St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press has been publishing a Popular Patristics series for some time now, comprised of various translations of individual Patristic works, selections thereof, or themed editions of excerpts. The translations are fresh, contemporary, and pleasant to read. The books are also of a perfect size for popping into a pocket: 5x7x1/2″ (12.5×18.5×1.3 cm for you metric heretics). I’ve just picked up a short stack of these, rather like Lenten pancakes, and thought I’d recommend them to any readers who are interested in patristic reading, as I am. Each little volume includes a helpful (and surprisingly, for such little volumes, high quality) introduction, and most (all?) include selective but very useful and most importantly thoughtful footnotes. The surface of these translations is perfectly popular, with the depths entirely scholarly. And they’re inexpensive. How delightful!
Kevin – thanks for the tip on the “Pop Patristics”. Sounds like a remarkable series that I will want to pick up. Thanks also, in general, for this remarkable website which I just stumbled on thanks to the secular wonders of Google. I was very frustrated at NOT finding a good online translation of Hippolytus’s treatise on Apostolic Tradition. Why is it that so many good patristic collections on the ‘net do not carry this, at least not in its wholistic form?
…. so many questions, so little time
rcb
Thanks for the compliment! Another great place for Patristics is Roger Pearse’s Early Church Fathers. The works are mostly older public domain translations, but there are some new works in there as well. His Tertullian site, which the Early Church Fathers is a part of, is great fun,too!