Author

St. Robert Bellarmine, S.J.

1542–1621

Jesuit

St. Robert Bellarmine (born October 4, 1542, Montepulciano, Tuscany [Italy]—died September 17, 1621, Rome; canonized 1930; feast day September 17) was an Italian cardinal and theologian, an opponent of the Protestant doctrines of the Reformation. He is considered a leading figure in the Catholic Counter-Reformation and strongly supported the self-reform decrees of the Council of Trent. During his lifetime he was regarded as one of the most enlightened of theologians and was named a doctor of the church by Pope Pius XI in 1931. He is one of the patron saints of catechists and catechumens. Bellarmine entered the Society of Jesus in 1560. After studying in Italy at Rome, Mondovì, and Padua, he was sent to Leuven (Louvain) in the Spanish Netherlands, where he was ordained in 1570 and began to teach theology. He was forced by the strength of Protestantism and the Augustinian doctrines of grace and free will prevailing in the Low Countries to define his theological principles. He returned to Rome, where he lectured at the new Jesuit College. Made a cardinal by Pope Clement VIII in 1599, he was subsequently appointed archbishop of Capua (1602).

Works

Texts currently available in the library.

De Controversiis, Prima Controversia Generalis: De Verbo Dei

1599

Robert Bellarmine’s Controversies on the Word of God (Controversiae de Verbo Dei) is a systematic defense of the Catholic doctrine of divine revelation and Sacred Scripture. Across four books, Bellarmine examines the inspiration and authority of Scripture, the canon of the Old and New Testaments, the Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, and Latin textual traditions, and the authority of the Latin Vulgate. He then addresses the interpretation of Scripture and the proper judge of doctrinal controversies, before concluding with an extensive defense of apostolic Tradition and its relationship to the written Word of God. Written in direct engagement with the theological disputes of the Reformation, the work combines biblical argument, patristic testimony, conciliar authority, and historical analysis in presenting the Catholic understanding of Scripture and Tradition.