SIBERT of BEKA (BEKE). - Carmelite theologian, born in Beek (near Geldern, Rhineland) around 1260, died in Cologne on 26 Dec. 1332, where he had taken the Carmelite habit around 1280. Having earned a doctorate in theology (1316) at the University of Paris, he governed the province of Lower Germany for many years, taking part in the politics of the time; at the end he was an arbitrator between the Duke of Brabant and the city of Brussels (1319) and, in the dispute between the Duke of Guelders and the Pope (1328), he succeeded in reconciling the two parties.
He intervened in the trial against Master Eckhart (v.) and in 1327, during the conflict between Emperor Louis the Bavarian and the Pope, he wrote, in defense of papal rights, a *Repreensio sex errorum* against Marsilius of Padua’s *Defensor Pacis*. He also composed: *Quodlibeta* I-II (ms. Vat. Borg. 39); the *Ordinale Carmelitarum*, which became the foundation of Carmelite liturgy (ed. Ben. Zimmerman, Paris 1910); and other works on the history and privileges of his Order.
SIBYL. - The S. (etymology unknown) is in classical tradition a maiden, young but sometimes envisaged as decrepit, who, when inspired and almost possessed by Apollo, reveals the future: *“Sibylla dicitur omnis puella cuius pectus numen recipit”* (Serv., *Ad Aen.* III, 445); an essentially popular concept, since all peoples recognize in woman a greater receptivity and a consequent greater capacity to be possessed by a deity and to express its will.