Imagining Paganism Through the Ages: Studies on the Use of the Labels 'Pagan' and 'Paganism' in Controversies 9789042942530, 9789042942547, 9042942533

Citation preview

IMAGINING PAGANISM THROUGH THE AGES STUDIES ON THE USE OF THE LABELS “PAGAN” AND “PAGANISM” IN CONTROVERSIES JOSEPH VERHEYDEN – DANIELA MÜLLER

IMAGINING PAGANISM THROUGH THE AGES STUDIES ON THE USE OF THE LABELS “PAGAN” AND “PAGANISM” IN CONTROVERSIES

BIBLIOTHECA EPHEMERIDUM THEOLOGICARUM LOVANIENSIUM

EDITED BY THE BOARD OF EPHEMERIDES THEOLOGICAE LOVANIENSES

L.-L. Christians, J. Famerée, É. Gaziaux, J. Geldhof, A. Join-Lambert, M. Lamberigts, J. Leemans, D. Luciani, A.C. Mayer, O. Riaudel, J. Verheyden

EXECUTIVE EDITORS

J. Famerée, M. Lamberigts, D. Luciani, O. Riaudel, J. Verheyden

EDITORIAL STAFF

R. Corstjens – C. Timmermans

UCLOUVAIN LOUVAIN-LA-NEUVE

KU LEUVEN LEUVEN

BIBLIOTHECA EPHEMERIDUM THEOLOGICARUM LOVANIENSIUM CCCXII

IMAGINING PAGANISM THROUGH THE AGES STUDIES ON THE USE OF THE LABELS “PAGAN” AND “PAGANISM” IN CONTROVERSIES

EDITED BY

JOSEPH VERHEYDEN – DANIELA MÜLLER

PEETERS LEUVEN – PARIS – BRISTOL, CT

2020

A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN 978-90-429-4253-0 eISBN 978-90-429-4254-7 D/2020/0602/98 All rights reserved. Except in those cases expressly determined by law, no part of this publication may be multiplied, saved in an automated data file or made public in any way whatsoever without the express prior written consent of the publishers. © 2020 – Peeters, Bondgenotenlaan 153, B-3000 Leuven (Belgium)

TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction (J. VERHEYDEN – D.A.T. MÜLLER) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

IX

Daniela MÜLLER (Nijmegen) Pagans: An Early Christian Concept in the Middle Ages . . . . .

1

Christoph SCHUBERT (Erlangen) Christen und Heiden: Juristische Aspekte im Octavius des Minucius Felix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

13

Mark EDWARDS (Oxford) Arnobius on Paganism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

35

Uta HEIL (Wien) Where Have All the Pagans Gone from the Historiae adversus paganos of Orosius? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

55

Joseph VERHEYDEN (Leuven) Between Persiflage and Frustration: Another Look at the Carmen contra paganos. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

83

Matthias HARDT (Leipzig) Slawische Gentilreligion in Historiographie, Briefen und Kreuzzugsaufrufen des hohen Mittelalters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 Mariano DELGADO (Freiburg/CH) Weder unzivilisierte Barbaren noch teuflische Götzendiener: Die Kulturen und die Religionen der Indianer nach Bartolomé de Las Casas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Alfons BRÜNING (Nijmegen) Konfessionskulturen bei den „Ungläubigen“? Glaubenswissen und Glaubenspraxis in der frühneuzeitlichen Polemik zwischen Lateinern und Orthodoxen (ca. 1550-1650) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 Winfried SCHRÖDER (Marburg) Hermann Samuel Reimarus’ Debt to Celsus, Porphyry, and Emperor Julian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183

VIII

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Yentl SCHATTEVOET (Nijmegen) Imagining the Pagan: The Romantic Roots of a Present-Day Religious Identity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205 Ronald HUTTON (Bristol) Christian Goddesses? The Question of “Pagan Survivals” Reconsidered . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231 Epilogue 1 (J. VERHEYDEN) Gentes, pagani, and the “Nijmegen School” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249 Epilogue 2 (J. VERHEYDEN) Gentiles and Pagans in the Vulgate: A Selective Survey of Relevant Vocabulary with a Few Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259 INDEXES Modern Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321 Historical Names and Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329 Biblical References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343

INTRODUCTION

This volume contains the proceedings of the first International Colloquium of the Research Centre “Polemikos” that was founded in 2016 by Joseph Verheyden (KU Leuven) and Daniela Müller (RU Nijmegen). The Centre is dedicated to the study of the history of religious polemics, primarily, but not exclusively, in Christian tradition. The topic of this first meeting, held 14-16 of March 2018 in Leuven, was chosen after a number of “brainstorming” sessions in which numerous other possible subjects of quite variegated nature were explored. Initially, the plan was to deal with a very broad topic. After some hesitation, we discussed the possibility to start with a more specific one, but in the end we returned to our first plan and settled for a theme and an approach we considered to be symbolic for the kind of research the Centre wishes to stand for. For our next colloquium, scheduled for November 2020, we have opted for a “smaller” topic and will deal with the Cathars, studying them not just as an historical movement, but also as a phenomenon that raises questions of a more general kind, such as how to define what is “perfect” in a particular religious tradition, who has or claims the right to decide on such principle issues, and why this matters altogether. But for our opening colloquium we widened our horizons and looked into what is a commonly known and broadly used way to discredit an adversary: by using labels, in particular the negative label par excellence – that of being “a pagan”. The importance of the topic probably needs little discussion. Apart from the historical aspect, the question also has quite some relevance for current discussions on identity markers, “otherness”, and the self-consciousness of particular groups and cultures. The colloquium and the resulting proceedings show how this is in a sense an “eternal” issue. The long and at times cruel fight of early Christianity against ancient Greco-Roman (“pagan”) religious and in part also social culture has been studied in much detail1. The fight involved a good deal of apologetics 1. Some of the more important works, and quite some others, are referred to in some of the chapters below. Among the classics are A. MOMIGLIANO (ed.), The Conflict between Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century, Oxford, Clarendon, 1963; J.H. SMITH, The Death of Classical Paganism, London, Chapman, 1976; R. MACMULLEN, Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries, New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1997; W.H.C. FREND, Orthodoxy, Paganism and Dissent in the Early Christian Centuries, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2002. For a recent collection of essays on Jewish and Christian views on and attitudes towards pagans, see D.C. SIM – J.S. MCLAREN (eds.), Attitudes to Gentiles

X

INTRODUCTION

and polemics from both sides and expressed through various literary genres, but also a dose of military and otherwise violent interventions, again, as time went on and as Christianity was on the rise, from both sides and with varying success. The disputes included logical, theological and philosophical arguments, were steeped in rhetoric, and displayed a wide range of strategies meant to conquer the enemy – from irony to stigmatisation, and from sound reasoning to appealing to divine authority. These tools and methods were picked up time and again all through history to shape and imagine enemies and fight and condemn other groups and peoples. It is documented in the Middle Ages and up to our days2. The initiative to act against (imagined) enemies came from individuals and local authorities, but also from the highest magistrates and occasionally indeed, on a larger scale, from the Church as a whole, or so it seems. In many cases the labels “pagan” and “paganism” proved or were thought to be successful means to meet the purpose of dealing with the others as “others”, of alienating them, and of establishing or strengthening one’s own identity. A label that originally was meant to refer to such milieus, mostly rural, that remained unaffected by the Christian mission gradually was turned into one that could identify individuals, and indeed whole peoples, who so far had lived outside of the Christian orbit, but came in touch with it through the political, socio-economic, and military expansion of the Western European nations. As a matter of fact, to many, politics and religion together made for a most efficient combination to subdue other cultures and promote the own tradition. As one can imagine, the topic is rich and includes many, indeed one might say, too many aspects. For practical reasons, the organisers decided to limit the focus in two respects. First, they wished to study voices and evidence of Western origin – from the famous adversus Paganos literature in the Western part of the Roman empire in Late Antiquity to the in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity (LNTS, 499), London, Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013. The subject has a long history and it would be an interesting and quite revealing exercise to look back at earlier publications and survey the history of scholarly approaches to the topic. For an ancient monograph dealing with the demise of paganism that is itself quite “contextualised”, see A. BEUGNOT, Histoire de la destruction du Paganisme en Occident, Paris, Didot, 1835; but there are many more. 2. See, by way of example and picked out randomly from a wealth of publications, C. STEEL – J. MARENBON – W. VERBEKE (eds.), Paganism in the Middle Ages: Threat and Fascination (Mediaevalia Lovaniensia, 1/43), Leuven, Leuven University Press, 2012; J. PALMER, Defining Paganism in the Carolingian World, in Early Medieval Europe 15 (2007) 402-425. J. ELFASSI, L’occultation du paganisme dans la Chronique mineure de Bède, in Histoire et littérature de l’Europe du Nord-Ouest 34 (2012) 63-72. Connecting Late Antiquity with the Middle Ages is R. FLETCHER, The Conversion of Europe: From Paganism to Christianity 371-1380 AD, Glasgow, HarperCollins, 1997.

INTRODUCTION

XI

controversies on native populations raising from the discovery of the New World and on the place and role to be given to more “rationalistic” approaches to the Christian faith in the (early) modern period. Second, they wished to do this with special attention to how the labels “pagan” and “paganism” with their many connotations have been used by many different authors to defend quite different causes. The case studies presented here illustrate that the label or “stigma” can receive many different meanings, but that some characteristics are more prominently present (or more useful for polemics) than others. Among the latter are the (gratuitous) characterisation of the others as strangers or barbarians, the accusation of committing idolatry, but also all sorts of insinuations or even outright claims of immoral or amoral behaviour and also more outlandish ones that associate these “pagan” others with devilish entities or identify them as collaborators in demonic schemes. The list of works and authors that could be studied from such a perspective is endless. The opening contribution (Daniela Müller) deals with the concept of paganism as such and how it was transferred, and partly transformed, from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages. The organisers have given quite some emphasis to the early Christian period, because it was foundational in developing the strategies. Four essays deal with the ancient Christian adversus Paganos literature that was partly produced in times when Christianity was still the underdog or the challenger and partly also after “victory” seemed to be certain. Three of the essays study prominent figures in that battle: Minucius Felix (Christoph Schubert), Arnobius of Sicca (Mark Edwards), and Orosius (Uta Heil). The fourth one presents a little poem that has been studied in a quite disproportionate way in recent literature taking into account its length and importance (Joseph Verheyden). A second contribution on the Middle Ages presents the factors and agents at work in the enormous enterprise of conquering parts of North-Eastern Europe for Christianity (Matthias Hardt). Three essays deal with the modern period. One studies the position of the famous de Las Casas in the controversy about native Americans (Mariano Delgado), the second the relation between doctrine and praxis in the controversies between the Latin and the Orthodox Church (Alfons Brüning), and the third explores the inspiration Reimarus may have found in ancient critics of Christianity (Winfried Schröder). The last two essays deal with contemporary issues. One focuses on the romantic roots of views and opinions on paganism in shaping religious identities today (Yentl Schattevoet), the other on “pagan survivals” in our (post-)modern world (Ronald Hutton). The last two contributions have less to do with “fighting” and more with “imagining” paganism, though it will become clear from reading the previous essays

XII

INTRODUCTION

that these two aspects overlap in a significant way and have influenced each other. As a matter of fact, this project started out as a study on “fighting paganism”, only for the editors to realise that many of the polemics are as much about imagining an enemy as about fighting that enemy. The two are closely interconnected. The book concludes with two epilogues by one of the editors. The first recalls a dispute that lasted for some decades in the middle of the past century among historical linguists on the origin of two key-terms (in Latin) for denoting pagans: gentes and pagani. The other provides a survey with summary comments on the use of the first of these terms and some others in the Vulgate. The two epilogues were written while in lockdown. The voices that can be heard in this volume are of necessity selective. The organisers regret it that for reasons beyond their power some areas could not be covered. One thinks spontaneously of the controversies with Islam in the medieval and later periods. It is certainly a lacuna, even if one realises that this fight was more often fought in terms of confronting “the infidels” rather than “the pagans”, though the latter label is used (Thomas’ Summa contra gentiles!), which is in a sense remarkable as a primary aspect of the notion of paganism is polytheism. It is as much proof of the force of the label as of the flexibility of those using it. One probably also thinks of the enormous amount of controversy literature and pamphlets produced, by both sides, during the first decades of the Reformation in which the accusation of falling back into paganism is a well-known ingredient. Besides the medieval “war on Islam” and the intra-Christian wars of the sixteenth century, many other topics can be mentioned, some of them probably quite unknown to many. Here are a few randomly chosen examples. Seventeenth-century Anglicanism faced two major enemies: Rome and Puritanism. The battle against these foes produced most interesting “over-the-top” booklets/pamphlets that vie with each other in the rigour of their authors and the length of their titles3. At about the same time the 3. Against Rome and the papacy: NN, The Anatomy of Popery, or, A Catalogue of Popish Errours in Doctrine, and Corruptions in Worship: Together with The Agreement between Paganism, Pharisaism, and Popery, London, Printed by Tho. Milbourne for Tho. Passenger at the Three Bibles on London-Bridge, 1673; [Owen Thankfull], A true and lively Representation of Popery: Shewing That Popery is only New-modell’d Paganism, and Perfectly destructive of the great Ends and Purposes of God in the Gospel, London, Printed by R. Everingham for W. Kettilby at the Bishops Head in S. Pauls Church-Yard, 1679. For the controversy on Quakerism: A Faithful Discovery of a treacherous Design of Mystical Antichrist, Displaying Christ’s Banners, But attempting to lay waste Scriptures, Churches, Christ, Faith, Hope, &c. and establish Paganism in England. Seasonably given in a Letter to the Faithful in and neer to Beverly, by Joseph Kellet, John Pomroy, and Paul Glisson. Containing an Examination of many Doctrines of the People called Quakers

INTRODUCTION

XIII

Jesuit Bartholomaeus Fibus published a book on the Father, the Son and the Church against anyone, and in particular Jansenists, who would have dreamt of deviating from orthodoxy and become “pagans” again4. In the mid-nineteenth century Mgr. Jean-Joseph Gaume, an Ultramontane priest and essayist as none other, who managed to alienate even his closest supporters, published a booklet against the threat of secularism that does not shy from using the term “paganism” in this context5. The examples can easily be amplified6. No doubt less harmless are recent works that figure the label in their title. They illustrate the appeal the word still has, or just the fact that it is so well known that many use it almost un-reflectively7. The editors regret that they had to be selective, but found some comfort in the fact that this colloquium can be seen as the first of what hopefully will become a series of journeys into the wide territory of religious polemics, focusing on labels, methods, strategies, and religious and semireligious arguments for characterising opponents, mainly for religious, but also for political, military, and socio-economic purposes. They also found some comfort in realising that readers, when looking at the subjects that are dealt with in this volume and thinking of the many that could have been added to the list, will probably grow even more aware of the diversity and variety of themes and factors that can be linked to this one. in York-shire, and now in most parts of England: Together with a Censure of their Way, and several Items concerning the designs of God, Satan, and Men, in these things, recommended to the consideration of them who are in good earnest for Christ, By Christopher Feak. John Simpson. George Cokayn, London, printed for Thomas Brewster, and are to be sold at the Three Bibles in Pauls Church-yard, 1654; twenty years later the controversy was not yet settled and continued on the same tone, as can be seen in the controversy between William Russel and William Loddington: Quakerism is Paganism, by W. L’s Confession; In a Book Directed to Mr. N. L. Citizen of London: or, Twelve of the Quakers Opinions, called by W. L. The Twelve Pagan Principles, or Opinions; for which the Quakers are opposed to Christians; Examined and Presented to William Penn. By William Russel, a Lover of Christianity. Printed for Francis Smith, at the Elephant and Castle in Cornhil near the Royal Exchange, 1674; with an immediate reply by “W. L.”, i.e.,William Loddington, Quakerism no Paganism, or, A Friendly Reply to W. R. his Unfriendly Discourse Intituled, Quakerism is Paganism: Shewing The Insufficiency of what he hath Written to Unchristian the Quakers, and to render them as Heathens and Pagans to the People By W. L. a Lover of Peace more than of Parties, London, s.n., 1674. 4. Via Veritatis & Vitae in mundi labyrintho; seu demonstratio tripartite, Dei adversùs atheos, & gentiles; Christi adversùs Judaeos & paganos; Ecclesiae adversùs haereticos & schismaticos: suffragante per omnia Augustino, Cologne, S. Ketteler, 1700. 5. Le ver rongeur des sociétés modernes ou Le paganisme dans l’éducation, Paris, Gaume, 1851; and Lettres à Monseigneur Dupanloup, évêque d’Orléans, sur le paganisme dans l’éducation, Paris, Gaume, 1852. 6. Cf. G. COMBÈS, Le retour offensif du paganisme, Paris, Lethellieux, 1938. 7. Again a few examples: P. GAY, The Enlightenment: An Interpretation. 1. The Rise of Modern Paganism, London, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1967 (several reprints); A. KOFSKY, Eusebius of Caesarea against Paganism (Jewish and Christian Perspectives, 3), Leiden, Brill, 2000.

XIV

INTRODUCTION

Paganism is everywhere and anything. It seems that this was for many centuries how many have thought (and some perhaps continue to do) about foreign, strange and “deviant” cultures and traditions: a handy term or category, the mere use of which was thought to suffice to have its intended effect upon the reader. But perhaps the most strange or remarkable observation to be made in dealing with this topic is that “paganism” proved to be flexible and tenacious, and in a sense found new life and vigour in the fight against it as this had been conceived by so many polemicists. Something of this can be seen in the fact that the struggle never ended, but also that paganism reinvented itself time and again. This latter aspect is illustrated in the last two essays and could in turn also easily be expanded. Countless are the books on the modern-day phenomenon of Neo-Paganism, as are the forms and formats in which “paganism” manifests itself to the world, including “Christian paganism” and “atheistic paganism”8. It seems the label has not yet been used down. Joseph VERHEYDEN Daniela MÜLLER

8. On the “history of paganism”, see, e.g., P. JONES – N. PENNICK, A History of Pagan Europe, London, Routledge, 1995, repr. 2006; K. DOWDEN, European Paganism: The Realities of Cult from Antiquity to the Middle Ages, London, Routledge, 2000. On the imaginative appeal of the term and any practices connected with it, R. SHORROCK, The Myth of Paganism: Nonnus, Dionysius and the World of Late Antiquity, London, Bristol Classical Press, 2011. On ancient and above all modern paganism, see the general surveys by C.S. CLIFTON – G. HARVEY (eds.), The Paganism Reader, London, Routledge, 2004; M. PIZZA – J.R. LEWIS (eds.), Handbook of Contemporary Paganism (Brill Handbooks on Contemporary Religion, 2), Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2009. Cf. also works by anthropologists, such as M. AUGÉ, Génie du paganisme, Paris, Gallimard, 1982. More murky and potentially more dangerous are works by authors who not only vaguely identify with pagan traditions, but connect with it authoritarian ideas about (re-)organising modern society: see A. DE BENOIST, Comment peut-on être païen?, Paris, Albin Michel, 1981, with the “veneration” of authors such as Julius Evola. Needless to say that from the side of “pagans” the fight against enemies is today largely fought on the internet.

PAGANS AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CONCEPT IN THE MIDDLE AGES

I. PRELIMINARIES Over the past years, “perception” has become increasingly important as a methodological starting-point in the field of history1. In general, the term “perception” alludes to the fact that we are not dealing with the purely factual side of history, but rather with historians primarily examining the perspectives received, especially those of the source authors2. If we look at history in this way, the term “reception” has great perceptive potential. In this particular case: to what extent did the term “heathen” or “pagan” belong to the perceived world of the Christian author and how were pagans perceived? Clearly, it is important to examine this rather undefined and vague terminology more closely. II. THE EARLY CHRISTIAN ROOTS During Late Antiquity, various terms were used to describe what we now call “pagans”3. First of all, there was the term “gentiles” – not coincidentally a derivative of the word gentes – meaning people with a common tribal father. Gentiles referred to the division of people into different categories in the way it was done in Judaism: we – the chosen people of God – 1. In 2009, for instance, an Advanced Grant Project on the topic of Perception of Other Religions, under the direction of Hans-Werner Goetz of the University of Hamburg, was accredited by the European Research Council. 2. Cf. the description of the project on the website http://www.geschichte.uni-hamburg. de/personal/ERC-Projekt.html. 3. Cf. for instance, K. ZECH, Heidenvorstellung und Heidendarstellung: Begrifflichkeit und ihre Deutung im Kontext von Bedas “Historia Ecclesiastica”, in A. AURAST – H.-W. GOETZ (eds.), Die Wahrnehmung anderer Religionen im frühen Mittelalter (Hamburger geisteswissenschaftliche Studien zu Religion und Gesellschaft, 1), Münster, LIT Verlag, 2012, 15-47, esp. pp. 18-22. Furthermore, on early church history see the authoritative descriptions by R.L. FOX, Pagans and Christians in the Mediterranean World from the Second Century AD to the Conversion of Constantine, Harmondsworth, Viking, 1986, and the works of Peter Brown, e.g. P. BROWN, Power and Persuasion in Late Antiquity: Towards a Christian Empire, Madison, WI, University of Wisconsin Press, 1992, or ID., Authority and the Sacred: Aspects of the Christianisation of the Roman, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1995.

2

D.A.T. MÜLLER

as opposed to all other gentes, that is, the people (gojim) who do not know Yahweh (Jer 10,25) and who therefore worship false gods. Within Judaism, this was a salvation-historical contrast that cannot be understood simply as a neutral, ethnic description. The New Testament, however, demonstrates an extended understanding of ethnos. After God’s all-encompassing act of reconciliation through the incarnation of Jesus, salvation applies to all ethnè (gentiles in Latin) or, reflecting the Hellenistic worldview, which also divided people into two categories, Greeks and barbarians (Rom 1,14)4. The early Apologists addressed their works Contra Graecos, meaning both Greeks and Hellenized Romans, in order to pit themselves in particular against Greek philosophy. One important argument against the early Christians was the accusation of superstitio, or superstition, as argued by Roman authors such as Suetonius and Tacitus. For these authors, superstitio was characterized by dubious practices, magic, secret meetings, ecstatic or sensually exaggerated emotions, and subversive intentions. In short, superstitio was seen as abnormal religious practice resulting in chaos rather than proper order5. Ultimately, superstition would end in ungodliness, because this exaggerated piety would lead to a perception of the gods only as caricatures. However, without such linguistic ammunition of Hellenism, the Christian Apologists would not have been able to develop their own arguments6. Using the rhetorical art of the retorsio7, they started to identify the religions of the Romans as superstitio and the Christian faith as vera religio8, causing a decisive change in this religious term, because now the exclusivity of the faith became the defining aspect. The ethnic particularism of Greek and Roman religions was not compatible with this Christian universalism. Christians trace all of humanity back to a single tribal father – Adam – and this is the base of their claim to universalism (exclusivity). Instead of using cultural terms (Greeks – barbarians) in a universal way, the Christians now started to use religious terms with a universal meaning: the category of “pagani” arose initially as a synonym 4. Cf. H.-W. GENSICHEN, “Heidentum I”, in Theologische Realenzyklopädie 1, Berlin, De Gruyter, 1977, 590-601, esp. pp. 591-592. 5. Superstitio is therefore anchored in the Roman religion as a negative concept. Cf. on Roman religion, for instance, P. VEYNE, Culte, piété et morale dans le paganisme grécoromain, in L’Empire gréco-romain, Paris, Seuil, 2005, 419-543 or J. RÜPKE (ed.), A Companion to Roman Religion, Malden, MA, Blackwell, 2007. 6. Cf. the volume of apologetic works in German translation by M. FIEDROWICZ, Christen und Heiden: Quellentexte zu ihrer Auseinandersetzung in der Antike, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2004. 7. Cf. ibid., p. 679. 8. Not coincidentally, Augustine would later call his work De vera religione…

PAGANS: AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CONCEPT IN THE MIDDLE AGES

3

for non-believers or heathens. We see this, for example, in the fourth century, when Jerome changed the usual heading Contra Graecos to Contra paganos in his work De viris illustribus9. The cultural opposition between Greeks and barbarians came to be combined with the concept of gentiles to construct a specific understanding of pagans. In contrast with the term “gentiles”, however, traits were assigned to the term “pagani” that previously had only been associated with the “barbari”: rough, uneducated, ignorant, not teachable and, therefore, obdurate. In this way, some elements already known to the Romans – who also used the term “pagani”, but only in a cultural-social sense – such as uneducated, simple and rustic, were combined with a religious aspect10. This means that we find here the terminological ingredients that would come to define the Christian perception of the term “pagan”. Pagans were those who came from rural rather than urban surroundings. Their faith was perverse, arising from a deliberate and deceitful attitude11. Instead of approaching the transcendental mystery of God, they were caught up in the lowliness of worldly affairs12. They could alternatively be called non-believers or heathens. Quite soon, however, the term “non-believer” (infideles) turned into a larger category that included heretics as well as pagans13. In all of this, the term’s broadness and inability to be pinned down had a specific purpose as it allowed the world to be separated into only two categories – Christians and non-Christians – with the Jews occupying a special position. It provided an explanation why the eschaton, the Kingdom of God, had not yet arrived. As long as there were opponents of the Christian faith, universal salvation could not occur. This had important consequences for the pagans. If they converted willingly, the power of evil would be overcome, and a next step towards the eschaton would be taken. However, if they were unwilling to convert, they exposed themselves as servants of the devil, fighting cruelly and obdurately against Christ and his 9. See JEROME, De viris illustribus, in A. CERESA-GASTALDO (ed.), Gli uomini illustri (Bibliotheca Patristica, 12), Florence, Nardini Editore, 1988. 10. See for this J. SHEENAN, Paganism, in A. GRAFTON – G.W. MOST – S. SETTIS, The Classical Tradition, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2010, 675-679, here p. 675: “The word pagan was simply not a religious term in antiquity”. 11. See, for instance, P. OROSIUS, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. K. ZANGEMEISTER (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, 5), Wien, apud C. Geroldi filium, 1892. 12. See, for example, the statements of F. MATERNUS, De errore profanarum religionum, ed. C.A. FORBES (Ancient Christian Writers, 37), New York, Newman, 1970. 13. See also H.-W. GOETZ, Einleitung, in AURAST – GOETZ (eds.), Die Wahrnehmung anderer Religionen im frühen Mittelalter (n. 3), 12-13.

