Jerome on Scripture and Christ
“Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.”
Plain English
Jerome is defending serious study of Scripture. To know Christ, Christians must know the books that bear witness to him.
Why it matters
The line still anchors Christian arguments for biblical literacy and careful exegesis.
About Jerome
Jerome gave the Latin West its Bible. He learned Hebrew when most Christian scholars still depended on Greek, settled in Bethlehem, and translated scripture from the original languages into the Latin text later known as the Vulgate. For a thousand years, when Western Christians heard, copied, preached, and argued over scripture, Jerome's Latin was usually the text in front of them. His temperament was sharp and often unpleasant, but his scholarly achievement changed the daily life of the church.
- Lifespan
- c. 347 – 420
- Era
- Nicene
- Born in
- Stridon
- Region
- Palestine
Daily Patristic Wisdom in your inbox
Get one early Church quote each morning, with historical context in plain English. Free. Unsubscribe whenever.