The Life of Malchus

Jerome (342–420)

The Life of Malchus, the Captive Monk

The life of Malchus was written at Bethlehem, a.d., 391. Its origin and purpose are sufficiently described in chapters 1 and 2.

I. They who have to fight a naval battle prepare for it in harbours and calm waters by adjusting the helm, plying the oars, and making ready the hooks and grappling irons. They draw up the soldiers on the decks and accustom them to stand steady with poised foot and on slippery ground; so that they may not shrink from all this when the real encounter comes, because they have had experience of it in the sham fight. And so it is in my case. I have long held my peace, because silence was imposed on me by one to whom I give pain when I speak of him. But now, in preparing to write history on a wider scale I desire to practise myself by means of this little work and as it were to wipe the rust from my tongue. For I have purposed (if God grant me life, and if my censurers will at length cease to persecute me, now that I am a fugitive and shut up in a monastery) to write a history of the church of Christ from the advent of our Saviour up to our own age, that is from the apostles to the dregs of time in which we live, and to show…

See also

• More works by Jerome

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