Luis Alcazar
( Ludovicus ab Alcasar )
 (1554-1613)

The "more legitimate and true precursor" of Grotius

Vestigatio arcani sensus in Apocalypsi
An Investigation into the Hidden Sense of the Apocalypse

Jesuit Father Serving the Palace Theological Society in Seville, Spain | Earliest Known Modern Preterist | Perhaps Preterism Suggested by Salmeron | Belluga interacts with him in (Latin) Commentary on Apocalypse, Zechariah and Daniel

A comprehensive commentary on the Book of Revelation by the Jesuit theologian Ludovicus ab Alcasar (1554-1613) who dedicated the work to Pope Pius V. In a curious introductory letter to the reader however, (by a censor?) Father Antonius Padilla is described as having greatly stimulated and furthered the edition of this commentary, and thus being de facto the dedicatee. After a series of introductory essays and a detailed synopsis follows the commentary, book by book, verse by verse. A concluding chapter on biblical weights and measures closes the work. A Lyon edition followed in 1618. A supplementary volume discussing in more detail those passages from Hiob, the Psalter, Canticles and Prophets quoted or alluded to in Revelation was published only in 1631. See De Backer-Sommervogel I 145-146 who incorrectly mention only 20 engravings.

Together with Ribeira, Alcasar is said to have introduced into the study of Revelation the scientific historical method, approaching the work from the viewpoint of the author and seeking the clue to his writings in the events of his time. In so many words Alcasar states in his dedication to Pope Pius V that Revelation was not only about the destruction of Jerusalem, but also about heathenish Rome; and what became increasingly clear to subsequent commentators like Grotius, Clericus, and others, that Rome and not Jerusalem was the object of attack in Revelation, is already foreshadowed in the very fine engravings after Don Juan de Jauregui: they show angels and monsters, but two of them have a bird's-eye view of a town not dissimilar to Rome. See R. H. Charles in Enc. Brit. 23:213.

Vestigatio Arcani Sensus in Apocalypsi

•  Made the seals the early expansion of apostolic Christianity

• God’s longsuffering, warnings, and punishments were allotted to the Jews

• The trumpets were judgments on fallen Judaism

• The two witnesses - the doctrine and holy lives of the Christians

• After the persecutions Christianity would arise with new glory and convert many Jews

• Revelation was the apostolic church, bringing forth the Roman church

• The first beast of Revelation 13 declared to be the persecuting arrogance of pagan Rome - the second beast, its carnal wisdom

• Revelation 17, the mystical meaning of idolatrous ancient Rome

• Revelation 18, its conversion to the Catholic faith
  
  (LeRoy Edwin Froom, The Prophetic faith of Our Fathers, The Historical Development of Prophetic Interpretation, volume 2, excerpts from pages 464-532)

 

"Behold, the Apocalypse sets before us the Advent of Christ in the clouds of the preaching of the Gospel, by means of which God pours down His heavenly shower, that is, the spirit of peace and of prayer."  (Clissold's Translation)

LATIN EXCERPTS FROM VESTIGATIO IN APOCALYPSI

No li putare, optime Lector, existimasse Luisium nostrum, licere sibi ad Apocalyptici vestibulionamentum per accomodationem huc trensferre, quod non erat eo respectu isaiae reuelatum. Sed potius sic habeto, propterea hic appositam fuisse eius visionis imaginem, quia persuasum habet luisius, spiritus sancti mentem in reuelatione illa Isaiae facta non fuisse aliam, quam ut extaret in veteri Scriptura insigne vaticinium de caelesti apocalypsi, quae aioanne erat spectanda, ac de ipsius apocalypseos argumento praecipuo. Res sane magna, si certa : ac de certitudine a te ipso ferendum est iudicium, perlecto capitis decimi septimi commentario, ubi res in disputationem veniet. Tunc vero, si tibi fueritsatisfactum ; fortasse fateberid, nihil grandius optari potuisse ad Apocalypseos propylaeum exornandum ; nihil aptius cogitari, quam tanti suisse apud Deum reuelationem hanc ionnai faciendam, ut augustissimo prognostico, & antiquissima praerogatiua eam singulariter honorare, & praenunciare decreuerit in ipso Isaiae libro, designatis speculatore & argumento : idque in literali nobilissimi vaticinii sunsu : qua ratione de ullo alio noui testimenti libro negat Luisim se peculiarem reperisse prophetiam." (p. 14)

