy, he reworked a remedy already decreed by the Fifth Council of the Lateran: anti-expansionist moral reforms by Europe's disunited leaders as a necessary unitive political step before any aggressive warfare against the Ottoman threat, reforms which might themselves, if sincere, prevent both the internecine and foreign warfare.[125]
Erasmus perceived and championed strong Hellenistic rather than exclusively Hebraic influences on the intellectual milieux of Jesus, Paul, and the early church: "If only the Christian church did not attach so much importance to the Old Testament!"[note 78] Perhaps the only Jewish book he published was his loose translation of the first century Hellenistic-Judaic "On the Sovereignty of Reason", better known as 4 Maccabees.[185]
Erasmus' pervasive anti-ceremonialism treated the early Church debates on circumcision, food, and special days as manifestations of cultural chauvinism by the initial Jewish Christians in Antioch.[note 79]
While many humanists, from Pico della Mirandola to Johannes Reuchlin, were intrigued by Jewish mysticism, Erasmus came to dislike it: "I see them as a nation full of most tedious fabrications, who spread a kind of fog over everything, Talmud, Cabbala, Tetragrammaton, Gates of Light, words, words, words. I would rather have Christ mixed up with Scotus than with that rubbish of theirs."[102]: 347
In his Paraphrase on Romans, Erasmus voiced, as Paul, the "secret" that in the end times, "all of the Israelites will be restored to salvation" and accept Christ as their Messiah, "although now part of them have fallen away from it."[186]
Several scholars have identified cases where Erasmus' comments appear to go beyond theological anti-Judaism into slurs or approving to an extent certain anti-semitic policies, though there is some controversy.
Slaves
On the subject of slavery, Erasmus characteristically treated it in passing under the topic of tyranny: Christians were not allowed to be tyrants, which slave-owning required, but especially not to be the masters of other Christians.[187] Erasmus had various other piecemeal arguments against slavery: for example, that it was not legitimate to enslave people taken in an unjust war, but it was not a subject that occupied him. However, his belief that "nature created all men free" (and slavery was imposed) was a rejection of Aristotle's category of natural slaves.[158]
Politics
Erasmus promoted the idea that a prince rules with the consent of his people, notably in his book The Education of a Christian Prince (and, through More, in the book Utopia.) He may have been influenced by the Brabantine custom of an incoming ruler being officially told of his duties and welcomed:[51] the Joyous Entry was a kind of contract. A monarchy should not be absolute: it should be "checked and diluted with a mixture of aristocracy and democracy to prevent it ever breaking out into tyranny."[12] The same considerations applied to church princes.
Erasmus contrasts the Christian Prince with the Tyrant, who has no love from the people, will be surrounded by flatterers, and can expect no loyalty or peace. Unspoken in Erasmus' views may have been the idea that the people can remove a tyrant; however, espousing this explicitly could expose people to capital charges of sedition or treason. Erasmus typically limited his political discussion to what could be couched as personal faith and morality by or between Christians, his business as a magister of theology.
Erasmus expressed much of his reform program in terms of the proper attitude towards the sacraments and their ramifications:[188] notably for the underappreciated sacraments of Baptism and Marriage (see On the Institution of Christian Marriage) considered as vocations more than events;[note 80] and for the mysterious Eucharist, pragmatic Confession, the dangerous Last Rites (writing On the Preparation for Death),[note 81] and the pastoral Holy Orders (see Ecclesiastes.)[190] Historians have noted that Erasmus commended the benefits of immersive, docile scripture-reading in sacramental terms.[note 82]
Sacraments
Johannes Œcolampadius by Asper (1550)
A test of the Reformation was the doctrine of the sacraments, and the crux of this question was the observance of the Eucharist. Erasmus was concerned that the sacramentarians, headed by Œcolampadius of Basel, were claiming Erasmus held views similar to their own in order to try to claim him for their schismatic and "erroneous" movement. When the Mass was finally banned in Basel in 1529, Erasmus immediately abandoned the city, as did the other expelled Catholic clergy.
In 1530, Erasmus published a new edition of the orthodox treatise of Algerus against the heretic Berengar of Tours in the eleventh century. He added a dedication, affirming his belief in the reality of the Body of Christ after consecration in the Eucharist, commonly referred to as transubstantiation. However, Erasmus found the scholastic formulation of transubstantiation to stretch language past its breaking point.[192]
By and large, the miraculous real change that interested Erasmus, the author, more than that of the bread is the transformation in the humble partaker.[193]: 211 Erasmus wrote several notable pastoral books and pamphlets on sacraments, always looking through rather than at the rituals or forms:
on marriage and wise matches,
preparation for confession and the need for pastoral encouragement,
preparation for death and the need to assuage fear,
training and helping the preaching duties of priests under bishops,
baptism and the need for that faithful to own the baptismal vows made for them.
Catholic reform
Institutional reforms
Albrecht Dürer, Portrait of Erasmus, sketch: black chalk on paper, 1520.
The Protestant Reformation began in the year following the publication of his pathbreaking edition of the New Testament in Latin and Greek (1516). The issues between the reforming and reactionary tendencies of the church, from which Protestantism later emerged, had become so clear that many intellectuals and churchmen could not escape the summons to join the debate.
According to historian C. Scott Dixon, Erasmus not only criticized church failings but questioned many of his Church's basic teachings;[note 83] however, according to biographer Erika Rummel, "Erasmus was aiming at the correction of abuses rather than at doctrinal innovation or institutional change."[note 84]
In theologian Louis Bouyer's interpretation,[148] Erasmus' agenda was "to reform the Church from within by a renewal of biblical theology, based on philological study of the New Testament text, and supported by a knowledge of patristics, itself renewed by the same methods. The final object of it all was to nourish[...]chiefly moral and spiritual reform[...]"[note 85]
At the height of his literary fame, Erasmus was called upon to take one side, but public partisanship was foreign to his beliefs, nature, and habits. Despite all his criticism of clerical corruption and abuses within the Western Church,[note 86] especially at first he sided unambiguously with neither Luther nor the anti-Lutherans publicly (though in private he lobbied assiduously against extremism from both parties), but eventually shunned the breakaway Protestant Reformation movements along with their most radical offshoots.[138]
"I have constantly declared, in countless letters, booklets, and personal
statements, that I do not want to be involved with either party."
— Erasmus, Spongia (1523)
The world had laughed at his satire, The Praise of Folly, but few had interfered with his activities. He believed that his work had commended itself to the religious world's best minds and dominant powers. Erasmus chose to write in Latin (and Greek), the languages of scholars. He did not build a large body of supporters in the unlettered; his critiques reached a small but elite audience.[196]
Anti-fraternalism
Reacting from his own experiences, Erasmus came to believe that monastic life and institutions no longer served the positive spiritual or social purpose they once may have:[197]: 669 in the Enchiridion he controversially put it "Monkishness is not piety."[note 87] At this time, it was better to live as "a monk in the world" than in the monastery.[note 88]
Many of his works contain diatribes against supposed monastic corruption and careerism, particularly against the mendicant friars (Franciscans and Dominicans). These orders also typically ran the university's Scholastic theology programs, from whose ranks came his most dangerous enemies. The more some attacked him, the more offensive he became about what he saw as their political influence and materialistic opportunism.
Alastor, an evil spirit: "They are a certain Sort of Animals in black and white Vestments, Ash-colour'd Coats, and various other Dresses, that are always hovering about the Courts of Princes, and [to each side] are continually instilling into their Ears the Love of War, and exhorting the Nobility and common People to it, haranguing them in their Sermons, that it is a just, holy and religious War. [...]"
Charon: "[...] What do they get out of it?"
Alastor: "Because they get more by those that die, than those that live. There are last Wills and Testaments, Funeral Obsequies, Bulls, and a great many other Articles of no despicable Profit. And in the last Place, they had rather live in a Camp, than in their Cells. War breeds a great many Bishops, who were not thought good for any Thing in a Time of Peace."
— Erasmus, "Charon", Colloquies
He was scandalized by superstitions, such as that if you were buried in a Franciscan habit, you would go direct to heaven.[note 89] crime[198] and child novices. He advocated various reforms, including a ban on taking orders until the 30th year, the closure of corrupt and smaller monasteries, respect for bishops, requiring work, not begging (reflecting the practice of his own order of Augustinian Canons,) the downplaying of monastic hours, fasts and ceremonies, and a less mendacious approach to gullible pilgrims and tenants.
However, he was not in favour of speedy closures of monasteries nor of larger reformed monasteries with important libraries: in his account of his pilgrimage to Walsingham, he noted that the funds extracted from pilgrims typically supported houses for the poor and elderly.[199]
These ideas widely influenced his generation of humanists, both Catholic and Protestant,[200]: 152 and the lurid hyperbolic attacks in his half-satire The Praise of Folly were later treated by Protestants as objective reports of near-universal corruption. Furthermore, "what is said over a glass of wine, ought not to be remembered and written down as a serious statement of belief," such as his proposal to marry all monks to all nuns or to send them all away to fight the Turks and colonize new islands.[35]
He believed the only vow necessary for Christians should be the vow of Baptism, and others such as the vows of the evangelical counsels, while admirable in intent and content, were now mainly counter-productive.
However, Erasmus frequently commended the evangelical counsels for all believers, and with more than lip service: for example, the first adage of his reputation-establishing Adagia was Between friends all is common, where he tied common ownership (such as practiced by his order's style of poverty) with the teachings of classical philosophers and Christ.[201]
His main Catholic opposition was from scholars in the mendicant orders. He purported that "Saint Francis came lately to me in a dream and thanked me for chastising them."[202] After his lifetime, scholars of mendicant orders have sometimes disputed Erasmus as hyperbolic and ill-informed. A 20th-century Benedictine scholar wrote of him as "all sail and no rudder".[115]: 357
The early reformers built their theology on Erasmus' philological analyses of specific verses in the New Testament: repentance over penance (the basis of the first thesis of the Luther's 95 Theses), justification by imputation, grace as favour or clemency, faith as hoping trust,[203] human transformation over reformation, congregation over church, mystery over sacrament, etc. In Erasmus' view, they went too far, downplayed Sacred Tradition such as Patristic interpretations, and irresponsibly fomented bloodshed.
Erasmus was one of many scandalized by the sale of indulgences to fund Pope Leo X's projects. His view, given in a 1518 letter to John Colet, was less theological than political: "The Roman curia has abandoned any sense of shame. What could be more shameless than these constant indulgences? And now they put up war against the Turks as a pretext, when their aim really is to drive the Spaniards from Naples."[102]
Erasmus and Luther impacted each other greatly. Each had misgivings about each other from the beginning (Erasmus on Luther's rash and antagonistic character, Luther on Erasmus' focus on morality rather than grace) but strategically agreed not to be negative about the other in public.
Noting Luther's criticisms of corruption in the Church, Erasmus described Luther to Pope Leo X as "a mighty trumpet of gospel truth" while agreeing, "It is clear that many of the reforms for which Luther calls" (e.g., the sale of indulgences) "are urgently needed."[204] However, behind the scenes Erasmus forbade his publisher Froben from handling the works of Luther[106]: 64 and tried to keep the reform movement focused on institutional rather than theological issues, yet he also privately wrote to authorities to prevent Luther's persecution. In the words of one historian, "at this earlier period he was more concerned with the fate of Luther than his theology."[205]
In 1520, Erasmus wrote that "Luther ought to be answered and not crushed."[206] However, the publication of Luther's On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church (Oct 1520)[207] and subsequent bellicosity drained Erasmus' and many humanists' sympathy, even more as Christians became partisans and the partisans took to violence.
Luther hoped for his cooperation in a work which seemed only the natural outcome of Erasmus' own,[note 90] and spoke with admiration of Erasmus's superior learning. In their early correspondence, Luther expressed boundless admiration for all Erasmus had done in the cause of a sound and reasonable Christianity and urged him to join the Lutheran party. Erasmus declined to commit himself, arguing his usual "small target" excuse, that to do so would endanger the cause of bonae litterae[note 91][209] which he regarded as one of his purposes in life. Only as an independent scholar could he hope to influence the reform of religion. When Erasmus declined to support him, the "straightforward" Luther became angered that Erasmus was avoiding the responsibility due either to cowardice or a lack of purpose.
