Paschasius Radbertus (PASCASIO, RADBERTO) - Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. IX, p. 561

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

PASCASIO, RADBERTO. – Theologian and Benedictine abbot, born in the region of Soissons ca. 790, died at Corbie ca. 865. A monk and scholasticus at Corbie, in 822 he took part, together with his abbot Adalard and Wala, in the foundation of the abbey of Corwey (New Corbie) in Germany. Elected abbot of Corbie in 844, he was present at the Councils of Paris (847) and Quierzy (849). Around 851, owing to internal difficulties, he withdrew as a simple monk to St-Riquier, from which he later returned to Corbie.

Through his numerous hagiographical, exegetical, and theological works (PL 120), he holds an eminent place among the authors of the Carolingian renaissance. Worthy of note are: Vita s. Adhalardi; Epitaphium Arsenii seu vita Vialae; Commentarius in Mt.: this is P.’s most extensive work, a synthesis of his homilies and biblical courses in the schola monastica; woven from patristic texts, it is nevertheless the most personal exegesis among those of his contemporaries; Expositio in Ps. 44 (pious reflections on the religious life); Expositio in lamentationes Ieremiae, on the ills of the Church in the declining Carolingian Empire; De fide, spe et caritate, important for the history of the treatise on the theological virtues; De partu Virginis, which combats Ratrammo’s thesis (v.) by asserting Mary’s virginity in partu; Homilia de Assumptione B. V., known as a letter from St. Jerome to Paula and Eustochium (PL 30, 126–47); Homiliae de Assumptione B. V., published among the works of St. Ildefonsus (PL 96, 239–68): the first 3 are probably by P., while the other 4 are disputed; Historia de ortu S. Mariae (among the doubtful works of St. Jerome: PL 30, 308–15): a reworking of the Protoevangelium of James concerning the childhood of the Madonna.

The celebrated Liber de Corpore et Sanguine Domini was written in 831 at the request of Warin, abbot of Corwey, for the Saxon monks; some excerpts from it immediately circulated as texts by St. Augustine. In 844 P. prepared a 2nd edition of it (dedicated to Charles the Bald), which gave rise to a considerable Eucharistic controversy (v. EUCARISTIA; MESSA), in which the principal opponents were Ratrammo and Rabanus Maurus (v.); P. intensified his realism in chap. 26 of the Commentarius in Mt. and in the Epistola ad Frudegardum de Corpore et Sanguine Domini (cf. A. Wilmart, Analecta Regimensia, Città

Article illustration — (courtesy of manz. G. Follani) PASCOLI, GIOVANNI — Portrait.

pre-existing term; therefore P., although going too far in admitting a kind of “transentation” at the expense of the reality of the sensible species, moves decisively in the theological direction that, after seven centuries, was defined by the Council of Trent, and his work must be regarded, despite its uncertainties and imprecisions, as the first essay in Eucharistic theology.

BIBL.: J. Geiselmann, Die Eucharistielehre der Vorscholastik, Paderborn 1926, pp. 144–70; C. Lambot, L'honolie du po. Jérôme sur l'Assomption, in Revue bénédictine, 46 (1934), pp. 265–82; H. Peltier, Pascase Radbert abbé de Corbie, Amiens 1938; id., Radbert (Pascase), in DThC, XIII, cols. 1628–39; A. Molien, Pascase Radbert, in Revue apologétique, 66 (1938), pp. 698–703; M. Jugie, La mort et l'Assomption de la Ste Vierge, Città del Vaticano 1944, pp. 277–78; C. Gliozzo, La dottrina della conversione eucaristica in P. R. e Ratrammo monaci di Corbie, Palermo 1945, with bibliography: G. Quadrio, il trattato « De assomptione B. M. V. » dello Pseudo-Agostino e il suo influsso sulla teologia assunzionistica latina, Roma 1951, pp. 86–90; S. Bonano, The divine maternity and eucharistic body in the doctrine of P. R., in Eph. mariologicae, 1 (1951), pp. 379–94. Antonio Poolanti

« PASCENDI DOMINICI GREGIS »: V. MODERNISMO.