Exegetical Systematization and Compilation Practices in the Xiphilinian Homiliary

The Byzantine impulse to systematize sacred knowledge fostered the compilation of extensive homiletic corpora keyed to the Sunday and festal lectionary. The earliest known collection arranged specifically for the Sunday Gospel cycle—the so-called Xiphilinian Homiliary (Ehrhard 1943, 525–559)—is traditionally attributed to (a) John Xiphilinos, although both its authorship and publication context remain debated. Rather than merely reproducing patristic homilies or catena-style excerpts, the homiliary forges a deliberate synthesis of varied materials, inaugurating the final significant phase of Byzantine homiletics. Two near-contemporaneous collections appear to presuppose and further develop the program it initiated: the “Patriarchal Homiliary” of John IX Agapetos (1111–1134; Xentaras 1999) and the Italo-Greek homiliary associated with Philagathos of Cerami (fl. first half of the twelfth century; Rossi Taibbi 1965, 1969). This paper examines the compilation context of the Xiphilinian Homiliary by situating it within its cultural-historical milieu and by tracing the textual strata and interpretive techniques that connect it to Theophylact of Ohrid’s Gospel Commentaries, and to the Patriarchal and Italo-Greek homiliaries. It highlights strategies of extraction, adaptation, and recombination that shed light on the intellectual framework underpinning twelfth-century Byzantine homiletic production. Furthermore, it argues that these convergences also point to reliance on common—now lost—repositories of patristic material.