# Poem on Christ

- Author: [Flavius Merobaudes](https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/authors/merobaudes/)
- Latin title: *Carmen de Christo*
- Date: ca. 430-450 (approximate)
- Source: J.-P. Migne, ed., Patrologiae cursus completus, series Latina, vol. 61 (Paris, 1847), cols. 972-973; digital text of the printed volume (Latin text: Migne, Patrologia Latina, digitized by Open Greek and Latin (patrologia_latina-dev, University of Leipzig), CC BY-SA 4.0)

- Translation: Claude, from the original text, unless a passage says otherwise; each passage below gives the translator
- Editions and translations: Friedrich Vollmer, ed., Flavii Merobaudis reliquiae, MGH Auct. ant. 14 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1905) (cited only)
- Work page: https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/merobaudes-carmen-de-christo/
- Passages: 1

## Carmen de Christo 1–30

- URL: https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/merobaudes-carmen-de-christo/1/#p-1
- Source: PL 61:972–973
- Translation: Claude (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-10-23

Summary: A short hymn to Christ: the eternal Son, born of the Virgin, recognized by the Magi, who raised the dead, descended to the realm of death, rose and ascended, and is one with the Father in a threefold light.

### Latin text

Proles vera Dei cunctisque antiquior annis, / Nunc genitus qui semper eras, a lucisque repertor, / Ante tuæ matrisque parens, quem misit ab astris / Æquævus genitor, Verbique in semina fusum / Virgineos habitare sinus, et corporis artus / iussit inire vias, parvaque in sede morari: / Quem sedes non ulla capit, qui lumine primo / Vidisti, quidquid mundo nascente creares, / Ipse opifex, opus ipse tui dignatus iniquas / Etatis sentire vices, et corporis hujus / Dissimiles perferre modos, hominemque subire, / Ut posses monstrare Deum, ne lubricus error / Et decepta diu varii solertia mundi / Pectora tam multis sineret mortalia saeclis. / Auctorem scivere Deum te, conscia partus / Mater, et attoniti pecudum sensere timores : / Te nova sollicito lustrantes sidera visu / In coelo videre prius, lumenque secuti / Invenere magi: tu noxia pectora solvis. / Elapsasque animas in corpora functa reducis, / Mundus et ad manes penetras, mortisque latebras / Immortalis adis : tibi tantum non fuit uni / Principium finisve mori, sed nocte refusa / In coelum ad Patrem scandis, rursusque perenni / Ordine purgatis adimis contagia terris. / Tu solus Patrisque comes, tu Spiritus insons, / Et toties unus, triplicique in lumine simplex. / Quis nisi pro cunctis aliud, quis credere possit, / Te potuisse mori, poteras qui reddere vitam ?

### English translation (Claude)

True offspring of God, older than all the years,
now born, you who always were, and discoverer of light,
parent of your own mother before her, whom the coeternal
Father sent from the stars, poured into the seeds of the Word,
to dwell in a virgin's womb, and bade you enter the ways
of a body's limbs and stay in a small dwelling:
you whom no dwelling contains, who in the first light
saw whatever you would create as the world was born,
yourself the maker, yourself the work, deigned to feel the harsh
changes of age, and to endure the unlike ways
of this body, and to take on manhood,
that you might show God, lest slippery error
and the long-deceived cleverness of the varied world
should leave mortal hearts astray for so many ages.
Your mother, aware of the birth, knew you as God
the Author, and the astonished fears of the cattle sensed you;
scanning new stars with anxious gaze,
the Magi first saw you in heaven and, following the light,
found you. You set free guilty hearts,
and lead back souls that had slipped away into dead bodies;
you pierce the world and reach the shades, and the hiding places of death
you, the immortal, enter: to you alone dying was
neither beginning nor end, but when the night had been driven back
you climb into heaven to the Father, and again in an everlasting
order you take away the defilement from the cleansed lands.
You alone are both the Father's companion, you the innocent Spirit,
and so many times one, simple in a threefold light.
Who, unless it were for all, who could believe
that you could die, you who could give back life?

### Scripture references

- John 1:1–3: echo, medium confidence
- Luke 1:31: allusion, medium confidence
- Matt 2:1–11: allusion, high confidence
- 1 Pet 3:19: echo, low confidence
- John 10:18: echo, low confidence

### Translation notes

- "a lucisque repertor" (line 2) and "Mundus et ad manes penetras" (line 21) are probably faulty in the digital text; both are translated by sense. Line 28, "Quis nisi pro cunctis aliud, quis credere possit", is cramped; translated by sense, uncertain.
- Line 26 calls Christ "Spirit" (Spiritus insons), an older usage for the divine nature of the Son; line 27 then speaks of the one God "simple in a threefold light". Translated as written.
- The attribution of the poem to Merobaudes rests on the manuscript; it has also been printed among Claudian's works.

### Citation (SBL)

Merobaudes, Carm. Christ. 1 (PL 61:972–973; trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/p/merobaudes-carmen-de-christo/1).