Pereyra, Benito

PEREYRA, BENITO. - Theologian and exegete, b. at Ruzafa, near Valencia, ca. 1535, d. at Rome on 6 March 1610. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1552. He taught rhetoric, philosophy, theology and Sacred Scripture at Rome, with a reputation for vast erudition.

His principal exegetical work, most learned but verbose, is the Commentariorum et dissertationum in Genesim (4 vols., Rome 1591-98; other editions down to 1685). Also noteworthy: Commentariorum in Danielem prophetam libri XVI (Rome 1587); Selectarum disputationum in S. Scripturam: I, Super libro Exodi (Ingolstadt 1591); II, Super Epistola beati Pauli ad Romanos (ibid. 1603); III, Super libro Apocalypsis (Lyons 1606, with the addition of 23 disputations against those who held Muhammad to be the Antichrist, printed separately: Trium et viginti disputationum, adversus Ioannem Annum Viterbiensem... [ibid. 1606]); IV and V in Evangelium b. Ioannis (ibid. 1608-10). The Opera theologica quotquot extant omnia (Cologne 1602) contain, besides the commentary on Daniel and the 5 tomes of the Disputationes in S. Scripturam, also the Adversus fallaces et superstitiosas artes, libri tres, already printed at Ingolstadt in 1591 and elsewhere; the first two books are already in the commentaries on Daniel and on Genesis. P.'s principal philosophical work is Physicorum, sive de principiis rerum naturalium libri XV (Rome 1562, 1576, 1585; later reprinted at Cologne, Venice, Paris). There also remain in manuscript several theological and exegetical works by P.: commentaries on Matthew, Luke, John, and an introduction to the Ep. to the Romans.

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