Hermann Zoest’s Calendarium Hebraicum Novum (1436)

Abstract

In 1436, only three years before a short-lived compromise on the Eucharist was reached in Florence, Hermann Zoest decided to address some of the issues underlying the azymes controversy in his treatise De fermento et azymo, which also dealt with various aspects of the Jewish calendar. In 1436, the same year that saw the composition of De fermento et azymo, Hermann sat down to produce a Calendarium Hebraicum novum (A New Hebrew Calendar), which applied the Jewish calendar to biblical chronology in an even wider sense than just the date of the Last Supper. The Calendarium is a remarkably innovative attempt to adapt the Jewish calendar to the standard exigencies of biblical reading. This chapter discusses that Hermann's Calendarium Hebraicum novum takes an approach previously explored by Robert of Leciester and Nicholas Trevet in that it treats the Jewish calendar first and foremost as an exegetical tool.Keywords: biblical chronology; Calendarium Hebraicum Novum; Hermann Zoest; Jewish calendar; Nicholas Trevet; Robert of Leciester