Education and Early Years
Jerome was born into a Christian family at Stridon, on the confines of Dalmatia and Pannonia. He was sent to Rome for advanced studies, where he studied under the philologist and grammarian Aelius Donatus, acquiring proficiency in Latin and Koine Greek through rhetorical and philosophical training. He was baptized in Rome around 360. By tradition he visited the catacombs on Sundays, contemplating martyrdom and mortality.
Drawn toward theological study, he traveled to Trier, renowned for its educational institutions, before spending time at Aquileia. Around 373 he journeyed eastward, eventually settling at Antioch, where he studied under Apollinaris of Laodicea.
Ascetic Life and Ordination
Drawn to ascetic life, Jerome withdrew to the desert of Chalcis, southeast of Antioch — a region known as the 'Syrian Thebaid' — where he spent roughly four to five years (about 374–379). During a serious illness marked by visions, he dedicated himself to biblical study rather than secular pursuits. In the desert he began studying Hebrew under a converted Jew and engaged with the Jewish Christian communities of the region.
Around 378 he was ordained a priest by Bishop Paulinus at Antioch. He afterward traveled to Constantinople (about 380–381), where he developed a friendship with Saint Gregory of Nazianzus (Gregory the Theologian) and studied Scripture under his guidance.
Rome and Pope Damasus
Between 382 and 385 Jerome resided in Rome, where he became the protégé and secretary of Pope Damasus I, who significantly shaped his exegetical pursuits and entrusted him with the task of revising the Latin Bible against Greek and Hebrew sources — work that produced the Vulgate. During this period he was surrounded by prominent women of patrician families who pursued ascetic study under his direction, including the widows Lea, Marcella, and Paula, and Paula's daughters Blaesilla and Eustochium.
Following the death of Pope Damasus in December 384, Jerome faced opposition from ecclesiastical rivals and, after inquiries by the Roman clergy, was forced to leave the city.
Bethlehem and the Vulgate
By 386 Jerome reached Bethlehem, where Paula funded a monastic settlement near the Church of the Nativity, adjacent to a convent founded by Paula and Eustochium, who had followed him to Palestine. He remained there for roughly thirty-four years, the most productive period of his life.
Between about 382 and 405 he translated the biblical texts into Latin, beginning with a revision of the Vetus Latina Gospels against Greek manuscripts and later translating the Hebrew Bible directly from the original Hebrew; his corrections also extended to the Pauline epistles. The resulting work formed the foundation of the Vulgate. He produced De Viris Illustribus (392–393), a biobibliography covering four centuries of primarily Christian writers, and biblical commentaries (about 405–420) that explained his translation choices.
Jerome engaged in significant theological disputes, notably with Rufinus over Origenistic teachings and with the Pelagians over the doctrine of grace and salvation, the latter producing his dialogue Against the Pelagians.
Legacy
The Catholic Church recognizes Jerome as one of the four Great Latin Church Fathers, alongside Ambrose, Augustine, and Pope Gregory I. His Vulgate became the standard Latin biblical text of the Western Church.
Relics & Shrines
Jerome died at Bethlehem on 30 September 420, at approximately 75 to 78 years of age, in Palaestina Prima. His remains were eventually translated to Rome; the Basilica of Saint Mary Major (Santa Maria Maggiore) in Rome serves as his major shrine.
