Writings
Gennadius knew Greek well and was well read in Eastern and Western, orthodox and heretical Christian literature. He was a diligent compiler and a competent critic.
De Viris Illustribus
De Viris Illustribus, in its most commonly accepted form, was probably published c. 495 and contains, in some ten folio pages, short biographies of ecclesiastics between the years 392 and 495. It is an important historical source on the over ninety authors treated therein, and in many cases the only surviving record.
It is a continuation of St. Jerome's De Viris Illustribus. In that work Jerome had for the first time drawn up a series of 135 short biographies of famous Christians, with lists of their chief writings. It was the first patrology and dictionary of Christian biography, and became very popular. Many people, including a disciple of Jerome named Paterius, wrote similar continuations; Sophronius produced a Greek translation.
It was Gennadius's continuation that became most popular and was accepted everywhere as a second part of Jerome's work, and was always written (eventually printed) together with his. Gennadius's part contains about one hundred lives, modelled closely after those of Jerome. Various edits and reprints do not number them consistently; by Bernoulli, i to xcvii, with some marked as xciib, etc., originally cxxxvi-ccxxxii).
The series is arranged more or less in chronological order, but there are frequent exceptions.
In xc, 92, he says (in one version) that Theodore of Coelesyria (Theodulus) "died three years ago, in the reign of Zeno". From this Czapla deduces that Gennadius wrote between 491 and 494.
The present form of the text indicates a repeated revision of the entire work. Other people have modified it and added to it without noting the fact—as is usual among medieval writers. Some scholars including Richardson and Czapla consider that chapters xxx (Bishop John II of Jerusalem), lxxxvii (Victorinus), xciii (Caerealis of Africa.), and all the end portion (xcv-ci), are not authentic. There is doubt about parts of the others.
Other writings
Gennadius states that he composed a number of other works, most of which are not extant:
- Adversus omnes hæreses libri viii., "Against all heresies" in 8 volumes
- Five books against Nestorius
- Ten books against Eutyches
- Three books against Pelagius
- Tractatus de millennio et de apocalypsi beati Johannis, "Treatise on the thousand years and on the Apocalypse of St. John"
- Epistola de fide, a "letter of faith" which he sent to Pope Gelasius.
- Works of Evagrius Ponticus and of Timothy Ælurus, translated and restored to their authentic form. These translations are also lost.
De Ecclesiasticis Dogmatibus
There is a treatise called De Ecclesiasticis Dogmatibus ("Of Church Doctrine") which was originally attributed to Augustine of Hippo but is now universally attributed to Gennadius. The work was long included among those of St. Augustine.
Some scholars (Carl Paul Caspari, Otto Bardenhewer, Bruno Czapla) think that it is probably a fragment of Gennadius's eight books "against all heresies", apparently the last part, in which, having confuted the heretics, he builds up a positive system.
Publication
The De Viris Illustribus was edited and published by J. Andreas (Rome, 1468), by J. A. Fabricius in Bibliotheca ecclesiastica (Hamburg, 1718), and by E. C. Richardson in Texte und Untersuchungen, xiv. (Leipsig, 1896). It also appears with many editions of the works of Jerome.
An English translation by Richardson was produced in the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 2nd ser, iii. 385–402.
A critical edition of the Liber de Ecclesiasticis Dogmatibus under the title Liber Ecclesiasticorum Dogmatum was published by C. H. Turner in the Journal of Theological Studies vii. (1905), pp. 78–99 at pp. 89–99. Turner's introduction reviews a number of previous editions and also provides a survey of manuscript copies that were known to him, including several that he used for the edition.