However, any hesitancy on the part of Erasmus may have stemmed, not from lack of courage or conviction, but rather from a concern over the mounting disorder and violence of the reform movement. To Philip Melanchthon in 1524 he wrote:
I know nothing of your church; at the very least it contains people who will, I fear, overturn the whole system and drive the princes into using force to restrain good men and bad alike. The gospel, the word of God, faith, Christ, and Holy Spirit – these words are always on their lips; look at their lives and they speak quite another language.[210]
Catholic theologian George Chantraine notes that, where Luther quotes Luke 11:21 "He that is not with me is against me", Erasmus takes Mark 9:40 "For he that is not against us, is on our part."[211]: 86
Though he sought to remain accommodative in doctrinal disputes, each side accused him of siding with the other, perhaps because of his perceived influence and what they regarded as his dissembling neutrality,[note 92] which he regarded as peacemaking accommodation:
I detest dissension because it goes both against the teachings of Christ and against a secret inclination of nature. I doubt that either side in the dispute can be suppressed without grave loss.
By 1523, and first suggested in a letter from Henry VIII, Erasmus had been convinced that Luther's ideas on necessity/free will were a subject of core disagreement deserving a public airing, and strategized with friends and correspondents[212] on how to respond with proper moderation[213] without making the situation worse for all, especially for the humanist reform agenda. He eventually chose a campaign that involved an irenical 'dialogue' "The Inquisition of Faith", a positive, evangelical model sermon "On the Measureless Mercy of God", and a gently critical 'diatribe' "On Free Will."
The publication of his brief book On Free Will initiated what has been called "The greatest debate of that era" [214] which still has ramifications today.[215] They bypassed discussion on reforms which they both agreed on in general, and instead dealt with authority and biblical justifications of synergism versus monergism in relation to salvation.
Erasmus replied to this in his lengthy two volume Hyperaspistes and other works, which Luther ignored. Apart from the perceived moral failings among followers of the Reformers—an important sign for Erasmus—he also dreaded any change in doctrine, citing the long history of the Church as a bulwark against innovation. He put the matter bluntly to Luther:
We are dealing with this: Would a stable mind depart from the opinion handed down by so many men famous for holiness and miracles, depart from the decisions of the Church, and commit our souls to the faith of someone like you who has sprung up just now with a few followers, although the leading men of your flock do not agree either with you or among themselves – indeed though you do not even agree with yourself, since in this same Assertion[216] you say one thing in the beginning and something else later on, recanting what you said before.
Continuing his chastisement of Luther – and undoubtedly put off by the notion of there being "no pure interpretation of Scripture anywhere but in Wittenberg"[218] – Erasmus touches upon another important point of the controversy:
You stipulate that we should not ask for or accept anything but Holy Scripture, but you do it in such a way as to require that we permit you to be its sole interpreter, renouncing all others. Thus the victory will be yours if we allow you to be not the steward but the lord of Holy Scripture.
In 1529, Erasmus wrote "An epistle against those who falsely boast they are Evangelicals" to Gerardus Geldenhouwer (former Bishop of Utrecht, also schooled at Deventer).
You declaim bitterly against the luxury of priests, the ambition of bishops, the tyranny of the Roman Pontiff, and the babbling of the sophists; against our prayers, fasts, and Masses; and you are not content to retrench the abuses that may be in these things, but must needs abolish them entirely. ...[220]
Here Erasmus complains of the doctrines and morals of the Reformers, applying the same critique he had made about public Scholastic disputations:
Look around on this 'Evangelical' generation,[221] and observe whether amongst them less indulgence is given to luxury, lust, or avarice, than amongst those whom you so detest. Show me any one person who by that Gospel has been reclaimed from drunkenness to sobriety, from fury and passion to meekness, from avarice to liberality, from reviling to well-speaking, from wantonness to modesty. I will show you a great many who have become worse through following it. [...] The solemn prayers of the Church are abolished, but now there are very many who never pray at all. [...] I have never entered their conventicles, but I have sometimes seen them returning from their sermons, the countenances of all of them displaying rage, and wonderful ferocity, as though they were animated by the evil spirit. [...] Who ever beheld in their meetings any one of them shedding tears, smiting his breast, or grieving for his sins? [...] Confession to the priest is abolished, but very few now confess to God. [...] They have fled from Judaism that they may become Epicureans.
— Epistola contra quosdam qui se falso iactant evangelicos.[222]
Other
According to historian Christopher Ocker, the early reformers "needed tools that let their theological distinctions pose as commonplaces in a textual theology;[...] Erasmus provided the tools" but this tendentious distinction-making, reminiscent of the recent excesses of Scholasticism to Erasmus' eyes, was "was precisely what Erasmus disliked about Luther" and "Protestant polemicists."[223]
Erasmus wrote books against aspects of the teaching, impacts or threats of several other Reformers:[224]
Martin BucerResponsio ad fratres Inferioris Germaniae ad epistolam apologeticam incerto autoreproditam (1530)
Heinrich EppendorfAdmonitio adversus mendacium et obstrectationem (1530)
However, Erasmus maintained friendly relations with other Protestants, notably the irenic Melanchthon and Albrecht Duerer.
A common accusation, supposedly started by antagonistic monk-theologians,[note 93] made Erasmus responsible for Martin Luther and the Reformation: "Erasmus laid the egg, and Luther hatched it." Erasmus wittily dismissed the charge, claiming that Luther had "hatched a different bird entirely".[225] Erasmus-reader Peter Canisius commented: "Certainly there was no lack of eggs for Luther to hatch."[226][note 94]
Philosophy
Portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger and workshop
Erasmus has a problematic standing in the history of philosophy: whether he should be called a philosopher at all,[note 95] (as, indeed, some question whether he should be considered a theologian either.[16]: 205 ) Erasmus deemed himself to be a rhetorician (rhetoric being the art of argumentation to find what was most probably true on questions where logic could not provide certainty)[note 96] or grammarian rather than a philosopher.[227]: 66 He was particularly influenced by satirist and rhetorician Lucian.[note 97] Erasmus' writings shifted "an intellectual culture from logical disputation about things to quarrels about texts, contexts, and words."[228]
A Sceptic is not someone who doesn't care to know what is true or false…but rather someone who does not make a final decision easily or fight to the death for his own opinion, but rather accepts as probable what someone else accepts as certain…I explicitly exclude from Scepticism whatever is set forth in Sacred Scripture or whatever has been handed down to us by the authority of the Church.
Historian Kirk Essary has noted that from his earliest to last works Erasmus "regularly denounced the Stoics as specifically unchristian in their hardline position and advocacy of apatheia": warm affection and an appropriately fiery heart being inalienable parts of human sincerity;[241]: 17 however historian Ross Dealy sees Erasmus' decrial of other non-gentle "perverse affections" as having Stoical roots.[232]
Erasmus wrote in terms of a tri-partite nature of man, with the soul the seat of free will:
The body is purely material; the spirit is purely divine; the soul…is tossed back and forwards between the two according to whether it resists or gives way to the temptations of the flesh. The spirit makes us gods; the body makes us beasts; the soul makes us men.
According to theologian George van Kooten, Erasmus was the first modern scholar "to note the similarities between Plato's Symposium and John's Gospel", first in the Enchiridion then in the Adagia, pre-dating other scholarly interest by 400 years.[243][244]
Anti-scholasticism
Thomas Aquinas inspiring himself on Free Will from the writings of previous theologians such as Augustine (1652)
Erasmus did not have a metaphysical bone in his frail body, and had no real feeling for the philosophical concerns of scholastic theology.
He usually eschewed metaphysical, epistemological and logical philosophy as found in Aristotle:[note 102] in particular the curriculum and systematic methods of the post-Aquinas Schoolmen (Scholastics)[note 103] and what he regarded as their frigid, counter-productive Aristoteleanism:[note 104] "What has Aristotle to do with Christ?"[248][note 105]
"They can deal with any text of scripture as with a nose of wax, and knead it into what shape best suits their interest."
Erasmus held that academics must avoid philosophical factionalism as an offense against Christian concord, in order to "make the whole world Christian."[250]: 851 Indeed, Erasmus thought that Scholastic philosophy actually distracted participants from their proper focus on immediate morality,[note 106][note 107] unless used moderately.[note 108] And, by "excluding the Platonists from their commentaries, they strangle the beauty of revelation."[note 109] "They are windbags blown up with Aristotle, sausages stuffed with a mass of theoretical definitions, conclusions, and propositions."[252]
Nevertheless, church historian Dr Ernst Kohls has commented on a certain closeness of Erasmus' thought to Thomas Aquinas', despite Erasmus' skepticism about runaway Aristotelianism[5]: 9 and his methodological dislike of collections of disconnected sentences for quotation. Ultimately, Erasmus personally owned Aquinas' Summa theologiae, the Catena aurea and his commentary on Paul's epistles.[30]
Philosophia Christi
Everything in the pagan world that was valiantly done, brilliantly said, ingeniously thought, diligently transmitted, had been prepared by Christ for his society.
(Not to be confused with his Italian contemporary Chrysostom Javelli's Philosophia Christiana.)
Erasmus approached classical philosophers theologically and rhetorically: their value was in how they pre-saged, explained or amplified the unique teachings of Christ (particularly the Sermon on the Mount[16]: 117 ): the philosophia Christi.[note 110][note 111]
"A great part of the teaching of Christ is to be found in some of the philosophers, particularly Socrates, Diogenes and Epictetus. But Christ taught it much more fully, and exemplified it better..."
— Erasmus, Paraclesis
In fact, Christ was "the very father of philosophy" (Anti-Barbieri.)[note 112]
In works such as his Enchiridion, The Education of a Christian Prince and the Colloquies, Erasmus developed his idea of the philosophia Christi, a life lived according to the teachings of Jesus taken as a spiritual-ethical-social-political-legal[253] philosophy:[note 113]
Christ the heavenly teacher has founded a new people on earth,…Having eyes without guile, these folk know no spite or envy; having freely castrated themselves, and aiming at a life of angels while in the flesh, they know no unchaste lust; they know not divorce, since there is no evil they will not endure or turn to the good; they have not the use of oaths, since they neither distrust nor deceive anyone; they know not the hunger for money, since their treasure is in heaven, nor do they itch for empty glory, since they refer all things to the glory of Christ.…these are the new teachings of our founder, such as no school of philosophy has ever brought forth.
— Erasmus, Method of True Theology
In philosopher Étienne Gilson's summary: "the quite precise goal he pursues is to reject Greek philosophy outside of Christianity, into which the Middle Ages introduced Greek philosophy with the risk of corrupting this Christian Wisdom."[255]
Useful "philosophy" needed to be limited to (or re-defined as) the practical and moral:
You must realize that 'philosopher' does not mean someone who is clever at dialectics or science but someone who rejects illusory appearance and undauntedly seeks out and follows what is true and good. Being a philosopher is in practice the same as being a Christian; only the terminology is different."
— Erasmus, Anti-Barbieri
Theology
Three key distinctive features of the spirituality Erasmus proposed are accommodation, inverbation, and scopus christi. [note 114]
In the view of literary historian Chester Chapin, Erasmus' tendency of thought was "towards cautious dulcification of the traditional [Catholic] view".[note 115]
Accommodation
Historian Manfred Hoffmann has described accommodation as "the single most important concept in Erasmus' hermeneutic".[note 116]
For Erasmus, accommodation is a universal concept: humans must accommodate each other, must accommodate the church and vice versa, and must take as their model how Christ accommodated the disciples in his interactions with them, and accommodated humans in his incarnation; which in turn merely reflects the eternal mutual accommodation within the Trinity. And the primary mechanism of accommodation is language,[note 117]: 6 which mediates between reality and abstraction, which allows disputes of all kinds to be resolved and the gospel to be transmitted:[258] in his New Testament, Erasmus notably translated the Greek logos in John 1:1 "In the beginning was the Word" more like "In the beginning was Speech:[259] using Latin sermo (discourse, conversation, language) not verbum (word) emphasizing the dynamic and interpersonal communication rather than static principle:[note 118] "Christ incarnate as the eloquent oration of God":[181] "He is called Speech [sermo], because through him God, who in his own nature cannot be comprehended by any reasoning, wished to become known to us."[238]: 45
Following Paul, Quintillian (apte diecere) and Gregory the Great's Pastoral Care, Erasmus wrote that the orator, preacher or teacher must "adapt their discourse to the characteristics of their audience"; this made pastoral care the "art of arts".[261]: 64 Erasmus wrote that most of his original works, from satires to paraphrases, were essentially the same themes packaged for different audiences.
In this light, Erasmus' ability to have friendly correspondence with both Thomas More and Thomas Bolyn,[127] and with both Philip Melanchthon and Pope Adrian VI, can be seen as outworkings of his theology, rather than slippery insincerity[note 58] or flattery of potential patrons. Similarly, it shows the theological basis of his pacificism, and his view of ecclesiastical authorities—from priests like himself to Church Councils—as necessary mediating peace-brokers.