4

D.A.T. MÜLLER

followers. Whereas the pluralism of religious beliefs with regard to divine transcendence had once been the only suitable attitude for Romans (and Greeks), now the claim to exclusivity by the Christian religion became an insuperable hindrance in the “old” religion’s fight for survival. Two fundamentally different concepts of religion collided here. III. THE MIDDLE AGES In AD 380, under Emperor Theodosius, Christianity (in its Catholic form) became the only officially tolerated religion. Due to this imperial support, it had become unwise by the end of the fourth century to continue to follow the “old” Roman religion14. In the mid-fifth century, Emperor Theodosius II even declared confidently that there were no pagans remaining in the entire empire15. However, it seems that two developments during the subsequent centuries in Europe gave cause to revive the old concept of pagani – once created to combat the Roman rivals. One development was the expansion that pushed the former Roman borders further to the north; the other was the encounter with Islam on European soil, which took place in Al-Andalus. There was an increasing necessity to integrate the contact with the Germanic and Slavic people that were living beyond the former Roman borders, into the Christian world view16. The category “pagan” was useful for this. The pagani were portrayed as animalistic and demonic in the actual conflict, and their conquest was integrated into the concept of the just war so that it could be understood as a holy deed to fight against them. Thus, archbishop Agobard of Lyon describes in detail some of the “superstitions” observed at the beginning of the ninth century and wonders to what extent these practices are criminal. He also mentions a cult of the goddess Diana in which a few “insane” women who have been seduced by the devil’s lies believe that they can fly through the air. Agobard does not view this as proof of witchcraft, but rather as proof of the stupidity of 14. Thanks to the studies of Johannes Hahn, however, we know that the practices in daily life were not necessarily as harsh as the juridical texts suggest, see J. HAHN, Gewalt und religiöser Konflikt: Studien zu den Auseinandersetzungen zwischen Christen, Heiden und Juden im Osten des Römischen Reiches in der Spätantike (Klio-Beihefte, 8), Berlin, Akademie Verlag, 2004. 15. See J.J. O’DONNELL, The Demise of Paganism, in Traditio 35 (1979) 45-88, here p. 86. Also A. CAMERON, The Last Pagans of Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011. 16. On the early Christian mission, see the standard work by L. VON PADBERG, Die Christianisierung Europas im Mittelalter, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2006.

PAGANS: AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CONCEPT IN THE MIDDLE AGES

5

the cult followers. This superstition arises from hyperarousal that is caused by demonic tricks17. In the hagiography of Saint Boniface written by Willibald of Mainz, Boniface is portrayed as a champion against augury, incantations and oracles – all practices that once were legitimate rituals within the Roman religion18. The followers of these customs were not always explicitly pagans or unbaptised. Instead, the fight against paganism in the Carolingian epoch was primarily a battle against the popular “superstitious” customs19. The image of the pagans as it appears in chronicles, especially those by the missionaries, must be viewed as an intensification of the ancient pattern. “Pagan” became a strangely ambivalent term, because conceptions that had previously been applied by the Church Fathers to aspects of Hellenism were now transferred from their writings to the Germanic environment. The Germanic religion was observed through the old perspective of the Interpretatio Romana and, as such, was misrepresented and even criminalized from the very beginning. The descriptions of cannibalism and human sacrifice could be interpreted as a revival of the old concepts found in the Classical writings. We know that a work, such as that of Paulus Orosius, was well-known and was used by medieval authors such as Bede (Beda Venerabilis) and Isidore of Seville. Isidore’s etymology in particular had significant influence on Boniface. It was Isidore of Seville who provided the explanation of the word “pagan”, by showing that the term could be literally traced back to the pagus outside of Athens20. Anyone who wanted to take action against the pagans – and heretics – found an invaluable treasure trove of information in Isidore’s writings. Romans used the concept of the Interpretatio Romana to subject the specific worldviews and, even 17. See the edition, with translation of the Canon Episcopi by W. HARTMANN (ed.), Das Sendhandbuch des Regino von Prüm. Unter Benutzung der Edition von F.W.H. WASSERSCHLEBEN herausgegeben und übersetzt (Ausgewählte Quellen zur deutschen Geschichte des Mittelalters, 42), Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2004; the text passage on pp. 420-423. For more details about the witches’ flight, see W. TSCHACHER, Der Flug durch die Luft zwischen Illusionstheorie und Realitätsbeweis: Studien zum sog. Kanon Episcopi und zum Hexenflug, in Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte: Kanonistische Abteilung 85 (1999) 225-276. 18. WILLIBALD VON MAINZ, Vitae Sancti Bonifatii archiepiscopi Moguntini, ed. W. LEVISON (Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum, 57), Leipzig, Hahn, 1905. About Boniface see L. VON PADBERG, Bonifatius, Missionar und Reformer, München, Beck, 2003. 19. Cf. S. PATZOLD, Wahrnehmung und Wissen: Christen und “Heiden” an den Grenzen des Frankenreiches im 8. und 9. Jahrhundert, in H. BLEUMER – S. PATZOLD, Das Mittelalter: Perspektiven mediävistischer Forschung (Wahrnehmungs- und Deutungsmuster im europäischen Mittelalter, 8), Berlin, Akademie Verlag, 2003, 83-106. 20. ISIDORE, Etymologies 8.2,3-5, in J. OROZ-RETA – M.A. MARCOS CASQUERO (eds.), San Isidoro de Sevilla, Etimologías (Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 433), Madrid, Editorial católica SA, 1982, pp. 708-710.

6

D.A.T. MÜLLER

more importantly, the religious worlds of the nations they had conquered. Through the Interpretatio Romana, the Germanic gods, which were demons to the Christians, were now “transcribed” – inserted into the old system of the Roman religion: Odin appears as Jupiter, Freja as Venus. The Interpretatio Romana (or Graeca) was not merely an analogy, but also the revelation of the true roots of Germanic paganism21. This way, paganism found among the Germanic people could be interpreted as a continuation of paganism found in the (ancient) Hellenistic worldview. Literary and iconographical topoi had their impact on perception – especially the perception of that which was unknown or strange. The foreign was made familiar, until it no longer seemed foreign. As Steffen Patzold demonstrates, there was also no room for pagans to have individual characteristics22. In the eyes of the Christian authors, the characteristic traits apply to the entire “gens”. Thus, the Frisians were a gens fera et idololatriis nimium dedita and the Saxons were characterized by exardescente ira. The “essence” of the pagans was the same everywhere, even if they were spread across various tribes and regions. They were more animalistic than human, wild, cruel, tending to bursts of anger, attached to idolatry and had the habit of casting lots to tell the future. Their bursts of rage revealed their true nature – they were “possessed” and indeed possessed by demons. More gentilium, pagan style appears repeatedly as a description for cruel, scornful acts against Christians. At the beginning of the ninth century, we read the first reports about the Slavic peoples. In his Vita Sturmi, Eigil, monk and later abbot of Fulda, describes the life of Saint Sturm, a pupil of Boniface23. Eigil perceived the Slavic people as wild animals; Saint Sturm’s horse trembles in fear of their naked bodies, their odour is horrible. From here, it is only a short leap to Bishop Bruno of Querfurt calling the pagan Wends “pagan dogs” and “subhuman beings”24. The descriptions of the Hungarians, whom Emperor Otto I conquered in the Battle of Lechfeld in 955, also take the same tone. And again, the same patterns are used during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries when the Slavic regions were conquered, and also during the Prussian mission in the thirteenth century. 21. See J. PALMER, Defining Paganism in the Carolingian World, in Early Medieval Europe 15 (2007) 402-425. 22. PATZOLD, Wahrnehmung und Wissen (n. 19). 23. Vita Sturmi, in Patrologica Latina, vol. 105, col. 423-444; German edition P. ENGELBERT, Eigil: Das Leben des Abtes Sturmi, in Fuldaer Geschichtsblätter 56 (1980) 17-49 (parallel with the Latin text). 24. See H.-D. KAHL, Compellere Intrare: Die Wendenpolitik Bruns von Querfurt im Lichte hochmittelalterlichen Missions- und Völkerrechts, in H. BEUMANN (ed.), Heidenmission und Kreuzzugsgedanke in der deutschen Ostpolitik des Mittelalters (Wege der Forschung, 7), Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1963, 177-274.

PAGANS: AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CONCEPT IN THE MIDDLE AGES

7

The descriptions in the missionary vitae reveal that the term “pagani” was universal: always and everywhere. Certain elements of the ancient image of the pagan were reactivated and intensified. The pagans’ ignorance and inability to be educated turned into primitivism and obduracy; their excessive emotionality, expressed particularly through anger and rage, attested to their animalistic nature; their imprisonment in the worldly could be seen in their habit of casting lots and in their creation of idolatrous images. Deceitfulness became shiftiness, unreasonableness turned into cruelty against those who proclaim the truth, and the multiplicity of their gods exposed the fragmentation of their truth. On the other hand, however, respect for the achievements of one such as Virgil remains undiminished, as the perception of him resonates with a certain tolerance of the pagan, in as far as it is interpreted as an indirectly proclaimed Christianity. And from this standpoint, initial steps are taken in the Middle Ages towards more tolerant contact. We must note that the change in the relationship between the Christians and the pagans was accompanied by an intensification in the relationship with the “heretics”, which can be demonstrated using examples from the sources. It was the contact with Islam on European soil that truly set off a new course in the perception of the pagans. Perhaps surprisingly, Muslims were initially considered to be either heretics or pagans, but not adherents of a different religion25. During the Middle Ages, the heyday of Scholasticism increasingly fell back on the gentiles, and the philosophical movements became known through, and were implemented by, both the Muslims and the Jews. This led to the development of a philosophical and argumentative discussion between Christians, on the one hand, and Muslims and Jews, on the other. Part of the group of outstanding theologians that participated in this exchange was Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274). Around 1260, Aquinas, the great taxonomist of Christian doctrine, wrote his Summa contra Gentiles, which was directed primarily to a Muslim (and to a certain extent also a Jewish) audience. He differentiates between three types of infidelitas – infidelitas gentilium seu paganorum, that of the Jews, and that of the heretics26. 25. On this, see C. VALENZUELA, “Ritu Mamentiano”: Auf der Suche nach den christlichen Wahrnehmungen vom Islam in der frühmittelalterlichen Historiographie Nordspaniens, in AURAST – GOETZ (eds.), Die Wahrnehmung anderer Religionen im frühen Mittelalter (n. 3), 121-169. 26. After Salvian’s fifth-century comment that the Ostrogoths were worse off as heretics than when they were still pagans (SALVIAN, De gubernatione Dei VIII, ed. F. PAULY [Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, 8], Wien, apud C. Geroldi filium, 1883, p. 102). By the eleventh century, the “haeretici” had emerged as the most dangerous group of all non-believers.

8

D.A.T. MÜLLER

He wanted to demonstrate the truth of the Christian faith through philosophical arguments and found common ground with Arabic culture when it comes to Aristotelian logic. Thus, we can see that even though Thomas was still addressing the gentiles, his philosophically educated opponents could in no way be compared to the brutal Germanic pagani that we find, for instance, in Eigil’s work. However, this growing appreciation of the Classical philosophical movements was certainly not unanimous. In the perception of self-proclaimed defenders of the faith, the University of Paris had developed into a stronghold of pagan academics because of their study of Aristotelian logic (influenced by Thomas Aquinas’ writings). Therefore, many clerics of the faculty of arts were accused of participating in a “new” paganism, and this eventually led to them being convicted as haeretici by Bishop Stephen Tempier in 127727. We can see the paradoxical nature of this situation: while those spreading Christianity, missionaries such as Boniface and his contemporaries, resuscitated the term “pagani”, the theoreticians of doctrine turned to the ancient philosophical system of Aristotle and for this they were reviled as pagans and convicted as heretics28. Eventually, however, the interest in the philosophy and culture of Antiquity led to an emerging appreciation of pagans and pagan culture, and by extension (as they were still regarded as such) of Muslims. As a result, Muslims and Islam were increasingly viewed with a flexible ambivalence, instead of through a black-and-white paradigm, which ultimately allowed Islam to become acknowledged as an independent religion. During this process of changing perceptions of the heathen, that is, the unbelievers, canon law also played an important role. In the Middle Ages in particular, this had become one of the most important pillars of the Pope’s general claim to superiority as the supreme leader of Christianity. Especially when the relation with non-Christians was an issue, egalitarian discourses can be discovered in church law. Paradigmatic here, for example, was the position of Pope Innocent IV that even unbelievers would have a right to use violence. Is it allowed to conquer countries that are ruled by unbelievers? Even though a long tradition of exegetical finesse 27. See H. THIJSSEN, Condemnation of 1277, in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford, CA, Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, First published Thu Jan 30, 2003; substantive revision Tue Nov 13, 2018, see https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ condemnation/ (accessed January 10, 2020). 28. See R.E. RUBENSTEIN, Aristotle’s Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Middle Ages, New York, Harcourt, 2004.

PAGANS: AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CONCEPT IN THE MIDDLE AGES

9

had established that infidels were inferior, that submission was legitimate, if not “rational”, Pope Innocent IV made it clear that unbelievers could also legitimately hold property and jurisdiction. His argument was that not only the faithful, but all “rational” people would be entitled to it. Paradoxically enough for our modern thinking, Pope Innocent IV advanced the idea of equality of all human beings, especially by describing the papal power as universal in the sense that the unbelievers are also subject to the Pope. Therefore, just by extending his position, he recognized the equality of all men: they are all sheep under the care of the guardian. The only difference between people was whether or not they are baptized. However, potential believers could become Christians if they were to convert voluntarily. The fact that this conversion should not take place by force, not by conquering the countries violently, was confirmed by all the great canonists of this epoch, for example Hostiensis29. As the canonists of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries were almost obsessively occupied with thinking about free will, a certain amount of freedom was created when it comes to the relation between Christians and non-Christians, who also had to be “tolerated”. This was particularly important considering trade relations. The background was the concept of reason within natural law. Reason was given to man by God and thus was a tool to reach the truth and faith30. However, at the same time, the bias of such a concept was also clear. If the intellect, given to all humans, was regarded as the characteristic sign of the truth and true faith – which could of course only be the Christian one – it became dangerous for these people who permanently denied this divine truth. By doing this, they showed exactly that they did not follow the natural, reasonable law, and thus, their characteristic human quality, reason, was conceived as defective, in the sense of inferior. For this purpose, the Aristotelian doctrine of the “slave of nature”31 was restored in order to be able to maintain a nature-given inequality of human beings. This serves as an example of the fact that 29. R. HELMHOLZ, Human Rights in the Canon Law, in J. WITTE, JR. – F.S. ALEXANDER (eds.), Christianity and Human Rights: An Introduction, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2010, 99-113. 30. S. KUTTNER, Natural Law and Canon Law, in University of Notre Dame Natural Law Institute Proceedings 3 (1950) 85-116. More recently: B. TIERNEY, The Idea of Natural Rights: Studies on Natural Rights, Natural Law, and Church Law 1150-1625, Atlanta, GA, Emory University Studies in Law and Religion, 1997. 31. “Wer von Natur nicht sein, sondern eines anderen, aber ein Mensch ist, der ist ein Sklave von Natur”. E. SCHÜTRUMPF, Aristoteles, Politik I, Berlin, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1991; see also O. GIGON, Die Sklaverei bei Aristoteles, in R. STARK et al. (eds.), La “Politique” d’Aristote (Entretiens sur l’Antiquite Classique, 11), Genève, Fondation Hardt, 1965, 245-283.

10

D.A.T. MÜLLER

sometimes even the recourse to the “latest” scientific findings – here of Aristotelianism – may not necessarily lead to a more humane development, but, on the contrary, to a relapse into old thought patterns, namely if the new science better legitimises the economic power relations than traditional thinking anchored in Paul. Exactly this turn took the canonistic discussion in the fourteenth century. Oldratus of Ponte, for example, dealt in his consilium 72 with the question if war against the Saracens was allowed32. His answer was that Muslims who did not acknowledge the Christian truth by their refusal to convert, showed that they were no longer humans, but wild animals. A moral question, best known from the debates about heretics in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, now became an ontological one. By defining human nature by reason and identifying that reason with the Christian faith, Oldratus resorts to the early medieval concepts already mentioned, which allowed to exclude some of the human persons from the general idea of humanity33. The well-known early medieval pattern – as it was described in missionary vitae – was thus recycled and enriched with the then modern facet of the use of reason. The question of the use of reason was therefore exacerbated and also served to justify war, conquest, oppression of non-Christians (such as the Jews) and finally enslavement. Beside theology and canon law, literature also played an important role for “changing perspectives” about pagans in the Middle Ages. One of the most outstanding examples is Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival34. In Parzival, we find a pagan to be a main character, although according to new linguistic characteristics, he is a Muslim: Feirefiz, Parzival’s halfbrother. In the description of the adventure by Gahmuret, who is Parzival’s father, “pagans” always denote “Muslims”. As Beate Kellner35 states, Wolfram’s portrayal of pagans is more than ambivalent. The Christian and 32. See N.P. ZACOUR, Jews and Saracens in the Consilia of Oldradus de Ponte (Studies and Texts, 100), Turnhout, Brepols, 1990, consilium 72. For more details about the canonist’s positions see J. MULDOON, Popes, Lawyers and Infidels: The Church and the Non-Christian World, 1250-1550, Philadelphia, PA, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1979. 33. J.C. LOPEZ, Beyond Eurocentrism and Orientalism: Revisiting the Othering of Jews and Muslims through Medieval Canon Law, in Review of International Studies 42 (2015) 420-470. 34. WOLFRAM VON ESCHENBACH, Parzival. Mittelhochdeutsch und Neuhochdeutsch, nach der Ausgabe von K. LACHMANN, übersetzt von W. SPIEWOK, 2 vols. (Reclams Universalbibliothek, 3681-3682), Stuttgart, Reclam, 1981. 35. B. KELLNER, Wahrnehmung und Deutung des Heidnischen in Wolframs von Eschenbach “Parzival”, in L. GRENZMANN – T. HAYE – N. HENKEL – T. KAUFMAN (eds.), Wechselseitige Wahrnehmung der Religionen im Spätmittelalter und in der Frühen Neuzeit (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen Neue Folge, 4), Berlin, De

PAGANS: AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CONCEPT IN THE MIDDLE AGES

11

the pagan intermingle while retaining their dichotomy. However, Feirefiz could definitely be the forerunner of the model of the “noble” pagan as it develops during the nineteenth century. Of course, the view that the Christian faith brought paganism to its full development remains, although we also see in paganism elements of the truth that then permitted the “pagans” moral attitude. Thus, it becomes possible to use paganism as a positive contrast to the lapses of the Christian knights. In the Christian context, using the label “pagan” ultimately has an eschatological component, probably beginning in Late Antiquity. Early on we see a parallel with the heretics. The odium of paganism is non-belief, which can be expressed in various ways. However, there were also “voices in the wilderness”, like Adam of Bremen, who criticised this dehumanising treatment early on. Because the philosophical movements became known and were implemented both through and by the Muslims and the Jews, this contact resulted in an initial appreciation of the specific attitude of paganism. After the subjugation of the originally “pagan” Europe, this came to be represented in the guise of the Muslims. In Late Antiquity, it was the contrast between ethnic particularism, on the one hand, and universality and exclusivity, on the other, that was decisive in the construction of the concept of the “pagani”. As long as the pagans refused to convert to the Christian religion, it was impossible for the eschaton to arrive. Therefore, paganism had to be overcome in order to achieve universal salvation. The early Christians derived from this perception their missionary entitlement, which would eventually receive imperial support. In the Middle Ages, the ancient concept of the pagans was once more resurrected and revitalised in the new contact with, and subsequent conquest of, the Germanic tribes. On the other hand, a growing interest in Classical philosophy and the development of more extensive contact with the Muslim world brought about an increasing appreciation of pagan culture in general, which eventually led to the recognition of Islam as a religion in its own right. All in all, the term “pagan” confronts us with a dazzling complexity and, at the same time, a lack of definition that is equalled by few other categories. This has enabled it to be implemented flexibly throughout the entire history of Christianity. Gruyter, 2009, 23-49: https://rep.adw-goe.de/bitstream/handle/11858/00-001S-0000-00239B9E-A/03_9783110213539_Wahrnehmung.Deutung.pdf?sequence=1

12

D.A.T. MÜLLER

IV. CONCLUSION: STUDYING PAGANISM In the past twenty years, there has been a clear shift in interest in the study of pagan religions. For a long time, the Christian perspective was the starting point and, in accordance with the study of Greco-Roman religion, mainly based in the field of Patrology. However, from the 1980s onward, there has been an increase in genuine interest in “pagan” religion, which examines the Christian polemics and retrospective judgements as characteristics and features of the Hellenistic religion. Jörg Rüpke has taken this paradigm shift into account in his impressive compilation A Companion to Roman Religion36. In addition, illuminating findings have been brought to light in the work of Peter Brown37, who has drawn convincing conclusions regarding the question of the downfall of the “old” religion by contrasting it with the “new” Christian religion. Despite the social-scientific focus of recent years, the standard philological analysis of texts should not be neglected when it comes to researching the Classical Period. Researchers, such as Fiedrowicz38, show that solid text analysis can give decisive answers when the tools of interpretation are mastered. In the field of Medieval Studies, interest in the “pagan” has for a long time been solely interwoven with the mission history of Europe. Therefore, there is a certain focus on studying the period between 500 and 950, as pointed out by James J. O’Donnell39 and Lutz von Padberg40. In later centuries, the interest in “heretics” outweighs the research, and more and more scholars have come to realise that they are intertwined. Postbus 9103 NL-6500 HD Nijmegen The Netherlands [email protected]

Daniela MÜLLER

36. RÜPKE (ed.), Roman Religion (n. 5). 37. P. BROWN – R. LIZZI TESTA (eds.), Pagans and Christians in the Roman Empire: The Breaking of a Dialogue (IVth-VIth Century A.D.). Proceedings of the International Conference at the Monastery of Bose (October 2008) (Christianity and History. Series of the John XXIII Foundation for Religious Studies in Bologna, 9), Münster, LIT Verlag, 2011. 38. FIEDROWICZ, Christen und Heiden (n. 6). 39. O’DONNELL, The Demise of Paganism (n. 15). 40. VON PADBERG, Die Christianisierung Europas im Mittelalter (n. 16).

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN JURISTISCHE ASPEKTE IM OCTAVIUS DES MINUCIUS FELIX

I. PRÄLIMINARIEN Das Christentum ist mit der Sphäre des Rechts von allem Anfang an verbunden. Johannes der Täufer kommt durch Rechtsbruch um, der Prozess gegen Jesus vor dem Hohen Rat und dem römischen Statthalter hat eine komplexe juristische Seite, Paulus appelliert als römischer Bürger an den Kaiser. Die Verkündigung der religiösen Botschaft des Christentums führt offenbar von Anfang an nicht nur zum Streit um die Wahrheit und entbindet religiöse Emotionen, sondern juristische Fragen sind für das Verhältnis zwischen Christen und Nicht-Christen auf vielfältige Weise virulent. Besonders deutlich zeigt sich dies in der rechtlichen Position der Christen gegenüber dem jeweils herrschenden Staat. Auch jenseits der Extreme, wie den Christenprozessen im Zuge der großen Verfolgungen des späteren 3. Jahrhunderts oder der überbordenden modernen Verrechtlichung durch Staatskirchenverträge, Kirchensteuerrecht, gesetzliche Regelung des Beichtgeheimnisses usw. gibt und gab es überall und zu allen Zeiten ein rechtliches Verhältnis zwischen dem Christentum und dem, was außerhalb des Christentums steht1. Doch sind auch innerhalb des Christentums rechtliche Fragen relevant, namentlich in dem eher äußeren Bereich der Organisation der Kirche und dem eher inneren der Auffassung vom Wesen des Christentums. In der Zeit der Alten Kirche bilden sich allmählich feste Ämter mit festen Befugnissen mit der natürlichen Tendenz zu Regelung und Normierung heraus. Das Mittelalter bildet dann ein Kirchenrecht im Vollsinn aus, das es, in sehr verschiedener Form, bis heute in allen großen christlichen Gemeinschaften gibt, von der rechtsförmigen Regelung der Papstwahl bis zur Geschäftsordnung lokaler Gemeindeversammlungen. Die Kirche ist in sich – auch – rechtsförmig verfasst2. 1. Vgl. einführend mit Literatur F. LOOS et al., Art. Recht, in Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart4, Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2004, 84-98, A. VON CAMPENHAUSEN, Christentum und Recht, in P. ANTES (Hg.), Christentum und europäische Kultur: Eine Geschichte und ihre Gegenwart, Freiburg i.Br. – Basel – Wien, Herder, 2002, 96-115 und A.M. RITTER (Hg.), „Kirche und Staat“ im Denken des frühen Christentums (Traditio Christiana, 13), Bern, Lang, 2005. 2. Vgl. G. SCHÖLLGEN et al., Art. Kirchenrecht, in Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart4, Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2001, 1268-1291 und S. KOCH, Rechtliche Regelung von

14

C. SCHUBERT

Das Christentum selbst in seinem Wesen als Gesetz, also als etwas Rechtliches aufzufassen, dürfte gegenwärtig eher außer Mode sein. Ganz selbstverständlich ist das allerdings nicht. Tertullian kann in der Auseinandersetzung mit den Markioniten das Christentum als im Kern gesetzliche Religion beschreiben, die auf eine allumfassende lex Dei ausgerichtet ist, die sich in der Thora, aber auch in allen anderen Geboten und Verboten Gottes innerhalb des Alten und Neuen Testaments historisch aktualisiert, als solche aber von Anfang an feststeht und durch Christus nicht aufgehoben, sondern als höchstem und letztem Gesetzgeber im vollen Umfang bestätigt und verdeutlicht wird3. Tertullian ist kein Einzelfall4. Im Laufe der Geschichte des Christentums ist die juristische Sehweise, das Christentum als wesentlich rechtliches Normensystem zu begreifen, immer wieder vertreten und gelebt worden. Verwunderlich ist das nicht, wohnt doch jeder Dogmatik die Tendenz zur Verrechtlichung inne. Ein weiteres Feld, auf dem Juristisches für Christen relevant wird, eröffnet sich jenseits des juristischen Außenverhältnisses des Christentums zu seiner Umwelt und seiner inneren Struktur und Selbstdefinition dann, wenn Christen im Alltag mit dem weltlichen Recht in Berührung kommen, und ganz besonders dann, wenn sie dies als Richter, Anwälte oder Geschworene professionell und regelmäßig tun und die rechtliche Aktivität mit ihren religiösen Überzeugungen in Einklang bringen müssen. Wie verträgt sich christliche Nächstenliebe mit dem Rechtsprinzip, ohne Ansehen der Person zu urteilen, wie kann man fragwürdige Verordnungen als christlicher Richter guten Gewissens durchsetzen, welche juristischen Winkelzüge und Tricks sind einem christlichen Verteidiger erlaubt? Die folgenden Seiten wollen eine kleine Sondierung vornehmen, wie die skizzierten Bereiche des Juristischen bei einem lateinischen Autor der Alten Kirche aufgegriffen werden und welche Rolle sie in der Auseinandersetzung mit dem Heidentum spielen5. Konflikten im frühen Christentum (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament, II/174), Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2004. 3. Vgl. v.a. Tertullians Schriften Adversus Marcionem und Adversus Iudaeos, dazu Tertullian. Adversus Iudaeos, hg. R. HAUSES (Fontes Christianae, 75), Turnhout, Brepols, 2007, S. 119-143 („Die Konzeption von Gesetz und Geschichte“). Vgl. außerdem die klassischen Studien von P. VITTON, I concetti giuridici nelle opere di Tertulliano, Roma, L’Erma di Bretscheider, 1924 und A. BECK, Römisches Recht bei Tertullian und Cyprian: Eine Studie zur frühen Kirchenrechtsgeschichte (Schriften der Königsberger Gelehrten Gesellschaft. Geisteswissenschaftliche Klasse, 7/2), Halle a.d. Saale, Niemeyer, 1930, nachgedruckt Aalen, 1967. 4. Vgl. z.B. für Cyprian A. HOFFMANN, Die Kirche – einig, heilsnotwendig, auf göttliches Gesetz gegründet: Grundlagen des Kirchenverständnisses bei Cyprian von Karthago, in J. ARNOLD – R. BERNDT – R.F. STAMMBERGER (Hgg.), Väter der Kirche: Ekklesiales Denken von den Anfängen bis in die Neuzeit. Festgabe für Hermann Josef Sieben SJ zum 70. Geburtstag, Paderborn – München – Wien – Zürich, Schöningh, 2004, 365-388. 5. Darüber, dass im Deutschen die Begriffe „Heide“, „heidnisch“ und „Heidentum“ hochgradig problematisch sind, da sie anachronistische und tendenziöse Wertungen

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

15

Dazu soll in einem ersten Schritt begründet werden, warum und inwiefern der Octavius des Minucius Felix in dieser Beziehung ein besonders geeignetes Studienobjekt sein dürfte. In einem zweiten Schritt soll den skizzierten Bereichen des Rechtlichen innerhalb des Textes nachgegangen und in einem dritten und letzten Schritt versucht werden, die Relevanz der juristischen Aspekte für die Auseinandersetzung mit dem Heidentum zu beurteilen. II. DER OCTAVIUS DES MINUCIUS FELIX Minucius Felix hat in der ersten Hälfte des 3. Jahrhunderts, vielleicht in den frühen 220er Jahren, jedenfalls zwischen Tertullian und Cyprian, eine kleine Schrift mit dem Titel Octavius abgeschlossen, mit der er das Christentum gegenüber heidnischen Vorwürfen verteidigt und für es wirbt. Der Octavius ist ebenso apologetisch wie protreptisch ausgerichtet und stellt sich damit in eine bereits längere Tradition der christlichen Apologetik, die auf griechischer Seite schon im 2. Jahrhundert beginnt und von Tertullian mit seinem Apologeticum erstmals in den lateinischen Bereich transferiert wird. Der „Sitz im Leben“ der Schrift ist notorisch schwer zu bestimmen – man wird ein gestuftes Publikum von Heiden, die dem Christentum gegenüber bereits aufgeschlossen waren, bis hin zur eigenen Gemeinde annehmen dürfen –, auch weil für Minucius selbst nur die spärlichen Daten, die er en passant nennt, zur Verfügung stehen und aus denen nicht viel mehr als die enge Verbindung zu Nordafrika und eine rechtsanwaltliche Tätigkeit in Rom hervorgehen6. Inhaltlich bietet der Octavius aufs Ganze gesehen Konventionelles. Er thematisiert in etwa dieselben Gräuelvorwürfe gegen das Christentum wie die anderen Apologien, er setzt sich mit dem Vorwurf des Atheismus, transportieren, aber auch „pagan“ und „Paganismus“ keinen idealen Ersatz bieten, die ebenfalls per se eine innerchristliche Perspektivierung eintragen, herrscht mittlerweile wohl Konsens. Alle alternativen Begriffe wie „die Anderen“ sind inhaltlich nicht positiv gefüllt und daher notgedrungen unterdeterminiert. „Heiden“ etc. wird im Folgenden daher faute de mieux und gewissermaßen in Anführungszeichen im Bewusstsein seiner Problematik als Sammelbegriff für die Gruppe von Menschen verwendet, denen von den zeitgenössischen Christen ein gegenüber einem als typisch christlich konstruierten Verhalten bzw. Denken abweichendes Verhalten und Denken zugeschrieben wurde. Im Fall von Minucius Felix ist dies im Übrigen besonders problematisch, da er es gerade vermeidet, eine einheitliche Gruppenidentität der Nicht-Christen zu konstruieren, und daher auf die begriffliche Erfassung der Anderen weitgehend verzichtet, vgl. L. AHMED, Bilder von den Anderen: Christliches Sprechen über Heiden bei den lateinischen Apologeten (Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum. Ergänzungsband Kleine Reihe, 14), Münster, Aschendorff, 2017, hier S. 5596; ibid. S. 2-3 zur Begriffsproblematik. 6. Zur Biographie s. C. SCHUBERT, Art. Minucius Felix, in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 24, Stuttgart, Hiersemann, 2011, 804-827, hier Sp. 804-806.

