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Document Details : Title: Deus naturae patitur Subtitle: Once Again on Dionysius the Areopagite and the Eclipse Author(s): MACÉ, Caroline Journal: Le Muséon Volume: 135 Issue: 3-4 Date: 2022 Pages: 357-372 DOI: 10.2143/MUS.135.3.3291199 Abstract : Looking for sources and parallels for the expression Aut deus naturae patitur, aut mundi machina dissolvetur attributed to Dionysius the Areopagite in the Breviarium Romanum and in Lorenzo Valla’s criticisms against Dionysius’ authenticity (c. 1445), it is possible to assert that the Legenda aurea (second half of the thirteenth century) must have been the target of Valla’s criticisms. The sources of the Legenda, in turn, are not completely clear, but the first part of the sentence (deus naturae patitur) certainly comes from Petrus Comestor’s Historia scholastica (second half of the twelfth century), and can be partly traced back to Michael Syncellus’ Encomium (ninth century), which was translated into Latin in the same period. The second part of the sentence in the Breviarium (machina mundi dissolvetur), however, is not found as such in the Legenda, but at the end of Johannes de Sacrobosco’s treatise De sphaera (written before 1220). Although no direct Greek source can be found for this expression, Dionysius’ alleged interpretation of the eclipse during the crucifixion of Christ (a story that is greatly diverging from Pseudo-Dionysius’ Ep. VII) is used in a similar context of defence of astronomy by Manuel I Comnenus at the end of the twelfth century. |
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