Andreae de Sancto Victore, opera IV: Expositio Super Ysaiam

Andrew of St. Victor, Commentary on Isaiah

Critical edition and introduction by Frans van Liere

Andrew of Saint Victor was one of the most prominent biblical scholars of the twelfth century. He was a regular canon of the Parisian abbey of St Victor, which in the twelfth century had developed into a prestigious center of spiritual learning, closely connected to the nascent university in Paris. Because of his frequent use of Jewish exegetical materials, Andrew's commentaries are a rich source for the history both of biblical hermeneutics and of inter-religious dialogue during the Middle Ages. His Isaiah commentary caused outrage among medieval Christian scholars because it eschewed traditional christological interpretations, and instead offered a reading "secundum Hebraeos." Scholars have seen Andrew of St Victor as standing at the cradle of a scholarly interest in the Biblical text, which influenced scholars such as the fourteenth-century Franciscan Nicholas of Lyra, and, in the long run, reformers such as John Wycliff, Martin Luther, and John Calvin.