Rabanus has left huge Commentaries upon the books of the Old and New Testaments, in which he and his pupils gathered the opinions of the Fathers. He also added such needful comment of his own as his “exiguity” of mind permitted (Praef. to Com. in Lib. Judicum, Migne 108, col. 1110). His Commentaries were superseded by the Glossa ordinaria (Migne 113 and 114) of his own pupil, Walafrid Strabo, which was systematically put together from Rabanus and those upon whom he drew. It was smoothly done, and the writer knew how to eliminate obscurity and prolixity, and in fact make his work such that it naturally became the Commentary in widest use for centuries. The dominant interest of these commentators is in the allegorical significance of Scripture, as we shall see (Chapter XXVII.). On Rabanus and Walafrid, see Ebert, Allge. Gesch. der Lit. des Mittelalters, ii. 120-166.
[259] De cleric. inst. iii. 26 (Migne 107, col. 404).
[260] Ibid. iii. 18.
[261] Ibid. iii. 20 (Migne 107, col. 397).
[262] Migne III, col. 9-614.
[263] Raban’s excruciating De laudibus sanctae crucis shows what he could do as a virtuoso in allegorical mystification (Migne 107, col. 137-294).
[264] De cleric. inst. iii. 16 (Migne 107, col. 392).
[265] De cleric. inst. iii. 25 (Migne 107, col. 403).
[266] Compare his De magicis artibus, Migne 110, col. 1095 sqq.
[267] Migne 107, col. 419 sqq.