16

C. SCHUBERT

der Tempel- und Kultlosigkeit, der Neuheit der Lehre auseinander, er schildert die ethische Reinheit der christlichen Gemeinden und sichert die christliche Lehre philosophisch ab. Kurz: Er teilt die prinzipiell offene Haltung der griechischen Apologeten und Tertullians in der Nachfolge der Areopag-Rede des Paulus und ist bereit, sein Christentum argumentativ gegenüber der nicht-christlichen Umwelt zu verteidigen, zu erklären und dafür zu werben7. Neu ist bei Minucius Felix allerdings die literarische Form, in der dies geschieht. Während in der ersten Phase der griechischen Apologetik die Form der Petition an den Kaiser, der libellus, überwiegt, so bei Aristides, Justin und Athenagoras, also eine eindeutig juristische Gattung, und während noch die zweite Phase der griechischen Apologetik, Tertullian eingeschlossen, dies insofern fortsetzt, als monologische und – zumindest fiktiv – juristische Gattungen verwendet werden – so die fiktive Rede bei Tatian oder Tertullian –, ist Minucius Felix der erste, der den philosophischen Dialog als Trägergattung seiner Apologetik einsetzt und damit erstmals eine dezidiert nicht-juristische Gattung8. Er tut dies in einer Zeit, in der die Wirtschaft noch prosperiert und die ökonomische und politische Krise des 3. Jahrhunderts noch kaum begonnen hat, in der Handel und Wandel noch funktionieren9. Es ist dies eine Zeit, in der die christlichen Gemeinden wohl kontinuierlich wachsen und das Christentum allmählich in allen Schichten einen wesentlichen Prozentsatz an Anhängern findet10. Den Gemeinden in Nordafrika, woher Minucius 7. Vgl. einführend E. HECK, Art. M. Minucius Felix (§ 475), in K. SALLMANN (Hg.), Handbuch der lateinischen Literatur der Antike 4, München, Beck, 1997, 512-519 und C. SCHUBERT (Hg.), Minucius Felix, Octavius (Kommentar zu frühchristlichen Apologeten, 12), Freiburg i.Br. – Basel – Wien, Herder, 2014, hier S. 1-87. 8. Zur Gattungsfrage vgl. je mit Berücksichtigung von Minucius B.R. VOSS, Der Dialog in der frühchristlichen Literatur (Studia et Testimonia Antiqua, 9), München, Fink, 1970; P.L. SCHMIDT, Zur Typologie und Literarisierung des frühchristlichen lateinischen Dialogs, in M. FUHRMANN (Hg.), Christianisme et formes littéraires de l’antiquité tardive en occident (Entretiens sur l’Antiquité Classique, 23), Genève, Fondation Hardt, 1977, 101-190; K. HEYDEN, Christliche Transformation des antiken Dialogs bei Justin und Minucius Felix, in Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum 13 (2009) 204-232 und A. CAMERON, Dialog und Debatte in der Spätantike (Spielräume der Antike, 3), Stuttgart, Steiner, 2014. 9. Vgl. nur H. BELLEN, Die Kaiserzeit von Augustus bis Diocletian, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, ²2010; H.J. DREXHAGE – H. KONEN – K. RUFFING, Die Wirtschaft des Römischen Reiches (1.-3. Jahrhundert), Berlin, Akademie Verlag, 2002; W. JONGMAN, Das römische Wirtschaftswunder und sein Zusammenbruch, in A. EICH – S. FREUND – M. RÜHL – C. SCHUBERT (Hgg.), Das dritte Jahrhundert: Kontinuitäten, Brüche, Übergänge (Palingenesia, 108), Stuttgart, Steiner, 2017, 35-56. 10. Auch wenn die absolute Größe der christlichen Gemeinden und die Chronologie ihres Wachstums bis zum 4. Jahrhundert umstritten bleiben, ist für das 3. Jahrhundert jedenfalls von einem dynamischen Prozess auszugehen; vgl. R. MACMULLEN, Christianizing the Roman Empire (A.D. 100-400), New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1984 und

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

17

Felix wohl stammte und wo er nach einem Berufsleben in Rom wohl schrieb11, standen die großen Verfolgungen unter Decius, Valerian oder Diokletian noch bevor; kleinere Pogrome und einzelne Christenprozesse, die im Martyrium endeten, hatte man aber schon miterlebt. Eine Zeit der kleineren Repressalien, der ständigen latenten Bedrohung, aber keine der staatlich organisierten Verfolgung. Keine ganz unbeschwerte, aber eine vergleichsweise ruhige Zeit, eine Zwischenzeit zwischen den kleinen unscheinbaren Anfängen der Mission und der blutigen Kampfphase bis zur Konstantinischen Wende12. Entsprechend liest man den Octavius üblicherweise nicht als kämpferischen Text, sondern als friedliche Werbung eines freundlichen Autors für ein Christentum, in dem er selbst Ruhe und Frieden gefunden hat, als eine Art intellektuelle Missionsschrift an die Gebildeten, das Christentum doch als philosophisch respektable Lebensform anzuerkennen, sich ihm womöglich anzuschließen und von törichten Vorurteilen abzulassen13. Eine solche Lektüre wird durch das urbane Verhalten der drei Dialogpartner, des Minucius selbst, seines Jugendfreundes Octavius und seines jungen Adlatus Caecilius, begünstigt, die alle engagiert diskutieren, aber auch selbstironisch von sich zurücktreten können14. Hinzu kommt das idyllische Setting des Anfangs, an dem von der tiefen Freundschaft des Minucius und des Octavius die Rede ist und an dem mit dem Strand von Ostia und seinem Wellengekräusel, mit Kinderspiel und Blick zum Horizont eine reizende Szenerie für das Gespräch entworfen wird15. Schließlich lädt auch die deutliche literarische Anlehnung an die philosophischen Dialoge Ciceros und ihre kultivierte Atmosphäre, in der fernab des Lärms des Forums und P. BROWN, The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, A.D. 200-1000, New York, J. Wiley, ³2013. 11. Vgl. zur Lokalisierung SCHUBERT (Hg.), Minucius Felix (Anm. 7), S. 12-14. 12. Vgl. im Überblick J. MOLTHAGEN, Der römische Staat und die Christen im zweiten und dritten Jahrhundert (Hypomnemata, 28), Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, ²1975 und jetzt H. SONNABEND, Triumph einer Untergrundsekte: Das frühe Christentum – von der Verfolgung zur Staatsreligion, Freiburg i.Br. – Basel – Wien, Herder, 2018. Die staatliche Perspektive betrachtet u.a. B. DORBATH, Die Logik der Christenverfolgungen durch den Römischen Staat, Diss. Würzburg, 2016, die christliche É. REBILLARD, Greek and Latin Narratives about the Ancient Martyrs (Oxford Early Christian Texts), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2017. 13. Vgl. z.B. HECK, Art. M. Minucius Felix (Anm. 7), S. 517-518. 14. Vgl. z.B. die durch einen Erzählerkommentar zusätzlich hervorgehobene Selbstironisierung des eigenen rhetorischen Pathos durch Caecilius und das folgende Geplänkel Oct. 14.1-2. 15. Oct. 2–4. Zur symbolischen Bedeutung der Rahmenhandlung s. T. UHLE, Der Strandspaziergang im Octavius des Minucius Felix als Begegnung mit dem Unverfügbaren: Eine allegorische Deutung von Min. Fel. 2,3/4,5, in Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 51 (2008) 44-54.

18

C. SCHUBERT

der Politik den letzten Fragen nachgegangen werden kann, ohne dass dies bei aller wechselseitigen Kritik einem der Gesprächspartner allzu weh täte, zu einer solchen Leseweise ein16. Allerdings – hierin unterscheidet sich der Dialog von Ciceros Schriften in einem ersten Punkt grundlegend – sind alle Gesprächspartner aktive Juristen. Minucius berichtet von sich selbst, zum Zeitpunkt des Gesprächs gerade Gerichtsferien gehabt zu haben (Oct. 2.3), war also professioneller Advokat (causidicus)17, obschon bereits Christ. Der junge Caecilius, der sich am Ende des Dialogs zum Christentum bekehrt, wird als sein ständiger Begleiter vorgestellt (Oct. 3.1), dürfte also Anwaltsgehilfe gewesen sein. Octavius, ein überzeugter Christ, blickt im Dialog auf eine juristische Tätigkeit zurück, die ihn als versierten Verteidiger mit Erfahrung in Christenprozessen zeigt (Oct. 28.1-5). Das Gespräch ist außerdem anders als bei Cicero nicht einfach als Wechselgespräch angelegt, sondern wird als Gerichtsverfahren inszeniert, in dem es mit dem Noch-Heiden Caecilius einen Ankläger gibt, der gegen das Christentum spricht, mit Octavius einen Verteidiger, der ein Plädoyer für das Christentum hält und zugleich das Heidentum attackiert, und mit Minucius einen Richter, der am Ende die Entscheidung fällen soll. Die Reden der beiden Kontrahenten folgen, um einen dritten Differenzpunkt zu nennen, keiner einfachen sachlichen Linie, sondern den rhetorischen Regeln für Gerichtsreden durch ihren Aufbau mit Proömien, comprobatio und refutatio und einer pathetischen peroratio und durch den Einsatz sämtlicher rhetorischer Überzeugungsmittel18. Obwohl die Gattungswahl des Dialogs den Blick also zunächst von der juristischen Grundsituation der vorausgehenden griechischen und römischen Apologien weglenkt, kehrt das Juristische innerhalb des Octavius umso massiver zurück. Als Jurist, der Christ geworden und Anwalt geblieben ist, der das Christentum gegen äußere Angriffe verteidigen will, der seinen religiösen Inhalt und das innere Leben der Gemeinde vorstellen will, ist Minucius als Autor und sind seine Dialogfiguren geradezu ideal dazu geeignet, zu allen Problemfeldern Stellung zu beziehen. Insofern dies noch nicht unter dem Eindruck der großen Verfolgungen geschieht, die zur Schwarz-Weiß-Malerei verleiten mussten, lässt sich von dem Text eine substanzielle und wertvolle Momentaufnahme erwarten. 16. Zum Ciceronianismus des Minucius s. E. HECK, Minucius Felix, der erste christliche Ciceronianer, in Hyperboreus 5 (1999) 306-325. 17. So auch HIERONYMUS, De viris illustribus 58, der diese Information freilich dem Octavius entnommen haben kann. 18. Zur rhetorischen Gestaltung der beiden Figurenreden vgl. J.F. O’CONNOR, The Conflict of Rhetoric in the Octavius of Minucius Felix, in Classical Folia 30 (1976) 165173 und SCHUBERT (Hg.), Minucius Felix (Anm. 7), S. 32.

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

19

III. JURISTISCHE ASPEKTE IM OCTAVIUS 1. Kirchliche Organisation Beginnen wir unsere Suche bei Aussagen über die innere Organisation der Kirche. Wir wissen nicht, ob Minucius ein kirchliches Amt innehatte; er selbst erwähnt davon nichts. Seine Schrift erzeugt im Gegenteil durchwegs den Eindruck, als bestehe die christliche Gemeinde aus lauter gleichberechtigten Brüdern und Schwestern, die einander alle mit dem Zeichen des Kusses begrüßen (Oct. 31.8), alle einträchtig und keusch das gemeinsame Mahl feiern (Oct. 31.1-5), sich gegenseitig unterstützen (Oct. 32.3), alle ihre Toten still ehren (Oct. 38.4), alle im Fall des Falles in gleicher Weise zum Martyrium bereit sind (Oct. 37.1-6). Von einer inneren Differenzierung der Gemeinde, von Ämtern oder einer Aufgabenverteilung ist nirgends die Rede. Selbst unter den Märtyrern werden nicht besondere Bischöfe oder Presbyter oder Jungfrauen hervorgehoben, sondern pauschal pueri et mulierculae nostrae, Frauen und Kinder, die so tapfer wie die Männer alle Foltern ertrügen (Oct. 37.5). Die einzige Stelle, an der von einem christlichen Priester überhaupt gesprochen wird, steht innerhalb der Rede des Heiden Caecilius. Dieser wirft den Christen vor, absurde bis obszöne Gegenstände zu verehren. So würden sie unter anderem auch die Genitalien des Priesters anbeten (Oct. 9.4): alii eos ferunt ipsius antistitis ac sacerdotis colere genitalia et quasi parentis sui adorare naturam: nescio an falsa, certe occultis ac nocturnis sacris adposita suspicio. Andere erzählen, sie verehren die Genitalien ihres eigenen Leiters und Priesters und beten so gleichsam die Zeugungskraft ihres Vaters an. Ob das eine falsche Verdächtigung ist, weiß ich nicht, sicher eine, die zu den geheimen nächtlichen Kultfeiern stimmt19.

Was hier geboten wird, ist nicht mehr als eine auf bloßes Hörensagen bezogene und offensichtlich gewollt falsche Außenperspektive auf christliche Funktionsträger. Die Formulierung, die Caecilius wählt, gibt dabei für eine präzisere Bestimmung nichts aus. Schon im paganen Usus ist antistes als Leiter und Vorsteher einer Kulthandlung oder eines religiösen Vereins 19. Der lateinische Text hier und im Folgenden nach der Ausgabe B. KYTZLER (Hg.), M. Minuci Felicis Octavius, Stuttgart – Leipzig, Teubner, ²1992; die Übersetzungen sind SCHUBERT (Hg.), Minucius Felix (Anm. 7) entnommen. Zur Motivik und den Einzelproblemen der zitierten Passagen vgl. außerdem die Kommentare bei J. BEAUJEU (Hg.), Minucius Felix Octavius (Collection des universités de France. Série latine), Paris, Les Belles Lettres, ²1974 und M. PELLEGRINO – P. SINISCALCO – M. RIZZI (Hgg.), Marci Minucii Felicis Octavius (Corona Patrum), Torino, Società Editrice Internazionale, 2000.

20

C. SCHUBERT

geläufig20, sacerdos die umfassende Bezeichnung für Priester aller Art21. Mit parens wird der Priester zu einem geistlichen Vater, auch dies gerade in den Mysterienreligionen nichts ganz Ungewöhnliches22. Die vom Heiden Caecilius vorgenommene Beschreibung des christlichen Priesters stimmt im Übrigen mit seinem sonstigen Priesterbild überein, das nicht am älteren Typus des römischen Priesters als eines Kultfunktionärs, sondern am neueren Typus eines initiierenden Seelenleiters und Kultvorstehers orientiert ist, wie er sich im Isis- oder Mithras-Kult findet (z.B. Oct. 7.6)23. Die Außenperspektive auf das Christentum stellt sich dieses also grosso modo wie eine neue Mysterienreligion vor. In seiner Replik auf den Vorwurf klärt der Christ Octavius das Missverständnis, das dahinter womöglich liegt, nicht auf, wie er dies auch in anderen Fällen nicht tut, sondern beschränkt sich darauf, den Vorwurf in retorsio an die Heiden und ihre angeblich libidinöse Genitalfixierung zurückzugeben (Oct. 28.10-11). Ein positives christliches Gegenbild besonders ehrwürdiger Lehrer, Bischöfe, Apostel oder sonstiger Funktionsträger wird nicht entworfen. Wo der Christ Octavius von Priestern spricht24, meint er pagane Priester, die von den Saliern und Arvalbrüdern über die Orakelpriester bis hin zu den Isispriestern immer wieder attackiert werden. Die innere Verfasstheit der Gemeinde wird völlig verschwiegen.

2. Christentum als Recht? Kommen wir zum nächsten Feld und fragen, was für Minucius das Christentum ausmacht. Jean Beaujeu hat treffend beobachtet, dass im Octavius vor allem der Anfang und das Ende des Glaubensbekenntnisses thematisiert werden und sich als Credo aus dem Text ergeben würde: „Ich glaube an Gott den Vater, den Allmächtigen, den Schöpfer des Himmels und der Erde, und die Gemeinschaft der Heiligen, die Auferstehung der Toten und das ewige Leben“25. Wie das Fehlen von substanziellen Aussagen zur Christologie zu beurteilen sei, ist seit langer Zeit umstritten. 20. Vgl. Thesaurus linguae Latinae II, 184-185 s.v. antistes. 21. Vgl. E. FORCELLINI, Totius Latinitatis Lexicon, V, Prati, 1871, S. 287-288 s.v. sacerdos und A. BLAISE, Dictionnaire latin-français des auteurs chrétiens, Paris, Librairie des Méridiens, 1954, S. 729 s.v. sacerdos. 22. Vgl. Thesaurus linguae Latinae X(1), 361.59-72 s.v. parens. 23. Zur Sache vgl. J.G. MUELLER, Art. Priester, in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 28, Stuttgart, Hiersemann, 2017, 112-155. 24. Oct. 21.3 (ägyptischer Priester des Hammon), 22.1 (Isispriester), 25.5 und 25.10 (römische Priester), 25.11 (Priester in heidnischen Tempeln), 25.12 (verschiedene römische Priesterkollegien); darüber hinaus wird mehrfach auf Priestern vorbehaltene Kulthandlungen hingewiesen. 25. BEAUJEU (Hg.), Minucius Felix (Anm. 19), S. XVII.

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

21

Erklärt wurde es teils aus der Person des Autors, der nur eine oberflächliche Kenntnis christlicher Lehre besessen hätte, teils aus der Funktion des Dialogs, der nur Prolegomena zum christlichen Glauben liefern wolle, teils aus der Scheu, Arkana christlicher Lehre allzu rasch preiszugeben, teils noch anders26. Welche Antwort man auch immer präferiert, so ist das Christentum für Minucius doch ganz gewiss kein Normensystem. Dies belegt ein Blick auf das Wortfeld von Gesetz und Gebot27. Das Wort decretum kommt in der Schrift überhaupt nicht vor, decernere ein einziges Mal, im Mund des Heiden, der den Christen vorwirft, Fragen, in denen die Philosophie bisher keine Klarheit erzielen konnte, entscheiden zu wollen28. Ebenfalls ein einziges Mal taucht praeceptum auf, das der Christ Octavius für die Gebote verwendet, die das Volk Israel von Gott erhielt und auf deren Befolgung Segen, auf deren Missachtung Strafe und Exil folgten29. Das zugehörige Verbum praecipere kommt nicht vor. Lex begegnet immerhin fünf Mal. Vom Heiden Caecilius wird es ein erstes Mal im Referat kosmogonischer Theorien verwendet, um die Alternativen von völligem Determinismus und völlig kontingenter Weltentstehung zu bezeichnen30. Auch bei der zweiten Verwendung durch den Heiden bezeichnet lex ein philosophisches Konzept, die platonisch-aristotelische Annahme eines ewigen Fortbestands der Welt, den die Christen törichterweise bestreiten würden31. Der Christ Octavius verwendet lex dreimal. Einmal ebenfalls im Referat philosophischer Lehrmeinungen für die stoische Auffassung vom Wesen des Göttlichen32, ein weiteres Mal metaphorisch 26. Vgl. SCHUBERT (Hg.), Minucius Felix (Anm. 7), S. 56-61. 27. Das Folgende stützt sich auf eine Auswertung der Konkordanz von B. KYTZLER – D. NAJOCK, Concordantia in Minuci Felicis Octavium (Alpha-Omega), Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, Olms-Weidmann, 1991. 28. Oct. 5.4 certum aliquid de summa rerum ac maiestate decernere, de qua tot omnibus saeculis sectarum plurimarum usque adhuc ipsa philosophia deliberat („ein sicheres Urteil über das Weltganze und seine Majestät abzugeben, worüber in so zahlreichen Schulen zu allen Zeiten die Philosophie selbst bis zum heutigen Tage unentschieden nachdenkt“). 29. Oct. 33.3 quamdiu praeceptis salubribus obtemperaverunt de paucis innumeri facti, de egentibus divites, de servientibus reges („solange sie seinen heilsamen Geboten gehorchten, sind sie aus wenigen Unzählige, aus Bedürftigen Reiche, aus Knechten Könige geworden“). 30. Oct. 5.13 aut … variis et lubricis casibus solutis legibus fortuna dominatur („oder … es herrscht in undeterminierbaren Wechselfällen losgelöst von Gesetzmäßigkeiten das Zufallsprinzip“). 31. Oct. 11.1 quasi … naturae divinis legibus constitutus aeternus ordo turbetur („als ob die ewige Ordnung zerstört werden könnte, die durch das göttliche Gesetz der Natur eingerichtet wurde“). 32. Oct. 19.10 Zenon … naturalem legem atque divinam et aethera interim interdumque rationem vult esse principium („Zenon … will das natürliche und göttliche Gesetz und bisweilen den Äther und manchmal die Vernunft den Ursprung aller Dinge sein lassen“).

22

C. SCHUBERT

für die dem Meer natürlicherweise gesetzte Grenze33. Dieser Passus befindet sich innerhalb des natürlichen Gottesbeweises, wodurch lex hier als eine von Gott der Natur auferlegte Beschränkung erscheint. In dieselbe Richtung geht die dritte Stelle, an der, immer noch innerhalb des natürlichen Gottesbeweises, von der guten Ordnung, die der Kosmos aufweist, als lex gesprochen wird34. Die lex als sinnvolles Regelwerk ist ebenso wie die vorausschauende Planung, providentia, und die zierliche Ordnung, ordo, Ausweis eines fürsorglichen Schöpferwillens. Das zugehörige Adjektiv legitimus verwendet der Christ Octavius nur einmal innerhalb einer Serie historischer Beispiele für die sogar staatlich sanktionierte lockere Ehe- bzw. Sexualmoral der Heiden, die Inzest erlaubt35. Außer an der eben zitierten Stelle, an der ius ein staatlich garantiertes Recht meint, begegnet das Wort nur noch einmal zum pauschalen Ausdruck eines „berechtigterweise“36. An beiden Stellen, an denen von iustitia die Rede ist, zielt Octavius auf die Gerechtigkeit von Menschen gegenüber anderen Menschen: Die erste greift sarkastisch die Rede von der in der Romideologie verankerten iustitia Romana an, die in Wahrheit nur brutale militärische Aggression bemänteln sollte und einem jeden eroberten Volk nicht das Seine ließ37. Die zweite empfiehlt im Gegensatz zu äußerlicher Kultpraxis die Pflege der Gerechtigkeit als wahren Gottesdienst, womit ohne religiöse Implikation die Ausrichtung des Alltagsverhaltens am Prinzip der Gerechtigkeit gemeint ist38. Ein größeres Bedeutungsspektrum weist iustus auf. Abgesehen vom übertragenen Gebrauch für die richtige 33. Oct. 17.9 mari intende: lege litoris stringitur („Schau doch auf das Meer: es wird vom Gesetz des Gestades in Schranken gehalten“). 34. Oct. 18.4 ita in hac mundi domo, cum caelorum terrarumque perspicias providentiam, ordinem, legem, crede esse universitatis dominum parentemque („wenn du nun die Voraussicht, Ordnung und Gesetzmäßigkeit, die Himmel und Erde durchwalten, deutlich siehst, so glaube in gleicher Weise, dass in diesem großen Haus, der Welt, ein Herr und Schöpfer aller Dinge ist“). 35. Oct. 31.3 ius est apud Persas misceri cum matribus, Aegyptiis et Athenis cum sororibus legitima conubia („bei den Persern gibt es das Recht, sich mit den Müttern zu vereinigen, bei den Ägyptern und Athenern gibt es rechtsgültige Ehen mit den Schwestern“). 36. Oct. 5.5 et beati satis satisque prudentes iure videamur, si secundum illud vetus sapientis oraculum nosmet ipsos familiarius noverimus („und dass wir uns zurecht für selig genug und klug genug halten können, wenn wir gemäß jenem alten Spruch des Weisen uns selbst genauer erkannt haben“). 37. Oct. 25.1 Nimirum insignis et nobilis iustitia Romana ab ipsis imperii nascentis incunabulis auspicata est! („Aber natürlich, die hervorstechende und hochangesehene römische Gerechtigkeit hat ja schon an der Wiege des entstehenden Reiches ihren verheißungsvollen Anfang genommen!“). 38. Oct. 32.3 qui iustitiam (sc. colit), deo libat („wer die Gerechtigkeit (wahrt), spendet Gott ein Trankopfer“).

