TIMOTHY OF JERUSALEM. - Fictitious name of a Byzantine sacred orator.
To T., a presbyter of Jerusalem, there is attributed in some manuscripts (while others bear the names of Methodius and Hesychius, likewise designated as presbyters of Jerusalem) a homily for the feast of the Hypapante, or Presentation of Jesus in the Temple (PG 86, 1, 237-252), in which the orator, paraphrasing the Gospel narrative with rhetorical emphasis and particularly illustrating the prophecy of Simeon, alludes to immortality "up to the present" and to the assumption of the Virgin (245 D).
Basing himself on the silence concerning the legend of Mary's tomb in Jerusalem and concerning the Nestorian controversy, Fr. M. Jugie (La mort et l'assomption de la ste Vierge [Studi e testi, 114], Vatican City 1944, pp. 70-76), judged this homily to have been composed at the end of the 4th century or the beginning of the 5th. This date was accepted by Fr. O. Faller (De priorum saeculorum silentio circa assumptionem B. Mariae Virginis [Rome 1948], col. 130 ff.), who nevertheless raised criticisms of the interpretation of the assumptionist passage. Reviewing this work, B. Altaner (Theol. Revue, 44 [1944], col. 130 ff.) upheld the date, previously commonly accepted, of the 6th century. Dom B. Capelle (Ephém. Liturg., 63 [1949], pp. 5-26) demonstrated that to the author of this homily, whose true name is unknown, at least four other homilies are due, so similar to it in vocabulary, style and oratorical devices as to reveal a common origin. One, which has come down to us under the name of Timothy (PG 86, 1, 256-65), extols the virtue of the cross prefigured by the attitude of Moses in prayer, comments on Jesus' exhortation to follow him by carrying the cross, and illustrates the transfiguration, in which the Savior wished to show his victory and that of his followers over death. Of the other three, which bear the name of St. Athanasius but were already recognized as spurious by the Maurists, the first (PG 28, 905-14) comments on the announcement of the angel Gabriel to Zechariah and to the Virgin. The second (ibid., 943-58), after narrating and commenting, with abundant oratorical amplifications, on the journey of Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem, dwells on the birth of Jesus, insisting particularly on the virginity of Mary after childbirth. The third (ibid., 1001-24) has as its subject the healing of the man born blind. Some slight indications would suggest Egypt as the author's homeland; the date can be inferred approximately (still according to Capelle) from the abundant use of the apocrypha and from the characteristics of language and style, which lead one to place him in the Byzantine age, between the 6th and 8th centuries.
Michele Pellegrino