Félix-Marie Abel, o.p. (FMA)

• Father Abel

One of the masters of the founding generation of the School was Félix- Marie Abel, o.p., born in Saint-Uze, in the Drôme, in 1878. He arrived as a novice in December 1897, and as soon as M.-J. Lagrange had identified his exceptional abilities, it was decided that he would remain in Jerusalem. He quickly became known for his mastery of Greek sources (texts and inscriptions), for the history and geography of Palestine. He wrote the historical part of Louis-Hugues Vincent's archaeological studies on Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Hebron. He composed a large commentary of 1- 2 Maccabees (1949), books that he also translated for the fascicle edition of the Jerusalem Bible. For the second edition of the Jerusalem Bible, his work was largely taken up by Jean Starcky. Abel had also been asked to translate the Book of Joshua, which he was also commenting on at the time of his death.

Abel taught geography courses in Palestine at the Bible School for nearly 50 years. In 1932, he and Vincent carried out excavations on the site of the Byzantine Emmaus. In 1940, he was appointed consultant to the Pontifical Biblical Commission.

His three most enduring works remain: Grammar of the Biblical Greek followed by a selection of papyrus, Bible Studies series (1927), Geography of Palestine (I. 1933; II. 1938), and History of Palestine from the conquest of Alexander to the Arab invasion (1952). It is less well known that this scientist was an accomplished watercolorist, who wrote an illustrated guide to the Holy Land.

He died at the École Biblique on the eve of the 1953 Annunciation.

ISAAR (CPF), 2nd Edition, 2004.

Entry prepared on November 2018

Author(s) : Marie-Alpais Torcheboeuf.