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

23

Länge des gemeinsamen Spaziergangs39 wird das Wort einmal von Caecilius und einmal von Octavius für allgemeine menschliche Gerechtigkeit gesetzt40. Die vierte Belegstelle spricht dem endzeitlichen Urteil Gottes über Gute und Böse Gerechtigkeit zu41. Nur hier wird dieses von Octavius iudicium genannt. An den beiden anderen Stellen, an denen er iudicium gebraucht, meint es ein auf bewusstem Urteil beruhendes menschliches Verhalten bzw. die menschliche Urteilskraft42. Iudex, das zugehörige nomen agentis, wird in der ablehnenden Beschreibung eines höchsten Wesens, wie es die Christen annehmen, durch den Heiden Caecilius zweimal verwendet43, außerdem zweimal für Minucius als Schiedsrichter der Auseinandersetzung44 und einmal für menschliche Beurteiler im allgemeinen45, nie zur Bezeichnung des Gottes der Christen. Schließlich meint auch iudicare an fünf von sechs Belegstellen menschliches oder tierisches Urteilen über einen Sachverhalt46. Nur anlässlich der knappen Darlegung 39. Oct. 3.5 Sed ubi eundi spatium satis iustum cum sermone consumpsimus („Aber als wir schon einen recht tüchtigen Spaziergang im Gespräch hinter uns gebracht hatten“). 40. Von der Gerechtigkeit der Christen in der rhetorischen Konzession Oct. 11.5 etsi iustos darem („sogar wenn ich einräumte, sie seien Gerechte“); und als Selbstbeschreibung der Christen Oct. 32.3 sic apud nos religiosior est ille qui iustior („Und so ist bei uns einer umso frömmer, je gerechter er ist“). 41. Oct. 34.12 cuius quanto iudicium tardum, tanto magis iustum est („dessen Gericht desto gerechter ist, je später es kommt“). 42. Oct. 16.1 utrum ea (sc. sententia) iudicio (so mit Cima; utrumne iudicio Kytzler; utrum tua eruditio cod.) turbata sit an vacillaverit per errorem („ob das Urteil mit Absicht wirr gehalten war oder aus Irrtum auf so schwachen Füßen stand“). Oct. 16.3 sic, cui non est veri stabile iudicium, prout infida suspicio spargitur, ita eius dubia opinio dissipatur („so wird der, der kein festes Urteil hinsichtlich der Wahrheit besitzt, in seinem unsicheren Wähnen hin und her gerissen, je nachdem sich bald hier bald dort eine Mutmaßung ergibt, auf die doch kein Verlass ist“). 43. Oct. 5.8 ita in fontem refluunt et in semet omnia revolvuntur, nullo artifice nec iudice nec auctore („so fließt alles zur Quelle zurück und kommt kreisend zu sich selbst zurück, ohne einen Bewirker oder Richter oder Urheber). Oct. 11.6 Igitur iniquum iudicem fingitis qui sortem in hominibus puniat, non voluntatem („Folglich ersinnt ihr einen ungerechten Richter, der an den Menschen ihr Los bestraft und nicht ihren Willen“). 44. Oct. 5.1 ut libram teneas aequissimi iudicis („die Waage wie der gerechteste Richter zu halten“). Oct. 15.1 „Decedis“ inquit Caecilius „officio iudicis religiosi“ („‚Du verstößt gegen die Pflicht eines gewissenhaften Schiedsrichters‘, sagte Caecilius“). 45. Oct. 14.5 sic adsidue temeritate decepti culpam iudicis tranferunt ad incerti querellam („Und so immerzu durch ihre Voreiligkeit getäuscht, überführen sie ihr schuldhaftes Versagen als Beurteiler in die Klage über die Ungewissheit“). 46. Oct. 14.5 ut damnatis omnibus malint universa suspendere quam de fallacibus iudicare („so dass sie lieber alle Stimmen verwerfen und das Ganze in der Schwebe lassen wollen, als über trügerische Stimmen urteilen“ [von der Rhetorik verwirrte Menschen]); Oct. 24.9 quanta vero de diis vestris animalia muta naturaliter iudicant! („Aber wie große Stücke von euren Göttern halten doch von Natur aus die stummen Tiere!“); Oct. 28.1 quam autem iniquum sit, incognitis et inexploratis iudicare, quod facitis („wie ungerecht es aber ist, ohne Kenntnis und Untersuchung der Sachlage zu urteilen, wie ihr es tut“ [in

24

C. SCHUBERT

seines fatum-Konzepts kommt der Christ Octavius in unpersönlicher Formulierung auf Gottes endzeitliches Gericht zurück47. Rein technisch ist der Gebrauch der Ableitung iudiciarius zur Bezeichnung der Gerichtsferien48. Die Durchmusterung der Belegstellen zeigt, dass von Recht und Gerechtigkeit, auch auf Seiten Gottes, zwar gelegentlich gesprochen wird, dass aber kein Wort zu den zehn Geboten oder dem Doppelgebot der Liebe gesagt, kein Hinweis auf eine irgendwie rechtlich aufzufassende Religionsausübung oder Frömmigkeit gegeben wird. Wir können festhalten, dass Minucius bei der Beschreibung des Christentums Juristisches geradezu peinlich fernhält.

3. Christentum und Heidentum Für das nächste Feld, das Außenverhältnis zwischen Christen und Heiden, ist das Material erheblich reicher. Die drei auffälligsten Aspekte, die in der Konstruktionsweise der christlichen Identität, der Haltung zum römischen Staat und in der spezifischen Darstellung der Christenprozesse liegen, seien genannt. Während das Christentum innerhalb der Schrift klar konturiert und beschrieben wird, man von spezifisch christlichen Lehren hört, wie dem Glauben an die Auferstehung des Fleisches (Oct. 34.9-12), über spezifisch christliche Bräuche belehrt wird, wie der Ablehnung, sich mit Blumen zu bekränzen (Oct. 38.2), von spezifisch christlichen Tugenden erfährt, wie der ehelichen Treue und Ablehnung einer zweiten Heirat (Oct. 31.5), sich also das klare Profil einer Religionsgemeinschaft ergibt, die den rationalen Wahrheitsanspruch einer Philosophenschule mit ethischer Praxis und echter Frömmigkeit, der Verehrung Gottes im Geist und in der Wahrheit, verbindet, während dieses klar konturierte Christentum auch einen Gruppennamen erhält, nämlich christiani, die Christen, den Octavius rund ein Dutzend mal in seiner Rede verwendet49, gibt es in der ganzen Schrift für Christenprozessen]); Oct. 28.5 cum, si ratio, non instigatio daemonis iudicaret („wenn die Vernunft und nicht dämonische Aufhetzung Recht spräche“ [vom Urteil in Christenprozessen]); Oct. 40.3 at ego, inquam, prolixius omnium nostrum vice gaudeo, quod etiam mihi Octavius vicerit, cum maxima iudicandi mihi invidia detracta sit („‚Ich aber‘, sagte ich da, ‚freue mich noch überschwänglicher, für uns alle, weil Octavius wohl auch für mich gesiegt hat, da mir die höchst undankbare Aufgabe, ein Urteil zu sprechen, abgenommen wurde‘“). 47. Oct. 36.1 actus hominis, non dignitas iudicatur („wird das Handeln des Menschen, nicht sein Erfolg im Leben beurteilt“). 48. Oct. 2.3 feriae iudiciariae. 49. Caecilius: Oct. 10.5. Octavius: 18.11; 20.1 (2×); 27.7; 28.2; 28.4; 28.5; 35.5; 35.6; 37.1; 37.3.

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

25

die Anderen, die Heiden, keine kollektive Bezeichnung. Weder in den auktorialen Partien noch in der Rede des Heiden oder des Christen wird das Heidentum begrifflich als solches gefasst. Minucius verwendet das Wort paganus nicht, er verwendet gentes und gentilis nur im klassischlateinischen Sinn für Stämme, Familien, Völker, nicht für die Heiden50. Diese Leerstelle ist umso auffälliger, als gerade Octavius in seiner Verteidigungsrede ständig mit dem Gegensatz „die Christen – die anderen“ arbeitet. An Stelle „des Heidentums“ und „der Heiden“ werden entweder einzelne Vertreter von Positionen, die auch innerhalb der paganen Welt umstritten sind, genannt – atheistische Philosophen, übelwollende Rhetoren, Isispriester –, oder es sind nicht näher spezifizierte Leute, die sich im Irrtum befinden oder einem Aberglauben aufgesessen sind – error und superstitio sind Leitworte des Dialogs51 – oder es wird ein kollektives „ihr“ gebraucht, in das sich ein paganer Leser eingeschlossen fühlen kann, aber nicht muss. Anders gesagt: Obwohl Minucius eine klare christliche Identität als Selbstbild ausformt, konstruiert er keine heidnische Identität, kein einheitliches Bild des Anderen. Das, was heidnisch ist, bleibt bei ihm ein einigermaßen diffuses Sammelbecken für alle möglichen, auch einander widersprechende Ansichten und Verhaltensweisen, deren einzige Gemeinsamkeit darin besteht, falsch und eben nicht-christlich zu sein. Im berühmten 25. Kapitel bezieht der Christ Octavius gegen die Glorifizierung des römischen Staates durch den Heiden Caecilius Stellung, indem er den Aufstieg Roms zur Weltmacht als Ergebnis eines hemmungslosen und gottlosen Imperialismus geißelt und den üblichen altrömischen Lichtgestalten die behauptete Frömmigkeit rundweg abspricht. Er bedient sich dabei der geläufigen Topik der Romkritik, die sich schon bei Sallust, Caesar und Tacitus in den sogenannten Barbarenreden findet52. Anders als dort wird die Kritik aber nicht von einem vorab disqualifizierten und persönlich unlauteren Sprecher vorgetragen und auch nicht durch eine Gegenrede kompensiert, sondern bleibt das letzte, vernichtende Wort über die römische Geschichte (Oct. 25.1-5): „At tamen ista ipsa superstitio Romanis dedit auxit fundavit imperium, cum non tam virtute quam religione et pietate pollerent“. nimirum insignis et nobilis iustitia Romana ab ipsis imperii nascentis incunabulis auspicata est. nonne in ortu suo et scelere collecti et muniti immanitatis suae terrore 50. Vgl. AHMED, Bilder von den Anderen (Anm. 5), S. 55-96. 51. Für error schlagen 19 Belege zu Buche, hinzu kommen 7 für errare; superstitio verwendet Minucius 10mal, superstitiosus 2mal. 52. Dazu zuletzt D. PAUSCH, Livius und der Leser: Narrative Strukturen in ab urbe condita (Zetemata, 140), München, Beck, 2011, S. 170-187 (Kapitel „Barbarenreden“).

26

C. SCHUBERT

creverunt? nam asylo prima plebs congregata est: confluxerant perditi facinerosi incesti sicarii proditores, et ut ipse Romulus imperator et rector populum suum facinore praecelleret, parricidium fecit. haec prima sunt auspicia religiosae civitatis. mox alienas virgines iam desponsatas, iam destinatas et nonnullas de matrimonio mulierculas sine more rapuit violavit inlusit, et cum earum parentibus, id est cum soceris suis bellum miscuit, propinquum sanguinem fudit. quid inreligiosius, quid audacius, quid ipsa sceleris confidentia tutius? iam finitimos agro pellere, civitates proximas evertere cum templis et altaribus, captos cogere, damnis alienis et suis sceleribus adolescere cum Romulo regibus ceteris et posteris ducibus disciplina communis est. ita quicquid Romani tenent colunt possident, audaciae praeda est: templa omnia de manubiis, id est de ruinis urbium, de spoliis deorum, de caedibus sacerdotum. „Aber dennoch hat eben dieser ‚Aberglaube‘ den Römern ihr Reich gegeben, gemehrt und gefestigt, da ihre Stärke weniger in ihrer Tapferkeit als in ihrer Gottesfurcht und Frömmigkeit lag“. Aber natürlich, die hervorstechende und hochangesehene römische Gerechtigkeit hat ja schon an der Wiege des entstehenden Reiches ihren verheißungsvollen Anfang genommen. Sind sie nicht zu Beginn ihres Aufstiegs durch das Verbrechen zusammengebracht worden und dann, geschützt durch die Angst vor ihrer Unmenschlichkeit, gewachsen? Denn in einer Freistatt wurde der erste Volkshaufe versammelt: zusammengeströmt waren verkommene Subjekte, Übeltäter, Blutschänder, Meuchelmörder und Verräter, und damit Romulus selbst als Gebieter und Herrscher sein Volk an Schandtaten überträfe, hat er einen Brudermord begangen. Das sind die ersten verheißungsvollen Anfänge dieser gottesfürchtigen Stadt. Bald darauf hat er gegen jedes Herkommen fremde Jungfrauen, die schon verlobt, schon fest versprochen waren, sowie einige junge Frauen aus dem Ehestand geraubt, vergewaltigt und seinen Spott mit ihnen getrieben und hat sich mit deren Vätern, also den eigenen Schwiegervätern, auf einen Krieg eingelassen und verwandtes Blut vergossen. Was könnte respektloser, was frecher, was gerade aufgrund der Dreistigkeit des Verbrechens risikoloser sein? Ferner die Nachbarn von ihrem Land zu vertreiben, die nächstgelegenen Städte samt Tempeln und Altären dem Boden gleich zu machen, die Besiegten zu unterjochen, durch fremde Verluste und eigene Verbrechen groß zu werden: diese Disziplin beherrschen die übrigen Könige und späteren Führer wie Romulus. So ist alles, was die Römer in ihrem Besitz, Gebrauch und Eigentum haben, die Beute ihrer Frechheit: alle Tempel sind aus dem Beuteertrag, also mit der Zerstörung von Städten, Beraubung von Göttern, Ermordung von Priestern bezahlt worden.

Eberhard Heck hat daher recht, wenn er die ungewöhnliche Schärfe dieser Romkritik, und das heißt Kritik an einem wichtigen Bestandteil der Staatsdoktrin, hervorhebt53. Zu beachten ist allerdings die Rahmung des Dialogs, die dann doch für eine gewisse Abfederung der historischen Staatskritik sorgt. Denn die Gesprächspartner befinden sich, wie die 53. Vgl. E. HECK, Minucius Felix und der römische Staat: Ein Hinweis zum 25. Kapitel des Octavius, in Vigiliae Christianae 38 (1984) 154-164.

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

27

Rahmenhandlung zeigt, nicht in Fundamentalopposition zum römischen Staat, sondern arbeiten als Juristen und Geschäftsleute in diesem Staat und an diesem Staat aktiv mit. Eine Glorifizierung und Sakralisierung des Staates lehnen sie ab, diesen selbst aber nicht. Zu beachten ist außerdem der Beurteilungsmaßstab, als der die fehlende iustitia der Amtsträger herausgestrichen wird. Die Gerechtigkeit als staatliche Handlungsmaxime ist aber kein spezifisch christliches Konzept, sondern dürfte von keinem gebildeten Heiden, der sein De re publica gelesen hatte, bestritten worden sein. Im Gegensatz zu Tertullians Apologeticum, Minucius’ wichtigster christlicher Quelle, wird die Frage der Christenverfolgung bzw. genauer der Prozesse gegen Christen aufgrund der bloßen Zugehörigkeit zur christlichen Gemeinschaft (nomen Christianum) in nur einem Kapitel behandelt (Oct. 28). Sachlich schließt sich Minucius Tertullian freilich an, indem er die Absurdität offenlegt, dass in diesen Prozessen nicht konkrete Verbrechen nachgewiesen werden sollten, sondern nur die Mitgliedschaft in der Vereinigung der Christen Gegenstand des Verfahrens wäre und die angeklagten Christen zum Leugnen ihres Christseins sogar durch die Folter getrieben werden sollten, obwohl man der Vereinigung der Christen schlimmste Verbrechen wie Kannibalismus zur Last legte (Oct. 28.1-6): Quam autem iniquum sit, incognitis et inexploratis iudicare, quod facitis, nobis ipsis paenitentibus credite. et nos enim idem fuimus et eadem vobiscum quondam adhuc caeci et hebetes sentiebamus, quasi Christiani monstra colerent, infantes vorarent, convivia incesta miscerent, nec intellegebamus ab his [sc. daemonibus] fabulas istas semper ventilari et numquam vel investigari vel probari, nec tanto tempore aliquem existere, qui proderet, non tantum facti veniam, verum etiam indicii gratiam consecuturum; malum autem adeo non esse, ut Christianus reus nec erubesceret nec timeret, et unum solummodo, quod non ante fuerit, paeniteret.  Nos tamen cum sacrilegos aliquos et incestos, parricidas etiam defendendos et tuendos suscipiebamus, hos nec audiendos in totum putabamus, nonnumquam etiam miserantes eorum crudelius saeviebamus, ut torqueremus confitentes ad negandum, videlicet ne perirent, exercentes in his perversam quaestionem, non quae verum erueret, sed quae mendacium cogeret. et si qui infirmior malo pressus et victus Christianum se negasset, favebamus ei, quasi eierato nomine iam omnia facta sua illa negatione purgaret. adgnoscitisne eadem nos sensisse et egisse, quae sentitis et geritis? cum, si ratio, non instigatio daemonis iudicaret, essent urguendi magis, non ut diffiterentur se Christianos, sed ut de incestis stupris, de inpiatis sacris, de infantibus immolatis faterentur. his enim et huiusmodi fabulis idem daemones ad exsecrationis horrorem inperitorum aures adversus nos referserunt. nec tamen mirum: cum omnium fama, quae semper insparsis mendaciis alitur, ostensa veritate consumitur, sic est negotium daemonum; ab ipsis enim rumor falsus et seritur et fovetur.

28

C. SCHUBERT

Wie ungerecht es aber ist, ohne Kenntnis und Untersuchung der Sachlage zu urteilen, wie ihr es tut, das glaubt uns nur, die wir es selbst bereuen! Auch wir waren nämlich früher genau so und dachten einst dasselbe wie ihr, damals noch blind und blöde, wie dass die Christen Ungeheuerliches verehrten, kleine Kinder fräßen und sich zu inzestuösen Gelagen vereinigten, und wir erkannten nicht, dass diese Schauermärchen von besagten Dämonen immer wieder in Umlauf gebracht werden, nie aber nachgeprüft oder bewiesen werden, und es über einen so langen Zeitraum hinweg niemanden gab, der solches den Behörden gemeldet hätte, obwohl er doch nicht nur Straferlass für die Tat, sondern sogar einen Gunsterweis für die Anzeige erlangt haben würde, und dass im Gegenteil so gar nichts Schlechtes daran ist, dass ein als Christ Angeklagter nie rot wurde noch Angst hatte und nur das eine bedauerte, es nicht schon früher gewesen zu sein. Wenn wir indes für einige dieser „Frevler“ und „Blutschänder“, ja sogar „Verwandtenmörder“ die Verteidigung oder Rechtsvertretung übernahmen, glaubten wir nicht, sie überhaupt anhören zu dürfen, und wüteten sogar manchmal aus Mitleid mit ihnen noch grausamer, dadurch dass wir ihnen, die bekannten, den Widerruf durch Folter abzupressen versuchten, selbstverständlich damit sie nicht ihr Leben verlören, und so bei ihnen eine perverse Verhörmethode anwandten, die nicht die Wahrheit ans Licht bringen, sondern zur Lüge zwingen sollte. Und wenn ein etwas weniger Standhafter durch die böse Behandlung unter Druck gesetzt und überwältigt wurde und dann widerrief, ein Christ zu sein, waren wir ihm wohlgesonnen, als hätte er, sobald er nur dem Christentum abgeschworen hatte, schon alle seine Taten mit diesem Widerruf reingewaschen. Erkennt ihr nun, dass wir dasselbe dachten und machten, was ihr denkt und tut? Wo sie doch, wenn die Vernunft und nicht dämonische Aufhetzung Recht spräche, vielmehr dazu gedrängt werden müssten, nicht ihr Christsein in Abrede zu stellen, sondern ein Geständnis abzulegen betreffs inzestuöser Unzucht, verwerflichen Kultes oder der rituellen Schlachtung kleiner Kinder. Denn mit diesen und ähnlichen Märchen haben besagte Dämonen bis zum Grausen und zur Verfluchung die Ohren der Ahnungslosen gegen uns verstopft. Doch verwunderlich ist das nicht, da das Gerede der Leute, das sich immer aus der Garnierung mit Lügen speist und erlischt, wenn sich die Wahrheit offen zeigt, in eben solcher Weise das Tätigkeitsfeld der Dämonen ist. Von ihnen selbst werden nämlich falsche Gerüchte ausgestreut und dann warmgehalten.

Gegenüber Tertullian erscheint die Behandlung dramatisiert, insofern der Christ Octavius solche Prozesse aus eigener rechtsanwaltlicher Erfahrung schildert. Die Passage ist reich an juristischem Vokabular. Auffällig ist aber, dass gesetzliche Bestimmungen, ein institutum Neronianum, ein Plinius-Reskript oder ein Erlass Marc Aurels, überhaupt keine Rolle spielen. Vielmehr beschränkt sich Octavius völlig auf die Verletzung allgemein anerkannter Rechtsgrundsätze, die in diesen Verfahren nicht befolgt würden, so das Prinzip, auch die Beklagten anzuhören oder mit der Folter Geständnisse, nicht Meineide zu erzwingen. Als treibende Kraft hinter

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

29

dieser Perversion des Prozesswesens stehen bei Minucius die Dämonen als böse Zwischenwesen, deren Einflüsterungen die beteiligten Anwälte und Richter unterlägen. Die Empörung über Gerichtsverfahren und Unrechtsurteile wird dadurch in Richtung religiöser Mächte kanalisiert und kann nicht in eine Empörung gegen Anwälte, Richter oder Gesetzgeber, in Wut und Rachegedanken umschlagen – war doch der Christ Octavius, der Sympathieträger des Dialogs, einst selbst, bevor er Christ wurde, diesen dämonischen Einflüssen ausgesetzt und handelte nicht anders, als die aktuellen Richter. Alle drei Punkte zeigen eine bemerkenswert moderate Beurteilung der Nicht-Christen als Gesamtgruppe, des nicht-christlichen Staates und sogar der anti-christlichen staatlichen Maßnahmen.

4. Christen und das pagane Recht im Alltag Glaubt man der Schilderung, die Minucius der Figur des Christen Octavius in den Mund legt, kann es auf dem letzten skizzierten Feld, der alltäglichen Begegnung der Christen mit dem geltenden Recht, gar keine Probleme geben. Denn alle Christen verhalten sich so vorbildlich, dass sie mit dem Gesetz nicht in Konflikt geraten können. Die Liste der altrömischen Tugenden, die Octavius den Christen zuschreibt, modestia (Oct. 31.8; 38.4), abstinentia (Oct. 37.11; 38.1), innocentia (Oct. 31.8; 36.7), pudor (Oct. 31.5; 37.11), castitas (Oct. 29.1; 31.5), gravitas (Oct. 31.5), frugalitas (Oct. 36.3) etc., ist lang54. Selbst im Bereich der Sitten und Bräuche, also der sozialen Normen, kommt es nur zu wenigen Punkten, an denen die Christen von der Allgemeinheit abweichen, so beim Theaterbesuch (Oct. 37.11) oder bei den Trauerriten (Oct. 38.3-4). Alle diese Abweichungen werden aber rational mit Vernunftgründen und nicht mit im engeren Sinne religiösen Gründen erklärt: Minucius’ Theaterkritik folgt der philosophischen Theaterkritik Senecas, die Geringschätzung von Ämtern, Ehren und Reichtum (Oct. 36.3-7) entspricht ebenfalls stoischer Lehre. Minucius’ Christen wirken wie eine Art Super-Bürger, die mit aller Welt und mit allen Gesetzen in Frieden leben, solange man ihnen nicht als Christen das Existenzrecht schlankweg abspricht. Das Verfahren, eine de facto gegebene Problematik nicht anzusprechen bzw. zu minimieren, gilt auch für die professionellen Juristen auf der Ebene der Gesprächspartner und ihre Mitwirkung im römischen Gerichtswesen. Im Allgemeinen scheint hier für die Figur des Minucius kein Problem zu 54. Auffälligerweise ist die Wortfamilie pius / pietas weitgehend gemieden.

30

C. SCHUBERT

bestehen, der vom römischen Gerichtsalltag lediglich körperlich erschöpft ist und einige Tage der Rekreation benötigt (Oct. 2.3); von inneren Konflikten erfahren wir nichts. Auch Octavius sieht in seiner früheren anwaltlichen Tätigkeit selbst kein grundsätzliches Problem. Die einzige Stelle, an der die Rolle als Christ mit der Rolle als Jurist dann doch kollidiert, ist seine frühere Teilnahme als Anwalt von angeklagten Christen in Christenprozessen. Wie er damit umgeht, ist bemerkenswert. Denn er schildert keinen systemischen Konflikt, sondern deutet sein Verhalten, damals das Christentum für etwas Schlechtes gehalten und die Christen von ihrem Christsein abbringen gewollt zu haben, als persönliches Versagen und Schuld, die er durch die Einflüsterung der Dämonen auf sich geladen habe und die er nun bereue. Das wird zu Beginn der Christenprozesspassage mehr angedeutet als ausgeführt (vgl. Oct. 28.1). Nur an dieser Stelle kommt in der ganzen Schrift ein Wort für Reue vor (paenitet), das durch die Wiederholung in Oct. 28.2 bewusstgemacht wird und nicht überlesen werden kann. Was Octavius bereut, ist nicht, Anwalt gewesen zu sein, sondern als Anwalt nicht richtig gehandelt zu haben. Einen grundsätzlichen Rollenkonflikt scheint es auch für ihn nicht zu geben55. Fassen wir das Ergebnis des Durchgangs durch die eingangs beschriebenen Felder des Juristischen zusammen: Der Dialog zeigt, dass er mit rechtsphilosophischen und staatsrechtlichen Fragen, wie der nach der Gerechtigkeit, vertraut ist; er bezieht die Sphäre der staatlichen Rechtsordnung im Bereich der Christenprozesse in juristisch einigermaßen präziser Sprache ein. Aber er gewährt dem Juristischen innerhalb der Kirche als Organisation und innerhalb des Christentums als Religion so gut wie keinen Raum und er thematisiert das Konfliktpotenzial, das in der alltäglichen Konfrontation mit dem staatlichen Rechtssystem und das in dem fundamentalen Gegensatz von Christentum und Heidentum innerhalb und außerhalb staatlicher Strukturen besteht, entweder gar nicht oder nicht als eigentlich juristisches Problem, sondern ganz überwiegend als psychisches, moralisches oder intellektuelles Problem der beteiligten Akteure. Wohlgemerkt: Handlungen und Tatbestände, die per se juristisch relevant sind und die 55. Ganz anders Tertullian, vor allem in De corona und De idololatria, der mahnt, bestimmte Berufe – Soldat, Richter – nicht auszuüben, in denen man selbst töten oder eine Tötung anordnen müsse; vgl. W. RORDORF, Tertullians Beurteilung des Soldatenstandes, in Vigiliae Christianae 23 (1969) 105-141. Die Nicht-Thematisierung des Rollenkonflikts bei Minucius wird in ihrer Tragweite und anti-tertullianischen Schärfe erst klar, wenn man sich vor Augen hält, dass Tertullian nicht nur durch das Apologeticum, sondern zahlreiche weitere Schriften der zentrale christliche Dialogpartner des Octavius ist und beide wohl für eine ähnliche Zielgruppe schrieben.