Inverbation
For Erasmus, further to accommodating humans in his Incarnation, Christ accommodated humans by a kind of inverbation:[note 121] we now knowing the resurrection, Christ is revealed by the Gospels in a way that we can know him better by reading him[note 122] than those who actually heard him speak;[note 123] this will or may transform us.[note 124]
Since the Gospels become in effect like sacraments,[265][note 125] for Erasmus reading them becomes a form of prayer[note 82] which is spoiled by taking single sentences in isolation and using them as syllogisms.[note 126] Instead, learning to understand the context, genres and literary expression in the New Testament becomes a spiritual more than academic exercise.[258] Erasmus' has been called rhetorical theology (theologia rhetorica.)[194]: 32 [note 127]
Scopus christi
Scopus is the unifying reference point, the navigation goal, or the organizing principle of topics.[note 128] According to his assistant-turned-foe, Œcolampadius, Erasmus's rule was "nihil in sacris literis praeter Christum quaerendum" ("nothing is to be sought in the sacred letters but Christ").[269]: 269
What Erasmus contributes[...]is a counsel of restraint in metaphysical speculation, an accent on the revelatory breadth of the eternal Word of God, and an invitation to think of Christ incarnate as the eloquent oration of God. But the central impulse[...]is the affirmation of the full incarnation of Christ in human existence[...]for the transformation of human life. With that, the ethical capstone of Erasmus' reflections on Christ centers on the responsibility to imitate Christ's love for others, and thus for advancing the cause of peace in personal and social life.
— Terrence J. Martin, The Christology of Erasmus[181] (Publisher's description [6])
In Hoffmann's words, for Erasmus "Christ is the scopus of everything": "the focus in which both dimensions of reality, the human and the divine, intersect" and so He himself is the hermeneutical principle of scripture": "the middle is the medium, the medium is the mediator, the mediator is the reconciler".[258]: 9 In Erasmus' early Enchiridion[note 129]: 82 he had given this scopus in typical medieval terms of an ascent of being to God (vertical), but from the mid-1510s life he moved to an analogy of Copernican planetary circling around Christ the centre (horizontal) or Columbian navigation towards a destination.[16]: 135
One effect is that scriptural interpretation must be done starting with the teachings and interactions of Jesus in the Gospels,[270]: 78 with the Sermon on the Mount serving as the starting point,[note 130][173] and arguably with the Beatitudes and the Lord's Prayer at the head of the queue.[citation needed] This privileges peacemaking, mercy, meekness,[note 131] purity of heart, hungering after righteousness, poverty of spirit, etc. as the unassailable core of Christianity and piety and true theology.[note 132]
The Sermon on the Mount provides the axioms on which every legitimate theology must be built, as well as the ethics governing theological discourse, and the rules for validating theological products; Erasmus' philosophia christi treats the primary and initial teaching of Jesus in the first Gospel as a theological methodology.[note 133]
For example, "peacemaking" is a possible topic in any Christian theology; but for Erasmus, from the Beatitude, it must be a starting-, reference- and ending-point when discussing all other theological notions, such as church authority, the Trinity, etc. Moreover, Christian theology must only be done in a peacemaking fashion for peacemaking purposes; and any theology that promotes division and warmongering is thereby anti-Christian. [note 134]
Mystical theology
Another important concept to Erasmus was "the Folly of the Cross"[16]: 119 (which The Praise of Folly explored):[note 135] the view that Truth belongs to the exuberant, perhaps ecstatic,[16]: 140 world of what is foolish, strange, unexpected[273] and even superficially repellent to us, rather than to the frigid worlds which intricate scholastic dialectical and syllogistic philosophical argument all too often generated;[note 136] this produced in Erasmus a profound disinterest in hyper-rationality,[note 137] and an emphasis on verbal, rhetorical, mystical, pastoral and personal/political moral concerns instead.
Theological writings
Several scholars have suggested Erasmus wrote as an evangelist not an academic theologian.[note 138] Even "theology was to be metamorphic speech, converting persons to Christ."[238]: 49 Erasmus did not conceive of Christianity as fundamentally an intellectual system:
Yet these ancient fathers were they who confuted both the Jews and Heathens [...]; they confuted them (I say), yet by their lives and miracles, rather than by words and syllogisms; and the persons they thus proselyted were downright honest, well meaning people, such as understood plain sense better than any artificial pomp of reasoning[...]
Historian William McCuaig commented "I have never read a work by him on any subject that was not at bottom a piece of evangelical literature."[275]
We may distinguish four different lines of work, parallel with each other, and complementary. First, the establishing and critical elucidation of the biblical texts; alongside it, the editions of the great patristic commentators; then, the exegetical works properly so called, in which these two fundamental researches yield their fruit; and finally, the methodological works, which in their first state constitute a sort of preface to the various other studies, but which—in return—were nourished and enlarged by them as they went along.
Apart from these programmatic works, Erasmus also produce a number of prayers, sermons, essays, masses and poems for specific benefactors and occasions, often on topics where Erasmus and his benefactor agreed. His thought was particularly influenced by Origen.[note 139]
He often set himself the challenge of formulating positive, moderate, non-superstitious versions of contemporary Catholic practices that might be more acceptable both to scandalized Catholics and Protestants of good will: the better attitudes to the sacraments, saints, Mary, indulgences, statues, scriptural ignorance and fanciful Biblical interpretation, prayer, dietary fasts, external ceremonialism, authority, vows, docility, submission to Rome, etc. For example, in his Paean in Honour of the Virgin Mary (1503) Erasmus elaborated his theme that the Incarnation had been hinted far and wide, which could impact the theology of the fate of the remote unbaptized and grace, and the place of classical philosophy:[278]
"You are assuredly the Woman of renown: both heaven and earth and the succession of all the ages uniquely join to celebrate your praise in a musical concord. [...]
During the centuries of the previous age the oracles of the gentiles spoke of you in obscure riddles. Egyptian prophecies, Apollo's tripod, the Sibylline books, gave hints of you. The mouths of learned poets predicted your coming in oracles they did not understand. [...]
Both the Old and the New Testament, like two cherubim with wings joined and unanimous voices, repeatedly sing your praise. [...]
Thus indeed have writers religiously vied to proclaim you, on the one hand inspired prophets, on the other eloquent Doctors of the church, both filled with the same spirit, as the former foretold your coming in joyful oracles before your birth and the latter heaped prayerful praise on you when you appeared."
— Erasmus, Paean in Honour of the Virgin Mary (1503)[278]
Erasmus was the most popular, most printed and arguably most influential author of the early sixteenth century, read in all nations in the West and frequently translated. By the 1530s, his writings accounted for 10–20% of book sales in Europe.[279] "Undoubtedly he was the most read author of his age."[280]: 608 His vast number of Latin and Greek publications included translations, paraphrases, letters, textbooks, plays for schoolboys, commentary, poems, liturgies, satires, sermons, and prayers. A large number of his later works were defences of his earlier work from attacks by Catholic and Protestant theological and literary opponents.
The Catalogue of the Works of Erasmus (2023)[281] runs to 444 entries (120 pages), almost all from the latter half of his life. He usually wrote books in particular classical literary genres with their different rhetorical conventions: complaint, diatribe, dialogue, encomium, epistle, commentary, liturgy, sermon, etc. His letter to Ulrich von Hutten on Thomas More's household has been called "the first real biography in the real modern sense."[282]
From his youth, Erasmus had been a voracious writer. Erasmus wrote or answered up to 40 letters per day,[35] usually waking early in the morning and writing them in his own hand. He did not work after dinner. His writing method (recommended in De copia and De ratione studii)[283] was to make notes on whatever he was reading, categorized by theme: he carted these commonplaces in boxes that accompanied him. When assembling a new book, he would go through the topics and cross out commonplace notes as he used them. This catalog of research notes allowed him to rapidly create books, though woven from the same topics. Towards the end of his life, as he lost dexterity, he employed secretaries or amanuenses who performed the assembly or transcription, re-wrote his writing, and in his last decade, recorded his dictation; letters were usually in his own hand, unless formal. For much of his career he wrote standing at a desk, as shown in Dürer's portrait.
on subjects of humanist interest:[284] "Three areas preoccupied Erasmus as a writer: language arts, education, and biblical studies. [...]All of his works served as models of style. [...]He pioneered the principles of textual criticism."[285] and
on pastoral subjects: "to Christians in the various stages of lives:[...]for the young, for married couples, for widows," the dying, clergy, theologians, religious, princes, partakers of sacraments, etc.[261]: 58
He is noted for his extensive scholarly editions of the New Testament in Latin and Greek, and the complete works of numerous Church Fathers. These formed the basis of the so-called Textus Receptus Protestant bibles.
The only works with enduring popularity in modern time are his satires and semi-satires: The Praise of Folly, Julius Excluded from Heaven and The Complaint of Peace. However, his other works, such as his several thousand letters, continue to be a vital source of information to historians of numerous disciplines.
Erasmus was given the sobriquet "Prince of the Humanists", and has been called "the crowning glory of the Christian humanists".[287] He has also been called "the most illustrious rhetorician and educationalist of the Renaissance".[242]
By the 1570s, "Everyone had assimilated Erasmus to one extent or another."
However, at times he has been viciously criticized, his works suppressed, his expertise corralled, his writings misinterpreted, his thought demonized, and his legacy marginalized. He was never judged and declared a heretic by the Catholic Church, during his lifetime or after: a semi-secret trial in Vallodolid Spain, in 1527 found him not to be a heretic, and he was sponsored and protected by Popes and Bishops.
Personal
Health
Erasmus was a quite sickly man and frequently worked from his sickbed. As a teenager he contracted Quartan fever, a non-lethal type of Malaria which recurred numerous times for the rest of his life: he attributed his survival to the intercession of St Genevieve.[288] His digestion gave him trouble: he was intolerant of fish, beer and some wines, which were the standard diet for members of religious orders; he eventually died following an attack of dysentery.
In Cambridge he was ill, possibly with the English sweating sickness. He suffered kidney stones from his time in Venice and, in late life, with gout[289] In 1514, he suffered a fall from his horse and injured his back.
In 1528 he suffered recurrent episodes of the stone, "from which he almost died."[290]
In 1529 his self-removal from Basel was delayed because of headcold and fever.[291] In 1530 while traveling he suffered some near-fatal illness which several doctors diagnosed as the plague (which had killed his parents) but several others diagnosed as not the plague.[292]
Various illnesses have been diagnosed of the skeletons claimed to be his, including pustulotic arthro-osteitis,[293]syphilis or yaws. Other doctors have diagnosed from his written descriptions ailments such as rheumatoid arthritis, enteric rheumatism[294] and spondylarthritis.[295]
Clothing
Visitation Momento mori, painter unknown, c.1500, juxtaposing pregnancy and death, with four Augustinan canons regular of the Chapter (Abbey) of Sion. Left, with a little lion behind him, is St Jerome; right, holding a heart, is St Augustine. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam[296]
Until Erasmus received his 1505 and 1517 Papal dispensations to wear clerical garb, Erasmus wore versions of the local habit of his order, the Canons regular of St Augustine, Chapter of Sion, which varied by region and house, unless travelling: in general, a white or perhaps black cassock with linen and lace choir rochet for liturgical contexts, or otherwise with white sarotium (scarf) (over left shoulder), or almuce (cape), perhaps with an asymmetrical black cope of cloth or sheepskin (Latin: cacullae) or long black cloak.[297]
From 1505, and certainly after 1517, he dressed as a scholar-priest.[298] He preferred warm and soft garments: according to one source, he arranged for his clothing to be stuffed with fur to protect him against the cold, and his habit counted with a collar of fur which usually covered his nape.[298]
All Erasmus' portraits show him wearing a knitted scholar's bonnet.[299]
Signet ring and personal motto
Signet rings of Erasmus of Rotterdam: Amerbach Kabinett
Erasmus chose the Roman god of borders and boundaries Terminus as a personal symbol[300] and had a signet ring with a herm he thought depicted Terminus carved into a carnelian.[300] The herm was presented to him in Rome by his student Alexander Stewart and in reality depicted the Greek god Dionysus.[301] The ring was also depicted in a portrait of his by the Flemish painter Quentin Matsys.[300]
The herm became part of the Erasmus branding at Froben, and is on his tombstone.[303]: 215 In the early 1530s, Erasmus was portrayed as Terminus by Hans Holbein the Younger.[302]
Quinten Metsys (Massijs), medal commissioned by Desiderius Erasmus. 1519, bronze, 105 mm
He chose Concedo Nulli (Lat. I concede to no-one) as his personal motto.[304] The obverse of the medal by Quintin Matsys featured the Terminus herm. Mottoes on medals, along the circumference, included "A better picture of Erasmus is shown in his writing",[305] and "Contemplate the end of a long life" and Horace's "Death is the ultimate boundary of things,"[303]: 215 which re-casts the motto as a memento mori.
