Hippolytus: why Patrologia graeca?

[jlm]

About the new Hippolytus module, I had two questions. The first is, are these all by the same author. The answer is apparently no. My second question is: why are you using Patrologia graeca when there are critical editions in the public domain?

 

Authenticity

As the EAC article on Hippolytus (https://accordance.bible/link/search/EAC;Titles?Hippolytus) explains, the authenticity of the works assigned to Hippolytus is disputed, and debate continues. It seems that there are two main authors of the Hippolytan corpus: one (Hippolytus of Rome) an exegete who wrote Contra Noetum, and the other, open to philosophy, whose name is unknown (Hippolytus? Josipe?) and who wrote a work against heresies (Refutatio omnium haeresium [Philosophoumena]). This is what I could gather about the works included in the collection:

 

• Fragments on the Interpretation of Daniel: Hippolytus of Rome (i.e., the author of Contra Noetum).
• On Christ and Antichrist: Hippolytus of Rome
• Against the Jews: assuming this is Demonstratio aduersus Iudaeos, it is spurious (CPG 1914).
• Against Plato on the Cause of the Universe: perhaps De universo (CPG 1898), but that exists only in 4 fragments. If it's what Simonetti calls Περὶ τοῦ παντός in the EAC article, it is attributed to the author of the Refutatio omnium haeresium (Philosophoumena).
• Against Noetus: Hippolytus of Rome

CPG is the Clavis patrum graecorum, the standard reference for patrologists looking for information on works and editions. You can consult its contents for free here: https://clavis.brepols.net/clacla/Custom/ClaCla/Home.aspx

 

Now, I haven't followed this debate, and apparently there are still some who defend the idea of a single author, but to attribute these five works to the same author is at least controversial. So if you think you have good reasons to attribute them all to the same person, you will have to defend that attribution.
 

Editions

I don't understand why you would choose the text of Patrologia graeca when there are critical editions out of copyright (see CPG for the respective works). A good choice would be the first volume of GCS (Die Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller). It contains the exegetical works, including Fragments on the Interpretation of Daniel and On Christ and the Antichrist in the Internet archive: https://archive.org/details/hippolytuswerke01hipp/page/n423/mode/2up. For Against Noetus, the PG edition might be the most recent one not in copyright. The following (from CPG 1902) were published more than 70 years ago, but their authors probably died less than 70 years ago:

• E. Schwartz, Zwei Predigten Hippolyts, Sitzungsberichte der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften in München, 1936, H. 3, p. 5-23
• P. Nautin, Hippolyte. Contre les hérésies (fragment). Étude, édition critique, Paris, 1949, p. 235-265

 

[rexk]

Good questions, and I apologize for not explaining before release. As in all the patristic texts, the fallback for Greek tagging tends to be the Migne. The basic reason is simple, as you surmised: Migne is in the PD and readily available. But my reasons are more than that. In selecting Greek texts to tag, there are actually three things that need to converge: 1) I need access to a Greek text that is in the PD, and so, in patristics, that tends to be Migne; 2) There needs to be an English translation available to work from to display alongside the tagged Greek text that is also in the PD; and 3) both texts ideally need to be in digital format (and not just photographs or PDF, since that involves a LOT of transcribing before I can even begin). In the case you are mentioning, you have provided links to more recent critical editions that are in the PD. Those are useful, and could be used down the road for a revised edition that, in this case, has a more recent and critical PD version available. Regarding the authenticity of these as Hippolytus, for now I could note in the "about this text" the current critical assessment of these works. But I need to let the user sort out the different assessments from the Migne edition for now. I don't think anyone would say the Migne is the final word.  It is certainly not the best text or series of texts, but for now that is what I had to work with given the parameters mentioned above. Hopefully this can be improved in the future.

[Fabian]

For me a German translation would be better. 

Für mich wäre eine Deutsche Übersetzung besser.

[jlm]

OK, I understand the need for an electronic text. I thought you were transcribing PG, which seemed like a bad choice. The quality of the text does affect my decision to buy the module, so please use critical texts when possible. Please keep the Open Greek and Latin project in mind. For Hippolytus (or Josipe, or whatever he was called), they have two texts of the Refutatio Omnium Haeresium (Philosophumena): https://scaife.perseus.org/library/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg2115.tlg060/

 

Although it isn't focused on the Fathers, you can find a lot of Origen, some apologists, Athanasius, Cyril of Alexandria, …

 

Some works have a translation in German (for Fabian's delight), French, or Latin.

 

The early GCS volumes are in the PD (see https://bibelexegese.bbaw.de/publikationsreihen/gcs/), and are the sort of thing that the Open Greek and Latin project should be digitizing, but I don't know if they have done so. There may well be raw OCR results from the Lace project, done back in 2014.

[Brian W. Davidson]

Good questions, and I apologize for not explaining before release. As in all the patristic texts, the fallback for Greek tagging tends to be the Migne. The basic reason is simple, as you surmised: Migne is in the PD and readily available. But my reasons are more than that. In selecting Greek texts to tag, there are actually three things that need to converge: 1) I need access to a Greek text that is in the PD, and so, in patristics, that tends to be Migne; 2) There needs to be an English translation available to work from to display alongside the tagged Greek text that is also in the PD; and 3) both texts ideally need to be in digital format (and not just photographs or PDF, since that involves a LOT of transcribing before I can even begin). In the case you are mentioning, you have provided links to more recent critical editions that are in the PD. Those are useful, and could be used down the road for a revised edition that, in this case, has a more recent and critical PD version available. Regarding the authenticity of these as Hippolytus, for now I could note in the "about this text" the current critical assessment of these works. But I need to let the user sort out the different assessments from the Migne edition for now. I don't think anyone would say the Migne is the final word.  It is certainly not the best text or series of texts, but for now that is what I had to work with given the parameters mentioned above. Hopefully this can be improved in the future.

 

Rex, So happy to have this work with your tagging!