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

31

Strafverfolgung nach sich ziehen müssen, von der rituellen Schlachtung Neugeborener über Ehebruch, Inzest und Vergewaltigung bis zur revolutionären Verschwörung kommen im Octavius durchaus prominent vor. Aber an ihnen interessiert kaum je die juristische Bewertung, welches Gesetz anzuwenden, welches Richterkollegium zuständig, welches Strafmaß richtig wäre, nicht die Frage der Nachweisbarkeit, Abwälzung oder Rechtfertigung, sondern justiziable ebenso wie nicht justiziable Handlungen (Begrüßungsformeln, Gebetsformen, Grabpflege etc.) werden mit denselben rhetorischen Verfahren und in primär ethisch-intellektueller Perspektive behandelt. IV. DIE RELEVANZ DES JURISTISCHEN IM OCTAVIUS Welche Bedeutung besitzt das Juristische dann überhaupt für den Dialog? Denn mit der geschilderten Reduktion und Minimierung steht nicht nur das Personal, das ausnahmslos aus Rechtsanwälten besteht, und die immer wieder, namentlich in der Rahmenhandlung aufgerufene Inszenierung als Gerichtsverfahren56 in auffälligem Kontrast, sondern auch die Tatsache, dass die Sprache des Caecilius und des Octavius passagenweise von juristischem Vokabular geradezu durchtränkt ist, wobei auffälligerweise kaum Substantive, also Rechtsgegenstände, sondern fast nur Verben, also rechtliche Verfahrensweisen, begegnen, die auf nicht-juristische Gegenstände angewandt werden57. Wie sollen wir vor dem Hintergrund dieser verrechtlichten Sprache und des juridischen Settings den Dialog lesen? 56. Vgl. Oct. 4.4-6; 5.1-2; 15.1-2; 39.3. 57. Hinweise auf juristisches Vokabular gibt J. POWELL, Unfair to Caecilius? Ciceronian Dialogue Techniques in Minucius Felix, in S. SWAIN – S. HARRISON – J. ELSNER (Hgg.), Severan Culture, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007, 177-189, hier S. 178. Um das Ausmaß zu zeigen, seien nur die mit a- beginnenden Verben aufgezählt, die zugleich bei Minucius und in juristischen Texten vorkommen. Als Vergleichskorpus dienen die für das Vocabularium Iurisprudentiae Romanae, I, Berlin, Reimer, 1903 verwendeten Texte (s. dort jeweils s.v. die Belegstellen). Die stets unscharfe Unterscheidung von Alltagsvokabular und juristischen Fachausdrücken, die durch das namentlich von Cicero beförderte Eindringen literarisierter Rechtstermini in die Normalsprache auf der einen Seite und die Bildlichkeit juristischer Texte auf der anderen vergrößert wird, ändert nichts an der Gesamttendenz des Befundes. Auch in Rechtstexten zu finden sind 67 Verben: abeo, abhorreo, abigo, abscondo, abstineo, absum, absumo, accedo, accendo, accido, accipio, accresco, addo, adduco, adeo, adiungo, adiuvo, admitto, admoneo, admoveo, adolesco, adorno, aestimo, affigo, affligo, aggredior, agito, agnosco, ago, aio, alieno, alo, ambigo, amo, animadverto, aperio, appareo, appello (-are), appello (-ere), appeto, appono, arbitror, ardeo, aresco, arguo, armo, aro, arripio, ascribo, aspergo, aspicio, aspiro, assentior, assero, assevero, assideo, assigno, assisto, assumo, astruo, attollo, audeo, audio, aufero,

32

C. SCHUBERT

Folgende Deutung sei mit Rekurs auf das Leitthema „Imagining Paganism through the Ages“ vorgeschlagen: Nach hundert Jahren christlicher Apologetik, die an der Rechtssituation der Christen nichts geändert hatte, mag Minucius Felix, vielleicht gerade weil er Jurist war, erkannt haben, dass die prekäre und ständig bedrohte Lage der Christen nicht primär auf ihre Rechtslage zurückzuführen war – denn Recht, das man für obsolet hielt, wurde in Rom viel leichter als heute einfach ad acta gelegt und schlicht nicht durchgeführt58 –, sondern an der aus verschiedenen und teils diffusen Quellen gespeisten Ablehnung des Christentums als vollgültige und ernst zu nehmende Religion. Die Dialogpartner können als ausgewiesene Juristen, deren Rechtskompetenz sich in ihrer Ausdrucksweise abbildet, besonders glaubhaft das Juristische als nebensächlich oder nicht den Kern betreffend beiseiteschieben und damit die tatsächlich entscheidenden Probleme, die hinter der Rechtsfrage stehen, anpacken, nämlich den merkwürdigen Cocktail aus haltlos dummen, aber trotzdem gefährlichen Vorwürfen, im Verborgenen Schandtaten aller Art zu begehen, aus missgünstiger Kritik konkurrierender Gemeinschaften, aus intellektuellem Hochmut philosophischer Zirkel und vor allem aus der Angst gerade der Wohlhabenderen und Angeseheneren, sich durch einen Übertritt zum Christentum sozial zu isolieren und politisch und wirtschaftlich wichtige Freundschaften zu verlieren. Der Octavius entwickelt daher ein attraktives, auf die Oberschicht zugeschnittenes Bild des Christentums, das ethisch und intellektuell konkurrenzfähig ist, das zuverlässige neue Freundschaften unter den Mitchristen auf Augenhöhe verheißt und das keinen radikalen Bruch mit der bisherigen Umwelt verlangt. Indem eine neue starke Identität angeboten wird, die bisherige heidnische Identität aber gerade nicht konzeptualisiert wird, wird der Übertritt erleichtert, der nur aus einem Ja-Sagen zum Christentum, nicht aus einem Nein-Sagen zu allem Bisherigen bestehen muss. Minucius Felix bekämpft das Heidentum, indem er den anderen gar nicht erst in einen feindlichen Block einreiht, sondern ihm – sofern er nicht zu den wenigen kategorischen Gegnern des Christentums gehört – als Freund und Individuum die Hand reicht und gangbare Wege zeigt, sich von dieser oder jener falschen Ansicht oder Verhaltensweise selbst zu distanzieren. Die Bekehrung des Caecilius dient dabei als sympathisches Rollenmodell, das nur Vorteile verspricht. Minucius kämpft nicht gegen Heiden, sondern augeo, averto, avoco. Ohne Parallele sind nur 19 Wörter: abstruo, adiuro, admiror, adoro, adstrangulo, aestuo, affluo, algeo, alludo, ambio, ango, animo, annecto, annitor, ardesco, assido, asto, auguror, auspicor. 58. Als Beleg mögen die zahllosen Erneuerungen gültiger Gesetze genügen.

33

CHRISTEN UND HEIDEN

um Heiden59. Vielleicht rührt auch daher die Faszination, die sein Büchlein seit seiner Wiederentdeckung bis heute ausübt. Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg Kochstraße 4/2 DE-91054 Erlangen Deutschland [email protected] [email protected]

Christoph SCHUBERT

59. Damit sei ein auch innerchristliches Lesepublikum des Dialogs nicht in Abrede gestellt; der Tendenz der neuesten Forschung, nur noch ein solches anzusetzen, ist aber zu widersprechen.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM1

The typical work of Christian apologetic in antiquity has three elements: a defence of Christians against the charge of sedition and atheism; a polemic against the worship of beings inferior to the true God; and a didactic illustration of the truth and antiquity of Christian teaching. We may say that all three are foreshadowed in Plato’s Apology for Socrates, and if we wish we may correlate the forensic mode of oratory with the defence, the epideictic with the polemic and the symbouleutic with the didactic element2. For the church, however, the difference between the second and the third is not merely formal but theological, for the reason alone will suffice to expose the absurdity of myth and idolatry that it engenders, whereas the triune being of God, his creation of all things out of nothing, his incarnation in Jesus and his judgment of the dead are truths that have been vouchsafed to us only by revelation. As early as Justin Martyr, a distinction is drawn between the universal logos, or reason, which enabled Socrates to discern the errors of his countrymen3, and Christ the transcendent Logos, or Word of God, who has sown in his prophets the intimations that were later passed off by Plato as his own doctrines (First Apology 60). If we fail to grasp this distinction we shall not perceive the consistency of Justin and may exaggerate the humanism of Clement, whose “second dispensation” to the Greeks took the form of inspiration only in the Sibyl and Hystaspes4, while the philosophers are once again credited only with plagiarism. The argument from exegesis is not neglected by any Greek apologist, and even where the tools of philosophy are most in evidence, as in Origen’s work Against Celsus, they are generally used to counteract false, invidious or heretical inferences from the sacred text. In Latin apologetic the balance shifts towards philosophy and polemic; direct quotations from scripture are rarer than general allusions even in the 1. Throughout this essay I make frequent reference to: G. MCCRACKEN, Arnobius of Sicca: The Case against the Pagans, Mahwah, NJ, Paulist, 1949; M.B. SIMMONS, Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, Oxford, Clarendon, 1995; C. TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani, Roma, Città Nuova, 2017. 2. See F.M. YOUNG, Greek Apologists of the Second Century, in M.J. EDWARDS – M.D. GOODMAN – S.R.F. PRICE (eds.), Apologetics in the Roman Empire, Oxford, Clarendon, 1999, 81-104. 3. First Apology 5 and 46; cf. Second Apology 8 on Heraclitus. 4. Stromateis 6.42; cf. JUSTIN, First Apology 44.

36

M. EDWARDS

Apology of Tertullian, while Minucius Felix eschews not only quotation but any tenet that is known only from the scriptures. Lactantius, except in the fourth book of his Divine Institutes, is almost equally reticent; there is therefore no anomaly in the failure of Arnobius to cite the Old Testament as a witness to the antiquity of his faith. If he wrote before Lactantius, as most scholars believe, he excels his predecessors in the frequency and particularity of his references to the life of Jesus. Nevertheless, it is true of him, as of them, that he is stronger in denouncing the creeds of others than in vindicating his own. Indeed – and here he may be a better Roman than a Christian – he contends that he is not required to know more than his interlocutors, so long as he can prove them to be in the wrong. Once he has demonstrated, against the “new men”, that it would be absurd for God to send innocent souls to a realm of evil and vicissitude, he has won his case without furnishing his own theodicy for the plight of souls (AN 2.47). Again, even if the form of the gods is hidden from us, we can satisfy ourselves that no graven image is a true copy (AN 3.17). Here, as elsewhere, the suspension of judgment is carried so far as to grant by implication that there may be more gods than one: this is certainly not the opinion of Arnobius himself, but in the passages where he appeals to the universal intuition of divine unity, he is apt to add that the properties of God are expressible only by negation5. While this apophaticism is characteristic of Latin Christianity, Arnobius derives from it not only an early form of Pascal’s wager6 but an argument for the sufficiency of the gospel as an empirical antidote to scepticism. The verified narratives of the life of Christ are his equivalent to the mos maiorum, or way of the fathers, upheld by Cicero’s Cotta and the Caecilian of Minucius Felix against the nescience of philosophy7. Thus Arnobius may be an early exemplar of the progression from scepticism to fideism. In the first part of this paper I shall argue that in consequence he handles the commonplaces of polemic with more reserve and ambiguity than many of his precursors. In the second I shall ask what separates him from the new men, the novi viri, whose philosophy he derides in the second book; in the third I shall hope to demonstrate that, in contrast to Tertullian and the Greek churchmen who boasted of their provinciality, Arnobius does not pose as a barbarian, and at times adopts the persona of a Roman who is steering his compatriots back into the ancestral ways.

5. See e.g. AN 1.28.6, with 1.31. 6. On AN 2.4.4 see MCCRACKEN, Arnobius of Sicca (n. 1), p. 303; G.M. PINTUS, Arnobio e il pari di Pascal, in Sandalion 10-11 (1988) 145-151. 7. CICERO, On the Nature of the Gods 3.5-9 and 43; MINUCIUS FELIX, Octavius 6–8.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

37

I. SOME THEORIES OF RELIGION If only the true religion is eternal, false religion, like its pantheon, must have a genealogy. Apologetic literature of the first three centuries offers at least four theories regarding the origins of polytheism, and while it might be difficult to hold all four with logical consistency, no author appears to think that one alone will account for every superstition: 1. That the gods and the stories told of them are literary inventions. This, of course, is an ancient theory, and when Xenophanes called Homer a liar he was playing the game of rivalry instituted by his fellow-poet Stesichorus8. The Muses to whom the Iliad appeals as trustees of memory confessed to Hesiod that they spoke falsehood as readily as truth9. Plato banished all poetry from his commonwealth save hymns to the Gods and the praises of the just, reserving special censure for Homer’s frivolous depiction of the gods (Republic 606e-607a). He rejects the placebo of allegory, proposed a century earlier by Theagenes of Rhegium, and when he says in the Timaeus that we are bound to believe the children of the gods (40c), it was only Christians who failed to see the joke. Nevertheless, all philosophers, Plato included, suspect that there is some truth in the poets, and even Aristotle, who no longer expects to resolve a moral question by inspecting the syntax of a lyric poet, seals his argument that the cosmos can have only one god with a quotation from Homer10. Christians display a similar ambivalence: Justin finds adumbrations of Christian doctrine in the poets, yet he also asks how those who believe their fables on no evidence can presume to doubt the miracles of Christ. Athenagoras mocks the poets where they teach polytheism but praises their occasional testimonies to the unity of the divine (Embassy 5). Tatian protests that poetry corrupts the soul (Oration 1), but his fellow-apologists found it useful at times to profess belief so that they can argue, with Theophilus of Antioch, that “it is not we but your own poets” who declare the gods unworthy of human worship (To Autolycus 9). In Latin we find Tertullian laying a general charge of libel against the poets from Homer onwards11, yet conceding that they were shrewd enough to borrow from the prophets: they are therefore 8. All cited by R. PFEIFFER, History of Classical Scholarship, vol. 1, Oxford, Clarendon, 1968, p. 9. Pfeiffer assumes that all three wrote at all times in earnest, ignoring the agnostic, and often ludic, character of Greek literature. 9. Iliad 2.480; Theogony 27–28. 10. Metaphysics 1076a, quoting Iliad 2.204. Cf. PLATO, Protagoras 339a-347a on Simonides. 11. Apology 14.4 and 47.11; at 47.2 they are plagiarists and at 23.2 witnesses to the iniquities of daemons.

38

M. EDWARDS

to be believed when they proclaim the oneness of God or threaten wicked souls with punishment after death. 2. That pagan religion is a cult of the dead. The most celebrated exponent of this thesis in the classical world was Euhemerus of Messene12, who professed to have discovered on a hitherto unknown island a stele relating the lives and escapades of the Olympians before they were objects of worship. Our chief informant, Diodorus Siculus (Histories 6.1), does not seem to have passed judgment on the piety or the veracity of Euhemerus, and his own custom of prefacing the history of each nation with an account of its gods could be said to cast the latter in the role of ancestors rather than immortal overseers of human affairs. Nor can we be certain that any satire was intended by Philo of Byblos when he translated or fabricated an ancient text in which the same trope is applied to the Phoenician pantheon13. Theophilus of Antioch, however, reckons Euhemerus among the notorious atheists of antiquity (To Autolycus 3.7), asserting for his own part that this name cannot be justly applied to one who has merely exposed the true identity of impostors. Athenagoras informs his pagan readers that they have been duped into worshipping their fellow-mortals (Embassy 28); like Tatian, who is conscious that the same indictment has been brought against Christians, he demands to know what thaumaturge other than Christ has performed any work of healing after his death (Embassy 26). He and Clement of Alexandria cite with pleasure the hymn in which Callimachus alludes to the grave of Zeus14, and Clement also opines that mysteries began as games in honour of the dead. No Greek Christian in fact pursues the thesis of Euhemerus with more vigour than Lactantius, whose narrative of Jupiter’s royal misdeeds after he deposed his father Saturn is avowedly drawn from the Latin translation of the original by Ennius15. 3. That new cults are imposed on the populace by official decree as occasion arises. So much as admitted by Ovid when he records the translation of the god Aesculapius in serpentine form from Epidaurus to Rome (Metamorphoses 15.626-744), or describes in his Fasti the action of the calumniated matron Claudia Quinta which led to the institution of the rites of the Magna Mater (4.205-248). The first Roman to be deified by the 12. See T.S. BROWN, Euhemerus and the Historians, in Harvard Theological Review 39 (1946) 259-274; EUHEMERUS, Reliquiae, ed. M. WINIARCZYK, Leipzig, Teubner, 1991. 13. A.I. BAUMGARTEN, The Phoenician History of Philo of Byblos, Leiden, Brill, 1991. Known to us chiefly from Porphyry as quoted in the first book of EUSEBIUS, Preparation for the Gospel. 14. CALLIMACHUS, Hymn 1.4-7; ATHENAGORAS, Embassy 30; CLEMENT, Exhortation 2.37.4. Cf. Titus 1,12, with M. KOLOKASIS, Zeus’s Tomb: An Object of Pride and Reproach, in Kernos 8 (1995) 123-138. 15. Divine Institutes 1.11, 13-14, 17, 22.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

39

senate, according to Livy and Plutarch, was Romulus16, notwithstanding the suspicion that the story of his ascent was a mere device to conceal his murder. Tertullian, more conscious than Greek authors of the Roman practice of deifying emperors, whether good or bad, is peculiarly caustic17, but Athenagoras too can wax indignant at the erection of a statue to Antinous, the catamite of Hadrian (Embassy 30). Such absurdities lent force to the argument that all gods were in origin mortals, and that their cults were therefore younger by many centuries than the worship of the true god as Moses prescribed it18; moreover it seems that monuments to the dead were quickly neglected, and hence afforded an easy butt for Christian mirth. 4. That the gods of shrines and oracles were demons masquerading as higher deities. This conjecture appeared to be corroborated by Platonists such as Plutarch and Apuleius, who held that, while the true gods are inaccessible to our petitions, they delegate the exercise of special providence to lesser beings, subtler in body and more percipient in intellect than humans, though neither omniscient nor eternal19. The term daimon, which was thought to imply sagacity, becomes pejorative only when Porphyry writes, in his treatise On Abstinence, that the daemons who require sacrifice are usurpers rather than intermediaries, falsely assuming the names of their superiors and sending plague and famine upon whole peoples who refuse to stain their altars with innocent blood20. Christians were wary of ascribing such power to demons, except by occasional permission of God, but they had seen abundant evidence of their thirst for incense and the blood of martyrs21. They also possessed, in the Book of Enoch, the record of an ancient fall of angels who descended to earth for love of mortal women. Banished from their celestial home, according to Justin Martyr, they avenged themselves by seducing mortals from the true religion22. Athenagoras couples Enoch with Euhemerus, alleging that the daemons effected their purpose by promoting a cult of the dead because they knew that mortals would not have worshipped them in their proper forms (Embassy 24–26). 16. LIVY, Histories 1.16; PLUTARCH, Romulus 27. 17. TERTULLIAN, Apology 6.7; 13.3; cf. 5.1. 18. JUSTIN, First Apology 44; TATIAN, Oration 31; THEOPHILIUS, To Autolycus 3.20; TERTULLIAN, Apology 19. 19. PLUTARCH, On the Sign of Socrates; APULEIUS, On the God of Socrates. 20. PORPHYRY, On Abstinence 2.38-43, pp. 167-173 in A. NAUCK (ed.), Porphyrii Opuscula Selecta, Leipzig, Teubner, 1886. 21. See e.g. ORIGEN, First Principles 2.3.3; Exhortation to Martyrdom 41. On divine permission see Against Celsus 8.31. 22. JUSTIN, Second Apology 5; First Apology 14 and 54.

40

M. EDWARDS

In Arnobius we discover signs of acquaintance with all four theories, but in each case with a difference in application which suggests that he has not fully detached himself from the ambient culture. We may take this as evidence not of his residual paganism but of a calculated choice to meet his adversaries on ground that was once his own. 1. It generally serves his purpose to profess belief in the crimes which are attributed to the gods of the civic pantheon, since his readers are thus convicted from their own mouths of worshipping beings who are unworthy of any cult. In his first book, he accuses the diviners of spreading fabulae to protect their shrinking revenues, but by this term he seems to mean above all the charge that Christians bring calamity on the Empire by their neglect of pagan altars23. Later in the same book he insists that those who deny the veracity of the gospel cannot demand credence for their own fables (AN 1.51-58), which, as he proceeds to demonstrate, do not rest on testimony of equal strength and offer no promise of salvation. This is nothing more than a tu quoque, and in Book 4 it is not Arnobius but his (real or putative) interlocutors who protest that the gods should not be judged by the fanciful tales of poets (4.32.1). 2. On various occasions he hints that the gods of pagan myth are deified mortals. Indeed he insinuates that even this status cannot be granted to the authors of recent oracles which enjoined the killing, torture and spoliation of the innocent, for we give the name “human” only to those who are worthy of it in mind as well as in body (AN 5.8.4 etc.). The worship of such heroes as Aesculapius and Hercules (1.38.2) furnishes an immediate retort to those who mock the Christians for their worship of a “born man”24: as we have seen, the argument is completed by a proof that the feats attributed to Christ are at once more marvellous and more credible than those of his mythical rivals. It is only in Book 4, however, that he compiles his own catalogue of murders, rapes and debaucheries to substantiate the theories of Euhemerus and other authors who sometimes bore the reproach of atheism. He reminds his Latin readers that Euhemerus had received the approval of Ennius, and cumbrously refrains from telling all that he has learned from this source of the wars of Bacchus and the infidelities of Diana (4.28–5.29.2). His object, he maintains, is not to write history but to show that the Romans speak more impiously of their gods than any other race, and far more so than the Christians, who are guilty at worst of incredulity (4.6.4; 5.8.1 etc.). We catch here an echo of Plutarch’s aphorism that he would rather his existence were denied 23. At AN 1.24.2, if not at 1.57.4. The term recurs often, e.g. at 3.12.1 and 4.30.3. 24. AN 1.36.1; 1.37.1; 1.57.1.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

41

than that the crimes were imputed to him which are recorded of the gods25. Plutarch, however, believed without ambiguity (though with philosophic caution), whereas Arnobius finds it politic to hover between Euhemerus and the poets. 3. It is well known that Arnobius, alone of the apologists, does not attempt to refute the charge of novelty by appealing to the Old Testament. Rather than offer proofs of the antiquity of his faith, he retorts that if the gospel is new it will soon be old (AN 1.71.1), just as the oldest elements in what now passes for piety in the Roman world were once new (3.11.1). He is able to prove, with unusual erudition, that the vaunted way of the fathers (mos maiorum) is the product of repeated innovations, proudly attested in Rome’s own histories (2.67.1; 2.73.2; 4.11.1). From time to time he can therefore speak without diffidence of the novelty of Christ’s miracles, which taxes our credulity (2.36.1) yet affords the strongest proof of his divine origin (1.42.5; 1.53.4; 1.55.2; 1.65.8). On the other hand he argues that the church has not disturbed the course of nature, the very regularity of which consists in perpetual vicissitude: on its first occurrence (before it is hurled at Christians at 1.3.426) the word novella denotes the recurrent waxing of the moon (1.2.6). Philosophers cite the power to produce new artefacts as evidence of our superiority to beasts (2.17.5)27. At the same time, the notion that Arnobius is an early proponent of the theory of progress, celebrating the new at the expense of the old, cannot be sustained in the light of his frequent appeal to the pejorative associations of novelty. For him, as for his opponents, the word innovatio connotes a total subversion of natural order – the fear of which is dispelled of the calamities which have punctuated the history of the world with no such outcome. He casts in the teeth of Rome her own assumptions that whatever is new in religion is superstitious (AN 1.24.3); when he styles his philosophical interlocutors novi viri, this echo of the old republican label novus homo is laced with irony (2.15.1); and he admits that Christianity would be pernicious if it had indeed subverted the natural order (1.3.1; cf. 1.5.7). The new penalties devised against the Christians – not so new after all, for they were already deplored by Cyprian – bear witness against her claim to an immutable tradition28. The new is false, in other words, when it lacks a rationale, and if Christianity requires no ancient witness, the reason is that a common instinct has always taught us to revere 25. PLUTARCH, On Superstition 169f-170a. 26. And again at AN 2.66.2; 2.69.1 and 2.70.5. 27. Hence at AN 2.22.3, the prisoner reared from infancy in a cave will be more obtuse than stone or wood, lacking all capacity for res novas. 28. AN 6.11.4; CYPRIAN, To Demetrianus 12.

