Giacomo Maria Airoli

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Giacomo Maria Airoli (1660 – March 27, 1721) was a Jesuit Orientalist and Scriptural commentator. He was born at Genoa. During his career, he was professor of Hebrew in the Roman College, and later succeeded Cardinal Tolomei in the chair of controversy. His knowledge of Hebrew is shown by his Hebrew translation of a sermon of Pope Clement XI.

He is the author of a number of dissertations on Scriptural subjects, mostly chronological, which were highly thought of. A full list of his works is found in Carlos Sommervogel's, Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jesus (Paris, 1890), I, 717. Sommervogel enumerates fourteen works of Airoli's, chief among which are:

• "Dissertatio Biblica in quâ Scripturæ textus aliquot insigniores, adhibitis linguis hebræa, syriaca, chaldaica, arabica, græca, . . . dilucidantur" (Rome, 1704)
• "Liber LXX hebdomadum resignatus, seu in cap. IX Danielis dissertatio" (Rome, 1713), several times reprinted;
• "Dissertatio chronologica de anno, mense, et die mortis Domini Nostri Jesus Christi" (Rome, 1718).

Arioli died in Rome on 27 March 1721.

This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913.