Theophylact of Bulgaria

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This article is about the bishop and biblical commentator. For the Count of Tusculum of the same name, see Theophylact, Count of Tusculum.

Image:Teophylact of Ohrid jpg..jpg

Titlepage of a 16th-century Latin translation of Theophylact's bible commentaries

Theophylact of Ohrid (Greek Θεοφύλακτος, surname¨Ηφαιστος Bulgarian Теофилакт Български) (1055- 1107) was a Greek archbishop of Ohrid and commentator on the Bible.

He was born most probably at Euripus, in Euboea, about the middle of the 11th century. He became a deacon at Constantinople, attained a high reputation as a scholar, and became the tutor of Constantine Ducas, son of the Emperor Michael VII, for whom he wrote The Education of Princes. About 1078 he went into Bulgaria as archbishop of Achrida (modern Ohrid). In his letters he complains much of the rude manners of the Bulgarians, and he sought to be relieved of his office, but apparently without success. His death took place after 1107.

His commentaries on the Gospels, Acts, the Pauline epistles and the Minor prophets are founded on those of Chrysostom, but deserve the considerable place they hold in exegetical literature for their appositeness, sobriety, accuracy and judiciousness. His other extant works include 530 letters and various homilies and orations, the hagiography of Clement of Ohrid known as Comprehensive, and other minor pieces. A careful edition of nearly all his writings, in Greek and Latin, with a preliminary dissertation, was published by JFBM de Rossi (4 vols. fol., Venice). The first English translation of Theophylact's commentaries on the Gospels, The Explanation of the Gospels, is available from Chrysostom Press [1].

Late in life he wrote accounts of how the constant wars between the Byzantine Emperie and the Pechenegs, Magyars and Normans had destroyed most of the food of the land and caused many people to flee to the forests from the towns.

Theophylact also wrote an account of the history of Ohrid.^[1]

[edit] References

^ The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, vol. 3, p. 1514

Karl Krumbacher, Byzantinische Litteraturgeschichte (2nd ed. 1897) pp. 132, 463.
Margaret Mullett, Theophylact of Ochrid: Reading the Letters of a Byzantine Archbishop, Variorum, 1997.
John Julian Norwich. Byzantium: The Decline and Fall. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996.

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.bg:Теофилакт (охридски архиепископ) sr:Блажени Теофилакт sh:Teofilakt Ohridski