42

M. EDWARDS

the benign, omnipotent and everlasting God whom it proclaims (1.25.4; 2.74.4). Rome’s pantheon is constantly renewed by procreation and infiltration (1.34; 2.61.2; 3.8.3; 3.9.1), but true piety, in every place, is to honour the One whose ordinances are eternal and whose being admits no change (2.72.2; 2.75.4)29. 4. It is no surprise that an author who betrays so little acquaintance with the Old Testament should be equally ignorant of the Book of Enoch. It is more surprising that he should be almost a stranger to the Christian usage of the word d(a)emon. In all it occurs six times in his apology, five times in the first book, once in the second and never again thereafter. Twice it is used of beings humbled by the power of Christ (AN 1.45.2; 1.50.3), once of the same beings when they corrupt the records of his ministry (1.56.3), and once again when they enable the magi to perform counterfeit miracles (1.43.2). All these, we may say, are extensions of the biblical vocabulary in defence of the biblical narrative; on its first occurrence, however, an approximation to Neoplatonic usage permits Arnobius to contrast the true gods (dii veri) with the vagabond daemons (daemones errones) who deceive the pagan world (1.23.3). At 2.53.3 he observes that Plato has taught his followers to regard deities, angels and daemons as three orders of divinity, but retorts that if one acknowledges one Father of all, one must believe that all the others spring form him by birth or by procession (cf. 2.35.4). At this point he is arguing ad hominem, knowing well that Platonists also posit one father of all30 and subordinate daemons to higher gods without denying them all share in divinity. To understand his strategy as a philosopher, and the subtlety with which he disarms the imputation of novelty, we must now turn to his polemic against the philosophers – at one time, perhaps, his own intellectual kindred – whom he now finds it expedient to deride as novi viri, or new men. II. THE NEW

AND THE

TRUE

It is not clear whether the first allocution to the novi viri at AN 2.13 betokens a change of subject. At 2.11 Arnobius has already named Numenius and Cronius31 – not the least obscure of Platonists – as favourite 29. It would be tedious to multiply citations, but the play on novem, novitas and Novensiles at AN 3.38ff. will also repay study. 30. See PLATO, Timaeus 28c. 31. Unless the reading at AN 2.11.2 should be Crotonio, an epithet of Pythagoras: see TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), p. 178, n. 89.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

43

authorities of his interlocutors, and even his assertion at the opening of the book that “you alone have not believed” would be incongruous if addressed to the Roman people as a whole, for (as he says) they had their quota of believers. Book 2 has its own peroration, and is also the only one that hints at a date of composition prior to Diocletian’s edict against the church in 303. It is possible therefore that it was once a discrete work which was subsequently inserted rather than woven into the grand apology Against the Nations. Its immaturity might explain the assiduous use of reasoning which even then would have struck most readers as Gnostic rather than orthodox; at the same time, he was not entirely a novice in Christianity, since the incidence of allusion to the New Testament is, if anything, higher than in the other books. The doctrines of the new men are adumbrated in chapters 13 and 14, not directly but by assimilation to the Christian beliefs on which they vent their satire. “You (he exclaims) who follow Mercury, Plato and Pythagoras, why do you mock our decision to venerate only the father and lord of all when the Theaetetus exhorts you to seek the greatest possible likeness to in thought and disposition? Can you deride us for teaching the resurrection of the body and yet embrace the prophecy in the Statesman of a time when the world will turn back in its course and men born old will end life as children in their cradles? Why do you cavil when we provide more carefully for our souls than for our bodies, when you too admit that the soul is our proper self and that the body is its prison? … And why is it more ridiculous for us to speak of the suffering of the reprobate in Gehenna than for Plato to lace his dialogues with mages of Cocytus, Phlegethon, Acheron and the Styx”32? The capital mistake of the novi viri (designated as such for the first time in chapter 15) is to credit the soul with a natural immortality, when in fact it is of an intermediate character, and God alone determines its longevity in accordance with its merits33. Failing to grasp the disparity between creature and creator, they “exalt the embodied soul above the sun and the stars”34, forgetting that we share our genital organs with the beasts, and that the arts in which we excel them are merely compensations for our inferiority in physical attributes (AN 5.17-19). In morality we fall far below them, as no animal ever acts against its own nature35; even in intellect, we are debtors to society, and if a child were reared 32. AN 2.13.2–2.14.2, alluding to PLATO, Phaedo 113d. Cf. TERTULLIAN, Apology 23.13. 33. Cf. AN 2.14.6. Arnobius leaves open the possibility of transmigration at AN 2.16.13, although at 2.14.4 he asserts that souls which are not saved return to nothing. 34. AN 2.19.2, reminiscent of PLOTINUS against the Gnostics, Enneads 2.9.13. 35. Cf. AN 2.17.1-2. For antecedents see SENECA, Letter 90; ALEXANDER OF APHRODISIAS, On Fate.

44

M. EDWARDS

alone from infancy, with only silent nurses to feed and tend him36, we can be sure that he would never display the knowledge which is elicited from the slave-boy in the Meno with the sophistical pretence that he could not have acquired it in this life because he has never been to school37. Pierre Courcelle conjectures that the new men are disciples of Porphyry38, yet the taunts attributed to them do not recur in the handful of passages which can be securely assigned to that author’s work against the Christians. As Chiara Tommasi observes, the first Platonist to rank Hermes Trismegistus with Pythagoras and Plato was not Porphyry but his pupil Iamblichus39; the latter, we know, was not ignorant of Numenius40, and allusions in Arnobius to secret rituals and the coercion of daemons sit more easily with his treatise On the Mysteries than with his master’s Letter to Anebo41. We may add that when the Christian orator speaks of Pythagoras yielding his breath or spirit he seems to be claiming back from Iamblichus a phrase which he had purloined from the Gospel of John42. Moreover, it is Iamblichus, not Porphyry who is known to have written commentaries on the majority of the dialogues which are cited in confutation of the new men43. Even the surviving works of Iamblichus, however, cannot throw light on the reference to the mysteries of Etruria near the end of the disquisition (AN 2.62); the name of Cornelius Labeo has also entered scholarly discussions44, although even the date of this author is in dispute. On the other hand, the argument that our embodied souls are no better than those of brutes cannot fail to remind us of Porphyry’s use of the converse thesis in Book 3 of his work On Abstinence to persuade his readers that animals have as much right to immunity from murder as human beings. In fact the rebuttal of the novi viri is a tissue of borrowings from 36. Cf. AN 2.20-23, a parody of HERODOTUS, Histories 2.2, where Pharaoh Psammetichus performs just such an experiment, and deduces from the children’s untaught knowledge of the word bekkos, the Phrygian for “bread”, that Phrygian is the most primitive language. 37. AN 2.24.1, ridiculing PLATO, Meno 82b-86a. 38. P. COURCELLE, Les sages de Porphyre et les viri novi d’Arnobe, in Revue des Études Latines 31 (1953) 257-271; A.-J. FESTUGIÈRE, La doctrine des viri novi sur l’origine et le sort des âmes, in Mémorial Lagrange, Paris, Gabalda, 1940, 97-132 had argued for a more eclectic pedigree. 39. TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), pp. 184-185, n. 108. 40. On the Mysteries 1.5. 41. See AN 2.13.8; also AN 4.12.2, with TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), p. 360, n. 55, citing On the Mysteries 3.31. 42. AN 1.40.2; cf. IAMBLICHUS, On the Pythagorean Life 35 and John 19,30. 43. See J.M. DILLON (ed.), Iamblichi Chalcidensis Commentaria, Leiden, Brill, 1973. Arnobius cites Theaetetus 158b at AN 2.7.7; Phaedo 113b at AN 2.13.2; Statesman 270b at AN 2.13.6; the main subject of the Phaedrus at AN 2.34.2; Timaeus 41d at AN 2.52.2. 44. P. MASTANDREA, Cornelio Labeone: Un Neoplatonico Latino, Leiden, Brill, 1979, pp. 127-129; A. SMITH, Porphyrian Studies since 1913, in Auftstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt 2.36.2 (1992) 717-773, at pp. 766-768.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

45

the Platonic tradition. The Meno, as we have noted, is turned on its head, together with the anecdote in Herodotus which was supposed to reveal the origin of language. The first Greek to maintain that individuals owe their virtues to society was Protagoras, as a speaker in Plato’s dialogue of that name. The interpretation of the rivers of Hades as conceits for the anguish of the delinquent soul can be traced to Pythagorean literature. The contention of the new men that souls are sent into the world for their edification is attested both in Porphyry and in Iamblichus; the vehement retort of Arnobius, burnished and bloated with every figure of eloquence, is that no benign deity would condemn us to bondage in a realm where we find no antidote for evil and can hope for nothing better than a quick death as a reprieve from tribulation (AN 2.39-43). We have called this Gnostic reasoning, but it is redolent also of the more pessimistic strain in Plato, which derives the noun soma (“body”) from sêma, or “tomb”. It raises a problem for orthodox Christianity which appears to be soluble only by returning to the notorious doctrine of Plato himself that the soul is by nature a denizen of the heavens, which descends to the lower world only as a result of its own temerity. Arnobius does not reach for this solution (which had already been castigated as Origen’s heresy), but neither is he ashamed to cite the Timaeus in corroboration of the biblical doctrine that the world has a beginning and endures only by the will of its creator (2.36.2). He does not quarrel with the delegation of sovereignty to the lesser gods in this dialogue; in this book he prefers the term dii to daemones or angeli (both of which he attributes only to the Platonists) and admits their existence so long as it is granted that they do not demand sacrifices, being creatures of the one God and immortal only by his will (2.35). The seventh book is another in which the premisses of Platonism serve the ends of Christian apologetic45. The opponents of Arnobius – no doubt the same men who reproach the Christians for their impiety in the first book – now contend that the favour of the gods must be secured by the constant sacrifice of beasts. Arnobius replies with the standard argument that a god, being incorporeal, can be in no need of sustenance, moreover, since divinity implies goodness, a being who demands the slaughter of innocent creatures cannot be divine. But for this proviso, he does not contest the assumption that there is more than one divinity; his originality lies in building a case that excludes not only animal sacrifice but even the bloodless oblations that were enjoined by both philosophy and the church. While we need not doubt his knowledge of it, no study of Porphyry’s treatise 45. See further R. LAURENTI, Il Platonismo di Arnobio, in Studi Filosofici 4 (1981) 3-54.

46

M. EDWARDS

On Abstinence was required to support this reasoning; and on the other hand, no account is taken of the Iamblichean thesis that we sacrifice for our own sake, disengaging ourselves by stages from the baser appetites by the surrender of our material property. Indifference to one’s contemporaries was typical of sophists in every epoch; it is not a sign of ignorance, and Arnobius may have wished his more learned readers be aware, when he sneers at the offering of vegetables, that Iamblichus had commended this humble gift as an acknowledgement of the omnipresent bounty of the gods46. Again the tone might almost be that of a Platonist deploring an aberrant tendency in his own school. Such co-option is not unusual among Latin Christians. Tertullian, who proves his theology only from the Bible, can make common cause with the Stoics when he has to prove the corporeality of the soul; Platonizing Gnostics furnish Marius Victorinus with his nomenclature for the persons of the Trinity; Augustine could have written most of his first two books against the Academics without abandoning Platonism for the church. Minucius Felix answers Cotta in Ciceronian periods; in the fifth book of his Divine Institutes Lactantius becomes a Christian redactor of Cicero’s treatise On the Laws47. Much has been said in recent times of mimicry as a device by which a subject people mocks and subverts the pretensions of its overlords; while there is clearly something of this in Arnobius and his African co-religionists, it is equally clear that we cannot apply the lexicon of modern historiography without qualification to the Roman era. The aim of our final section will be to ascertain how much the work of Arnobius is coloured by the fact that he wrote in Africa and not in some other province of the west.

III. PROVENANCE AND PROVINCIALITY We cannot doubt that African writers before him had been more apt to proclaim their origins than to disguise them. Apuleius confesses, or rather boasts, in the prologue to his Golden Ass that his speech will sound exotic to the Roman ear48; the author of the philippic that Minucius Felix puts into the mouth of his pagan speaker is Fronto, “our fellow-townsman of 46. Contrast AN 7.24 with On the Mysteries 5.23. 47. See B. COLOT, Lactance: Penser la conversion de Rome au temps de Constantin, Paris, Broché, 2014, chapter 3. 48. On APULEIUS and TERTULLIAN’s On the Pallium see M.J. EDWARDS, Reflections on the African Character of Apuleius, in A. KAHANE – A. LAIRD (eds.), A Companion to the Prologue of Apuleius’ Metamorphoses, Oxford, Clarendon, 2001, 47-54.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

47

Cirta” (Octavius 9), from which it follows, no doubt, that if the Empire can include Africa it need not exclude the church. Tertullian recalls the sack of Carthage in his diatribe On the Pallium and deplores the errors of the Roman see in two of his theological treatises49; still more offensive to the well-schooled pagan was his purposeful cultivation of a style that defied every principle of taste yet was too brilliant to be despised as the bombast of an aspiring peasant. Lactantius returns to the Ciceronian idiom, but only to lend orotundity to his strictures on Rome as the plunderer of nations (Divine Institutes 6.9.4). The pax Romana brings no peace with God, and the Christian’s citizenship in heaven (Phil 3,20) is worth more than the legal status which had now been extended to every freeborn person of the Empire, thereby ceasing to confer any privilege even in this world. In this respect, the west imitates the east. The statement in the Epistle to Diognetus that a Christian is of no race and no language is as hostile to Roman policy as the celebration of barbarism in Justin50 and Tatian is hostile to the pretensions of Greek culture. Loyalty to the Emperor was bound up with the observance of local cults and obedience to local vassals, and, since the Greek tongue was spoken wherever Roman law prevailed, contempt for one was a challenge to the other. Had Tatian been a pagan, he might have cultivated the Attic mannerisms that proved so remunerative for his fellow-Syrian, Lucian of Samosata; as a Christian, he has freed himself at once from cultural arrogance and from coercive polytheism51. Even Clement, who cannot disavow his education, declines to cultivate the elegance of the sophists, and aligns himself with those who deny the invention of philosophy to the Greeks. No wonder that Celsus, the author of the first sustained invective against Christianity, should have taxed it not only with playing on credulity and ignorance but with imperilling the survival of the Empire, which he regarded as a mirror of God’s own governance of the world through his superhuman viceroys. It might seem that Arnobius takes the side of the barbarian when he scoffs at those who cannot believe the gospels because they are full of solecisms. Command of grammar, he argues, is no guarantee of veracity, least of all in a culture which measures the talents of a sophist by his ability to give lies the appearance of truth. If our canons of elegance were dictated by nature rather than convention, we ought to trust the poets rather than the evangelists; in fact, it is our caprice that gives a word one meaning 49. TERTULLIAN, On the Pallium 1.3; Against Praxeas 1.5; On Modesty 1.6. 50. See especially First Apology 5. 51. See L. NASRALLAH, Justin, Tatian, Lucian and the Second Sophistic, in Harvard Theological Review 98 (2005) 283-314.

48

M. EDWARDS

rather than another (AN 1.59.6), while the rules that determine gender and declension are so arbitrary that even learned speech admits both caelus and caelum, hic panis and hoc pane, candelabrum and candelaber (1.59.10). At this point, however (a point that is already far beyond pedantry), the reader can no longer see Arnobius as a barbarian: on the contrary, he has demonstrated a mastery of both accidence and usage, of the language both written and spoken, that would do honour do the most erudite of his pagan interlocutors. Arnobius never misses an opportunity to surprise us with a torrent of exotic names; rejoicing in circuitous constructions, he will often eke out a sentence that is already too long with a string of recondite terms that we would now think suitable only for a thesaurus. If he seldom falls into the elliptical syntax of Tertullian, he avoids the classical periods which Lactantius, a student of his own school, was able to round so smoothly. Since all three were African – and since, for that matter, most Latin of this epoch is African Latin – it would seem that his idiosyncrasies are designed to advertise not his provincial origins, but the breadth and versatility of his intellectual culture. The accusation of ignorance thus recoils upon his adversaries: there are indeed few epithets that come to him more readily than stolidus in his frequent denunciations of their rites and supposed beliefs52. Since they oppress the church in the name of Rome, his task is to show them, as their own compatriot in the republic of letters, that there is nothing left of Rome outside the church. “‘But these’, it is said, ‘are not the rites of our commonwealth (rei publicae)’” (AN 5.24.1). The remonstrants are evidently the people of Rome, notwithstanding the exclamation “What have you to say, oh nations? (quid dicitis, o gentes)” a little earlier in the same book (5.14.1). The reply of Arnobius echoes his apostrophe to the same Romans in his first book, Vestra sunt haec, “these are your abominations” (1.24.1). It might be felt that on both occasions too much has been laid at a single door, for in Book 1 he makes the Romans answerable not only for the Lares, Aius Locutius and Faunus (who were all powers native to Italy)53, but for Jupiter’s north African avatar Hammon54 and four oracles of Apollo in the east. In Book 5 their intervention follows a series of lampoons on foreign mysteries, all involving abominations of the kind that were in fact forestalled 52. AN 1.3.3; 1.28.2; 1.54.3; 1.65.6; 2.7.10; 2.12.1; 2.30.5; 2.32.2; 2.54.3; 2.77.2; 3.16.2; 5.1.2; 5.12.7; 6.15.2; 7.20.2. On the Lucretian timbre of this word see F. MONTARESE, Lucretius and His Sources: A Study of De Rerum Natura 1. 635-920, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2012, pp. 85-187. 53. AN 1.28.1-2. 54. AN 6.12.2 and 6.12.4; on the text of AN 1.26.3 see TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), p. 98.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

49

by Numa when, according the story recounted in the opening chapters, he cunningly circumvented Jupiter’s ordinances for human sacrifice (5.1-2). In this tale, adapted from Ovid, the gods who lead Numa to Jupiter are befuddled with new wine (5.1.6; 5.2.2); the one that follows, the longest surviving account of the emasculation of Attis (5.5-7), is derived from the Greek Timotheus (5.7.1), who had famously clamoured that new songs are better than old55. Thus their utility to the Christian satirist is obvious, but have they any logical force against the “bacchantic” imputations of atheism and blasphemy which he undertook to explode at the beginning of Book 1? The clue lies in this metaphor, the suppression of the Bacchanals in 186 BC being the most celebrated measure of the Senate in defence of the mos maiorum56. Livy’s account of it tinctured the Roman perception of Christianity57, but not before the capital had become a home to the onceforbidden orgies. This is but one example of the flowing of the Orontes into the Tiber which was deplored by Juvenal, and for the Christian one more piece of evidence that what Horace said of Greece – the captured took the conqueror captive – was now true of every nation that lived under the sway of Rome58. Arnobius keeps a rhetorical silence regarding the Bacchanalia59, into which he smuggles allusions to the handling of snakes and the bloodying of the mouth with a goat’s intestines (AN 5.19.1). He has already hinted at flagellation and drunkenness in the rites of the Bona Dea (5.18.3) and narrated the obscene history of the Dei Conserentes (5.18.4-5); he now affects to have nothing to say of the Cyprian Venus except that her votaries bring back a phallus in return for courting her like a harlot (5.19.2), and nothing again of the Corybants, except that the fratricide which their rites commemorate resulted in the growth of celery and an interdict on vegetables (5.19.4). Returning to Bacchus, he now relates a second myth, in which he is dismembered in his infancy by the Titans set to guard him; Jupiter is tempted to consume his fragrant remains, but perceives the fraud and avenges the child by reducing his murderers to ashes (5.19.4). He cuts a poorer figure in the next myth, in which he tries to seduce the Phrygian 55. See E. CSAPO – P. WILSON, Timotheus the New Musician, in F. BUDELMANN (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Greek Lyric, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, 277-294. 56. LIVY, Histories 39.8-18; A. ERNOUT, Recueil de textes latins archaïques, Paris, Klincksiek, 1947, pp. 58-61. 57. R.M. GRANT, Pliny and the Christians, in Harvard Theological Review 41 (1948) 273-274. 58. JUVENAL, Satire 3.62; HORACE, Epistles 2.1.156. 59. AN 5.19.1: Bacchanalia etiam praetermittemus inmania, quibus nomen Omophagiis Graecum est.

50

M. EDWARDS

goddess, his mother, but is repulsed as she assumes the formidable guise of Brimo; he none the less contrives to copulate with her as a bull, and when a daughter is born to them ravishes her also in the guise of a terrible serpent (5.20-21). Protest as you will, he admonishes his readers, the villain of every fable is Jupiter (5.22.5), and this is the god who in his second appearance in Book 1 is Jupiter Optimus Maximus, to whom the spoils are dedicated at the end of every Roman war (1.34.1). What of the author’s native Africa? It is fair to say that, but for Jerome’s testimony, we should never guess that he had set foot in the province. In contrast to Tertullian and Cyprian, he never addresses an African magistrate, and his allusions to local phenomena are not frequent enough to catch a reader’s attention in a work of such vast and heterogeneous learning. He cites the name Hammon, but without commentary60; he certainly knows of the celebrated remedies for snakebite which were offered by the Psylli (AN 2.32.2). It is Pliny the Elder, however, who bears witness to their celebrity, and Pliny was not an African. More cogent as evidence of local knowledge is his reference to a drought among the Gaetuli and Zingitani coinciding with a rich harvest among the Mauri (1.16); his use of the appellative Bocchores for the gods of the latter tribe (1.36) is alleged by Simmons as evidence of his knowing that they invariably addressed their gods in the plural. In fact, however, the reading is uncertain, and the plural of the name Bonchor is unattested in literature or in inscriptions61. Even granting all that Simmons conjectures, Arnobius offers us only scant and fleeting indices of his “North African environment”62: one did not need to be indigenous to have heard of the Garamantes (6.5), and Africa was not the only territory in which stone could be quarried (2.40). Arnobius’ recollection of his own past is vague enough to be veridical, as Simmons holds it to be against A.D. Nock63. “I too”, he says, “adored mere effigies fresh from the furnace, gods forged upon the anvil or with hammers bones of elephants, pictures, ribbons on ageing trees, and stones anointed with oil of olive as though some present force resided in them” (AN 1.39.1). The animism that Simmons detects here, far from being peculiar to the Berbers, is the justification offered for image-worship in Porphyry’s treatise On Statues: Arnobius may in fact have had no distinct theory in mind, as he goes on to confess, in the language of the prophets, 60. AN 1.26.3 and 6.12.2 and 4, as above. 61. E. LIPIŃSKI, Bonchor de Béja, in Latomus 64 (2005) 404-408. 62. SIMMONS, Arnobius of Sicca (n. 1), p. 108. 63. Ibid., p. 109. On its vagueness, see TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), p. 119, n. 220. A.D. NOCK, Conversion, Oxford, Clarendon, 1933, p. 258 suggests that it should not be taken “too literally”.

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

51

that he treated these things like sentient creatures, knowing them to be mere wood and stone. Simmons observes that animists in modern Tunisia deck the boughs of trees in ribbons; we cannot prove that Arnobius was acquainted with this practice, but he tells us that a pine was swathed in bands of wool for the obsequies of Attis (5.16.3). If by bones of elephants he means ivory, the most famous executor of such an image was the Athenian Phidias64. Arnobius does evince a special interest in two deities, Saturn and Venus, who were widely revered in Africa; it is easily shown, however, that the Saturn and Venus against whom he inveighs were known to him only form texts that he might have perused in any library. 1. Hecatombs of Carthaginian children to Baal, whom Romans knew as Saturn and Greeks as Cronos, were notorious, and Tertullian professes, as we have seen, to have grown up among spectators of such atrocities. This however, is an association, that Arnobius seems determined to ignore. Saturn enters the treatise as the founder of Saturnia, an Italian city distinguished by a reference in the Aeneid. In Book 2 he figures three times, always as an Italian deity, requiring human sacrifice from Hercules (AN 2.69), and siring not only Jupiter (here called Jove) but Picus, the grandfather of Latinus (2.70.2; 2.71.3). He is coupled with Janus at 3.6.2, is identified with the Greek Cronos, hence with Khronos (“Time”) at 3.29.5, and is once again the father of Jupiter at 3.30.2. Although his consort has hitherto been Ops, he is mated with the mother of the gods at 3.32.3. At 4.9.3 his name is derived from satio, the Latin word for sowing, and at 4.14.1 he is one of five deities with a son named Jove. At 4.20.1 he renews his marriage with Ops; at 4.22 the adjective “Saturnian” is attached to his offspring Jupiter and Juno, and at 4.24.3 he is charged with the parricide for which the Greek Cronos was imprisoned. At 6.12 and 6.25, however, he bears the sickle which pertains to him as the ruler of Italy in its golden age. It is typical of Arnobius to dwell on the manifold representations of the same god in pagan cult and myth, and it is thus all the more remarkable that he never once gives the name Saturn to an African divinity. If it is true (as some maintain on less than compelling evidence) that the African Saturn is hidden under the appellation Frugifer at 6.10.765, this illustrates the reluctance of Arnobius to use the god’s Latin name in any context that would enable a Roman audience to say “his crimes are not ours”. 64. TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), p. 119, n. 221. 65. T.D. BARNES, Monotheists All?, in Phoenix 55 (2001) 142-162, at p. 153, n. 12: contrast TOMMASI (ed.), Arnobio contra i pagani (n. 1), pp. 486-487, n. 79. In any case, he fails to refute my observation that Saturn in Arnobius is never the name of an African deity: to say that when he refers to the African deity he never calls him Saturn is simply to state the logical converse of the same proposition.

52

M. EDWARDS

2. Arnobius, as an inhabitant of Sicca, will have been aware of its famous cult of Venus. A contemporary inscription records the erection of a statue of this goddess to replace one that had been stolen many years earlier. Michael Simmons, noting that an animadversion on sacrilege at AN 6.23 is preceded by a “scathing attack” on an image of Venus, surmises that both passages were inspired by the theft at Sicca66. Arnobius in fact describes not one image but two (6.22), one in Cyprus and one in Carian Gnidus, both known to him only from books and both (as one might infer) more celebrated than the tenant of his local shrine. Venus figures in catalogues of Greek and Roman deities at 1.36.4; 2.70.3 and 3.6.1; at 3.26.1 and 3.27.1 she is patron of love and mother of Cupid, while at 3.33.1-2 she is merely a personification of lust. Having mocked her numerous guises at 4.7.1; 4.15.1 and 4.17.3 Arnobius is predictably disgusted at 4.24.3 by the birth of the Cytherean Venus from the severed genitals of the sky-god. At 7.30.8 he alludes to another venereal rite that is mentioned by Valerius Maximus, but it is not local to Africa. In short, as McCracken observes67, we are struck by his failure to say anything of Venus that betrays his own provenance. I have now replied in detail to the argument of Simmons, taking care that there should not even be a parenthesis that I have “totally ignored”68. Nevertheless it seems to me still, as it seemed to me twenty years ago, that Arnobius keeps an indomitable silence regarding his African heritage, even where it might have been natural for him to divulge it. It would not matter if this silence were occasionally broken by some inadvertent revelation: I do not mean to deny that he was an African, but only to maintain that the argumentative contest for him is never with Africa, but with Rome. 66. SIMMONS, Arnobius of Sicca (n. 1), pp. 103-105, citing Valerius Maximus 2.6.15 on prostitution as a preliminary to marriage. We have no reason to think that Valerius Maximus was an African. 67. MCCRACKEN, Arnobius of Sicca (n. 1), p. 7. 68. M.B. SIMMONS, Universal Salvation in Late Antiquity: Porphyry of Tyre and the Pagan-Christian Debate, New York, Oxford University Press, 2015, p. 302, n. 50, where (if I have understood him) he himself totally ignores my brief discussion of his arguments on the very page that he cites and the one that follows: see The Flowering of Latin Apologetic: Lactantius and Arnobius, in EDWARDS – GOODMAN – PRICE (eds.), Apologetics in the Roman Empire (n. 2), 197-222, pp. 198-199. The charge of having “totally ignored” his own discoveries is levelled against other scholars eight times in this book: thus I am also said on p. 302, n. 56 to have “totally ignored” the proscription of sacrifice by Constantine in Dating Arnobius: Why Discount the Evidence of Jerome?, in L’Antiquité Tardive 12 (2004) 263-271. In fact (at p. 268, n. 27) I offer a short bibliography on this disputed subject, though my argument does not require me to take a side. Again, on p. 301 I am accused of “completely” ignoring the doubts attaching to Jerome’s chronology in the same article, notwithstanding my brief observation in n. 3.

53

ARNOBIUS ON PAGANISM

To him this name represents not the ancient city, the decadent nurse of Cicero and Seneca to which Lactantius addressed his Institutes of the true religion; it represents what is called the Roman Empire – in reality a pandemonium of idols where profanity and dissipation masquerade as holiness, where nothing is ancient except the procession of novelties, and the so-called mistress is in fact the slave and dupe of all. Christ Church College University of Oxford [email protected]

Mark EDWARDS

WHERE HAVE ALL THE PAGANS GONE FROM THE HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS OF OROSIUS? I. OROSIUS We do not know much about Orosius1. He was a Spaniard, but he left Spain early in the fifth century (411?), arrived in North Africa in 414, and met Augustine there. Obviously, Augustine appreciated him. Therefore, he recommended him to Jerome, gave him some instructions concerning Pelagius and awaited him back after his travel in the East. In his recommendation letter to Jerome, Augustine describes Orosius as: Behold, a religious young man has come to me, by name Orosius, who is in the bond of catholic peace a brother, in point of age a son, and in honor a fellow presbyter, a man of quick understanding, ready speech, and burning zeal, desiring to be in the Lord’s house a vessel rendering useful service in refuting those false and pernicious doctrines, through which the souls of men in Spain have suffered much more grievous wounds than have been inflicted on their bodies by the sword of the barbarians2.