Representations
Portrait of Desiderius Erasmus by Albrecht Dürer, 1526, engraved in Nuremberg, GermanyCommemorative coins or medals of Erasmus by Göbel, Georg Wilhelm (1790)
Erasmus frequently gifted portraits and medals with his image to friends and patrons.
Hans Holbein painted him at least three times and perhaps as many as seven, some of the Holbein portraits of Erasmus surviving only in copies by other artists. Holbein's three profile portraits – two (nearly identical) profile portraits and one three-quarters-view portrait – were all painted in the same year, 1523. Erasmus used the Holbein portraits as gifts for his friends in England, such as William Warham, the Archbishop of Canterbury. (Writing in a letter to Warham regarding the gift portrait, Erasmus quipped that "he might have something of Erasmus should God call him from this place.") Erasmus spoke favourably of Holbein as an artist and person but was later critical, accusing him of sponging off various patrons whom Erasmus had recommended, for purposes more of monetary gain than artistic endeavor. There were scores of copies of these portraits made in Erasmus' time. Holbein's 1532 profile woodcut was particularly lauded by those who knew Erasmus.[94]: 129
Albrecht Dürer also produced portraits of Erasmus, whom he met three times, in the form of an engraving of 1526 and a preliminary charcoal sketch. Concerning the former Erasmus was unimpressed, declaring it an unfavorable likeness of him, perhaps because around 1525 he was suffering severely from kidney stones.[94]: 129 Nevertheless, Erasmus and Dürer maintained a close friendship, with Dürer going so far as to solicit Erasmus's support for the Lutheran cause, which Erasmus politely declined. Erasmus wrote a glowing encomium about the artist, likening him to famous Greek painter of antiquity Apelles. Erasmus was deeply affected by his death in 1528.
Quentin Matsys produced the earliest known portraits of Erasmus, including an oil painting from life in 1517[306] (which had to be delayed as Erasmus' pain distorted his face)[94]: 131 and a medal in 1519.[307]
In 1622, Hendrick de Keyser cast a statue of Erasmus in (gilt) bronze replacing an earlier stone version from 1557, itself replacing a wooden one of 1549, possibly a gift from the City of Basel. This was set up in the public square in Rotterdam, and today may be found outside the St. Lawrence Church. It is the oldest bronze statue in the Netherlands.[308]
In 1790, Georg Wilhelm Göbel struck commemorative medals.'
Canterbury Cathedral, England has a statue of Erasmus on the North Face, placed in 1870.
The original Erasmus Programme scholarships enable European students to spend up to a year of their university courses in a university in another European country, commemorating Erasmus' impulse to travel.
The European Union cites the successor Erasmus+ programme as a "key achievement": "Almost 640,000 people studied, trained or volunteered abroad in 2020."[309]
The parallel Erasmus Mundus project is aimed at attracting non-European students to study in Europe.
The Erasmus Prize is one of Europe's foremost recognitions for culture, society or social science. It was won by Wikipedia in 2015.
The Erasmus Lectures are an annual lecture on religious subjects, given by prominent Christian (mainly Catholic) and Jewish intellectuals,[310] most notably by Joseph Ratzinger in 1988.[311]
A peer-reviewed annual scholarly journal Erasmus Studies has been produced since 1981.[312]
Queens' College, Cambridge, has an Erasmus Tower,[318] Erasmus Building[319] and an Erasmus Room.[320] Until the early 20th century, Queens' College used to have a corkscrew that was purported to be "Erasmus' corkscrew", which was a third of a metre long; as of 1987, the college still had what it calls "Erasmus' chair".[321]
In 1928, the site of Erasmus' grave was dug up, and a body identified in the bones and examined.[298] In 1974, a body was dug up in a slightly different location, accompanied by an Erasmus medal. Both bodies have been claimed to be Erasmus'. However, it is possible neither is.[322]
Notes
^"Erasmus charged the reading world with a style which, though far from correct [ Ciceronian ] Latin, is the most delightful which the Renaissance has left us. [...] Erasmus' Latin was a living and spoken tongue." Encyclopedia Britannica[3]
^Vollerthun and Richardson suggest three phases, grouping the first two quarters for their purposes.[4]: 31
^Colet and Vitrier were "two of the deepest influences on his life."[5]: 11
^Erasmus was his baptismal name, given after Erasmus of Formiae. Desiderius was an adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The Roterodamus was a scholarly name meaning "from Rotterdam", though the Latin toponymic adjective would be Roterdamensis.
^Painter Hieronymous Bosch lived nearby, on the marketplace, at this time.
^"Poverty stricken, suffering from quartan fever, and pressurized by his guardians"Juhász, Gergely (1 January 2019). "The Making of Erasmus's New Testament and Its English Connections". Sparks and Lustrous Words: Literary Walks, Cultural Pilgrimages. Archived from the original on 9 September 2023. Retrieved 23 May 2024.
^Canons regular of St Augustine, Chapter of Sion (or Syon), Emmaus house, Stein (or Steyn).
^This is a non-mendicant order of clerics which followed the looser Rule of St Augustine, who do not withdraw from the world, and who take a vow of Stability binding them to a House in addition to the usual Poverty (common life, simplicity), Chastity and Obedience. Erasmus described the Canons Regular as "an order midway between monks and (secular priests) [...] amphibians, like the beaver [...] and the crocodile". Also "for the so-called Canons formerly were not monks, and now they are an intermediate class: monks where it is an advantage to be so; not monks where it is not".[32]
The kind of world-involved, devout, scholarly, loyal, humanistic, non-monkish, non-mendicant, non-ceremonial, voluntaristic religious order without notions of spiritual perfection that may have suited Erasmus better arose soon after his death, perhaps in response to the ethos Erasmus shared: notably the Jesuits, Oratorians[33]: 52 and subsequent congregations such as the Redemptorists. For the Ursalines, Barnabites, etc. "these associations were not conceived by their founders as 'religious orders', but as spiritual companies mostly
composed of both lay and religious folk ... Similarly to the teachings of humanists like Erasmus and of the devotio moderna, these ... associations did not emphasise the institutional aspect of religious life."[34]
^Diarmaid MacCulloch (2003). Reformation: A History. p. 95. MacCulloch has a footnote "There has been much modern embarrassment and obfuscation on Erasmus and Rogerus, but see the sensible comment in J. Huizinga, Erasmus of Rotterdam (London, 1952), pp. 11–12, and from Geoffrey Nutuall, Journal of Ecclesiastical History 26 (1975), 403"
In Huizinga's view: "Out of the letters to Servatius there rises the picture of an Erasmus whom we shall never find again—a young man of more than feminine sensitiveness; of a languishing need for sentimental friendship. [...]This exuberant friendship accords quite well with the times and the person. [...] Sentimental friendships were as much in vogue in secular circles during the fifteenth century as towards the end of the eighteenth century. Each court had its pairs of friends, who dressed alike, and shared room, bed, and heart. Nor was this cult of fervent friendship restricted to the sphere of aristocratic life. It was among the specific characteristics of the devotio moderna."
^
However, note that such crushes or bromances may not have been scandalous at the time: the CistercianAelred of Rievaulx's influential book On Spiritual Friendship put intense adolescent and early-adult friendships between monks as natural and useful steps towards "spiritual friendships", following Augustine. The correct direction of passionate love was also a feature of the spirituality of the Victorine canons regular, notably in Richard of St Victor's On the Four Degrees of Violent Love[37] Huizinga (p.12) notes "To observe one another with sympathy, to watch and note each other's inner life, was a customary and approved occupation among the Brethren of the Common Life and the Windesheim monks."
^Erasmus used similar expressions in letters to other friends at the time.[11]: 17 D. F. S. Thomson found two other similar contemporary examples of humanist monks using similar florid idiom in their letters. Thomson, D.F.S. (1969). "Erasmus as a poet in the context of northern humanism". De Gulden Passer (in Dutch). 47: 187–210. Historian Julian Haseldine has noted that medieval monks used charged expressions of friendship with the same emotional content regardless of how well-known the person was to them: so this language was sometimes "instrumental" rather than "affective." However, in this case we have Erasmus' own attestation of the genuine rather than formal fondness. Haseldine, Julian (2006). "Medieval Male Friendship Networks". The Monastic Review Bulletin (12). p.19.
^Erasmus editor Harry Vredeveld argues that the letters are "surely expressions of true friendship", citing what Erasmus wrote in his Letter to Grunnius about an earlier teenage infatuation with a "Cantellius": "It is not uncommon at [that] age to conceive passionate attachments [fervidos amores] for some of your companions". However, he allows "That these same letters, which run the gamut of love's emotions, are undoubtedly also literary exercises—rhetorical progymnasmata—is by no means a contradiction of this."Harry Vredeveld, ed. (1993), Collected Works of Erasmus: Poems, Translated by Clarence H. Miller, University of Toronto Press, p. xv, ISBN9780802028679
^But also a capacity to feel betrayal sharply, as with his brother Peter, "Cantellius", Aleander, and Dorp.
^ abThe biographer J.J. Mangan commented of his time living with Andrea Ammonio in England "to some extent Erasmus thereby realized the dream of his youth, which was to live together with some choice literary spirit with whom he might share his thoughts and aspiration". Quoted in J. K. Sowards, The Two Lost Years of Erasmus: Summary, Review, and Speculation, Studies in the Renaissance, Vol. 9 (1962), p. 174.
^The position of Latin Secretary to some great churchman or prince had a long and distinguished history: Jerome had been the Latin Secretary for Pope Damasus I.[42] The position was important but not lucrative, unless a stepping-stone to other offices.
^ This was his entry to the European network of Latin secretaries, who were usually humanists, and so to their career path: a promising secretary could be appointed tutor to some aristocratic boy, when that boy reached power they were frequent kept on as a trusted counselor, and finally moved over to some dignified administrative role.[45]
^25 was the minimum age under canon law to be ordained a priest. However, Gouda church records do not support the 1492 year given by his first biographer, and 1495 has been suggested as more plausible.[7]
^Erasmus suffered severe food intolerances, including to fish, beer and many wines, which formed much of the diet of Northern European monks, and caused his antipathy to fasts. "My heart is Catholic, but my stomach is Lutheran." (Epistles)
^The canonry burnt down in 1549 and the canons moved to Gouda. Klein, Jan Willem; Simoni, Anna E.C. (1994). "Once more the manuscripts of Stein monastery and the copyists of the Erasmiana manuscripts". Quaerendo. 24 (1): 39–46. doi:10.1163/157006994X00117.
^Dispensed of his vows of stability and obedienceArchived 6 June 2019 at the Wayback Machine from his obligations "by the constitutions and ordinances, also by statutes and customs of the monastery of Stein in Holland", quoted in J. K. Sowards, The Two Lost Years of Erasmus: Summary, Review, and Speculation, Studies in the Renaissance, Vol. 9 (1962), p. 174. Erasmus continued to report occasionally to the prior, who disputed the validity of the 1505 dispensation.
^Undispensed illegitimacy had various effects under canon law: it was not possible to be ordained a secular priest or to hold benefices, for example. Clarke, Peter (2005). "New sources for the history of the religious life: the registers of the Apostolic Penitentiary". Monastic Research Bulletin. 11.
^Subsequent students included Ignatius of Loyola, Noël Béda, Jean Calvin, and John Knox.
^Some of these visits were interrupted by trips back to Europe.[citation needed]
^According to theologian Thomas Scheck "In the fuller context of the Ratio the "ceremonies" Erasmus criticizes are not the liturgical rites of the Church, but the special devotions and prescriptions added to them, particularly those related to food and clothing, which became binding in particular religious orders and more generally, under threat of excommunication and even eternal punishment."[66]
^"We find in the New Testament that fasting was observed by
Christians and praised by the apostles, but I do not remember reading that it was prescribed with certain rites. These things are not mentioned so that any ceremonies that the church has instituted concerning clothing, fasting or similar matters should be despised, but to show that Christ and his apostles were more concerned with things pertaining to salvation."[66]
^Movingly remembering later, how Alexander would play the monochord, recorder or lute in the afternoon after studies.[77]
^Even in good times, Erasmus had a "frequent inability to understand the details of his own finances" which caused him disappointment and suspicion.[80] His finances as late as 1530 have been described as "bewilderingly complicated" with multiple small income sources being managed with varying degrees of promptness by different associates in different countries.[81]: 2404
^ Erasmus claimed the blind poet laureate friar Bernard André, the former tutor of Prince Arthur, had promised to cover the rent. Roth, F. (1965). "A History of the English Austin Friars (continuation)". Augustiniana. 15: 567–628. ISSN0004-8003. JSTOR44992025. p.624. It may also show the practical difficulty of being dispensed from wearing the habit of his order without being entirely dispensed from his vow of poverty: indeed, Erasmus had said his order of Augustinian Canons regular were priests when that suited and monks when that suited.[11]
^He wrote to Servatius Rogerus, the prior at Stein, to justify his jobs: "I do not aim at becoming rich, so long as I possess just enough means to provide for my health and free time for my studies and to ensure that I am a burden to none."[85]
^"Beer does not suit me either, and the wine is horrible."Froud, J.A. (1896). Life and Letters of Erasmus. Scribner and Sons. p. 112.