"Arias vero in sua illa spirituali accommodatione, dum Apocalypseos bella vult intra unius hominis pectus includere; non video, qua ratione possit in bello illo spiritali, quod itra unius hominis pectus geritur, distinguere duo veluti bella, quorum primum respondeat bello Ierosolymae corruere; alterius vero, universam Babylonem conflagrare: atque his succedre mille annorum pacem ; ac demum Antichristi bellum.  Etenim, licet mysticum duarum urbium praelium in hominis pectore pie meditari, subtile sit inventum, nec improbandum ; ceterum ille trium bellorum ordo ad mysticum hoc bellum transferri non potest.  Nec contendit Arias omnia per ordinem ad subtilissimam illam normam redigere.  Posse vero multa non ordinatim, sed promiscue, at absque filo accommodari, non inficior.  Quin imo existimo, si Arias suam illam applicatione in litterali sensu stabiliret, multa praeterea illum ingeniose pro votis aptare potuisse.  Nam in perfidae Ierosolymae bello adversus Dei Ecclesiam poterat contemplari, quam acriter Deo conentur obsistere ii, qui semel fuerant illuminati et gustaverant donum caeleste, et verbum Dei, et prolapsi sunt, ad Hebraecos 6.4.  Quorum ex numero vix decima tandem pars, id est, perpauci sese illi submittent.  In bello etiam Romae ethnicae adversus Ecclesiam gesto, idoneus sese dabat sermo de eorum de corum repugnantia" (Vestigatio, Lyons, 1618, p. 19)

"Mathematicae autem artis peritis evidens est, si sol & luna coniuncti uterque sint, & luna ab inferiori loco et uno latere respiciatur; utramque lunae cuspidem, sive acumen deorsum conversa videri" ("Painters usually show the [crescent] moon upside down at the feet of this woman. But it is obvious to learned mathematicians, if the moon and the sun face each other, both points of the moon have to point downward. Thus the woman will stand on a convex instead of a concave surface."  (Vestigatio, Antwerp, 1614, 453: I cite the translation in Reeves, chap. 4.)

WHAT OTHERS HAVE SAID

Abbas Amanat
"The exegete who set much of the agenda for the Catholic interpretation of the Apocalypse in the seventeenth century was the Jesuit, Luis Alcasar (1554-1612), whose Vestigatio arcani sensus in Apocalypsi first appeared posthumously in Antwerp in 1614 and was immediately recognized as one of the most 'modern' interpretations of John's mysterious revelation.   Alcasar broke with earlier Jesuits in stressing a preterite and historical reading that held that everything in the Apocalypse, with the exception of the last three chapters, had been fulfilled in the early centuries of the Church.  Although he noted that a number of early commentators had taught that Apocalypse 20 referred to the refrigerium sanctorum after Antichrist, Alcasar had no sympathy for this view.  He also launched an attack on Joachim of Fiore, saying 'He who will may hold the Abbot Joachim to be a prophet of God, but not I." (Imagining the End: visions of apocalypse from the ancient Middle East to modern America, p. 165)

Isbon Beckwith
"He finds in the book no prediction of world history beyond the time of Constantine, when the Millennium began." (The Apocalypse of John, p. 332)

Jacques Bossuet
"Le savant jésuite Louis d'Alcasar, qui a fait un grand commentaire sur l'Apocalypse, où Grotius a pris beaucoup de ses idées, la fait voir parfaitement accomplie jusqu'au xxe chapitre, et y trouve les deux témoins sans parler d'Elie ni d'Enoch.

"XV. Qu'il peut y avoir plusieurs sens dans l'Ecriture, et en particulier dans l'Apocalypse.

A cela il faut ajouter ce que dit le même Alcasar avec tous les théologiens, qu'une interprétation même littérale de Y Apocalypse ou des autres prophéties, peut très-bien compatir avec les autres. " (Oeuvres complètes, 378)

Thomas Kelly Cheyne
"Conspicuous above all is the Vestigatio arcani sensus in Apocalypsi of Ludovicus ab Alcazar.  That writer was the first to carry out consistently the idea that the Apocalypse in its earlier part is directed against Judaism, and in its second against Paganism, so that in chaps. 12 f. we read of the first persecution of the Christians in the Roman Empire, and in ch. 19 of the final conversion of that Empire.  He thus presents us with the first serious attempt to arrive at a historical and psychological understanding of the book.   The idea worked out by Alcazar had already been expressed by Hentenius in the preface to his edition of Arethas (OEcumenii Commentar, ed. Morelius et Hentenius 2), and by Salmeron (Opera, 12, Cologne, 1614. 'In sacram Jo. Apoc. praeludia'). " (Encyclopedia Biblica: A Critical Dictionary of the Literary Political and Religious History, p. 200)

F.W. Farrar
"It has been usual to say that the Spanish Jesuit Alcasar.. was the founder of the Præterist School.. But to me it seems that the founder of the Præterist School is none other than St. John himself." (The Early Days of Christianity - PRÆTERIST INTERPRETATION | FALL OF JERUSALEM | APOCALYPSE)

