The Story of Ruth According to Peter Comestor
Ruth - Rhiannon Graybill
Sara Moscone [+]
University of Berne
Sara Moscone earned a PhD from the University of Berne with a dissertation on the role of Flavius Josephus and rabbinical sources in Peter Comestor’s Historia Scholastica. She is now working on the biblical figure of Samuel in Judeo-Hellenistic texts as a revealing example of interconnections and demarcations in Jewish and Christian imagery. Her dissertation thesis “Pro veritate historiae: Flavio Giuseppe e le fonti ebraiche nell’Historia Scholastica di Pietro Comestore” was published with Schwabe Verlag in 2024.
Description
Peter Comestor’s rewriting of Ruth in his Scholastic History (1160s) is original for its historical perspective and its use of Jewish sources like Flavius Josephus and rabbinical texts. Untainted by anti-Judaism and polemics, the History identifies the main questions arising from the story, without losing the immediacy of the narrative and the poetic nature of the tale. Some of these elements also survived in later vernacularizations and versifications of the story of Ruth, inspired by Comestor’s work.