^Historians have speculated that Erasmus passed on to More an early version of Bartholome de las Casas' Memoria which More used for Utopia, due to 33 specific similarities of ideas, and that the fictional character Raphael Hythloday is de las Casas.[95]: 45 Coincidentally, de las Casas' nemesis Sepúlveda, arguing for the natural slavery of American Indians, had previously been Erasmus' opponent as well, initially supporting the anti-decadence of Erasmus' Ciceronians but then finding heresy in his translations and works.
Another theory is that Raphael Hythloday is Erasmus himself.[51]
^Italian gold florins and Venetian gold ducats, Dutch silver guilders had similar values. However, there is no single modern equivalent exchange rate.[101]
^By 1524, his disciples included, in his words, "the (Holy Roman) Emperor, the Kings of England, France, and Denmark, Prince Ferdinand of Germany, the Cardinal of England, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and more princes, more bishops, more learned and honourable men than I can name, not only in England, Flanders, France, and Germany, but even in Poland and Hungary..." quoted in Trevor-Roper, Hugh (30 July 2020). "Erasmus". Pro Europa. Archived from the original on 29 December 2023. Retrieved 29 December 2023.
^ Rhenanus shared many humanist contacts from Paris and Strassburg: a former student of Andrelini, friend of the Amerbach family, colleague of Sebastian Brant etc. He had learned printing in Paris with Robert Estienne.
^In his own house "Zur alten Treu" which Froben had bought in 1521 and fitted with Erasmus' required fireplace.[111]
^Engineered by reformer Cardinal Thomas Cajetan,[114] the leading Thomist of his age, who had become a friendly correspondent of Erasmus and had moved to bibliocentrism, progressively producing his own commentaries on the New Testament and most of the Old. Erasmus was initially sceptical of Cajetan, blaming him for taking a too-hard line against Luther, however he was won over in 1521 after reading Cajetan's works on the Eucharist, Confession and invocation of the saints.[115]: 357 In 1530, Cajetan proposed that concessions be made to Germany to allow communion under both kinds and married clergy, in full sympathy with Erasmus' spirit of mediation.
^"When the Lutheran tragedy (Latin: Lutheranae tragoediae) opened, and all the world applauded, I advised my friends to stand aloof. I thought it would end in bloodshed...", Letter to Alberto Pío, 1525, in e.g., "Froude, Life and Letters of Erasmus, p 322"(PDF).
^In a few hours, they cleansed churches of idolatry by smashing statues, rood-screens, lights, altar paintings – everything they could lay their hands on, including Hans Holbein the Younger's work.[...] the hang-man lit nine fires in front of the Minster [...] It was, [a witness] lamented, as though these objects 'had been public heretics'.[...] Nowhere else was the destruction by Christian activists so unexpected, violent, swift and complete.[118]: 96
^Prominent reformers like Oecolampadius urged him to stay. However, Campion, Erasmus and Switzerland, op. cit., p26, says that Œcolampadius wanted to drive Erasmus from the city.
^He spent the first two years in Freiburg as a guest of the city in the unfinished mansion Haus zum Walfisch and was indignant when an attempt was made to charge back-rent: he paid this rent, and that of another refugee from Basel in his house, his fellow Augustinian Canon Bishop Augustinus Marius, the humanist preacher who had led the efforts in Basel to resist Œcolampadius. Emerton (1889), p.449.
^His arthritic gout[124] kept him housebound and unable to write: "Even on Easter Day I said mass in my bedroom." Letter to Nicolaus Olahus (1534)
^De Góis then proceeded to Padua, meeting with the humanist cardinals Bembo and Sadeleto, and with Ignatius of Loyola. He had previously dined with Luther and Melanchthon, and met Bucer.[126]
^The last was released at the time of Henry VIII and Anne Bolyn's wedding; Erasmus appended a statement that indicated he opposed the marriage. Erasmus outlived Anne and her brother by two months.
^Erasmus writing a moving letter to William Blount's teenaged son Charles about Warham: "I wrote this in sorrow and grief, my mind totally devastated… We had made a vow to die together; he had promised a common grave…I am held back here half-alive, still owing the debt from the vow I had made, which …I will soon pay. …Instead, even time, which is supposed to cure even the most grievous sorrows, merely makes this wound more and more painful. What more can I say? I feel that I am being called. I will be glad to die here together with that incomparable and irrevocable patron of mine, provided I am allowed, by the mercy of Christ, to live there together with him."[66]: 86
^"I am so weary of this region[...]I feel that there is a conspiracy to kill me[...]Many hope for war." Letter to Erasmus Schets (1534)
^In the Expositio Fidelis, Erasmus recounts "Included with the Carthusians was the Brigittine monk Reynolds, a man of angelic features and angelic character and possessed of sound judgment, as I discovered through the conversations I had with him when I was in England in the company of Cardinal Campeggi."[130]: 611
^During which he occupied himself copying out quotations from Erasmus' Adagesetc and formally complaining about the protestantized English translation of Erasmus' Paraphrases of the New Testament.[132]
^Contrast the "outsider" interpretation of Huizinga "He tried to remain in the fold of the old [Roman] Church, after having damaged it seriously, and renounced the [Protestant] Reformation, and to a certain extent even Humanism, after having furthered both with all his strength." Johan Huizinga, Erasmus and the Age of Reformation (tr. F. Hopman and Barbara Flower; New York: Harper and Row, 1924), p. 190. with the "insider" interpretation of Francis Aidan Gasquet "He was a reformer in the best sense, as so many far-seeing and spiritual-minded churchmen of those days were. He desired to better and beautify and perfect the system he found in vogue, and he had the courage of his convictions to point out what he thought stood in need of change and improvement, but he was no iconoclast; he had no desire to pull down or root up or destroy under the plea of improvement. That he remained to the last the friend of Popes and bishops and other orthodox churchmen, is the best evidence, over and above his own words, that his real sentiments were not misunderstood by men who had the interests of the Church at heart, and who looked upon him as true and loyal, if perhaps a somewhat eccentric and caustic son of Holy Church. Even in his last sickness he received from the Pope proof of his esteem, for he was given a benefice of considerable value."[35]: 200
^This assertion is contradicted by Gonzalo Ponce de Leon speaking in 1595 at the Roman Congregation of the Index on the (mostly successful) de-prohibition of Erasmus' works said that he died "as a Catholic having received the sacraments." Menchi, Silvana Seidel (2000). "Sixteenth-Annual Bainton Lecture". Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook. 20 (1): 30. doi:10.1163/187492700X00048.
^According to historian Jan van Herwaarden, it is consistent with Erasmus' view that outward signs were not important; what mattered is the believer's direct relationship with God. However, van Herwaarden states that "he did not dismiss the rites and sacraments out of hand but asserted a dying person could achieve a state of salvation without the priestly rites, provided their faith and spirit were attuned to God" (i.e., maintaining being in a State of Grace) noting Erasmus' stipulation that this was "as the (Catholic) Church believes."[139]
^"He left a small fortune, in trusts for the benefit of the aged and infirm, the education of young men of promise, and as marriage portions for deserving young women – nothing, however, for Masses for the repose of his soul." Kerr, Fergus (2005). "Comment: Erasmus". New Blackfriars. 86 (1003): 257–258. doi:10.1111/j.0028-4289.2005.00081.x. ISSN0028-4289. JSTOR43250928.
^'After the payment of all outstanding claims, the sum in the hands of Bonifacius and the two Basel executors amounted to 5,000 florins. This sum was invested in a loan to the duchy of Württemberg that yielded an annual income of 250 florins. The greater part of this sum became a fund to provide scholarships for students at the University of Basel (in theology, law, and medicine); the rest went into a fund devoted to the assistance of the poor."[130] In modern terms, 5000 florins could be between US$500,000 and US$5,000,000; 250 florins could be between $25,000 and $250,000
^Historian Kirk Essary comments "Reading the work (Exomologesis), one is reminded that Erasmus remains underrated for his psychological insights in general and that he is perhaps overlooked as a pastoral theologian."[146]
^For Erasmus, "dogmatics do not exist for themselves; they take on meaning only when they issue, on the one hand, in the exegesis of scripture and, on the other, in moral action" according to Manfred Hoffmann's Erkenntnis und Verwirklichung der wahren Theologie nach Erasmus von Rotterdam (1972) [16]: 137
^However, "his wit can be gentle; it can break out into bitterness. In controversy, resentments and anxieties can get loose, countermanding the Christian imperative of love to which he was devoted and which runs as a leitmotiv through all his writings." Mansfield [16]: 230
^"So thin- skinned that a fly would draw blood." Albert Pio, quoted in Encyclopedia Britannica[3]
^ abHis mode of expression made him "slippery like a snake", according to Luther,Visser, Arnoud (2017). "Irreverent Reading: Martin Luther as Annotator of Erasmus". The Sixteenth Century Journal. 48 (1): 87–109. doi:10.1086/SCJ4801005. hdl:1874/348917. S2CID31540853.)
^"[...]of all Renaissance writers, Erasmus is the one who prefers the dialogue, with its avoidance of dogmatism, it balance and swing of debate, its insistence of friendship and communication.[5]: 7
^For Markish, Erasmus' "theological opposition to a form of religious thought which he identified with Judaism was not translated into crude prejudice against actual Jews", to the extent that Erasmus could be described as 'a-semitic' rather than 'anti-semitic'."Erasmus of Rotterdam". Jewish Virtual Library. AICE. Archived from the original on 15 July 2023. Retrieved 15 July 2023.
^ Historian Kevin Ingram suggests "The conversos also clearly reveled in Erasmus's comparison, in the Enchiridion, of Old-Christians mired in ceremonial practice to Pharisees who had forgotten the true message of Judaism, a statement they used as a counter-punch against Old-Christian accusations of converso Judaizing. The conversos conveniently ignored the anti-semitic aspect of Erasmus' statement."[128]: 71
^
"Erasmus discussed Amerindians and their way of life only as a tool, an analogy or parable, for those issues that consistently preoccupied his mind, namely the mores of the Christian Church."[158]
^Erasmus, de bello Turcico, apud Ron, Nathan The Non-Cosmopolitan Erasmus: An Examination of his Turkophobic/Islamophobic Rhetoric, op. cit. p 99: Ron takes this as an affirmation by Erasmus of the low nature of Turks; the alternative view would take it as a negative foil (applying the model of the Mote and the Beam) where the prejudice is appropriated in order to subvert it.
^Summa nostrae religionis pax est et unanimated. Erasmus continued: "This can hardly remain the case unless we define as few matters as possible and leave each individual's judgement free on many questions." Erasmus (1523). Letter to Carondelet: The Preface to His Edition of St. Hilary. Note that the use of summa is perhaps also a backhanded reference to the scholasticsumma, which he upbraided for their moral and spiritual uselessness.Surtz, Edward L. (1950). ""Oxford Reformers" and Scholasticism". Studies in Philology. 47 (4): 547–556. JSTOR4172947. Archived from the original on 19 June 2023. Retrieved 19 June 2023.
^"Latin: Vicit mansuetudine, vicit beneficentia" R. Sider translates vicit as "he prevailed" Sider, Robert D. (31 December 2019). "A System or Method of Arriving by a Short Cut at True Theology by Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam". The New Testament Scholarship of Erasmus: 479–713. doi:10.3138/9781487510206-020. ISBN9781487510206. S2CID198585078.
