Lyra, Nicolaus de

LYRA, li"ra', NICOLAUS DE (NICOLAUS LYRAMUS): French exegete; b. at Lyre (a small village in the diocese of Evreux) c. 1270; d. at Paris Oct. 23, 1340. In 1292 he entered the Franciscan order at Verneuil, and later went to Paris, where he spent the remainder of his life as a teacher at the Sorbonne. Them are the only certain details of his life, and are given on his epitaph in the Minorite monastery at Paris. Other sources, however, add that in 1325 he was appointed provincial of his order for Burgundy according to the provisions of the will of Jeanne, queen of Philip the Tall. The statement that he taught in Oxford is baseless, as is the tradition that he was of Jewish descent. He doubtless acquired his knowledge of Hebrew in Paris, where oriental studies in the interest of polemics against Judaism and Mohammedaniam were not unknown. Immediately after entering the monastery he began his commentary on the Bible; in 1322 he was working on Genesis, and in 1326 on Isaiah. The work reached a temporary conclusion in 1330, but was not published until after his death, when it received additions from other hands, particularly the prefaces to the individual books and the general introduction De lilmis carwrticis et -on canonicis. His Postilla; include fifty books of running commentary on the entire Bible, including the Apocrypha, which, however, are treated as non-canonical. Then follow thirty-five books of moralia, and the whole 1s preceded by three prologues. The first of these is a conventional eulogy of the Scriptures and a recommendation of their study. The second is devoted to method and is based on the theory of the double meaning of the text, one literal and the other mystical. The third prologue develops the mystical meaning in three categories and the whole is summed up in the passage:

·' The fact dwells in literal meaning. allegorical is thy belief: tell. The moral defuuth thins lotions, thins end anagogo doth The characteristic feature of Nicolsus is his so briety as an exegete and his ability to restrict him self to the literal sense of the Bible, avoiding the peril of allegorical interpretation as well as mystic and dogmatic excursus. It is.noteworthy in this connection that the Jewish exegete whom he al most transcribed was Rashi, who had introduced an anti-allegorizing epoch into Jewish hermeneu tics. Of Greek Nicolaus shows little knowledge, but he had a source for Aramaic and Arabic in the Pttgio f dei of Raymond Martin. In addition to the Church Fathers, he made much use of Thomas Aquinas. His Poatilla; enjoyed extraordinary pop ularity in the Middle Ages, and were repeatedly edited, generally with the adverse criticisms of Paul of Burgos and the rejoinders of Mattheeus D6ring, a German Minorite. Luther in his inter pretation of Genesis consulted Nicolaus in almost every sentence and owed to him his rabbinical knowledge, while Melanchthon, Urbanus Rhegius, and other Reformers were also acquainted with his work. From this feet originated the well-known doggerel of Peter of Pflug, Si Lyre neon Zyrasset, Ltctherus port saltaaset, or, according to another ver sion, Si Lyra non lyrasaet, memo doetorum in Bi6 liam saltasaet, "If Lyra had not played the lyre, Luther (or, those learned in the Bible) would not have danced." The remaining works of Lyra are of little interest. He proved his right to be considered a scholastic by his commentaries on Peter Lombard and the Qtco and wrote three books against the Jews. His alleged authorship of the treatises De idoneo rninistrante. and Corttemplatio de vita et gestis aartcti FrarEC7;sci is doubtful.

(R. Schmid.)

Bibliography: For a bibliography of the early editions consult J. Le Long, Bibliotheca saga, ed. A. G. Meath, II., iii. 359 sqq., and cf. J. F. T. Graesaa, TrEeora des liurea rarea et prbcaeux, 8 vols., Dresden, 18b9-89. Consult: s. Davidson, sacr«t Hermeneutica, Edinburgh, 1843;

Siegfried, in Archiro Jür Erjorechung des A. T., vol. i., 1887; idem in ZWT 1894 L. Diestel, Ouchichte du A. T. in der christlichen KircTu, pp. 195 sqq., Jena, 1888: F. w. Farrar, Hist. of Irterpretatioa, pp. 27¢278, New York,
1888; Masehkowalci, in ZATW, 1891.