Letter 35: Damasus addresses five questions to Jerome with a request for information concerning them. They are: 1. What is the meaning of the words Whosoever slays Cain vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold?
Letter 35: From Pope Damasus (384 AD, Rome)
[A brief letter from Pope Damasus I putting five biblical questions to Jerome — the sort of queries that show why Damasus valued his scholarly secretary so highly. Jerome was the only major Latin theologian of the era who could read Hebrew, and Damasus made full use of this.]
Damasus addresses five questions to Jerome, requesting explanations:
1. What do the words mean: 'Whoever kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold'? [Genesis 4:15]
2. If God made all things good, how is it that he gives Noah instructions concerning unclean animals, and says to Peter: 'What God has cleansed, do not call common'? [Acts 10:15]
3. How can Genesis 15:16 ('in the fourth generation they shall return here') be reconciled with the Septuagint reading of Exodus 13:18 ('in the fifth generation the children of Israel went up out of Egypt')?
4. Why did Abraham receive circumcision as a seal of his faith? [Romans 4:11]
5. Why was Isaac — a righteous man and beloved of God — allowed by God to be deceived by Jacob? [Genesis 27]
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