^Bruce Mansfield summarizes historian Georg Gebhart's view: "While recognizing the teaching authority, but not the primacy, of Councils, Erasmus adopted a moderate papalism, papal authority itself being essentially pastoral."[16]: 132
^If any single individual in the modern world can be credited with "the invention of peace", the honour belongs to Erasmus rather than Kant whose essay on perpetual peace was published nearly three centuries later.[96]
^"The argument of Bellum is governed by three favorite themes that recur in other works of Erasmus. First, war is naturally wrong[...]Second, Christianity forbids war[...]Third, "just cause" in war will be claimed by both sides and will be next to impossible to determine fairly: hence, the traditional criteria of the just war are nonfunctional."[165]
^"Desiderius Erasmus, Thomas More and John Colet[...]between them in the first three decades of the sixteenth century, ushered in not only humanism – an ethically sanctioned guide for practical, humanitarian ways of living in society – but also the formation of a group that might be called a 'peace movement'."[167]
^"I do not deny that I wrote some harsh things in order to deter the Christians from the madness of war, because I saw that these wars,which we witnessed for too many years, are the source of the biggest part of evils which damage Christendom. Therefore, it was necessary to come forward not only against these deeds, which are clearly criminal, but also against other actions, which are almost impossible to do without committing many crimes." Apology against Albert Pío [162]: 11
^"Erasmus and Vives ruled out conquests and annexation of territories."[158]
^Erasmus was not out-of-step with opinion within the church: Archbishop Bernard II Zinni of Split speaking at the Fifth Council of the Lateran (1512) denounced princes as the most guilty of ambition, luxury and a desire for domination. Bernard proposed that reformation must primarily involve ending war and schism. Minnich, Nelson H. (1969). "Concepts of Reform Proposed at the Fifth Lateran Council". Archivum Historiae Pontificiae. 7: 163–251. ISSN0066-6785. JSTOR23563707. Archived from the original on 1 November 2023. Retrieved 1 November 2023. p. 173,174
^James D.Tracy notes that mistrust of the Habsburg government in the general population (partially due to the fact Maximilian and his grandson Charles V were absentee rulers, the secret nature of diplomacy and other circumstances) was widespread, but it is notable that intellectuals like Erasmus and Barlandus also accepted the allegations.[98]: 94, 95
^"I have made my support of the church sufficiently clear[...]The only thing in which I take pride is that I have never committed myself to any sect." Erasmus, Letter to Georgius Agricola (1534)
^Historian Johannes Trapman notes "But who are in fact heretics? According to Erasmus not somebody who doubts a minor doctrinal point or even errs in some article. [...]For the protection of the commonwealth[...] heretics who are not only blasphemous but also seditious deserve the death penalty."[175]: 23 Erasmus commended that the punishment of the early church for heresy was excommunication.
^"...in large part half-Christian and perhaps nearer to true Christianity than most of our own folk." Letter to Paul Volz[181]: 32
^"...the goal of De bello Turcico was to warn Christians and the Church of moral deterioration and to exhort them to change their ways.... Erasmus' objection to crusades was by no means an overall opposition to fighting the Turks. Rather, Erasmus harshly condemned embezzlement and corrupt fundraising, and the Church's involvement in such nefarious activities, and regarded them as inseparable from waging a crusade." Ron, Nathan (1 January 2020). "The Non-Cosmopolitan Erasmus: An Examination of his Turkophobic/Islamophobic Rhetoric". Akademik Tarih ve Düşünce Dergisi (Academic Journal of History and Idea). pp. 97,98
^"If only the Christian church did not attach so much importance to the Old Testament! It is a thing of shadows, given us for a time." Ep 798 p. 305,[184]
For Erasmus, "...the relative importance we should ascribe to the different books of the Bible" accorded to how much "they bring us more or less directly to knowledge of (Christ)," which gave priority to the New Testament and the Gospels in particular.[148] "To Erasmus, Judaism was obsolete. To Reuchlin, something of Judaism remained of continuing value to Christianity."[152]
^"The Jews" (i.e. the earliest Jewish Christians in Antioch) "because of a certain human tendency, desire(d) to force their own rites upon everyone, clearly in order under this pretext to enhance their own importance. For each one wishes that the things which he himself has taught should appear as outstanding." Erasmus, Paraphrase of Romans and Galatians[149]: 321
^
In marriage, Erasmus' two significant innovations, according to historian Nathan Ron, were that "matrimony can and should be a joyous bond, and that this goal can be achieved by a relationship between spouses based on mutuality, conversation, and persuasion."[189]: 4:43
^According to historian Thomas Tentler, few Christians from his century gave as much emphasis as Erasmus to a pious attitude to death: the terrors of death are "closely connected to guilt from sin and fear of punishment" the antidote to which is first "trust in Christ and His ability to forgive sins", avoiding (Lutheran) boastful pride, then a loving, undespairing life lived with appropriate penitence. The priests' focus in the Last Rites should be comfort and hope. Tentler, Thomas N. (1965). "Forgiveness and Consolation in the Religious Thought of Erasmus". Studies in the Renaissance. 12: 110–133. doi:10.2307/2857071. ISSN0081-8658. JSTOR2857071. Archived from the original on 25 December 2023. Retrieved 25 December 2023.
^ ab"It is because Christ is in the pages of the bible that we meet him as a living person. As we read these pages we absorb his presence, we become one with him." Robert Sider[191]
^"Erasmus had been criticizing the Catholic church for years before the reformers emerged, and not just pointing up its failings but questioning many of its basic teachings. He was the author of a series of publications, including a Greek edition of the New Testament (1516), which laid the foundations for a model of Christianity that called for a pared-down, internalized style of religiosity focused on Scripture rather than the elaborate, and incessant, outward rituals of the medieval church. Erasmus was not a forerunner in the sense that he conceived or defended ideas that later made up the substance of the Reformation thought. [...] It is enough that some of his ideas merged with the later Reformation message." Dixon, C. Scott (2012). Contesting the Reformation. Wiley-Blackwell. p. 60. ISBN978-1-4051-1323-6.
^"Unlike Luther, he accepted papal primacy and the teaching authority of the church and did not discount human tradition. The reforms proposed by Erasmus were in the social rather than the doctrinal realm. His principal aim was to foster piety and to deepen spirituality."
[194]: 37
^"Rigorously scientific biblical study must sustain an effort to renew the interior life, and the interior life must itself be at once the agent and the beneficiary of a renewal of the whole of Christian society." This went beyond the devotio moderna, which "was a spirituality of teachers."
^Writer Gregory Wolfe notes however "For Erasmus, the narrative of decline is a form of despair, a failure to believe that the tradition can and will generate new life."[195]
^monachatus non est pietas: Being a monk is not piety but he adds 'but a way of life that may be useful or not useful according to each man's physical make-up and disposition'.[194]: 36
^DeMolen claims: "It is important to recall that Erasmus remained a member of the Austin Canons all his life. His lifestyle harmonized with the spirit of the Austin Canons even though he lived outside their monastic walls."[32] Erasmus represents the anti-Observantist wing of the canons regular who believed that the charism of their orders required them to be more externally focussed (on pastoral, missionary, scholarly, charitable and sacramental works) and correspondingly de-focussed on monastic severity and ceremonialism.
^"In the first years of the Reformation many thought that Luther was only carrying out the program of Erasmus, and this was the opinion of those strict Catholics who from the outset of the great conflict included Erasmus in their attacks on Luther." Catholic Encyclopedia
^An expression Erasmus coined. Bonae connotes more than just good, but also moral, honest and brave literature. Such sound learning encompassed both sacred literature (Latin: sacrae litterae), namely patristic writings and sacred scriptures (Latin: sacrae scripturae), and profane literature (Latin: prophanae litterae) by classical pagan authors.[208]
^Future cardinal Aleander, his former friend and roommate at the Aldine Press, wrote "The poison of Erasmus has a much more dangerous effect than that of Luther" Catholic Encyclopedia
^Namely Egmondanus, the Louvain Carmelite Nicolaas Baechem.[223]
^For Craig R. Thompson, Erasmus cannot be called philosopher in the technical sense, since he disdained formal logic and metaphysics and cared only for moral philosophy. Similarly, John Monfasani reminds us that Erasmus never claimed to be a philosopher, was not trained as a philosopher, and wrote no explicit works of philosophy, although he repeatedly engaged in controversies that crossed the boundary from philosophy to theology. His relation to philosophy bears further scrutiny.
MacPhail, Eric. "Desiderius Erasmus (1468?—1536)". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 17 August 2010. Retrieved 28 July 2023.
^"Humanists regarded it (rhetoric) as a practical way to investigate questions on which dialectical argumentation based on logic had proved unable to produce certitude. Rhetoric was the procedure to be used in pursuit of conclusions that could not be proved beyond doubt but were the most probable choice among the alternatives explored."Nauert, Charles. "Desiderius Erasmus". plato.stanford.edu.
^"According to Erasmus, Lucian's laughter is the most appropriate instrument to guide pupils towards moral seriousness because it is the denial of every peremptory and dogmatic point of view and, therefore, the image of a joyful pietas ("true religion ought to be the most cheerful thing in the world"; De recta pronuntiatione, CWE 26, 385). By teaching the relativity of communicative situations and the variability of temperaments, the laughter resulting from the art of rhetoric comes to resemble the most sincere content of Christian morality, based on tolerance and loving persuasion." Bacchi, Elisa (2019). "Hercules, Silenus and the Fly: Lucian's Rhetorical Paradoxes in Erasmus' Ethics". Philosophical Readings Online Journal of Philosophy. CI (2). Archived from the original on 1 November 2023. Retrieved 20 October 2023.
^According to historian Jamie Gianoutsos, Erasmus was not cherry-picking, in the way of St Augustine's 'spoiling the Egyptians,' i.e., acquiring what is valuable from the pagan heritage for the benefit of Christianity. "Erasmus, in contrast, had expressed reserve and even cautious criticism for Augustine's views while betraying great enthusiasm for St Jerome and his metaphor of the freeman who marries the captive slave to obtain her freedom. Christianity[...]had wed itself to the classical heritage to enhance and liberate it (i.e., that heritage) from its pagan ethos[...]"[229]
^Baker-Smith, Dominic (1994). "Uses of Plato by Erasmus and More". Platonism and the English Imagination. pp. 86–99. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511553806.010. ISBN9780521403085. p. 92: Erasmus does not engage with Plato as a philosopher, at least not in any rigorous sense, but rather as a rhetorician of spiritual experience, the instigator of a metaphorical system which coheres effectively with Pauline Christianity.
^"Despite a lack of formal philosophical training and an antipathy to medieval scholasticism, Erasmus possessed not only a certain familiarity with Thomas Aquinas, but also close knowledge of Plato and Aristotle. Erasmus' interest in some Platonic motifs is well known. But the most consistent philosophical theme in Erasmus' writings from his earliest to his latest was that of the Epicurean goal of peace of mind, ataraxia. Erasmus, in fact, combined Christianity with a nuanced Epicurean morality. This Epicureanism, when combined in turn with a commitment to the consensus Ecclesiae as well as with an allergy to dogmatic formulations and an appreciation of the Greek Fathers, ultimately rendered Erasmus alien to Luther and Protestantism though they agreed on much." Abstract of Monfasani, John (2012). "Twenty-fifth Annual Margaret Mann Phillips Lecture: Erasmus and the Philosophers". Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook. 32 (1): 47–68. doi:10.1163/18749275-00000005.
^Historian Fritz Caspari quipped that Machiavelli "appears as a sceptic whose premise is the badness of man", while Erasmus is a sceptic whose general premise is "man is or can be made good."[239]
^In the Adagia, Erasmus quotes Aristotle 304 times, "making extensive use of the moral, philosophical, political, and rhetorical writings as well as those on natural philosophy, while completely shunning the logical works that formed the basis for scholastic philosophy" Mann Phillips, Margaret (1964). The 'Adages' of Erasmus. A Study with Translations. Cambridge University Press. apud Traninger, Anita (25 January 2023). "Erasmus and the Philosophers". A Companion to Erasmus. pp. 45–67. doi:10.1163/9789004539686_005. ISBN9789004539686.
^"However learned the works of those men may be, however 'subtle' and, if it please them, however 'seraphic,' it must still be admitted that the Gospels and Epistles are the supreme authority." Erasmus, Paraclesis, apud Sider [246]
^Erasmus followed the tradition of proto-humanist Petrarch, summarized as: "Aristotle was spiritually deficient, because although he could define virtue, his words lacked the power to motivate men to lead virtuous lives. It was not possible to know God adequately in this life, but it was possible to love him, which made virtue far more important than knowledge."[247]: 39
^A narrowing of Tertullian's "What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?"
