Jerome at the Light of his Epistolary: The use of Written Oratory for the conformation of his personality
María Teresa MUÑOZ GARCIA DE ITURROSPE
Original title: Jerónimo a la luz de su Epistolario: el uso de la oratoria escrita para la conformación de su personaje
Published in Mirabilia Journal 31 (2020/2)
Keywords: Letters, Saint Hieronymus, Self-representation, Written Oratory.
A careful reading of the epistolary confirms that in his most “personal” texts Hieronymus of Strido follows, with Paul as a model, the guidelines of the epideictic genre (and sometimes also the judicial one). Self-praise and humiliation, self-defense and confession are completed with isolated data on his origin, age, studies and physical appearance. All these elements − which in the classic prescriptive were applied to the speaker and which he adapts to impose a powerful self-portrait as a Christian intellectual − can help to explain how he managed to promote himself to be distinguished in the Christian community through the spread of his collection of letters.