James E. Force
"Ludovicus ab Alcazar was even more disturbing.   For his Vestigatio arcani sensus in Apocalypsi (1614) he used methods normally associated with the "Higher Criticism" of the nineteenth century.  He applied the first half of the Apocalypse to the Jewish Revolt and the second half to early Roman persecution of Christians.   While he owed his chronological order to Lyra, he dropped ecclesiastical history and eschatology.   The whole book concerned events long ago and no longer served a prophetic function.  He supported his argument with the first complete survey of Apocalypse criticism, from antiquity to the present, and Bousset still used Alcazar to date many medieval works.   In the North his followers were Grotius, Hammond and Bousset.  Newton cites approvingly his reading of the wilderness where the woman hides, but attacks Alcazar's approach, saying that those who apply Apocalypse to the Apostolic Age must explain why their interpretations were not expressed then. (Because Alcazar, like Ribera, does use patristic sources, Newton's criticism loses much of its force)." (Newton and Religion, p. 208)

Timothy James
"A Spanish Jesuit of Seville named, Luis De Alcazar (1554-1613) invested forty years of his life to this study which culminated in his 900 page commentary, "Vestigatio Arcani Sensus in Apocalypsi (Investigation of the Hidden Sense of the Apocalypse). In this work which was published posthumously in 1614, Alcazar made a new attempt irrespective of both Catholic and Protestant views to interpret the Apocalypse through the use of critical-historical methods. He concluded that the Apocalypse describes the two-fold war of the Church in the first century; one with the Jewish synagogue, and the other with paganism, which resulted in victory over both adversaries. Frrom makes an interesting note regarding Alcazar:

Alcazar was fully aware that he contradicted certain of the fathers, differed from the Futurists Ribera and Viegas, and was in conflict with Malvenda. While approving of the concept of spiritual resurrection held by Augustine, he contended against his view of the binding of Satan, as well as that of Ribera and Viegas. (Froom, LeRoy Edwin. The Prophetic Faith of our Fathers, 3 vols. (Wash. D.C.: Review and Herald, 1948), vol 2, p.509) (Preterist Eschatology in the Sixteenth Through Eighteenth Centuries)

Robert H. Mounce
"Alcasar was a thoroughgoing “preterist.” (The Book of Revelation, p. 26)

Moses Stuart
"Near the commencement of the seventeenth century (1614), the Spanish Jesuit Ludovicus ab Alcasar published his Vestigatio arcani Sensus in Apocalypsi, a performance distinguished by one remarkable feature, which was then new. He declared the Apocalypse to be a continuous and connected work, making regular advancement from beginning to end, as parts of one general plan in the mind of the writer. In conformity with this he brought out a result which has been of great importance to succeeding commentators. Rev. v-vi, he thinks, applies to the Jewish enemies of the Christian Church; xi-xix to heathen Rome and carnal and worldly powers, xx-xxii to the final conquests to be made by the church, and also to its rest, and its ultimate glorification. This view of the contents of the book had been merely hinted at before, by Hentenius, in the Preface to his Latin version of Arethas, Par. 1547. 8vo; and by Salmeron in his Preludia in Apoc. But no one had ever developed this idea fully, and endeavoured to illustrate and enforce it, in such a way as Alcasar ... Although he puts the time of composing the Apocalypse down to the exile of John under Domitian, yet he still applies ch. v-xi to the Jews, and of course regards the book as partly embracing the past.

"It might be expected, that a commentary that thus freed the Romish church from the assaults of the Protestants, would be popular among the advocates of the papacy. Alcasar met, of course, with general approbation and reception among the Romish community. "'(Stuart, Moses, "Commentary on the Apocalypse", Allen, Morrill and Wardell, Andover, 1845, Volume 1, p. 464.)

Books Available in Sardinia and Piemontisi and Cordoba, Argentina

1613: Ludouici ab Alcasar Hispalensis, and Societate Iesu… *In eas Veteris Testaments partes, quas respicit Apocalypsis. Books quinque. Cum opusculo de malis medicis. - Prodeunt nunc primum. … - Lugduni: sumptibus Iacobi & Andreae Prost, 1631. - 12! , 312, 28! p. ; 2º. ((It marks not controlled (Aquila and snakes: In virtute ET fortune) on the front. - Segn.: a6A-2D62E8. - Front. printed in red and black.

1618: Rev. patris mysterious Ludouici ab Alcasar Hispalensis, and Societate Iesu… *Vestigatio sensus in Apocalypsi. Cum opusculo de sacris ponderibus ac mensuris. - Antuerpiae: apud Ioannem Keerbergium, 1614 (Antuerpiae: typis Gerardi WolschatI, & Henrici AertsI, 1614)

1614: Rev. Patris Ludovici ab Alcasar Hispalensis… *Vestigatio mysterious sensus in Apocalypsi. Cum opusculo de sacris ponderibus ac mensuris. - Antuerpiæ: apud heredes Martini Nutij, 1619. - [20], 960, 82, [74] p. : ill. calcogr. ; fol. ((Vignetta on the front. (Iustissima virtus pietas homini). - Text on two columns.
 

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