Studies of Bede and his Commentaries

The most recent full-length studies of Bede's life and works are: 
  • George Hardin Brown, Bede the Venerable, Twayne's English Authors Series 443 (Boston: Twayne, 1987)
  • Benedicta Ward, The Venerable Bede (Harrisburg: Morehouse, 1990)
  • Peter Hunter Blair, The World of Bede  (New York: Cambridge UP, 1990--first edition, London: Secker & Warburg, 1970)--a classic recently reissued with minor corrections by Michael Lapidge
Five collections of essays also serve as general studies: 
  • Bede: His Life, Times and Writings, ed. A. Hamilton Thompson (Oxford: OUP, 1935)--now somewhat dated
  • Famulus Christi: Essays in Commemoration of the Thirteenth Centenary of the Birth of the Venerable Bede, ed. Gerald Bonner (London: SPCK, 1976)
  • Bede and His World: The Jarrow Lectures, 1958-1993 (Brookfield, VT: Variorum, 1994)--brings together in one place a number of seminal essays; as a diachronic collection, must be used with some care, but the preface by Michael Lapidge gives considerable guidance
  • Beda Venerabilis: Historian, Monk & Theologian, ed. L. A. J. R Houwen and A. A. MacDonald, Mediaevalia Groningana 19 (Groningen: Egbert Forsten, 1996)--"The present collection of essays has its origin in a one-day conference devoted to Bede, held in 1990 at the University of Groningen." Jan Davidse, "On Bede as a Christian Historian"; J. E. Cross, "Bede's Influence at Home and Abroad: an Introduction"; A. T. Thacker, "Bede and the Irish"; Michael Idomir Allen, "Bede and Frechulf at Medieval St Gallen"; Karl Lutterkort, "Beda Hagiographicus: Meaning and Function of Miracle Stories in the Vita Cuthberti and the Historia Ecclesiastica"; B. A. Blokhuis, "Bede and Ælfric: the Sources of the Homily on St Cuthbert"; Dan O'Donnell, "A Northumbrian Version of 'Caedmon's Hymn' (eordu-recension) in Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale MS 8245-57 ff. 62r2-v1: Identification, Edition and Filiation"; A. M. Jansen, "Bede and the Legends of St Oswald."
  • Northumbria's Golden Age, ed. Jane Hawkes and Susan Mills (Thrupp, Gloucestershire: Sutton, 1999)--lavishly produced, with 34 essays of general interest. The last six, in a section titled "Bede," are: George Hardin Brown, "The Church as Non-symbol in the Age of Bede"; Gerald Bonner, "Bede: Scholar and Spiritual Teacher"; Christopher Grocock, "Bede and the Golden Age of Latin Prose in Northumbria"; Mark Stansbury, "Source-marks in Bede's Biblical Commentaries"; Arthur Holder, "(Un) Dating Bede's De Arte Metrica"; and Thomas W. Mackay, "Augustine and Gregory the Great in Bede's Commentary on the Apocalypse."
It has been an almost reflexive gesture for scholars to note the paucity of studies devoted to Bede's commentaries. For example, Roger Ray writes: "In modern scholarship, however, they [Bede's biblical works] have suffered remarkable, I would say regrettable, neglect....The situation has been scarcely better for the study of the methods and contents of the exegetical works....On the Bedan hermeneutics short studies are more helpful, though precious few and never more than exploratory" ("What Do We Know About Bede's Commentaries?" Recherches de Théologie ancienne et médiévale 49 [1982], 6-7). There are in fact a fair number of such writings now available, though studies of the historical works still enjoy a disproportionately large place in the Bedan bibliography. Bede's scriptural understanding in general is treated by Jenkins in "Bede as Exegete and Theologian;" in the essay just cited by Roger Ray; and by M.T.A. Carroll in The Venerable Bede: His Spiritual Teachings. The first and last of these labor, as they themselves note, under the disability of having no critical editions of the commentaries, but still manage to serve useful purposes. 

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This page last revised on 20 January, 2001.