^"For I am ready to swear that Epimenides came to life again in Scotus." Erasmus to Thomas Grey Nichols, ep. 59; Allen, ep 64
^"Like Jean Gerson before him, he recommended that (scholastic method) be practiced with greater moderation and that it be complemented by the new philological and patristic knowledge that was becoming available."[251]: 26
^"I find that in comparison with the Fathers of the Church our present-day theologians are a pathetic group. Most of them lack the elegance, the charm of language, and the style of the Fathers. Content with Aristotle, they treat the mysteries of revelation in the tangled fashion of the logician. Excluding the Platonists from their commentaries, they strangle the beauty of revelation." Enchiridion, Erasmus, apud Markos, Louis A. (April 2007). "The Enchiridion of Erasmus". Theology Today. 64 (1): 80–88. doi:10.1177/004057360706400109. S2CID171469828. p. 86
^"Why don't we all reflect: this must be a marvelous and new philosophy since, in order to reveal it to mortals, he who was god became man..."Erasmus (1516). Paraclesis(PDF). Archived(PDF) from the original on 11 August 2023. Retrieved 11 August 2023.
^A Lutheran view: "Philosophia christiana as
taught by Erasmus has never been factual reality; wherever it was philosophia, it was not christiana; wherever it was christiana, it was not philosophia." Karl Barth[253]: 1559
^Philosopher Étienne Gilson has noted "Confronted with the same failure of philosophy to rise above the order of formal logic, John of Salisbury between 1150 and 1180, Nicolas of Autrecourt and Petrach in 1360, Erasmus of Rotterdam around 1490, spontaneously conceived a similar method to save Christian faith," i.e. a sceptical-about-scholasticism ad-fontes religious moralism promoting peace and charity.[254]: 102–107
^Accommodation and scopus christi were ideas significant later, in Calvin's theology.[256]: 231, 131
^For example, "It is likely that Erasmus rejected the traditional view of Hell as a place of real, material fire. But although he probably conceived of it as a place of mental rather than physical torment,... Erasmus does not appear to reject the eternality of Hell."[257]
^Furthermore, "the role allegory plays in Erasmus' exegesis is analogous to the crucial place accommodation obtains in his theology".[258]: 7 )
^"We see Erasmus' hermeneutic as governed by the idea of language as mediation [...] The dynamics of mediation, central as it is in Erasmus' hermeneutic, informed all aspects of his world view."Hoffmann, Manfred (1994). Rhetoric and Theology(PDF). University of Toronto. ISBN978-0-8020-0579-3. Archived(PDF) from the original on 23 February 2024. Retrieved 23 February 2024.
^"Just as the Word of God
is the image of the Father, so too, human speech is a certain image of the human mind, which is the most wondrous and powerful thing man has."[260]: 27
^"The saintly versatility with which Christ and Paul accommodate their message to their imperfect hearers is one of the highest expressions of their charity, which desires the salvation of all men."[211]
^Erasmus quoted "I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some." ( Cor. 9:22, RSV).[261]: 55
^"The gospel text for Erasmus, and many others, possessed "the capacity to transform our
inner self by the presence of God as incarnated in the text (or 'inverbation') Leushuis, Reinier (3 July 2017). "Emotion and Imitation: The Jesus Figure in Erasmus's Gospel Paraphrases". Reformation. 22 (2): 82–101. doi:10.1080/13574175.2017.1387967. S2CID171463846.: 93
^Not a novel idea: see Duns Scotus' "For as there is no place in which it is more proper to seek Thee than in Thy words, so is there no place where Thou art more clearly discovered than in Thy words. For therein Thou abidest, and thither Thou leadest all who seek and love Thee."[264]: ch2
^Mansfield[16]: 166 summarizes Robert Kleinhan that "In contrast to contemporary theologies which centred on grace (Luther) or church and sacraments (the Council of Trent), Erasmus' theology 'stressed the acquisition of peace through the virtue obtainable by union with Christ through meditation upon the documents of the early church's witness to him.'"
^For Erica Rummel "In content, Erasmian theology is characterized by a twin emphasis on inner piety and on the word as mediator between God and the believer."[194]
^Margaret O'Rourke Boyle sees it as "The text was real presence."[238]: 49 However, this may go too far: "The Christian Faith does not recognize either inlibration or inverbation"[266]
^"Erasmus insists in the Ratio that in the process of interpreting a passage from Scripture it is essential to consider not only what was said but also by whom and to whom it was said, with which words, at what time, on what occasion, and what preceded and followed it."[261]: 65
^This was a fine-grained extension of the medieval theory of modus procedendi, associated with Alexander of Hales and Bonaventure, that each biblical book requires a different mode of proceeding as history, law, lyric, etc.[267]
^Scopus comes from Origen and was also picked up by Melanchthon. Saarinen, Risto. Luther and the Reading of Scripture in [268]
^"Erasmus is so thoroughly, radically Christ-centered in his understanding of both Christian faith and practice that if we overlook or downplay this key aspect of his character and vision, we not only do him a grave disservice but we almost completely misunderstand him."Markos, Louis A. (April 2007). "The Enchiridion of Erasmus". Theology Today. 64 (1): 80–88. doi:10.1177/004057360706400109. S2CID171469828.
^According to philosopher John Smith "The core of his theological thought he traced back to Christ's Sermon on the Mount, rather than Paul."[271]
^Historical theologian Carl Meyer writes "Because the Scriptures are the genuine oracles of God, welling forth from the deepest recesses of the divine mind, Erasmus said they should be approached with reverence. Humility and veneration are needed to find the secret chambers of eternal wisdom. "Stoop to enter," Erasmus warned, "else you might bump your head and bounce back!"[173]: 738
^According to historian Emily Alianello, "Throughout Ecclesiastes, Erasmus seeks to orient his theories of preaching around "the simplicity of Christ's teaching and example." Consequently, preaching is not for engaging in controversy, but for bringing salvation, moving the congregation to a moral life and building community through concord."[272]: 71
^I.e., Erasmus' method is that Jesus' primary teachings are not things you (whether lay person or theologian) interpret in the light of everything else (particularly some novel, post-patristic theological schema, even if ostensibly biblically coherent), but what you base your interpretation of everything else on.
^This is quite contrary to Luther's privileging of his scheme of justification, its associated verses of Romans and Galatians, and his prizing of vehement assertions and insults. Erica Rummel notes "The similarities between his and Luther's thought were of course superficial."[194]: 36
^As with many of his individual works, reading The Praise of Folly in isolation from his other works may give an idea of Erasmus' priorities different to that given by broader reading, even though he sometimes claimed to be re-presenting essentially the same thoughts in different genres.
^This was a long-recognized tendency: indeed Aquinas wrote in the Preface to his Summa Theologiae that "students in this science have not seldom been hampered by what they have found written by other authors, partly on account of the multiplication of useless questions, articles, and arguments"[274]
^"Erasmus saw the scholastic exercise, in its high intellectualism, as fundamentally wrong-headed."[16]: 148
^Historian William McCuaig wrote " I will however defend the view that for the historian evangelism is the category to which Erasmus should rightly be assigned."[275] Historian Hilmar Pabel wrote "an essential aspect of Erasmus' life's work (was)...his participation in the responsibility of the bishops and all pastors to win souls for Christ."[261]: 54
^"Without denying the presence of theological mistakes in Origen's corpus, Erasmus felt that an irenic attitude toward Origen was more helpful to the Church than one of censorious criticism. Erasmus believed that Origen had seen further into the mind of St Paul than Augustine had done."[277]
^ abcdefVollerthun, Ursula; Richardson, James L. (31 August 2017). The Idea of International Society: Erasmus, Vitoria, Gentili and Grotius. doi:10.1017/9781108264945.005.
^Avarucci, Giuseppe (1983). "Due codici scritti da 'Gerardus Helye' padre di Erasmo". Italia Medioevale e Umanistica (in Italian). 26: 215–55, esp. 238–39.
^Huizinga, Erasmus, pp. 4 and 6 (Dutch-language version)
^ abcVredeveld, Harry (Winter 1993). "The Ages of Erasmus and the Year of his Birth". Renaissance Quarterly. Vol. 46, no. 4. pp. 754–809. JSTOR3039022.
^Gleason, John B. (Spring 1979). "The Birth Dates of John Colet and Erasmus of Rotterdam: Fresh Documentary Evidence". Renaissance Quarterly. Vol. 32, no. 1. The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Renaissance Society of America. pp. 73–76. JSTOR2859872.
^ abGulik, Egbertus van; Grayson, J. C.; McConica, James; Trapman, J. (2018). Erasmus and his books. Toronto ; Buffalo ; London: University of Toronto Press. ISBN978-0-8020-3876-0.
^Forrest Tyler Stevens, "Erasmus's 'Tigress': The Language of Friendship, Pleasure, and the Renaissance Letter". Queering the Renaissance, Duke University Press, 1994
^Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 1, p. 12 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1974)
^Sutton, Anne F.; Visser-Fuchs, Livia (1997). Richard III's books: ideals and reality in the life and library of a medieval prince. Stroud: Sutton publ. ISBN0750914068.: 376
^Kuhner, John Byron (2017). "The Vatican's Latinist". The New Criterion. 25 (7). Archived from the original on 6 June 2017. Retrieved 3 March 2024.
^Erasmus, Desiderius (1974). The Correspondence of Erasmus: Letters 2204–2356 (August 1529 – July 1530). University of Toronto Press. ISBN978-1-4426-6833-1.
^ abcVermeir, Maarten M.K. (June 2012). "Brabantia: decoding the main characters of Utopia". Moreana. 49 (Number 187- (1–2): 151–182. doi:10.3366/more.2012.49.1-2.9.
^Andrews, Edward D.; Lightfoot, J.B.; Kenyon, Frederic G. (2022). THE REVISIONS OF THE ENGLISH HOLY BIBLE: Misunderstandings and Misconceptions about the English Bible Translations. Christian Publishing House. ISBN9798352124185.
^Suzanne, Hélène (December 2014). "Conscience in the Early Renaissance: the case of Erasmus, Luther and Thomas More". Moreana. 51 (3–4 (197–198)): 231–244. doi:10.3366/more.2014.51.3-4.13. ISSN0047-8105.
^Masur-Matusevich, Yelena (2023). Le père du siècle: the early modern reception of Jean Gerson (1363-1429) theological authority between Middle Ages and early modern era. Turnhout: Brepols. ISBN978-2-503-60225-7.
^ abcScheck, Thomas P. (June 2022). "Mark Vessey (ed.), Erasmus on Literature: His Ratio or 'System' of 1518/1519 (Review)". Moreana. 59 (1): 141–148. doi:10.3366/more.2022.0119. S2CID248601520.
^"Erasmus". www.britannica.com. 23 October 2023. Archived from the original on 26 April 2019. Retrieved 22 April 2023.
^van Herwaarden, Jan (1 January 2003). Between Saint James and Erasmus: Studies in Late-Medieval Religious Life – Devotion and Pilgrimage in the Netherlands. doi:10.1163/9789004473676_024. S2CID239956783.
^Erasmus, Desiderius (2016). The correspondence of Erasmus. Letters 2357 to 2471 August 1530 – March 1531 / translated by Charles Fantazzi ; annotated by James M. Estes. Toronto Buffalo London: University of Toronto Press. ISBN978-1442648784.
^Askin, Lindsey (12 July 2013). "Erasmus and Queens' College, Cambridge". Queens' Old Library Books Blog. Queenslib.wordpress.com. Archived from the original on 19 July 2023. Retrieved 8 March 2014.
^"Old Library Collections". Queens' College Cambridge. Queens' Rare Book and Special Collections. Queens.cam.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 13 December 2013. Retrieved 8 March 2014.
^Feys, Xander (6 March 2024). "Mourning an Oenophile: A Forgotten Mock Epitaph for Dirk Martens by Erasmus". Erasmus Studies. 44 (1): 103–113. doi:10.1163/18749275-04401001.
^ abIntroductpry Note in Tracey, James (31 December 2010). "The Sponge of Erasmus against the Aspersions of Hutten/ Spongia adversus aspergines Hutteni". Controversies. University of Toronto Press: 1–146. doi:10.3138/9781442660076-002. ISBN978-1-4426-6007-6.
^Pastor, Ludwig (1923). The History of the Popes, from the Close of the Middle Ages.
^ abcvan Herwaarden, Jan (2012). "Erasmus and the Non-Christian World". Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook. 32 (1): 69–83. doi:10.1163/18749275-00000006.
^ abBietenholz, Peter G. (1966). History and Biography in the Work of Erasmus of Rotterdam. Geneva: Librairie Droz.
^ abErasmus, Desiderius (31 December 2021). Estes, James M.; Dalzell, Alexander (eds.). The Correspondence of Erasmus: Letters 2940 to 3141, Volume 21. doi:10.3138/9781487536695. ISBN978-1-4875-3669-5.
