LENTULUS, LETTER OF
LETTER OF LENTULUS. — Apocryphal work so named from its supposed sender; it describes the physical beauty of Jesus Christ, who is said to have been the most handsome of men, according to Ps. 44:3.
The letter purports to have been written by a contemporary of the Lord, namely the Roman Lentulus, who is variously described in the manuscripts as governor (praeses) or official (officialis) of Judea. However, no Lentulus held such a position in Palestine at the time of Christ. The writing may depend on the famous Testimonium Flavianum (cf. GIUSEPPE FLAVIO) and certainly on Nicephorus Callistus (Hist. eccl., I, 40; PG 145, 748-50). It first appears only in the 15th century, in the preface to the Vita Iesu Christi of Ludolph of Saxony (q.v.) (1300-70), printed in Cologne in 1474. But Valla already refers to it in 1450, declaring it outright apocryphal (De falso credita et ementita Constantinio donatione declaratio, ed. Leipzig 1928, p. 62). Despite the wide diffusion of the letter, few have dared to uphold its authenticity against Valla’s opinion. Most likely, in its present form it issued from the pen of some Christian humanist of the 15th century, while originally it must have been the product of monastic literature of the 13th or 14th century. Though dependent on Greek sources, it was written in Latin.