Jacques Bonfrère

François Sweerts [fr], in his Atheneae Belgicae, speaks of him as a man of rare virtue; he praises his industry and prudence, as well as the penetration of his mind and the solidity of his judgment.

Bonfrère owes his fame to his work in the department of Sacred Scriptures, into which, he tells us, he had been initiated by Cornelius a Lapide.

His Praeloquia was, in 1839, selected by Jacques Paul Migne as the most suitable treatise or general introduction with which to begin his Sacrae Scripturae Cursus Completus (I, cols.

viii: De modo quo Deus cum hisce Scriptoribus hagiographis habuit).

The "Praeloquia" were published along with a commentary on the Pentateuch in a volume entitled: Pentateuchis Mosis commentario illustatis, praemissis praeloquiis perutilibus (fol., Antwerp, 1625).

Bonfrère had undertaken to explain the Books of Kings before his work on the Pentateuch, he tells us in his preface to the latter; but he had felt the need of going back to the beginning of things.

His explanation of the text of scripture shows a very good knowledge of Hebrew, and pays special attention to the places mentioned.