PRADES, JEAN MARTIN de. - Anti-Catholic writer, b. at Castelsarrasin (diocese of Montauban) in 1720, d. at Glogau in 1782. Having gone to Paris to take his degree in theology, he made contact with the Encyclopedists and accepted their ideas, which he inserted into his doctoral thesis, defended on 18 Nov. 1751. The novelty of the doctrines, unnoticed by his examiners, aroused the attention of the political and cultural world of Paris. The Sorbonne re-examined the thesis and after lively discussions, on 27 Jan. 1752, censured ten propositions of it.
In the same month there appeared, in the Encyclopédie, the long article Certitude, written by P., which was to have been the introduction to his Traité sur la vérité de la religion, left, it seems, in manuscript. Shortly afterwards followed the condemnations of certain bishops and of Benedict XIV. To escape imprisonment, decreed against him by the Parliament, P. fled to Holland, where he began his Apologie (Amsterdam 1752-53), finished at Potsdam in Voltaire's house and completed, it seems, by Diderot. Catholics, Jansenists and Protestants reacted promptly with polemical writings. P. meanwhile had entered the good graces of Frederick II. Urged from several quarters, on 6 Apr. 1754 he wrote to the Sorbonne and on 27 he signed the text of his retraction, whose sincerity is called into doubt by what is read in the preface, written by Frederick II, to P.'s last work: Abrégé de l'histoire ecclésiastique de Fleury (Bern 1767).
BIBL.: sources
Agostino Amaroli PRADO, GIOVANNI de, blessed. - Franciscan, b. in 1563 at Morgobego di León (Spain), d. at Marrakech on 24 May 1631.
After completing his studies at the University of Salamanca he took the habit of the Discalced Friars Minor in the province of St. Gabriel (1584), whence, already a priest and superior, he came to form part of the new province of St. Diego in Andalusia, indeed he was its first provincial minister (1620). Desirous of devoting himself entirely to the missions among the infidels (the one of Guadeloupe having come to nothing), he obtained the restoration of another, far more difficult one, namely that of Morocco, to which he was appointed by Pope Urban VIII in 1630 with the title of apostolic prefect. In March 1631 he sought with his companions to broaden the apostolate by leaving the city; but he was brought back there by the guards. The sultan 'Abd al-Malik, well disposed toward the Spaniards, was assassinated by his brother Mülj al-Walid, who, having ascended the throne, was a ferocious supporter of an entirely contrary policy; G. de P. was a victim of it for the faith. He was beatified by Benedict XIII on 24 May 1728. His feast falls on 24 May.
BIBL.: sources
GRADO, JERÓNIMO de. - Jesuit, b. at Baeza (Andalusia) in 1547, d. at Rome on 13 Jan. 1595.
Having entered the Society of Jesus in 1572, he was for 16 years professor of exegesis in the college of Cordova and there composed the commentaries on Isaiah, Zechariah, Malachi,
on the letter to the Hebrews (unpublished) and the commentary on Ezekiel
down to ch. 26. The father general C. Aquaviva had summoned him to Rome in 1591, together with his disciple J. B. Villalpando, to finish this great work, which however he did not manage to complete. Villalpando (b. at Cordova in 1552, a Jesuit in 1565, d. at Rome on 22 May 1608) helped him by explaining the passages of Ezekiel that deal with Hebrew weights and measures; for his part he added the commentary on chs. 27-42 and on selected passages of chs. 43-48 and the drawings of the Temple in the great final vision (chs. 40-48). Moreover he published, with a very large subsidy from Philip II, the work in 3 vols.: Hieronymi Prati et I. B. Villalpandi a S. I. in Ezechielem explorationes et apparatus urbis et templi Hyerosolymitani commentariis et imaginibus illustratis (Rome 1596-1604). The work, most diligent, full of ancient, classical and patristic erudition, is very important for the history of exegesis. The two authors examine even Greek and rabbinic catenae on the Prophet, explaining especially the Hebrew words. But Villalpando, most erudite in classical architecture, imagined an architectural marvel without equal; despite the applause of his contemporaries, his attempt must be called fantastic, given the linear and rough simplicity of the true model of the Ezechielian Temple. He also edited an edition of the Exploraciones epistolarum b. Pauli Apostoli (Rome 1598) of Remigius of Auxerre, erroneously attributing them to Remigius of Reims.
BIBL.: sources