NEMESIO, VESCOVO DI EMESA
Nemesius, Bishop of Emesa
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Volume VIII · p. 1023 · 1952
English translation · Testo originale italiano
NEMESIUS, bishop of EMESA. — He lived in the 4th–5th century; author of a book *De natura hominis*, of Neoplatonic inspiration (Porphyry is often cited). The author mentions Eunomius, Apollinaris of Laodicea, and probably polemicizes against the Christology of Theodore of Mopsuestia. His work is important for the history of ancient philosophy. N. accepts the doctrine of the pre-existence of souls. His anthropology exerted great influence. St. John Damascene copied whole pages of N. in his book *De fide orthodoxa*. Through St. John Damascene and a Latin translation, N.’s influence made itself felt in Scholastic philosophy. The Syrians, Armenians, Georgians, and Copts also knew him, sometimes under the name of Gregory of Nyssa.
Bibl.: edition by Chr. Mathaei, Halle 1802. The reprint in PG 40 is defective. A critical edition is still lacking; for this, extracts from St. John Damascene and the monk Melitus (9th cent.) will be useful. An early Latin translation was made by Alfanus of Salerno. The text was published by Burkhard, Leipzig 1917 (Bibl. Teubneriana). Another translation by Giovanni Burgundio of Pisa (d. 1194) served as the basis for citations by Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas. On Armenian texts V.
BARDENHEWER, OTTO, IV, p. 279; cf. also: J. Karst, *Litterature georgienne chrétienne*, Paris 1934, p. 38; G. Graf, *Gesch. der christl.-arab. Literatur*, I (Studi e testi, 118), Vatican City 1944, p. 319; traces among the Syrians: V. J. Dráske, in *Zeitschrift für wissenschaft. Theologie*, 46 (1903), pp. 506 ff.; Klinge, in *Zeitschrift für Kirchengesch.* (1930), pp. 363 ff. Of the rich bibliography on N. we cite: E. Skard, s.V. in Pauly-Wissowa, VII, pp. 562–66; B. Domanski, *Die Psychologie des N.* (Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, 3, 1), Münster 1900; W. W. Jäger, *N.*, Berlin 1914; H. A. Koch, *Quellen u. Untersuchungen zu N.*, 11, 1921; R. Arnou, in *Gregorianum*, 17 (1936), pp. 116 ff.; E. Skard, in *Symbolae Osloenses*, 1942, p. 40 ff. (on N. and Galen); and id., ibid., p. 23 ff.; 18 (1937), p. 9 ff.; 1939, p. 46 ff.
NEMROD (Heb. Nimrōdh), Septuagint Nepōō (descendant of Cush, of Canaanite stock, said to have been a mighty hunter and to have founded an empire (Gen. 10:8–12) in Babylon and other cities of the land of Shinar (= Sumer), from which he went to Assyria to found Nineveh and other Assyrian centers (whence Assyria is called in Mic. 5:5 “the land of N.”).
Attempts to trace in Sumerian-Akkadian literature a name of which the biblical one may be considered an echo have been made in many ways, but without definitive results, since these are always hypothetical reconstructions. Many think of the name Nimurta (NIN-IB), god of war and the hunt. Linguistically better is a reconstruction as Nin-Marad “Lord of Marad” (an ancient Sumerian city).
In popular imagination (which finds an echo in Dante’s Nimrod [Inf. XXXI, 34 ff.; Purg., XII, 34 ff.; Par. XXVI, 126]) he became a proverbial expression for being gigantic and brutal.
Bibl.: A. Kraeling, *The origin... of Nimrod*, in *Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures*, 38 (1921), pp. 214–20; various articles by A. Deimel, in *Biblia*, 2 (1921), pp. 71 ff.; 461 ff.; Giovanni Rinaldi.
