Two first editions of works by the Franciscan scholar Frans Titelmans (1502-1537), one of the most famous theologians produced by the University of Louvain in the early 16th-century. Born in Hasselt and educated under distinguished masters in Greek, Hebrew, and theology, Titelmans rose rapidly as a lecturer before entering the Observant Franciscans in 1523. His biblical commentaries made him one of the leading Catholic exegetes of his generation.
Ad 1: the first of these works was the Elucidatio, a commentary on the entire Book of Psalms. The psalms, after all, were not merely sung or read: they were memorised, the daily spiritual bread of monastic and clerical life. Each psalm opened with an argumentum and he explained who speaks in each psalm, Christ, the Church, the individual soul, and how its structure unfolds. He commented on titles, historical settings, and interpretive difficulties. His method was learned yet remarkably free of scholastic heaviness. The humanist currents of the age, even as he resisted some of their tendencies, shaped his prose.
Ad 2: The Annotationes ex Hebraeo atque Chaldaeo, also first printed in May-June 1531, explored the Hebrew and Chaldean (Aramaic) elements of the Psalms. These annotations were deliberately separated from the main commentary. Titelmans wished to spare the ordinary reader the burden of complex philological debates. Yet, he did not hesitate to enter them here: analysing variants, discussing ambiguous Hebrew terms, and occasionally citing the original text. His aim, however, was not to undermine the Latin Vulgate. On the contrary, he sought to show that the Hebrew truth (hebraica veritas) ultimately harmonised with the Churchs text. Discrepancies, he argued in his brief preface, were matters of wording rather than sense, and disappeared when the deeper meaning was considered.
With an ownership inscription on the title page ("B(?) Groenhout"), a small tear on the title page (not affecting the text or woodcut), a small wormhole from leaf 307 towards the end, some staining in the upper margin, and some occasional browning. Otherwise in good condition. De Troeyer II, 310-313 no. 535; Schmitz, "Frans Titelmans: latinist en theoloog", Het aandeel der Minderbroeders in onze middeleeuwse literatuur (1936), pp. 80-89; Tomasz Karol Mantyk, "Biblical Scholarship of Franciscus Titelmans", (2023); WorldCat 1151576707 (8 copies); Ad 1: CCPB 000026195-5; Nijhoff & Kronenberg 2041; USTC 403849; WorldCat 68854395 (7 copies); not in STCV; Ad 2: Nijhoff & Kronenberg 2034; USTC 403840; not in STCV.