^
Jan Van Herwaarden (2003), Between Saint James and Erasmus: Studies in Late Medieval Religious Life, Leiden: Brill, pp. 529–530, ISBN9789004129849
^Campion, Edmund (2003). "Erasmus and Switzerland". Swiss American Historical Society. 39 (3). Archived from the original on 21 June 2023. Retrieved 21 June 2023.
^Vale, Malcolm (6 November 2020). "Erasmus and his Books, by Egbertus van Gulik, tr. J.C. Grayson, ed. James K. McConica and Johannes Trapman". The English Historical Review. 135 (575): 1016–1018. doi:10.1093/ehr/ceaa149.
^Guggisbert, Hans (2003). Sebastian Castellio, 1515–1563; Humanist and Defender of Religious Toleration in a Confessional Age; Translated and Edited by Bruce Gordon. Hants England; Burlington, Vermont, USA: Ashgate Publishing Limited. ISBN0754630196.
^Essary, Kirk (2016). "Collected Works of Erasmus, written by Frederick J. McGinness (ed.), Michael J. Heath and James L.P. Butrica (transl.), Frederick J. McGinness and Michael J. Heath (annotat.), and Alexander Dalzell (contrib. ed.)". Erasmus Studies. 36 (1): 64–66. doi:10.1163/18749275-03601005.
^ abcdBouyer, Louis (1969). "Erasmus in Relation to the Medieval Biblical Tradition". The Cambridge History of the Bible: Volume 2: The West from the Fathers to the Reformation. 2: 492–506. doi:10.1017/CHOL9780521042550.011. ISBN978-1-139-05550-5.
^ abChester, Stephen (April 2008). "When the Old Was New: Reformation Perspectives on Galatians 2:16". The Expository Times. 119 (7): 320–329. doi:10.1177/0014524608091090. S2CID144925414.
^Ocker, Christopher (22 September 2022). The Hybrid Reformation: A Social, Cultural, and Intellectual History of Contending Forces. doi:10.1017/9781108775434.011.
^ abDunkelgrün, Theodor (16 November 2017). "The Christian Study of Judaism in Early Modern Europe". The Cambridge History of Judaism: 316–348. doi:10.1017/9781139017169.014. ISBN9781139017169.
^Kimmerle, Heinz (8 April 2024). "The Arguments of Erasmus in His Debate with Luther about Free Will". Scriptura, Geist, Wirkung: 97–108. doi:10.1515/9783111315348-006.
^Erasmus, Declarationes ad censuras Lutetiae, 1532.
^Dart, Ron. "Erasmus: Then and Now". Clarion: Journal for Religion, Peace and Justice. Archived from the original on 30 November 2023. Retrieved 28 November 2023.
^Xheraj, Blerina (4 December 2020). "Erasmus, Jus Canonicum and Arbitration". The Social and Psychological Underpinnings of Commercial Arbitration in Europe. University of Leicester. Archived from the original on 19 June 2023. Retrieved 19 June 2023.
^ abcMeyer, Carl (1 December 1969). "Erasmus on the Study of Scriptures". Concordia Theological Monthly. 40 (1). Archived from the original on 25 December 2023. Retrieved 25 December 2023.
^Remer, Gary, Humanism and the Rhetoric of Toleration (University Park: University of Pennsylvania Press 1996), p. 95 ISBN0-271-02811-4
^ abTrapman, Johannes (2013). "Erasmus and Heresy". Bibliothèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance. 75 (1): 12. JSTOR24329313. Archived from the original on 26 March 2023. Retrieved 15 July 2023.
^Cohen, Jeremy (15 August 2022). "3. The Latin West: From Augustine to Luther and Calvin". The Salvation of Israel: 50–70. doi:10.1515/9781501764769-005.
^Tylenda, Joseph N. (December 1971). "Book Review: Erasmus: His Theology of the Sacraments". Theological Studies. 32 (4): 694–696. doi:10.1177/004056397103200415. S2CID170334683.
^Cummings, Brian (1 January 2013). "Erasmus and the Invention of Literature". Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook. 33 (1): 22–54. doi:10.1163/18749275-13330103.
^A reference to Luther's Assertio omnium articulorum per bullam Leonis X. novissimam damnatorum (Assertion of all the Articles condemned by the Bull of Leo X, 1520), WA VII.
^Collected Works of Erasmus, Controversies: De Libero Arbitrio / Hyperaspistes I, Peter Macardle, Clarence H. Miller, trans., Charles Trinkhaus, ed., University of Toronto Press, 1999, ISBN978-0-8020-4317-7 Vol. 76, p. 203
^Hyperaspistes, Book I, Collected Works of Erasmus, Vol. 76, pp. 204–05.
^The Reformers on the Reformation (foreign), London, Burns & Oates, 1881, pp. 13–14. [2] See also Erasmus, Preserved Smith, 1923, Harper & Brothers, pp. 391–92. [3]
^"Circumspice populum istum Euangelicum…" Latin text in Erasmus, Opera Omnia, (1706), vol. 10, 1578BC. [4]
^Pabel, Himer M. (2013). "Praise and Blame: Peter Canisius's ambivalent assessment of Erasmus". In Enenkel, Karl Alfred Engelbert (ed.). The reception of Erasmus in the early modern period. p. 139. doi:10.1163/9789004255630_007. ISBN9789004255630.
^Ocker, Christopher (2017). "Review: Collected Works of Erasmus, vol. 73: Controversies: Apologia de 'In Principio Erat Sermo', Apologia de Loco 'Omnes quidem', De Esu Carnium, De Delectu Ciborum Scholia, Responsio ad Collationes, edited by Drysdall, Denis L.". Erasmus Studies. 37 (2): 229–231. doi:10.1163/18749275-03702007.
^Gianoutsos, Jamie A. (4 May 2019). "Sapientia and Stultitia in John Colet's Commentary on First Corinthians". Reformation & Renaissance Review. 21 (2): 109–125. doi:10.1080/14622459.2019.1612979. S2CID182939353.
^Roberts, Hugh (1 January 2006). "Dogs' Tales: Representations of Ancient Cynicism in French Renaissance Texts". Faux Titre Online. 279. doi:10.1163/9789401202985_006. S2CID243905013.
^Leushuis, Reinier (2015). "The Paradox of Christian Epicureanism in Dialogue: Erasmus' Colloquy The Epicurean". Erasmus Studies. 35 (2): 113–136. doi:10.1163/18749275-03502003.
^Thorsrud, Harald. "Cicero: Academic Skepticism". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Archived from the original on 13 March 2024. Retrieved 21 April 2024.
^Rummel, Erika; MacPhail, Eric (2021). "Desiderius Erasmus". The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Archived from the original on 11 December 2017. Retrieved 25 August 2023.
^Essary, Kirk (2016). "Fiery Heart and Fiery Tongue: Emotion in Erasmus' Ecclesiastes". Erasmus Studies. 36 (1): 5–34. doi:10.1163/18749275-03601014.
^van Kooten, George. "Three Symposia"(PDF). Faculty of Divinity. University of Cambridge. Archived(PDF) from the original on 11 August 2023. Retrieved 5 August 2023.
^Harold W. Attridge, "Plato, Plutarch, and John: Three Symposia about Love", in: Townsend, Philippa; Denzey Lewis, Nicola; Jenott, Lance; Iricinschi, Eduard (2013). Beyond the Gnostic Gospels: Studies Building on the Work of Elaine Pagels (Studies and Texts in Antiquity and Christianity 82. Tübingen: Mohr Siebec.
^Collected works of Erasmus: an introduction with Erasmus' prefaces and ancillary writings. Toronto Buffalo (N.J.) London: University of Toronto press. 2019. ISBN9780802092229.
^Coetsee, Albert J.; Walt, Sarel van der; Muller, D. Francois; Huijgen, Arnold; Brink, Gijsbert van den; Alten, HH van; Broeke, Leon van den; Kotzé, Manitza; Kruger, P. Paul; Potgieter, Raymond M.; Fick, Rikus; Dreyer, Wim (17 November 2023). The Belgic Confession. doi:10.4102/aosis.2023.BK448. ISBN978-1-77995-289-9.
^ abcdHoffmann, Manfred (July 1991). "Erasmus on Language and Interpretation". Moreana. 28 (Number 106- (2–3): 1–20. doi:10.3366/more.1991.28.2-3.4.
^Jarrott, C. A. L. (1964). "Erasmus' "In Principio Erat Sermo": A Controversial Translation". Studies in Philology. 61 (1): 35–40. JSTOR4173446.
^Vance, Jacob (11 September 2014). Secrets: Humanism, Mysticism, and Evangelism in Erasmus of Rotterdam, Bishop Guillaume Briçonnet, and Marguerite de Navarre. doi:10.1163/9789004281257_003.
^ abcdePabel, Hilmar M. (1995). "Promoting the Business of the Gospel: Erasmus' Contribution to Pastoral Ministry". Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook. 15 (1): 53–70. doi:10.1163/187492795X00053.
^Moore, Michael Edward (13 March 2019). "Truth and Irony: Philosophical Meditations on Erasmus, by Terence J. Martin (Review)". Erasmus Studies. 39 (1): 107–113. doi:10.1163/18749275-03901009. S2CID171963677.
^Kraebel, Andrew (2020). "Interpretive Theories and Traditions". Biblical Commentary and Translation in Later Medieval England: Experiments in Interpretation: 21–53. doi:10.1017/9781108761437.002. ISBN978-1-108-76143-7.
^Martin Luther's Erasmus, and How he got that Way, Marius, Richard (1998). "Eleventh-Annual Margaret Mann Phillips Lecture". Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook. 18 (1): 70–88. doi:10.1163/187492798X00069.
^Smith, John H. (15 October 2011). Dialogues between Faith and Reason: The Death and Return of God in Modern German Thought. doi:10.7591/9780801463273-003.
^Smith, David R (September 2005). "Portrait and Counter-Portrait in Holbein's The Family of Sir Thomas More". The Art Bulletin. 87 (3): 484–506. doi:10.1080/00043079.2005.10786256. S2CID191473158.
^Carrington, Laurel (2013). "Desiderius Erasmus. The Correspondence of Erasmus: Letters 2082 to 2203, 1529. Ed. James Estes. Trans. Alexander Dalzell. Collected Works of Erasmus 15. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012. xxii + 404 pp. $175. ISBN: 978–1–4426–4203–4". Renaissance Quarterly. 66 (1): 180–181. doi:10.1086/670414.
Bietenholz, Peter G. (2009). Encounters with a Radical Erasmus. Erasmus' Work as a Source of Radical Thought in Early Modern Europe. Toronto: University of Toronto Press
McDonald, Grantley (2016). Biblical Criticism in Early Modern Europe: Erasmus, the Johannine Comma, and Trinitarian Debate. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press
Ron, Nathan (2019). Erasmus and the "Other": On Turks, Jews, and Indigenous Peoples. Palgrave Macmillan Cham
Ron, Nathan (2021). Erasmus: Intellectual of the 16th Century. Palgrave Macmillan Cham
Quinones, Ricardo J. (2010). Erasmus and Voltaire: Why They Still Matter. University of Toronto Press, 240 pp. Draws parallels between the two thinkers as voices of moderation with relevance today.
Winters, Adam. (2005). Erasmus' Doctrine of Free Will. Jackson, TN: Union University Press.
Non-English
Bataillon, Marcel (1937) Erasme et l'Espagne , Librairie Droz (1998) ISBN 2-600-00510-2
Erasmo y España: Estudios Sobre la Historia Espiritual del Siglo XVI (1950), Fondo de Cultura Económica (1997) ISBN 968-16-1069-5
Garcia-Villoslada, Ricardo (1965) 'Loyola y Erasmo, Taurus Ediciones, Madrid, Spain.
Lorenzo Cortesi (2012) Esortazione alla filosofia. La Paraclesis di Erasmo da Rotterdam, Ravenna, SBC Edizioni, ISBN978-88-6347-271-4
Pep Mayolas (2014) Erasme i la construcció catalana d'Espanya, Barcelona, Llibres de l'Índex
Primary sources
Collected Works of Erasmus (U of Toronto Press, 1974–2023). 84/86 volumes published as of mid 2023; see U. Toronto Press, in English translation
The Correspondence of Erasmus (U of Toronto Press, 1975–2023), 21/21 volumes down to 1536 are published
Desiderius Erasmus: "War is sweet to those who have no experience of it ..." – Protest against Violence and War ( Publication series: Exhibitions on the History of Nonviolent Resistance, No. 1, Editors: Christian Bartolf, Dominique Miething). Berlin: Freie Universität Berlin, 2022. PDF
Sporen van Erasmus (Traces of Erasmus), documentary TV series, 5 episodes ("Sporen van Erasmus". www.ngnprodukties.nl. NGN produkties Amsterdam.)
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