The ten works of Erasmus contained in this volume are among the twenty that the editors of CWE have selected for inclusion in the series of spiritual and pastoral works,spiritualiaandpastoralia.The basis for this category is Erasmus’ famous enclosure with his letter to Hector Boece of 15 March 1530, in which he listed his writings and divided them into nine categories orordines.¹ The fifthordoconsists of writings pertaining topietas,the startingpoint for our designation. For further discussion of the issues raised by this category, I refer the reader to the pertinent pages of my...

ThePrecatio ad Virginis filium Iesum,together with thePaean Virgini Matri(20–38) and theObsecratio ad Virginem Mariam(41–54), owed its origin to the patronage Erasmus received from Anna van Borssele, the lady of Veere,¹ during the final years of the fifteenth century. While Erasmus was studying in Paris with a view to gaining a doctorate in theology, his friend Jacob Batt² obtained employment as tutor to Anna van Borssele’s young son, Adolph of Burgundy.³ During the autumn of 1498 Batt persuaded Anna van Borssele to invite Erasmus to the castle of Tournehem, between Calais and Saint-Omer,...

Erasmus composed thePaean Virgini Matriduring the early weeks of 1499, at the same time as theObsecratio ad Virginem Mariamand thePrecatio ad Virginis filium Iesum,while staying at the castle of Tournehem as the guest of Anna van Borssele, the lady of Veere. The three prayers were later dedicated, together with theOratio de virtute amplectenda,to Anna van Borssele’s young son, Adolph of Burgundy.¹

The imagery upon which Erasmus drew for thePaean Virgini Matri,derived in the first instance from Scripture, but also from patristic sources and from the traditions of Latin homiletic literature...

TheObsecratio sive oratio ad Virginem Mariam in rebus adversis(the usual modern title of the work) was composed by Erasmus for the young Adolph of Burgundy, heer van Veere, at the request of his mother, the widowed Anna van Borssele. Erasmus tell us this in a letter written to Adolph in 1499 (Ep 93:112–15). The work was first published in 1503 in a volume entitledLucubrationes aliquot,printed by Dirk Martens in Antwerp. Erasmus sent a copy of this volume to John Colet in 1504, and in the accompanying letter there is a note of defensiveness about the...

Since praying is an essential part of the Christian life, and the Lord’s Prayer is the pre-eminent example of prayer, it is in no way surprising that, from the early Fathers down to modern times, churchmen and theologians have devoted much attention to interpreting and discussing the prayer that Jesus instructed his disciples to use.¹ For Tertullian the Lord’s Prayer represented ‘an epitome of the whole Gospel,’² a sentiment that is often repeated in later commentaries and treatises. In his essay on prayer, theModus orandi Deum(CWE 70), a small section of which is devoted to the Lord’s Prayer,...

Erasmus composed theLiturgia Virginis Matrisat the request of Thiébaut Biétry,¹ parish priest of Porrentruy, a small town in the Jura mountains. Biétry had probably become acquainted with Erasmus as a result of a mutual connection with the prince-bishop of Basel, Christoph von Utenheim, whose patronage had been one of the key factors in persuading Erasmus to settle in that city.² The castle of Porrentruy was Christoph von Utenheim’s favoured residence, especially after 1519, when his advanced age and the disaffection of the citizens of Basel towards his authority prompted him to withdraw from active participation in affairs. Biétry,...

As Erasmus’ prefatory letter to Johann Rinck explains, thePrecatio pro pace ecclesiaewas written as a response to a letter from Rinck deploring the calamities he foresaw for Germany as a result of the religious controversies there.¹ Rinck came from a distinguished family of Cologne, where his father had been burgomaster.² Rinck himself had studied at the University of Cologne, then received a doctorate in both canon and civil law at Bologna in 1517. The next year he received the same degree from Cologne and joined the law faculty there, where he remained until his death in 1566. He...

The collection of Erasmus’ prayers issued under the Froben imprint with the titlePrecationes aliquot novaein August 1535 was divided into three parts. The first consisted of twenty-seven previously unpublished prayers. It was prefaced by a short letter of dedication¹ addressed to David, the youngest son of Johann Paumgartner, one of the leading citizens of Augsburg.² The second section of the work was made up of twenty-two brief prayers (some no more than a single line in length) drawn from Scripture, mostly from the Psalms, followed by thirteen prayers taken from Erasmus’ own works; all of the latter, with...

Helias Marcaeus (Elias Mertz), master of arts in the University of Cologne, was rector and confessor of the convent of the Maccabees,¹ a community of Benedictine nuns in Cologne who owed this name to relics in their possession of the seven Maccabee brothers and their mother, Jews whose martyrdom at the hands of the Pergamene king Antiochus Epiphanes in the 160s BC is recounted in the Old Testament apocrypha.² Doubtless because of his connection with the convent, Marcaeus became an enthusiastic proponent devotion to the heroic family. By 1517 or 1518 he had become friendly enough with Erasmus to persuade...

TheEpistola consolatoria in adversiswas first published early in 1528, but the seed of this ‘little flower culled from the ever-verdant garden of Isaiah’ (189) had been sown some thirty years before. In 1497–8 Erasmus, living the life of an impoverished theology student, was obliged to support himself by giving tuition to young men from, wealthy families. One of his pupils was an Englishman named Thomas Grey.¹ Erasmus conceived a great affection for him, and it seems to have been to Grey, under the nickname Leucophaeus, that he originally dedicatedDe ratione studii.² The two men had remained...

The first edition ofInstitutio christiani matrimonii,dedicated to Catherine of Aragon, was published by Froben at Basel in August 1526. The dedicatory letter looks like acaptatio benevolentiae:Erasmus pleads that pressure of work has delayed the appearance of a treatise promised more than two years before, and fears that haste has prevented him from portraying marriage as artistically as he might. The brief letter also includes, with unforeseeable irony, a eulogy of Catherine’s own marriage and, very pertinently, a compliment on the upbringing of the ten-year-old Princess Mary: the mother’s role in the education of her (female) children...