The Principles of the Biblical Exegesis of the Church Fathers

Abstract

After a brief historical overview of main tendencies of intepretation in patristic period the article focuses on central hermeneutical principle in the biblical exegesis of the Fathers and finds it in existence of an other sense beyond the basic literal sense. The following discourse deals with two different modifications of this principle both in Antiochene school and in Alexandrian environment, represented by the alegorical exegesis of Origen.

In the conclusion there is indicated how the basic hermeneutical paradigma was developed into four senses of the Scripture in Middle Ages.