Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/678

Rh 666 KUFINUS. under Alexander Severus, which appears from his consulting Paulus (Dig. 40. tit. 13. s. 4). There are in the Digest seventeen excerpts from twelve books of Regulae by Rufinus, according to the Florentine Index ; but one excerpt (Dig. 42. tit. i. s. 34) is superscribed Lib. XIII.^ which, however, proves nothing, as error easily occurs in such a numeral. The name of Licinius Rufinus appears in the Geneva edition of the Collatio Legnrn Mo- saicarum et Romanarum, as the compiler ; but this Rufinus cannot be the contemporary of Paulus, for the Collatio was compiled after the publication of the Code of Theodosius ; not to mention other arguments. (Zimmem, GeschiclUe des Rom. Primt- rcchts, vol. i.) [G. L.] RUFI'NUS, ME'NNIUS, one of the generals of Vitellius, A. D. 69. (Tac. Hist. iii. 12.) RUFI'NUS, TREBO'NIUS, a friend of the younger Pliny, had been decemvir, or one of the chief magistrates, of the Roman colony of Vienna in Gaul. (Plin. Ep. iv. 22.) He is pro- bably the same person as the Rufinus to whom one of Pliny's letters is addressed. (Ep. viii. 18.) RUFI'NUS, TRIA'RIUS, consul in a. d. 210 with M Acilius Faustinus. (Fasti.) RUFI'NUS, C. VI'BIUS, consul suffectus in A. D. 22. (Fasti.) RUFI'NUS, literary. 1. Tyrannius or Tur- RANius, or ToRANUS, as the name is variously written, must have been born about the middle of the fourth century, but neither the precise date nor the place of his nativity can be determined with cer- tainty, although some of his biographers have con- fidently fixed upon a. d. 345, for the former, and Concordia, near the head of the Adriatic, as the latter. After he had attained to manhood he became an inmate of the monastery at Aquileia, where, upon acquiring a knowledge of the principles and rites of Christianity, he received the sacrament of baptism, in 371 or 372, from the hands of the presbyter Chromatins. At this epoch also he formed that close intimacy with Hieronymus which was long maintained with great mutual warmth, but event- ually most rudely dissolved. Having conceived an eager desire to visit Palestine, Rufinus set out, almost immediately after his admission into the Church, for Syria, in the train of Melania, a noble, wealthy, and devout Roman matron, and remained in the East for about twenty-six years, passing a portion of his time at Alexandria, where he en- joyed the instructions of Didymus and other learned fathers ; and the rest at Jerusalem, where he took up his abode with the monks on the Mount of Olives, making frequent excursions, however, in different directions, in company with Melania, to whom he seems to have acted as spiritual adviser and almoner. During the earlier part of the above period he maintained a most affectionate corre- spondence with Jerome, who had retired to the desert between Antioch and the Euphrates, and although they met once only (in 385), their friend- ship continued uninterrupted up to 393, when bitter strife arose. Both had been wann admirers of Origen, and this admiration had been expressed in the most emphatic terms by Jerome, in the preface to his translation of the Homilies upon the Song of Solomon. But when the doubtftil tendency of many of the theories involved in the imaginative orientalisms of Origen began by degrees to be more clearly discerned, and when the cry of heresy, first raised by Theophilus, became loud and strong, RUFINUS. Jerome, eager to escape all suspicion of adherence to such errors, vehemently supported Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis, in his attack upon John of Jt-- rusalem, by whom Rufinus had been ordained a presbyter, and to whom he was warmly attached. The seeds of enmity planted by this controversy were cherished into vigour by the characteristic heat of Jerome, whose denunciations of his fonr.er companion became, by quick degrees, more and more fierce and unsparing ; but before the quarrel had ripened into inextinguishable hatred, its pro- gress was checked by the interposition and explana- tions of honest friends, and a solemn reconciliation took place at Jerusalem, on Easter day, A. D. 3.97. In the autumn of the same year Rufinus em- barked for Italy, along with Melania, and having been hospitably entertained by Paulinas [Pauli- Nus], at Nola, betook himself from thence, with- out visiting the metropolis, to the monastery of Pi- netum. Hither multitudes flocked for the purpose of making inquiries with regard to the ceremonies and liturgies of the sister Churches of the East, the rules of the most celebrated coenobitical frater- nities, the Greek ecclesiastical writers, and various other points upon which one who had been so long resident in Asia and Egypt would be capable of imparting information. The intelligence thus obtained proved so interesting, that the learned traveller was earnestly solicited to gratify curiosity still further, by translating into Latin some of those productions to which he had been in the habit of referring most frequently. With this re- quest, not foreseeing the storm he was about to excite, he willingly complied, and accordingly pub- lished translations of the Apology for Origen by Pamphilus, and of the books of Origen Ilepl dpxoiu, together with an original tract Ue Adultcratione Librorum Origenis, while in the preface to the De Priticipiis, either from a wish to avoid any miscon- ception of his own views, or from some feeling of lurking malice, he quoted the panegyric pronounced by Jerome upon Origen, of which we have made mention above. The appearance of these works pro- duced a violent ferment. Pammachius and Oceanus represented the transaction in the most unfavourable light to Jerome, whose wrath blazed forth more hotly than ever ; all attempts to bring about a better understanding served only, from the bad faith of the negotiators, to feed the flame ; a bitter correspondence followed, which was crowned by the Apologia of the one adversus Hieronymum., and the Apologia of the other wlversus Rujinum. Soon after the commencement of the dispute Rufinus retired to Aquileia, and during the life of Siricius, was steadily supported by the pontifical court. But, upon the elevation of Anastasius, he was summoned by the new pope to repair to Rome, for the purpose of answering the charges preferred against his orthodoxy : this mandate, however, he evaded, and, instead of appearing in person, trans- mitted an Apologia^ in which he explains his real views, and altogether disavows any participation in the dangerous doctrines imputed to him by hia enemies. Anastasius replied by an epistle, in which he condemned, most unequivocally, the tenets of Origen, and censured indirectly the rashness of his translator, without, however, seeking further to disturb him in his retreat. After the death of Anastasius in 402, the flames which had raged fu- riously for upwards of three years, gradually became more faint, and at length expired altogether, liuti*