Editing Pope Damasus I (section)

===Jerome, the Vulgate and the Canon===
[[File:Hieronymus presents Vulgata.jpg|thumb|left|Jerome presents the Vulgate to Pope Damasus; miniature from the {{circa|1150}} Gospel Book of [[Lund Cathedral]] (Cod. Ups. 83)]]
Pope Damasus appointed [[Jerome|Jerome of Stridon]] as his confidential secretary. Invited to Rome originally to a synod of 382 convened to end the [[Schism (religion)|schism]] of [[Antioch]], he made himself indispensable to the pope, and took a prominent place in his councils. Jerome spent three years (382–385) in Rome in close intercourse with Pope Damasus and the leading Christians. Writing in 409, Jerome remarked: "A great many years ago when I was helping Damasus, bishop of Rome with his ecclesiastical correspondence, and writing his answers to the questions referred to him by the councils of the east and west..."<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.ccel.org/fathers/NPNF2-06/letters/lette123.htm| title = ''Epistle'' cxx.10}}</ref>

In order to put an end to the marked divergences in the western texts of that period, Damasus encouraged the highly respected scholar Jerome to revise the available [[Vetus Latina|Old Latin]] versions of the [[Bible]] into a more accurate [[Latin]] on the basis of the Greek [[New Testament]] and the [[Septuagint]], resulting in the [[Vulgate]]. According to Protestant biblical scholar, [[F.F. Bruce]], the commissioning of the Vulgate was a key moment in fixing the biblical canon in the [[Western Christianity|West]].<ref>{{cite book|url=http://media.sabda.org/alkitab-2/PDF%20Books/00059%20Bruce%20The%20Canon%20of%20Scripture.pdf|title=The Canon of Scripture|last=Bruce|first=F. F.|publisher=[[InterVarsity Press]]|year=1988|page=225|author-link=F. F. Bruce}}</ref> Nonetheless,  as the ''Catholic Encyclopedia'' states:

{{Blockquote|In the Latin Church, all through the [[Middle Ages]] we find evidence of hesitation about the character of the deuterocanonicals. There is a current friendly to them, another one distinctly unfavourable to their authority and sacredness, while wavering between the two are a number of writers whose veneration for these books is tempered by some perplexity as to their exact standing, and among those we note St. Thomas Aquinas. Few are found to unequivocally acknowledge their canonicity.  
The prevailing attitude of Western medieval authors is substantially that of the Greek Fathers. The chief cause of this phenomenon in the West is to be sought in the influence, direct and indirect, of St. Jerome's depreciating Prologus.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Knight|first1=Kevin|title=. Canon of the Old Testament|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03267a.htm|website=New Advent|publisher=The Catholic Encyclopedia|access-date=26 November 2015}}</ref>}}

Significant scholarly doubts and disagreements about the nature of the Apocrypha continued for centuries and even into Trent,<ref>{{cite book|last1=Jedin|first1=Hubert|title=Papal Legate At The Council Of Trent|date=1947|publisher=B. Herder Book Co|location=St Louis|pages=270–271}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Wicks|first1=Jared|title=Cajetan Responds: A Reader in Reformation Controversy|date=1978|publisher=The Catholic University Press of America|location=Washington}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Metzger|first1=Bruce|title=An Introduction to the Apocrypha|date=1957|publisher=Oxford|location=New York|page=180}}</ref>  which  provided the first infallible definition of the Catholic canon in 1546.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Catholic Encyclopedia|title=Canon of the Old Testament|date=1908|publisher=Robert Appleton Company|location=New York}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=H. Tavard|first1=George|title=Holy Writ or Holy Church|date=1959|publisher=Burns & Oates|location=London|pages=16–17}}</ref>

Jerome devoted a very brief notice to Damasus in his ''[[De Viris Illustribus (Jerome)|De Viris Illustribus]]'', written after Damasus' death: "he had a fine talent for making verses and published many brief works in heroic metre. He died in the reign of the emperor [[Theodosius I|Theodosius]] at the age of almost eighty".<ref>''De Viris Illustribus'', ch. 103</ref> Damasus may be the author of the anonymous ''[[Carmen contra paganos]]'' (song against the pagans).<ref name=ODB>{{ODB|authorlink=Barry Baldwin|first=Barry|last=Baldwin|title=Carmen Contra Paganos}}</ref>

====Letter of Jerome to Damasus====
{{further|Letter of Jerome to Pope Damasus}}
The letters from Jerome to Damasus are examples of the primacy of the See of Peter:
{{blockquote|Yet, though your greatness terrifies me, your kindness attracts me. From the priest I demand the safe-keeping of the victim, from the shepherd the protection due to the sheep. Away with all that is overweening; let the state of Roman majesty withdraw. My words are spoken to the successor of the fisherman, to the disciple of the cross. As I follow no leader save Christ, so I communicate with none but your blessedness, that is with the chair of Peter. For this, I know, is the rock on which the church is built! This is the house where alone the paschal lamb can be rightly eaten. This is the ark of Noah, and he who is not found in it shall perish when the flood prevails. But since by reason of my sins I have betaken myself to this desert which lies between Syria and the uncivilized waste, I cannot, owing to the great distance between us, always ask of your sanctity the holy thing of the Lord. Consequently I here follow the Egyptian confessors who share your faith, and anchor my frail craft under the shadow of their great argosies. I know nothing of Vitalis; I reject Meletius; I have nothing to do with Paulinus. He that gathers not with you scatters; he that is not of Christ is of Antichrist.<ref>Letter of Jerome to Pope Damasus, 376, 2.</ref>}}