RIBERA, FRANCISCO DE

Exegete and professor of Sacred Scripture; b. Villacastín near Segovia, Spain, 1537; d. Salamanca, Nov. 24, 1591. In 1570, when he was already a priest and doctor in theology, he entered the Society of Jesus. He dreamed of imitating St. Jerome's eremitic dedication to the sacred sciences, but his life as a Jesuit in Spain was spent in missionary activity and scholarship, including 16 years at Salamanca teaching Scripture. His renowned Biblical exegesis, prayerfulness, penance, and zeal for souls gained the attention of St. Teresa of Avila, and he became her confessor and first biographer.

His commentaries demonstrate wide patristic erudition and, for his century, pioneered in proposing the unique literal sense of a scriptural passage. They include principally: In librum XII prophetarum minorum commentarii sensum … historicum moralem et persaepe allegoricum complectentes (Salamanca 1587); In librum XII prophetarum commentarii selecti historici (Salamanca 1598); In epistolam ad Hebraeos commentarii (Salamanca 1598); and In evangelium secundum Iohannem commentarii (Lyons 1623). In addition, the University of Salamanca library possesses many manuscripts of his exegesis. His one biography, La vida de la madre Teresa de Jesús (Salamanca 1590), has often been reproduced.

Bibliography: c. sommervogel et al., Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jésus, 11 v. (Brussels-Paris 1890–1932; v. 12, suppl. 1960) 6:1761–67. h. hurter, Nomenclator literarius theologiae catholicae, 5 v. in 6 (3d ed. Innsbruck 1903–13) 3: 238–240. a. astrain, Historia de la Compañía de Jesús en la Asistencia de España, 7 v. (Madrid 1902–25) 4:48–50. f. stegmÜller, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner, 10 v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65) 8:1282.

[t. t. taheny]