Commentary on the Letters of St Paul

Commentarii in epistolas sancti Pauli · Lanfranc of Bec, archbishop of Canterbury (c. 1005-1089) · c. 1050-1065 · commentary

Latin · domain: latin-tenth-eleventh · researched 2026-11-14

Why this is in the register

The English Lanfranc in HOLLIS is the letter collection, V. Helen Clover and Margaret Gibson's 'The letters of Lanfranc, archbishop of Canterbury' (Oxford Medieval Texts, 1979) (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Lanfranc%20letters%20Clover%20Gibson&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 1 record). A query on the Pauline commentary returns only English studies: 'Teacher in faith and virtue: Lanfranc of Bec's commentary on Saint Paul' (Commentaria 1, Brill, 2007) and 'Artes and Bible in the medieval West' (1993) (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Lanfranc%20commentary%20on%20the%20Pauline%20epistles&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 2 records) - analyses of the commentary, not translations of it. The Latin is printed as 'Commentaria in Epistolas S. Pauli' in Migne PL 150 (https://archive.org/details/patrologiaecursu0150mign). Lanfranc's eucharistic treatise, by contrast, is translated in Fathers of the Church, Mediaeval Continuation 10 (2009) alongside Guitmund of Aversa (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Lanfranc%20on%20the%20body%20and%20blood%20of%20the%20Lord&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 so the translated Lanfranc is the controversialist and letter-writer, not the exegete.

Lanfranc's Pauline commentary is one of the founding works of the northern European exegetical revival: the commentary through which the Bec school, Anselm's generation, read Paul with Augustine and the Greek Fathers, and one of the most copied exegetical works of the eleventh century. It is also one of the largest Latin biblical commentaries before the Glossa ordinaria, and its absence has distorted the history of twelfth-century exegesis.

Existing translations recorded

None recorded in English. Non-English versions, where they exist, are named in the evidence above.

Electronic text

Scanned witnesses

Scan search: not checked. Not searched in the scan pass: this dossier was outside the 121-work scan target set.

Harvard Hollis

Hollis query: "Commentary on the Letters of St Paul" — 4 record(s); match basis title_only.

Sources checked

• https://archive.org/details/patrologiaecursu0150mign
• HOLLIS search — Lanfranc commentary on the Pauline epistles
• HOLLIS search — Lanfranc letters Clover Gibson
• HOLLIS search — Lanfranc on the body and blood of the Lord

Cite: Tergwame, “Commentary on the Letters of St Paul” (latin gap dossier), 2026. https://naxiai.com/christian/gaps/latin-lanfranc-commentarii-in-epistolas-pauli