Junilius Africanus (GIUNILIO AFRICANO)

JUNILIUS AFRICANUS. - Writer, d. 248-49. His real name is Junilius (Iunillus): cf. Procopius, Anecd., 20, 17. He was quaestor sacri palatii under Justinian and wrote for Primasius of Hadrumetum the work: Instituta regularia divinae legis in 2 books, a kind of introduction to Sacred Scripture, based on the teaching he had received in the school of Nisibis from a certain Paul (Paul the Persian?). It does not reflect, as has been demonstrated by R. Devreesse, the ideas of Theodore of Mopsuestia, but only the ideas of one current of the Nisibene school.

BIBL.: sources

Edition: H. Kihn, Theodor von Mopsuestia und Julius Africanus als Exegeten, Freiburg 1880. On other manuscripts of the very widespread book of G. cf. M. L. W. Leistner, Antiochene exegesis in Western Europe during the middle age, in Harvard theol. Review, 1947, p. 19 ff.; A. Siegmund, Die Überlieferung der griechisch-christl. Literatur in der latein. Kirche, Munich 1949, p. 108 ff. Studies: R. Devreesse, Essai sur Théodore de Mopsueste (Studi e testi, 141), Vatican City 1948, pp. 273-77. On the date cf. Ed. Stein, Le questeur Junillus et la date des ses « Instituts », in Académie roy. de Belgique, Bulletin de la Classe des Lettres, 1937, pp. 378-83; R. Devreesse, L'Eglise d'Afrique durant l'occupation byzantine, in Mélanges de l'Ecole franç. de Rome, 57 (1940), pp. 150-51. On the relations with Paul of Nisibis: A. Baumstark, Gesch. der syrischen Literatur, Bonn 1922, p. 121; R. Devreesse, Essai, p. 273, n. 2. Cf. also A. Rahlfs, Lehrer und Schüler bei Junillus Africanus, in Nachrichten der Göttinger Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, Göttingen 1891, p. 242 ff. On the importance of G. for the work of Cassiodorus cf. P. Courcelle, Les lettres grecques en Occident, Paris 1943, pp. 317, 336. Maurizio Gordillo-Erik Peterson

@incollection{ec6_giunilio_africano, author = {Gordillo, Maurizio and Peterson, Erik}, title = {Giunilio Africano}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {VI}, pages = {761--764}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1951}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/giunilio-africano} }

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