Gregorius Coelius Pannonius

Gregorius Coelius Pannonius (Hungarian: Coelius Gergely; died 1552) was a 16th-century Hungarian Pauline monk and theological writer.

Earlier historiography mistakenly identified him with Gergely Gyöngyösi and/or Gergely Bánffy.^[1] His Humanist surnames Coelius and Pannonius refer to the Caelian Hill (where he served as prior, see below) and the Kingdom of Hungary (country of origin), respectively.^[2]

Coelius took the monastic vows in the Monastery of St Lawrence at Buda, before its vicar Gáspár Pesti.^[3] By January 1534, Coelius functioned as secretary of Bálint Hadnagy, who was general prior of the Pauline Order from 1532 to 1536.^[4] He regularly corresponded on religious matters with Gergely Simontornyai, one of the earliest Protestant Reformers in Hungary. Their harsh correspondence survives from 1534. Simontornyai recommended an undetermined postil of Martin Luther (possibly regarding the Bible translation of Martin Bucer) to Coelius to read.^[5] In response, Coelius – who stayed in the Pauline monastery of Gombaszög then – wrote that "I fear the Lord, who did not recommend to me the fugitive Luther, but rather the shepherd Peter, and said to him: Feed my sheep. I am one of these sheep, who feeds on the institutions of Christ and his shepherd."^[6] Despite all of Simontornyai's theological arguments, Coelius persisted in his Catholic faith throughout the correspondence, adding "may the earth swallow me up if I ever think of agreeing with Luther's schism".^[4]

Coelius served as prior of the Pauline monastery at Santo Stefano al Monte Celio (Santo Stefano Rotondo) in Rome from 1537 until his death in 1552. In the late 1530s, he had his monastery's various documents compiled into a collection and authenticated. The income from the monastery in Rome was used to cover the cost of the Pauline Breviary printed in Venice in 1540. Gregorius was also responsible for having four large psalm books prepared in 1546 for the completion of the choral prayer.^[1] Various printing orders are also related to his priory.^[7]

His commentary on the Rule of Saint Augustine together with its Hungarian translation was published by the print house of Ioannes Patavinus and Venturinus Roffinelli in Venice in 1537.^[8] The work was printed several times in the 17th and 18th centuries (for instance, in Kraków and Vienna in 1642 [without the Hungarian translation], Pressburg in 1742, Nagyvárad in 1743 and Częstochowa in 1756), which indicates its frequent use within the Pauline order.^[6] A copy was kept in Csíksomlyó (present-day Șumuleu Ciuc, Romania) since the mid-17th century. It was discovered by Lajos Dézsi in 1900 and re-discovered by Erzsébet Muckenhaupt in 1982. Its facsimile edition was published by Gábor Sarbak in 2001. Currently, the manuscript is located in the Muzeul Secuiesc al Ciucului in Miercurea Ciuc. It originally contained 104 folios, but three of them were lost.^[8]

Coelius dedicated his work to Gáspár Pesti, general prior of the order, with the date 12 March 1537 in Venice.^[9] The preface is almost verbatim identical to a treatise of Tamás Szombathelyi (Aliud thema regule), a fellow Pauline friar from the late 15th century, who himself utilized the works of Hugh of Saint Victor and Humbert of Romans.^[10] Coelius' work consists of two parts: firstly, the Rule of Saint Augustine with its translation to Hungarian and the author's commentary, secondly, the translation of the text of the monastic vows and reflection on its content. The first part contains about one and a half hundred quotes from the Bible, one third of which are from the Old Testament. There are also quotations from scholastic authors, including Bonaventure (1), Jerome (1), Bernard of Clairvaux (3), the Corpus Juris Canonici (1), Saint Gregory the Great (7), the Glossa ordinaria (1), Haimo of Auxerre (1), Basil of Caesarea (1), the Vitae Patrum (1) and the constitution of the Pauline Order (1).^[9] Coelius' intention was to compile a manual that was transparent and useful in content and scope for his fellow monks; each discussion concludes with a short summary of the main points.^[11]

The second part (with the title De recognitione professionis) analyzes the monastic vow by utilizing the texts of the Bible, Saint Gregory the Great, Jerome, Ambrose, Bernard of Clairvaux and Ovid. The part also contains the Latin and Hungarian versions of the Paulines' monastic vow.^[12]

Gregorius Coelius wrote his commentary on the Song of Songs in 1548, during his stay in Rome. Its earliest known copy was printed in Vienna in 1681 by the printing house of Leopold Voigt, with the contribution of Pauline and Jesuit friars. According to the letter of recommendation to György Szelepcsényi, the Archbishop of Esztergom, the manuscript was known to the Pauline Order, but due to unfavorable circumstances – the Ottoman conquest and the Reformation in Hungary –, it took 133 years for it to be printed. No manuscript copies are known. According to Croatian Jesuit friar Laurentius Chrysogonus, who utilized its text, a copy was kept in the Pauline monastery in Lepoglava around 1646.^[13] After its print in 1681, copies were kept in the Pázmáneum, the episcopal libraries of Eger and Győr, in addition to the Jesuit college at Nagyszombat (present-day Trnava, Slovakia).^[14]