1. On Orosius’ vita see the introduction of A.T. FEAR in his translation of Orosius: Seven Books of History against the Pagans (Translated Texts for Historians, 54), Liverpool, Liverpool University Press, 2010, pp. 1-6; see also S. BRADBURY, Severus of Minorca: Letter on the Conversion of the Jews (Oxford Early Christian Texts), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. 16-25; P.M. CAVERO – D.B. CORBALÁN – R.G. FERNÁNDEZ, El Commonitorium de Orosio: Traducción y comentario, in Faventia 21 (1999) 65-83; V. GAUGE, Les routes d’Orose et les reliques d’Étienne, in Antiquité Tardive 6 (1998) 265-286; P. VAN NUFFELEN, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History (Oxford Early Christian Studies), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2012, pp. 26-30; J. VILELLA, Biografía crítica de Orosio, in Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 43 (2000) 94-121. Cf. also H. BRANDT, Historia magistra vitae? Orosius und die spätantike Historiographie, in A. GOLTZ – H. LEPPIN – H. SCHLANGE-SCHÖNINGEN (eds.), Jenseits der Grenzen: Beiträge zur spätantiken und frühmittelalterlichen Geschichtsschreibung (Millennium Studies, 25), Berlin – Boston, MA, De Gruyter, 2009, 121-133; H.-W. GOETZ, Die Geschichtstheologie des Orosius (Impulse der Forschung, 32), Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1980; R. HERZOG, Orosius und die Formulierung eines Fortschrittkonzepts aus der Erfahrung des Niedergangs (1980), in ID., Spätantike: Studien zur römischen und lateinisch-christlichen Literatur, ed. P. HABERMEHL, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002, 293-320. 2. AUGUSTINUS, Epistula 166.2 (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 44, 547,5-9, ed. A. GOLDBACHER): ecce uenit ad me religiosus iuuenis catholica pace frater, aetate filius, honore conpresbyter noster orosius uigil ingenio, paratus eloquio, flagrans studio, utile uas in domo domini esse desiderans ad refellendas falsas perniciosasque doctrinas, quae animas hispanorum multo infelicius quam corpora barbaricus gladius trucidarunt. Trans. J.G. CUNNINGHAM (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers 1/1, 523).

56

U. HEIL

But neither the barbarian invasion3 nor the Pelagian debate was Orosius’ main interest4, but rather the troubles in Spain with the Priscillians and Origenists, about which he was looking for further support and information. Later on, he was asked to bring some relics of the martyr Stephen from Jerusalem to Braga in Spain. In fact, one gets the impression that Orosius was a sort of travel agent for multiple clients or projects, and it is fascinating how the different quarrels of those times intersect in the person of Orosius: first the controversy on Origen, which arouse in the East in the 390s and, in the meantime, also occupied Augustine and spread to Spain5; second the debate between Augustine and Pelagius and last but not least the dispute about the Priscillianists in Spain6. Actually, on his way back from Jerusalem to Spain, Orosius did stay again with Augustine in North Africa (since 4167) and experienced the ongoing debates regarding Pelagius. He brought the relics not to Braga, but to Magona on Minorca8, and he disappears from historical sources 3. Although he obviously fled from Spain as he mentioned in Hist. 3.20.6-7; 5.2.1-2. 4. However, he defended Augustine’s position on the synod in Jerusalem in July 415, was himself accused of heresy and wrote the Liber apologeticus contra Pelagium (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 5, 603-664, ed. K. ZANGEMEISTER). On Pelagius cf. W. LÖHR, Art. Pelagius, in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 27, Stuttgart, Hiersemann, 2016, 1-26; V. DRECOLL, Art. Pelagius / Pelagiani, in Augustinus-Lexikon 4, Basel, Schwabe, 2014-2016, 624-666; A. BONNER, The Myth of Pelagianism, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018; cf. also G. MALAVESI, The Greek Version(s) of Augustine’s De gestis Pelagii, in Zeitschrift für Antikes Christentum 21 (2018) 559-572. 5. Cf. on this matter AUGUSTINUS, Ad Orosium contra Priscillianistas et Origenistas, eingeleitet, übersetzt und kommentiert von V.H. DRECOLL unter Mitarbeit von M. KUDELLA (Augustinus. Opera – Werke, 50), Paderborn – München – Wien – Zürich, Schöningh, 2013, pp. 299-381; V. DRECOLL, With Origen against Manichaeism: Orosius’ Commonitorium against Priscillian and the Early Reception of Origen in Spain, in A.-C. JACOBSEN (ed.), Origeniana Undecima: Origen and Origenism in the History of Western Thought. Papers of the 11th International Origen Congress, Aarhus 2013 (BETL, 279), Leuven – Paris – Bristol, CT, Peeters, 2016, 511-524; U. HEIL, Augustine and the Origenist Controversy in the West: Some Observations on the Commonitorium of Orosius, ibid., 525-543; T. TOOM, Was Priscillian a Modalist Monarchian?, in Harvard Theological Review 107 (2014) 470-484. 6. Cf. n. 4 and 5 above. 7. Cf. AUGUSTINUS, Epistula 175 from a synod in Carthage to Innocent of Rome, which refers to Orosius’ arrival in North Africa and his information about the developments in the East. Cf. also AUGUSTINUS, Epistula 172.1 (this is a letter of Jerome, which relates Orosius’ stay with him). 8. The route and chronology is debated, cf. HEIL, Augustine and the Origenist Controversy in the West (n. 5), p. 527, with note 9. On the relics of protomartyr Stephen, their deposition in Magona on Menorca and the anti-Jewish riots, see BRADBURY, Severus of Minorca (n. 1); E.D. HUNT, St. Stephen in Minorca: An Episode in Jewish-Christian Relations, in Journal of Theological Studies 33 (1982) 106-123; M. SCHÄRTL, Der imperiale Gott – oder zur Christianisierung Menorcas, in N. HÖMKE et al. (eds.), Bilder von dem Einen Gott: Die Rhetorik des Bildes in monotheistischen Gottesdarstellungen der

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

57

in 4189. However, meanwhile, he had accepted another assignment: this order came again from Augustine, and he urged Orosius to write a history. But this was not a normal history, but a history of the catastrophes and miseries of the world across the ages. He started writing while Augustine himself was working on his De civitate Dei, Book 11, as Orosius himself states10, and probably finished his Historiae adversus paganos by 41811. Orosius writes at the beginning of his work: (9) You have instructed me to write against the arrogant wickedness of those who are strangers of the City of God and are called pagans, taking their name from the crossroads and fields in the countryside, or otherwise gentiles, because they know the things of this world. These men, as they do not look to the future and have either forgotten or are ignorant of the past, besmirch the present as a time particularly full of evils, far beyond those which are always with us, and do so for this reason alone: because Christ is believed in and God is worshipped, while their idols are worshipped the less. (10) You have instructed me, therefore, to set out in a book, concisely and in order, all the troubles caused by wars, the ravages of disease, the sorrows caused by hunger, the terrible events brought about by earthquakes, the unexpected disasters caused by floods, the terror caused by volcanic eruptions, the Spätantike (Philologus. Supplementary Volumes, 6), Berlin – Boston, MA, De Gruyter, 2016, 289-307; cf. also F. BOVON – B. BOUVIER, La translation des reliques de saint Étienne le premier martyr, in Analecta Bollandiana 131 (2013) 5-50 on the translation of the relics of Stephen to Constantinople in the fifth century. On the relevance of Stephen for Augustine and North Africa, see M. KLÖCKENER, Art. Festa sanctorum et martyrum, in Augustinus-Lexikon 2, Basel, Schwabe, 1996-2002, 1281-1305, esp. cc. 1298-1299. On the miraculous discovery of the relics in 415 cf. the latin translation by Avitus of Braga of the “Apocalypse of St. Stephen” of presbyter Lucianus (BHG 1648x-1649; BHL 78501756). 9. The last mentioned event in his Histories (see n. 11), namely Hist. 7.43.10, is the death of the Gothic king Vallia. 10. OROSIUS, Hist. 1 prol. 11 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 8): Maxime cum reuerentiam tuam perficiendo aduersum hos ipsos paganos undecimo libro insistentem, quorum iam decem orientes radii mox ut de specula ecclesiasticae claritatis elati sunt toto orbe fulserunt (“I thought it right that your Reverence should not be bothered with this slight work while you were working hard to complete your eleventh book against these same pagans, the soaring rays of ten others of which having already swiftly shone across the whole world, as they blazed forth from a watchtower of the church’s bright light”). The English translations of Orosius are taken from FEAR, Orosius (n. 1). This reference is in itself used as a hint to date the work of Augustine, cf. G.J.P. O’DALY, Art. Ciuitate dei (De-), in AugustinusLexikon 1, Basel, Schwabe, 1986-1994, 969-1010, esp. c. 974. 11. The critical editions are in Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 5, Wien, apud C. Geroldi filium, 1882, ed. K. ZANGEMEISTER and, used in this article: OROSE, Histoires contre les Païens, texte établi et trad. par M.-P. ARNAUD-LINDET (Collection des universités de France. Série latine), Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1990-1991. A German translation can be found in A. LIPPOLD (ed.), Paulus Orosius: Die antike Weltgeschichte in christlicher Sicht, 2 vols. (Bibliothek der Alten Welt. Reihe Antike und Christentum), Zürich – München, Artemis & Winkler, 1985-1986; an English one by FEAR, Orosius (n. 1). About the chronology see above n. 1, esp. FEAR, Orosius, pp. 4-7.

58

U. HEIL

savagery of lightning strikes and hailstorms, and the misery caused by parricide and other such crimes, found in times gone by, which I could discover in all the records of the histories and annals which are to be had at the present12.

This is exactly what one can read in these seven books, and it is a demoralizing read, to be sure. War after war, cruelty after cruelty, murder after murder – and in between, plagues, earthquakes, famines, and so on. As is well-known, his challenge and aim was to minimize the catastrophe of Alaric’s plundering of Rome in 410 and to refute the pagans who faulted the Christianization of the Roman Empire with Rome’s ruin13. These pagans should be informed or enlightened about the true past, for either they have forgotten or ignored it. For obvious reasons, his main sources are the histories and annals of these very pagans: He must beat them with their own weapons14. The difference is, as Orosius himself states15, that the pagan historians unroll the 12. OROSIUS, Hist. 1 prol. 9-10 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 8): 9 Praeceperas mihi, uti aduersus vaniloquam pravitatem eorum, qui alieni a ciuitate Dei ex locorum agrestium conpitis et pagis pagani uocantur siue gentiles quia terrena sapiunt, qui cum futura non quaerant, praeterita autem aut obliuiscantur aut nesciant, praesentia tamen tempora ueluti malis extra solitum infestatissima ob hoc solum quod creditur Christus et colitur Deus, idola autem minus coluntur, infamant: 10 praeceperas ergo, ut ex omnibus qui haberi ad praesens possunt historiarum atque annalium fastis, quaecumque aut bellis grauia aut corrupta morbis aut fame tristia aut terrarum motibus terribilia aut inundationibus aquarum insolita aut eruptionibus ignium metuenda aut ictibus fulminum plagisque grandinum saeua uel etiam parricidiis flagitiisque misera per transacta retro saecula repperissem, ordinato breuiter uoluminis textu explicarem. 13. On Augustine’s and others’ reaction on 410 see W.H.C. FREND, Augustine’s Reactions to the Barbarian Invasions of the West: Some Comparisons with His Western Contemporaries, 407-417, in Augustinus 39 (1994) 241-255; H. SCHLANGE-SCHÖNINGEN, Augustinus und der Fall Roms: Theodizee und Geschichtsschreibung, in A. GOLTZ – H. LEPPIN – H. SCHLANGE-SCHÖNINGEN (eds.), Jenseits der Grenzen: Beiträge zur spätantiken und frühmittelalterlichen Geschichtsschreibung (Millennium Studies, 25), Berlin – Boston, MA, De Gruyter, 2009, 135-152; M. KULIKOWSKI, Die Goten vor Rom, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2009; M. MEIER – S. PATZOLD, August 410 – Ein Kampf um Rom, Stuttgart, Klett-Cotta, 2010; U. HEIL, Was hat Rom mit Sodom und Gomorra zu tun? De urbis excidio und andere heilsgeschichtliche Katastrophen, in M. MEYER-BLANCK (ed.), Geschichte und Gott: Europäischer Kongress für Theologie (14.-18. September 2014 in Berlin) (Veröffentlichung der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theologie, 44), Leipzig, Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2016, 519-540. 14. “Pagan” sources of Orosius are mainly JUSTIN, Epitome of Pompeius Trogus; LIVIUS, History of Rome; FLORUS, Epitome of Roman History and EUTROPIUS, Breviarium. See FEAR, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 15-16. See GOETZ, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 25-29; see also VAN NUFFELEN, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 95-114, who demonstrates by the example of the exempla collection of Valerius Maximus how Orosius intentionally changed his sources. However, not only pagans are Orosius’ intended readership; see note 91. 15. OROSIUS, Hist. 3 prol. 1 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 133): quippe cum illi bella, nos bellorum miserias euoluamus. Cf. also Hist. 1.3.5-6: Pagans do not know about the fall of men and the damnation of the entire human race. Cf. on the technique of Orosius, to make

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

59

heroic history of wars, but he unrolls the wars’ miseries and, in addition, the true forces of history, which are more or less hidden from the pagans. Four times he uses arcanus to describe this hidden plan of God (Hist. 2.3.4; 2.3.5; 5.4.10; 7.1.1), but he also uses latere or latentus to hint at divine provision or providentia, which are mostly divine punishments. His statement in Hist. 7.1.1 can be understood as a summary of this conviction: Enough material has been gathered together, I believe, from which it is shown openly without using that secret which belongs to the faithful few, that the One, true God, whom the Christian faith proclaims, created the world and, when he willed it, both dispersed his creation widely, though he was widely unknown, and also united it into one when he was proclaimed by his only Son, and that at the same time his power and patience have shone forth through many proofs of different kinds16.

As is well-known, Orosius presented these stories with a different emphasis than Augustine wanted. Orosius writes about this in his prologue: (13) I gave myself over to the work and straight away found myself in confusion, for I had often thought that the disasters of our present times seemed to rage beyond what could have been expected. (14) However, I found that the days gone by were as fraught as the present, and all the more horribly wretched as they were further from the salvation of true religion. So through this scrutiny it became clear, and rightly so, that death, greed for blood, had reigned when there was no knowledge of religion which keeps bloodshed at bay. For when religion spreads forth its light, death is confounded; death is imprisoned when religion is strong; indeed, in the profoundest sense death will not exist when religion alone reigns17. the audience feel the suffering (“Rhetoric of Pathos”) VAN NUFFELEN, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 115-144. He states: The “choice for pathos as the mode of narrative is part of the demonstration that pagan accounts are less truthful than the Historiae. The latter shows the true, sour flavor of the past, in conscious contrast with the sweet tones of the traditional accounts” (p. 131). 16. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.1.1 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 13): Sufficientia ut arbitror documenta collecta sunt, quibus absque illo arcano quod paucorum fidelium est probari de medio queat unum illum et uerum Deum quem Christiana fides praedicat, et condidisse mundum creaturamque eius, cum uoluit, et disposuisse per multa, cum per multa ignoraretur, et confirmasse ad unum, cum per unicum declaratus est, simulque potentiam patientiamque eius multimodis argumentis eluxisse. Cf. GOETZ, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 43 and 58-70. 17. OROSIUS, Hist. 1 prol. 13-14 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 9): 13 dedi operam et me ipsum in primis confusione pressi, cui plerumque reputanti super modum exaestuauisse praesentium clades temporum uidebantur. 14 nanctus sum enim praeteritos dies non solum aeque ut hos graues, uerum etiam tanto atrocius miseros quanto longius a remedio uerae religionis alienos: ut merito hac scrutatione claruerit regnasse mortem auidam sanguinis, dum ignoratur religio quae prohiberet a sanguine; ista inlucescente, illam constupuisse; illam concludi, cum ista iam praeualet; illam penitus nullam futuram, cum haec sola regnabit.

60

U. HEIL

The contextualization of 410 turned into a history of progress, and his history is an apologetic demonstration of the tempora Christiana against pagan criticism18. II. PAGANISM IN OROSIUS As quoted already above, Orosius composes his work against the pagans. He even defines them in the prologue: Paganus is the name “taken from the crossroads and fields in the countryside” (ex locorum agrestium conpitis et pagis).

This description is of importance, as it defines Orosius’ view on the term paganus. Obviously, he derives the sense of this term from the contrast between the Christian population in the cities and the more non-Christian population in rural regions (agrestis), the peasants, as pagus refers to rural places, villages in the countryside, and compitis to crossroads. Perhaps he also wants to allude to the compitalia, the veneration of gods, i.e. lares, at altars at the crossroads, although he does not mention this explicitly19. Therefore, Orosius confirms the association of “pagan” with rural populations (pagus), although another deduction is also possible, namely from paganus as a civilian. This deduction would include a more theological interpretation, as it confronts the soldiers of Christ, milites Christi, with the non-Christian “civilians”. Perhaps Orosius oversees this deduction as he wants to unite Christianity with peace and pagans with cruel wars, as will be demonstrated below. In addition, he contrasts these pagans with inhabitants of the city of God. Therefore, pagans are not only alien from city life in general, but on a higher-level alien from the city of God. This is, of course, a play on words with the title of Augustine’s famous work. In sum, Orosius 18. Cf. GOETZ, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 71-107. In Hist. 7.40.1 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 117), he states himself: cuius rei quamuis recens memoria sit, tamen si quis ipsius populi Romani et multitudinem uideat et uocem audiat, “nihil factum”, sicut etiam ipsi fatentur, arbitrabitur; nisi aliquantis adhuc exsistentibus ex incendio ruinis forte doceatur (“Although this deed is of recent memory, if anyone were to see the great numbers of Rome’s population and listen to them, he would think, as they themselves say, that ‘nothing had happened’, unless he were to learn of it by chance from the few ruins which still remain from the fire”). Also the problems with the barbarians will, according to Orosius, soon be solved, as one can see in Spain (Hist. 7.43.15): Here, they kill each other and are at war with each other. 19. On compitalia, see: U.W. SCHOLZ, Art. Compitalia, in H. CANCIK – H. SCHNEIDER – M. LANDFESTER (eds.), Der Neue Pauly, consulted online on 27 December 2018 ; first published online: Leiden, Brill, 2006.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

61

deliberately chose this term which Latin-speaking Christians sharpened to label non-Christian and non-Jewish people during the fourth century20. This term neither has a parallel in Greek21 nor stems from a “pagan” selfdescription. As James J. O’Donnell states: Until that label was created, though, pagans didn’t exist. … It was the Christian who came along and called all those people by one name. Christian common identity was strengthened by the shared conviction that the us/ them relationship was real. … Julius Caesar wasn’t a pagan. He wouldn’t have understood what you could possibly mean by getting out of our time machine and calling him one. No one else would have understood either. People became pagans when it was convenient to Christians for them to do so22. 20. Vgl. dazu J.-C. FREDOUILLE, Art. Heiden, in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 13, Stuttgart, Hiersemann, 1986, 1113-1149; I. OPELT, Griechische und lateinische Bezeichnungen der Nichtchristen: Ein terminologischer Versuch, in Vigiliae Christianae 19 (1965) 1-22 (with pp. 14-16 on the research debate on the definition of the term paganus by contrast to the military or to the rural realm); C. JONES, Between Pagan and Christian, Cambridge, MA – London, Harvard University Press, 2014 (on terminology, but mainly on the common cultural heritage of “Pagans” and Christians). Paganus is also the preferred term in the laws of the Theodosian Code (cf. OPELT, Bezeichnungen, p. 16). The newness of this term can be demonstrated by the observation that it is e.g. lacking in the chronicles of Sulpicius Severus. In addition, paganus was preferred in more colloquial contexts, as e.g. AUGUSTINE uses it in De civitate Dei only five times (5.23; 8.26; 9.19; 21.6; 22.3) but more than 450 times in his sermons and cognate literature (almost 170 times in his Sermones, more than 100 times in his Ennarationes in Psalmos; more than 50 times in Contra Faustum, 14 times in his Tractatus in Iohannis Euangelium). Probably, the most important author before Augustine and Orosius who promoted this term, was PHILASTRIUS OF BRESCIA: in his Diversarum hereseon liber (Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina 9, 207-324, ed. F. HEYLEN) about 156 heresies, paganus occurs 46 times and describes something like a fundamental error in the background of many heresies. 21. The Greek ἔθνη (already in the Septuagint for “gojim” = foreign peoples) corresponds to Latin gentes or nationes, both used in Christian literature (nationes only by Arnobius). The other, since the fourth century dominant Greek term Ἕλληνες (former used for Greek nation, language and culture) in contrast to βάρβαροι has its parallel in Graeci and barbarus. However, paganus in this new Christian use for heathen has no Greek parallel. 22. J.J. O’DONNELL, Pagans: The End of Traditional Religion and the Rise of Christianity, New York, Harper Collins, 2015, pp. 162-163. Cf. on the Christian invention of paganism also: T. JÜRGASCH, Christians and the Invention of Paganism in the Late Roman Empire, in M. SALZMAN – M. SACHY – R. LIZZI TESTA (eds.), Pagans and Christians in Late Antique Rome: Conflict, Competition, and Coexistence in the Fourth Century, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016, 115-138. On paganism in Late Antiquity in general, cf. A. CAMERON, The Last Pagans of Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011; P. BROWN – R. LIZZI TESTA (eds.), Pagans and Christians in the Roman Empire: The Breaking of a Dialogue (IVth-VIth Century A.D.). Proceedings of the International Conference at the Monastery of Bose (October 2008) (Christianity and History. Series of the John XXIII Foundation for Religious Studies in Bologna, 9), Münster, LIT Verlag, 2011; JONES, Between Pagan and Christian (n. 20); M. KAHLOS, The Shadow of the Shadow: Examining Fourthand Fifth-Century Christian Depictions of Pagans, in ID. (ed.), The Faces of the Other: Religious Rivalry and Ethnic Encounters in the Later Roman World (Cursor Mundi, 10), Turnhout, Brepols, 2011, 165-195.

62

U. HEIL

Here, Orosius was quite influential as his Histories were received and read widely23. Besides paganus, he also refers to gentes or gentiles24. Orosius states that gentes is the name of someone who only knows things of this world. Here Orosius uses the adjective gentiles as a substantive, as also at times later in his work25, but his explanation in his prologue is indeed strange. Perhaps he defines gentes thus because he himself mostly uses the term in a very broad sense. For him gentes is a label for the different peoples and nations on earth. They belong to the civitas terrena. But, according to Orosius, they also know only the civitas terrena (quia terrena sapient). III. MISSING PAGANISM IN OROSIUS Nevertheless – after these introductory remarks, Orosius does not use the term paganus for a long time. Therefore, if one wants to look at Orosius’ descriptions of the pagans, one is confronted with a huge gap. This is an astonishing observation, as at least one could expect more. In his long work in seven books, there are only 19 occurrences of paganus. The first two have already been mentioned; they are part of the prologue: first, the sentence with the definition of paganus, second, the reference to the contemporaneous De civitate Dei of Augustine26. The third one in Hist. 6.1.3 is an isolated remark on pagan monotheism, probably the Neoplatonists of Orosius’ times27. Orosius mentions them in his introduction to Hist. 6, where he reflects in general upon 23. Cf. on the transmission and reception of Orosius’ Histories, FEAR, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 24-25 with further literature, as well as the information on the more than 200 manuscripts which are known today, in the critical editions (see n. 11). 24. Gentes is the traditional Latin term for Greek “ἔθνη”, which in the Septuagint is the translation for Hebrew “gojim” (see above n. 21). Orosius uses gentes 134 times, plus gentilicus (1), gentilis (9), gentilitas (2), see the following note. See on the statistics the Concordance: A. ENCUENTRA, Pauli Orosii operum Concordantiae (Alpha-Omega. Reihe 1: Lexika, Indices, Konkordanzen zur klassischen Philologie, 181.1), Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, Olms, 1998. Orosius, however, uses this term gentes very often and in such a broad sense that it is not a specific term for “paganism” at all. Therefore, this article concentrates on his use of paganus. 25. OROSIUS, Hist. 1.3.6: gentiles historici; 4.17.10: gentiles and Christians pray for rain on different days; 7.5.7: Caligula profaned Jerusalem’s temple by gentile sacrifices; 7.27.15 persecutions by gentiles; cf. also Hist. 7.33.16, 18; 7.36.3. 26. See above note 10 and 12. 27. On different faces of pagan monotheism cf. the volume by P. ATHANASSIADI – M. FREDE (eds.), Pagan Monotheism in Late Antiquity, Oxford – New York, Oxford University Press, 1999; cf. also M. EDWARDS, Pagan and Christian Monotheism in the Age of Constantine, in S. SWAIN – M. EDWARDS (eds.), Approaching Late Antiquity: The Transformation from Early to Late Empire, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2004, 211-234; S. MITCHELL – P. VAN NUFFELEN (eds.), Monotheism between Pagans and Christians in Late Antiquity (Interdisciplinary Studies in Ancient Culture and Religion, 12), Leuven, Peeters, 2010.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

63

human knowledge of God and the divine providence of this one God, including the special role of the Roman Empire28: Now even the pagans, whom the manifest truth now convicts of insolence rather than ignorance, then they debate with us, say that they do not follow many gods, but rather venerate many agents who are ruled by one great God29.

Therefore, this statement is more about the non-paganism of some pagans, and, as Orosius states in the next sentence, almost everyone has the opinion that there is only one God (quia de uno deo omnium paene una opinio est). However, strangely enough this is an isolated use of paganus after five books Histories. The rest of pagani can be found in Book 7, which presents the history of the Christian era, beginning with the birth of Christ after Emperor Augustus established universal peace. But strangely, pagani are not mentioned in the beginning of Book 7, but only in paragraph 27 onwards. This is the paragraph in which Orosius refers to Emperor Constantine for the first time: Orosius mentions his closing of pagan temples. He interprets Constantine’s measures as divine punishment against the pagans and parallels it with the tenth plague against the Egyptians. Three times paganus occurs here: There, finally, the tenth and last plague of all was the death of everyone’s firstborn sons; here, this tenth, that is to say final, punishment was no less than the destruction of all the idols which were their first creation and their first love. … There, the precious vessels of the Egyptians were given to the Hebrews; here, the most glorious pagan temples became Christian churches30. This is that slow but sure punishment of the pagans31. Constantine was the first to change the old order to a new and just disposition of affairs. He decreed by edict that the pagan temples be closed down, without killing a single man32. 28. Hist. 6.1 is an important chapter where Orosius presents his theological interpretation of history, progress and divine providence: The one true God founded the Roman Empire (Hist. 6.1.5), and the divine providence is proven by the synchronized events of pax Augusta and Christ’s incarnation (Hist. 6.1.8, 16), see above n. 16 and 18. 29. OROSIUS, Hist. 6.1.3 (ARNAUD-LINDET 2, 162): unde etiam nunc pagani quos iam declarata ueritas de contumacia magis quam de ignorantia conuincit non se plures deos sequi sed sub uno deo magno plures ministros uenerari fatentur. 30. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.27.13-14 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 13): Ibi postremo decima plaga quae et nouissima omnium fuit, interfectio filiorum quos primos quique genuerant: hic nihilo minus decima id est nouissima poena est omnium perditio idolorum quae primitus facta in primis amabant. … Ibi Aegyptiorum uasa pretiosa Hebraeis tradita sunt: hic in ecclesias Christianorum praecipua paganorum templa cesserunt. 31. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.28.3 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 75): Haec est lenta illa paganorum poena sed certa. This haec means, that since Constantine all emperors (except Julian) have been Christians. 32. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.28.28 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 79): Tum deinde primus Constantinus iusto ordine et pio uicem uertit; edicto siquidem statuit citra ullam hominum caedem paganorum templa claudi.

