Before obtaining the Magisterium in Sacred Theology, he began biblical and Oriental studies at the University of Louvain; he continued them for two years at the École biblique de Jérusalem under the direction of Fr. M.-J. LAGRANGE, GIUSEPPE LUIGI (v.), subsequently completing all the examinations required for the doctorate (1920) before the Pontifical Biblical Commission. From 1911 to 1946 he taught biblical exegesis, especially of the New Testament, at the Pontifical Institute and Angelicum in Rome. In 1929 he was appointed consultant to the Pontifical Biblical Commission, of which he became secretary in 1939. He was also a consultor to the Sacred Congregations for the Eastern Church and for Seminaries and Universities, a member of the Commission for the Codification of Eastern Law, dean of the Commission for the Edition of the Pontifical of the Chaldeans and of the Syrians of Antioch, and a fellow of the Belgian-Flemish Academy of Sciences and Fine Arts.
He wrote very many articles in various journals and many works on biblical and Oriental questions (a list comprising 158 items, in Angelicum, 20 [1943], pp. 4-15, dedicated to him on his 60th birthday, and continued [with a further 62 items] until his death, ibid., 26 [1950], pp. 174-78). His principal works are: Comm. in Ep. ad Ephes., ad Thessalon. (Rome 1917; Comm. in Ep. ad Ephes., 2nd ed. 1932); De div. inspiratione et veritate S. Scripturae (2nd ed. 1932); Parabola Domini nostri (2 vols., 2nd ed. 1933); Theodori Mopsuesteni commentarius in ev. Iohan. ap. (Corpus Script. Christ. Orient., Script. Syri, nos. 115-16, Paris-Louvain 1940); Pontificale iuxta ritum Eccl. Syrorum occident., id est Antiochiae (Lat. vers. by I. Al. Assemani emended and annotated, Rome 1940, 1942, 1944).