Honorius Augustodunensis - Expositio in Cantica Canticorum

Honorius Augustodunensis, a theologian of the first half of the 12th century, was teaching presumably at a monastery school in southern Germany. However, his life and origins remain largely unknown. Judging by the large number of surviving manuscripts of his works, many of which have been preserved in Austrian libraries, he was a bestseller author in the Middle Ages. The wide dissemination of his writings in the Middle Ages not withstanding, his works and thought have been widely neglected in modern times. This is partly due to the lack of reliable text editions and translations of his works, but also to a disregard for the theology of his time in later times, when medieval theology was primarily identified with the great masters of the 13th and 14th centuries such as Thomas Aquinas or John Duns Scotus. This project therefore aims to get a better understanding of the uniqueness and significance of Honorius` theology and the appeal of his writings at his time. The focus is on one of his main works, the interpretation of the Song of Songs. The Canticum canticorum, as its Latin title reads, was by far the most frequently commented book of the Old Testament. Due to its erotic imagery and dense symbolism, it exerted a strong attraction on theologians, as the love song that a royal bridegroom and his beautiful bride sing to each other was seen as a mysterious expression of the relationship between Christ and the Church, but also between the soul of the God seeker and God. The text therefore invited medieval commentators to uncover various layers of symbolism in it and to define the so-called spiritual senses of Sacred Scripture more precisely. Honorius discussed a number of other theological topics in his commentary, in which he showed himself as an innovative thinker, anticipating important theological insights and doctrinal developments. The project will produce two books: in the first place a critical edition of this biblical commentary, which has survived in 180 manuscripts. AI- based tools such as the Transkribus editing program, which will be specially adapted and optimized for this project, will be used to cope with the exceptionally large textual tradition, helping to turn it into a critical text. Besides the critical edition of the text, a monograph will analyze the textual history and the theological themes of the commentary and interpret them within the context of 12th century theology. Finally, careful analysis of the numerous manuscripts is expected to provide new insights into the figure of Honorius himself, his life and work, and the reception of his oeuvre in academic circles at his time.