TIMOTEO DI GERUSALEMME. — Fictitious name of a Byzantine sacred orator.
To T., a presbyter of Jerusalem, is attributed in some manuscripts (while others bear the names of Metodius and Esichius, 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 account with rhetorical emphasis and commenting particularly on Simeon’s prophecy, alludes to immortality « until the present » and to the Assumption of the Virgin (245 D).
On the basis of the silence concerning the legend of Mary’s tomb in Jerusalem and concerning the Nestorian controversy, p. M. Jugie (La mort et l'assomption de la ste Vierge [Studi e testi, 114], Città del Vatic. 1944, pp. 70–76) judged this homily to have been composed at the end of the fourth or the beginning of the fifth century. This date was accepted by p. O. Faller (De priorum saeculorum silentio circa assumptionem B. Mariae Virginis [Roma 1948], col. 130 ff.), who nevertheless raised objections to the interpretation of the passage concerning the Assumption. In his review of this work, B. Altaner (Theol. Revue, 44 [1944], col. 130 ff.) upheld the dating, previously generally accepted, to the sixth century. Dom B. Capelle (Ephém. Liturg., 63 [1949], pp. 5–26) has demonstrated that the author of this homily, whose true name is unknown, was responsible for at least four other homilies, very similar to it in vocabulary, style, and rhetorical procedures, revealing a common origin. One of them, transmitted under the name of Timoteo (PG 86, 1, 256–65), extols the virtue of the cross prefigured by Moses’ attitude in prayer, comments on Jesus’ exhortation to follow him by bearing the cross, and expounds 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 angel Gabriel’s announcement to Zachariah and to the Virgin. The second (ibid., 943–58), after narrating and commenting, with abundant rhetorical amplifications, on Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem, dwells on the birth of Jesus, insisting particularly on Mary’s virginity after childbirth. The third (ibid., 1001–24) concerns the healing of the man born blind. A few slight indications might suggest Egypt as the author’s homeland; the date can be inferred approximately (always according to Capelle) from the abundant use of apocrypha and from the characteristics of the language and style, which lead to placing him in the Byzantine age, between the sixth and eighth centuries.