64

U. HEIL

This statement is nowadays assessed as misjudgment as the first antipagan edicts were issued by Constantius II. Constantine himself has not passed a law against pagan temples; only measures against some places of worship for Aphrodite can be named33. However, Orosius relies here on Jerome’s Chronicle (who interestingly wrote gentilium templa and not paganorum templa which was therefore deliberately chosen by Orosius)34, as also the following events in his Histories are taken from this chronicle35. Obviously, his aim is to contrast the “pagan” pre-Constantine era with the beginning Christian era, for which this note in Jerome was very useful. After writing about Constantine, Orosius mentions the term paganus in his reflections on Valens and his death at the battle against the Goths in Adrianople in 378 AD: But how does this help to console the pagans, as they can clearly see that here, too, a persecutor of the church was being punished36? 33. His edicts are in Codex Theodosianus 16.10.6 and 15. Cf. H. LEPPIN, Constantius II. und das Heidentum, in Athenaeum 87 (1999) 457-480, and in general P. BARCELÓ, Constantius II. und seine Zeit: Die Anfänge des Staatskirchentums, Stuttgart, Klett-Cotta, 2004. Cf. about Constantine, M. WALLRAFF, Die antipaganen Maßnahmen Konstantins in der Darstellung des Euseb von Kaisareia, in J. HAHN (ed.), Spätantiker Staat und religiöser Konflikt: Imperiale und lokale Verwaltung und die Gewalt gegen Heiligtümer (Millennium Studies, 34), Berlin – Boston, MA, De Gruyter, 2011, 7-18; K. EHLING – G. WEBER (eds.), Konstantin der Große: Zwischen Sol und Christus, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2011; S. DE BLAAUW, Konstantin als Kirchenstifter, in A. DEMANDT – J. ENGEMANN (eds.), Konstantin der Große: Imperator Caesar Flavius Constantinus, Ausstellungskatalog, Mainz, Zabern, 2007, 163-172; R.P.C. HANSON, The Transformation of Pagan Temples into Churches in the Early Christian Centuries (1978), in ID., Studies in Christian Antiquity, Edinburgh, T&T Clark, 1985, 347-358; O. DALLY, “Pflege” und Umnutzung heidnischer Tempel in der Spätantike, in G. BRANDS – H.-G. SEVERIN (eds.), Die spätantike Stadt und ihre Christianisierung: Symposion vom 14. bis 16. Februar 2000 in Halle/ Saale (Spätantike – Frühes Christentum – Byzanz. Kunst im ersten Jahrtausend. Reihe B: Studien und Perspektiven, 11), Wiesbaden, Reichert, 2003, 97-114; D. BAR, Continuity and Change in the Cultic Topography of Late Antique Palestine, in J. HAHN – S. EMMEL – U. GOTTER (eds.), From Temple to Church: Destruction and Renewal of Local Cultic Topography in Late Antiquity (Religions in the Graeco-Roman World, 163), Leiden, Brill, 2008, 275-298, who states (p. 288): “The swift Christianization process in Jerusalem – the destruction of the pagan temple and the building of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre – should be seen as an exceptional incident, not characteristic of the process in other parts of the country”. Cf. on Constantine also N. LENSKI (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine, revised edition, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2012. 34. JEROME, Chronicle ad anno 331 (Die Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller [GCS] 47, 233,4-5, ed. R. HELM): Edicto Constantini gentilium templa subuersa sunt. 35. Constantine’s siege on the Goths in Sarmatia (Hist. 7.28.29); defeat of usurper Calocaerus on Cyprus (Hist. 7.28.30); chose Dalmatius as his Caesar (Hist. 7.28.30) – cf. JEROME, Chronicle ad annos 332 to 335 (GCS 47, 233,6-20 HELM). 36. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.33.17 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 92): Sed quid hoc ad consolationem proficit paganorum, qui palam peruident et in his quoque persecutorem ecclesiarum fuisse punitum? On the military campaign cf. D. BRODKA, Einige Bemerkungen zum Verlauf der

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

65

Orosius chose paganus deliberately, as this passage is one of his personal comments in-between. However, this remark is convoluted, as it relies on Orosius’ description of Valens as a heretical emperor who supported the Arians. Therefore, Valens – although a Christian emperor – is a persecutor of the church. In consequence, his death does no harm to the Christians nor console the pagans but, according to Orosius, is a relief for the church37. The next isolated use of paganus is within the final remark on the battle at the river Frigidus (today Slovenia) between the usurpers Arbogastes and Eugenius and Theodosius in September 394. This historical event is interpreted by Orosius as a divine sign for Christianity and against paganism. He writes this final evaluation: “This was Heaven’s judgement between the party which had no human help, but humbly placed its hope in God alone, and that which had the arrogant presumption to trust in its own strength and idols”38. Just one sentence before Orosius even quotes from Claudian’s Panegyric on the Emperor Honorius, lauding his interpretation and introducing the quotation with this remark: I have no fears of their testimony, since one of them, a famous poet, though a notorious pagan, has left a record of the event for God and for man in these verses: “O deeply beloved of God, for you the sky joins the battle and the winds banded together come to the trumpet’s call”39. Schlacht bei Adrianopel (9. August 378), in Millennium-Jahrbuch 2009, Berlin – New York, De Gruyter, 2009, 265-280. 37. This battle or the defeat of a great Roman army including the death of the emperor in 378 was seen as a huge catastrophe and was even considered as the beginning of the “Völkerwanderung” (cf. P.J. HEATHER, The Fall of the Roman Empire, London, Macmillan, 2005). Orosius takes up a line which was drawn already by Ambrose: He recommends to the next emperor Gratian the true orthodox faith which would safeguard future campaigns against the Goths (De fide ad Gratianum). 38. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.35.22 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 102): Ita caelitus iudicatum est inter partem etiam sine praesidio hominum de solo Deo humiliter sperantem, et partem adrogantissime de uiribus suis et de idolis praesumentem. This battle was since then estimated as decisive for Christian success and the beginning of anti-pagan laws by Theodosius. Orosius relies with this theological interpretation on RUFINUS, Church History 11.30. However, cf. the critical reflections on this theological interpretation CAMERON, Last Pagans (n. 22), pp. 93-131; cf. also T. GRÜNEWALD, Der letzte Kampf des Heidentums in Rom?, in Historia 41 (1992) 462-487. See the critical reflections on this battle by G. GOTTLIEB with “fictional historiography”: Von Homer bis Theodosius dem Großen: Sechzehn historische Fiktionen mit Themen der griechischen und römischen Geschichte (Braunschweiger Beiträge zur Kulturgeschichte, 6), Frankfurt a.M., Lang, 2016, namely the last contribution pp. 157-164: Eugenius gewinnt die Schlacht am Fluß Frigidus (394 AD). 39. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.35.21 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 101-102): quamuis ego hoc testimonio non laborem, quando unus ex ipsis, poeta quidem eximius sed paganus peruicacissimus, huiusmodi uersibus et Deo et homini testimonium tulit, quibus ait: O nimium dilecte Deo! tibi militat aether, Et coniurati ueniunt ad classica uenti.

66

U. HEIL

This description takes up the Augustinian mode of speaking, as Augustine had introduced the same quote in De civitate Dei 5.26 with quamuis a christi nomine alienus40 – according to Orosius’ definition of paganus in the prologue as alienus a ciuitate Dei he now transforms this in paganus. The last occurrences (except one) are concentrated in Hist. 7.37 where paganism is associated with barbarism. In this chapter, Orosius relates the battles at the beginning of the fifth century, namely the battle of Pollentia in 402 against the Goths under Alaric, led by Stilicho’s pagan general named Saul, as well as the invasion of Italy in 405 by the Goths under Radagaisus. It is not the place here to recall the turbulent historicalpolitical circumstances and upheavals41. Interestingly, with respect to our question, the paganism of Saul, Stilicho’s general, is contrasted with the Christianity of Alaric I who respected Easter festival, which is a kind of prelude to Orosius’ description of Alaric’s intrusion to Rome in 410. Therefore, some “barbarians” are also labeled pagans, with particularly Radagaisus in focus. Orosius writes: I shall say nothing about those terrible acts were done at Pollentia, when supreme command was given to a barbarian, pagan general, namely Saul, who in his wickedness violated the most revered days of the year and Holy Easter, forcing the enemy, who had withdrawn in respect for religion, to fight. Then God showed in a brusque judgement what His favor can do and what his vengeance exacts, for we won the battle, but were vanquished in our victory42. Radagaisus, who was by far the most barbarous of all Rome’s present and past foes, suddenly launched an invasion into all of Italy. … because he was a pagan and a Scythian, he had vowed, as is the custom among barbarous nations of this kind, to placate his gods by sacrificing every last drop of Roman blood to them43. 40. AUGUSTINUS, De civitate Dei 5.26 quotes the same verse, but introduces Claudian not with paganus, but with: quamuis a christi nomine alienus. 41. Cf. G. HALSALL, Barbarian Migrations and the Roman West 376-568, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 201-219; H. WOLFRAM, Die Goten: Von den Anfängen bis zur Mitte des 6. Jahrhunderts: Entwurf einer historischen Ethnographie, München, Beck, 42001, pp. 158-168; P.J. HEATHER, Goths and Romans 332-489 (Oxford Historical Monographs), Oxford, Clarendon, 1991, pp. 193-224. Cf. also the literature in n. 13 and 22. 42. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.37.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 107): Taceo de infelicibus illis apud Pollentiam gestis, cum barbaro et pagano duci, hoc est Sauli, belli summa commissa est, cuius inprobitate reuerentissimi dies et sanctum pascha uiolatum est cedentique hosti propter religionem, ut pugnaret extortum est, cum quidem, ostendente in breui iudicio Dei, et quid fauor eius possit, et quid ultio exigeret, pugnantes uicimus, uictores uicti sumus. This was the battle of Pollentia against the Gothic army, Easter 402. Cf. on the battle and its background G.D. DUNN, Easter and the Battle of Pollentia, in Journal of Religious History 34 (2010) 55-66. 43. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.37.5 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 108): Hic, supra hanc incredibilem multitudinem indomitamque uirtutem, paganus et Scytha erat, qui, ut mos est barbaris huiusmodi gentibus, omnem Romani generis sanguinem diis suis propinare deuouerat. This was

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

67

Three negative attributes are united in this passage: pagan, Scythian and barbarian, which even surpass his former definition of paganus in the prologue. The “othering” effect is that paganism is united more with “barbarians” than with Romans, a useful apologetic strategy of the Christian author Orosius. He continues to describe the reaction of the pagans in Rome who, as later on in 410, interpreted the situation from their false religious point of view: When this danger loomed over Rome’s defenses, all the pagans gathered together in the city, saying: “An enemy has arrived who is powerful because of the size of his forces, but more than this, because he has the protection of the gods, while the city has been abandoned by them and will soon perish because she has lost her gods and their sacred rites”44.

This virtual quotation takes up, of course, the main topic which Orosius strives to refute: According to Orosius, Rome’s misfortunes were by no means caused by the loss of her gods’ protection. Therefore, the Roman pagans not only misjudge the providence of the one true God but also pay false honor to the pagan barbarians and their gods. In the following parenthesis, he compares again the troops of Radagaisus with the Goths of Alaric I. The following two quotes have the highest density of paganus in the whole Histories: … at that time two Gothic tribes, led by their two most powerful kings, raged through Rome’s provinces. One of these was a Christian, more like a Roman, and, as events have proved, less savage in his slaughter through his fear of God. The other was a pagan and barbarian, a true Scythian, whose insatiable cruelty loved slaughter for slaughter’s sake as much as glory and plunder45. For had they fallen into the hands of a pagan idolater, not only would those pagans who survived indubitably have been convinced to renew their cult of idols, but Christians, too, would have become dangerously confused, since they would have been terrified by this judgement, while the pagans would have been strengthened in their faith by what happened. Therefore, God, the in 405 AD. On Radagaisus cf. H. WOLFRAM, Art. Radagais, in Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde 24, Berlin – New York, De Gruyter, 22003, 55-56 with remarks on the military and religious role of Radagaisus and on the apologetic interpretation of Orosius. 44. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.37.6 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 108): Hoc igitur Romanis arcibus imminente fit omnium paganorum in Vrbe concursus: “hostem adesse cum utique copia uirium tum maxime praesidio deorum potentem, Vrbem autem ideo destitutam et mature perituram quia deos et sacra perdiderit”. 45. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.37.9 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 109): quorum unus Christianus propiorque Romano et, ut res docuit, timore Dei mitis in caede, alius paganus barbarus et uere Scytha, qui non tantum gloriam aut praedam quantum inexsaturabili crudelitate ipsam caedem amaret in caede, et hic iam sinu receptus Italiae Romam e proximo trementem terrore quassabat.

68

U. HEIL

just director of the human race, willed the pagan enemy to perish, but allowed the Christian one to triumph, so that the pagan and the blasphemous Romans might both be confounded by the destruction …46.

Again, the triad pagan, barbarian and Scythian occurs. As Orosius interprets the situation, it was divine providence which promoted the Christian Goths and vanquished the pagan Goths together with the pagan Romans. After this passage referring to Radagaisus, the commander Stilicho and his son Eucherius are not directly called pagan, but their aim is interpreted as “threatening to restore pagan temples” (Hist. 7.38.6). Both were killed in 408 and Orosius’ description of them is very hostile, again obviously intended to give a contrast to Alaric I. This is the point where Orosius arrives at describing the events of Alaric’s plundering of Rome in 410. Included in his description is a strange event, namely that sacred vessels were saved: They were transferred in a procession to the basilica of the apostles, which gives more the impression of an ecclesiastical festival than of warfare. He writes: From all sides the vessels of Christ came running to the vessels of Peter – even many pagans joined the Christians, professing, though not possessing, the faith, and in this way managed to save themselves for that time…47.

Therefore, the reader of the Histories must concede: if the pagans were honest, they would have known the true and mighty protection of the Christian’s God. The last occurrence of paganus is in Hist. 7.41, which is a theological commentary on the recent events guided by God’s providence and clemency. Orosius envisages the new peace which can be gained on the basis of inclusion of the barbarians into the Roman Empire. This is also an opportunity for their Christianization, which would lead to a sustainable peace: “So many peoples came to recognize the truth, which they would have been unable to find without this opportunity” (Hist. 7.41.8). He concludes with a general theological remark about life, death and the Christian reward of eternal life: 46. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.37.10-11 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 109): quandoquidem in pagani et idolatriae manus incidisse, non solum paganis residuis de instaurando cultu idolorum esset indubitata persuasio, sed etiam Christianis periculosa confusio, cum et hi terrerentur praeiudicio et illi confirmarentur exemplo. Quamobrem iustus dispensator humani generis Deus perire paganum hostem uoluit et Christianum praeualere permisit, ut pagani blasphemantesque Romani et illo confunderentur perdito et hoc punirentur immisso … . 47. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.39.10 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 115): concurrunt undique ad uasa Petri uasa Christi, plurimi etiam pagani Christianis professione, etsi non fide, admiscentur et per hoc tamen ad tempus, quo magis confundantur, euadunt; quantoque copiosius adgregantur Romani confugientes, tanto auidius circumfunduntur barbari defensores.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

69

For what loss is it to the Christian who yearns for the life eternal to be taken from this world at any time or in any way? Or what gain is it for a pagan, who has hardened himself against the faith in the midst of Christians, if he drags out his life a little longer, since he who gives up hope of conversion will be doomed to die in the end48?

In sum, it is astonishing that pagani are only mentioned in the introduction, but are missing in the following. After one remark on pagan philosophical monotheism in Book 6, all the other testimonies can be found in Book 7, and in this book only in the later parts, namely after Constantine. It is also striking that the term is applied to Valens, a heretical emperor, and afterward, to barbarian leaders such as Arbogastes, who influences Eugenius to strive for usurpation, and to Radagaisus, Stilicho, and Eucherius. Pagans are also those in Rome who give in to threats and unite themselves with these barbarians. Interestingly, other terms confirm the results. For example, one can take a look at those which are also used for pagans, but which are more polemical: Incredulitas – this term is mentioned only twice by Orosius, again only in Hist. 7: in 7.39.14 he states, that a separation of Christians and “unbelievers” occurred in Rome in 410 during the procession (see above), because Christians went to the basilica while the unbelievers stayed only to be burnt and destroyed like dung and straw. In addition, Orosius mentions in his last remark to Augustine that he presented the history on the basis of a separation of the Christian era from the era of disbelief (7.43.19). Idolatria – this term can be found only in Book 7 (five times) as well. On the one hand, idolatry is mentioned in the context of persecution (Hist. 7.22.3: Valerian ordered Christians to be tortured into committing idolatry). On the other hand, idolatry is also used in his paragraphs about the last persecution of Diocletian and Constantine49. The other context 48. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.41.8-9 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 122-123): … tantae gentes agnitionem ueritatis acciperent quam inuenire utique nisi hac occasione non possent. Quid enim damni est Christiano ad uitam aeternam inhianti, huic saeculo quolibet tempore et quoquo pacto abstrahi? quid autem lucri est pagano in medio Christianorum aduersus fidem obdurato, si paulo diutius diem protrahat, quandoquidem morituro cui desperata conuersio est?. 49. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.27.13 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 73): The “tenth plague meant the destruction of all the idols” (perditio idolorum). This is Orosius’ interpretation of Constantine’s measures as divine punishment on the last persecution of the Christians under Diocletian (see n. 77). This is repeated in Hist. 7.27.14 (people are no longer forced into idolatry; pagan temples became Christian churches); 7.28.1 (no idols); 7.29.2; 7.29.3 (Constantius left the error of idolatry [see n. 33] but invented the heresy of Arianism).

70

U. HEIL

in which idolatry is mentioned is again the story about the usurpers Eugenius and Arbogastes (7.35.11-12; 7.35.22), and about Radagaisus (7.37.10, 15, 17)50. IV. EXPLANATIONS How can these findings be explained? What reasons are there? One possible explanation may be that Orosius mainly wants to rely on pagan sources, as stated already51. Therefore, he is not quoting from the Bible about Moses, Abraham, Lot, etc., but from other sources. With respect to this decision, Orosius avoids the term paganus because it is, of course, a redefined Christian label. No pagan names himself a pagan. It is clear, that for Orosius all non-Christian Romans are pagans, but he does not use this term during six and a half books. However, as the term actually does occur in selected passages, other aspects may be relevant as well. One may guess that paganism only exists in contrast to Christianity. Therefore, only after Christ’s incarnation this separation between pagans and Christians is possible. This nearly fits the results. In addition, Orosius is mainly concentrated on presenting a history of times or ages, namely the pre-Christian era and the Christian era. Therefore, only the person who is not a Christian during the Christian era, is actually a pagan. This comparison between past and contemporary eras is a constant feature in the histories; very often he contrasts past ages with the present age, the past times of misery and the present time of “benefactions”. To quote just one example: Let them recall, along with me, the times of their ancestor, times troubled by wars, cursed by their crimes, soiled by dissension, and continually miserable – times at which they can rightly tremble, because they were so and 50. Similar is the result with impius: it occurs 19 times: once in the last sentence in the prologue (1 prol. 16: at the end of times, the saints will receive their approbation, the impious their damnation); once in the first book on the Exodus (1.10.15: the impious entered into a trench of death that they had not foreseen); in 4.6.6; two times in book five: 5.4.8 (impious haruspices); 5.10.16 (impious sacrifice Busiris [see n. 55]); the remaining nine examples are in book 7: 7.4.14 (quotation of Virgil: impious mortals feared eternal night – when the sunlight was effaced at the time of Christ’s death); 7.7.10 (on Nero’s persecution of Christians, the first persecution of Christians); 7.5.3 (quotation of Virgil); 7.22.1 (general commentary on Valerian); 7.22.5 (Valerian, the incarceration of one impious man … did not compensate for the wrong or provide sufficient recompense for the torture of so many thousands of saints); 7.26.10; 7.28.2 (emperor Julian); 7.28.26 (Constantine punishes blasphemers); 7.30.6 (Julian: God’s mercy ended these blasphemous plans through the blasphemer’s death); 7.37.8. 51. See above n. 14. However, it is obvious that he especially uses the historical and chronographic works of Eusebius, Jerome and Rufinus without naming them explicitly.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

71

ought of necessity to ask that they should be so no more. They surely need to ask the one sole God, who through his hidden justice once allowed these things to come to pass, but now has revealed his mercy and vouches that they shall be no more52.

In addition, it is of importance that Orosius wants to demonstrate the cruelties and miseries of the pagan era, as stated already, and as can be observed in this last quotation as well. Therefore, he is more focused on moral categories than religious ones53. This suits the observation that Orosius rarely deals with critiques of different cults and the veneration of many gods54, and it suits the impression that paganism is more related to barbarians than to Romans. This emphasis on morality can be observed where Orosius deals with the main pagan error, namely their belief in many gods. Even in this context, this is not the main point of the criticism – though, of course, a false religion leads to immoral life –, but instead the immorality of the disbelievers. This can be demonstrated by glancing at those passages in which Orosius mentions gods in the plural. One example is Busiris, a king of Egypt. Orosius writes: At the same time, the cruel Busiris, the blood-stained tyrant of Egypt, exercised his cruel hospitality and practiced his even crueler religion. He sacrificed the innocent blood of his guests to toast the gods who were accomplices in his crime; a crime that men certainly find execrable, I would inquire, whether the gods found it so, too55.

The sacrifice of human beings is described as a crime by the cruel Busiris: this is the main point of critique, not the veneration of many gods – who may even find it execrable as well! Also in other passages, Orosius does not reprehend the many gods, but that the Romans think 52. OROSIUS, Hist. 2.3.9-10 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 89-90): Recolant sane me cum maiorum suorum tempora, bellis inquietissima, sceleribus exsecrabilia, dissensionibus foeda, miseriis continuatissima, quae et merito possunt horrere, quia fuerunt, et necessario debent rogare, ne sint: eum sane rogare solum Deum qui et tunc occulta iustitia permisit ut fierent, et nunc aperta misericordia praestat ut non sint. Cf. also the prologue; 1.20.6; 1.21.17-19; 2.6.13-14; 2.18.5; 2.19.4, 12ff.; 3.8 etc.; 7.2. See GOETZ, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 29-36. 53. For example, only in Hist. 4.6.4 does he call gods demons, namely the gods of the Carthaginians (demons occur only four times; one, Hist. 6.1.7, refers to Christ’s exorcisms). 54. Cf. as a contrasting example the Carmen contra paganos (A. BARTALUCCI [ed.], Contro i pagani (Carmen, Cod. Paris. Lat. 8084). Introduzione, testo critico, traduzione e commento, Pisa, Pisa University Press, 1998); see CAMERON, Last Pagans of Rome (n. 22), pp. 802-808. 55. OROSIUS, Hist. 1.11.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 58): Busiridis in Aegypto cruentissimi tyranni crudelis hospitalitas et crudelior religio tunc fuit; qui innocentem hospitum sanguinem diis scelerum suorum participibus propinabat: quod exsecrabile sine dubio hominibus uiderim an ipsis etiam diis exsecrabile uideretur.

72

U. HEIL

they should placate them with games (3.4.4-5)56. Orosius repudiates games and theatre many times because “men butcher their virtue as a sacrifice on the altar of luxury”57. Sacrifice, especially of course human sacrifice, is also incrimated as murder58; particularly the Carthaginians are relevant here: When, among all their other troubles, they also suffered from plague, they resorted to murder rather than medicine, performing human sacrifice and placing small children on their altars, something which made even their enemies pity them. … So, the Carthaginians, with the gods against them because of this infamous kind of sacrifice, according to Pompeius Trogus and Justin, or, as we clearly know, because of their presumption and impiety had angered God, had fought a long war without success …59.

The only direct and explicit anti-pagan critique can be found in Hist. 3.16.13 with reference to the oracle of Philip the Macedonian, which Orosius describes as a sort of self-deception: So Alexander was convinced and has shown us that since the gods are both deaf and dumb, it is either in the power of the priest to devise whatever answer he wishes or in the credulity of the petitioner to hear what he prefers to hear60.

This does not mean that Orosius in not interested in the “paganism” of the pagans. The contrast between paganism and true worship is a given 56. OROSIUS, Hist. 3.4.4 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 145): Conquererentur hoc, ut arbitror, loco obtrectatores temporis Christiani si forte silentio praeterierim quibus tunc caerimoniis Romani placauerint deos et sedauerint morbos! Cum pestilentia in dies crudesceret, auctores suasere pontifices ut ludi scaenici diis expetentibus ederentur. 57. OROSIUS, Hist. 4.21.5-6 (ARNAUD-LINDET 2, 70): Quamobrem intellegant nostri – quibus quidquid extra oblectamentum libidinis occurrit offensio est – propter hoc, quod se infirmiores esse hostibus suis ipsi sentiunt et fatentur, theatra incusanda non tempora, 6 nec blasphemandum Deum uerum qui usque ad nunc ea prohibet, sed abominandos deos, uel daemones suos, qui ista petierunt, profundo quidem satis malignitatis suae argumento tale sacrificium flagitantes, quoniam non magis fuso cruore pecudum quam profligata uirtute hominum pascerentur. 58. Cf. OROSIUS, Hist. 1.12.5; 3.5. Cf. also Hist. 6.5 on Mithridates, his parricide and self-sacrifice with the word “I beg you, gods of my father, if you exist …”. Cf. also Hist. 3.14.6; 4.1.14; 4.11.9; 5.2.4; 5.4.11 on haruspices. 59. OROSIUS, Hist. 4.6.3-6 (ARNAUD-LINDET 2, 20-21): Sed cum inter cetera mala etiam pestilentia laborarent, homicidiis pro remediis usi sunt: quippe homines ut uictimas inmolabant aetatemque inpuberem, quae etiam hostium misericordiam prouocaret, aris admouebant. … Itaque Carthaginienses auersis diis propter istius modi sacra – sicut Pompeius Trogus et Iustinus fatentur, sicut autem apud nos constat, propter praesumptionem impietatemque ipsorum irato Deo – cum in Sicilia diu infeliciter dimicassent, translato in Sardiniam bello iterum infelicius uicti sunt. 60. OROSIUS, Hist. 3.16.13 (ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 166): Ita certus Alexander fuit nobis que prodidit, diis ipsis mutis et surdis uel in potestate esse antistitis quid uelit fingere uel in uoluntate consulentis quid malit audire.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

73

fact. He writes his seven books to demonstrate the almighty God and his hidden providence in history. Therefore, there are two longer passages in which he summarizes his insights and debates who rules the world – their gods or the one true God61? Nevertheless, he is more concerned with the immoral consequences of the false religion than with pagan idolatry itself. V. PAGANS IN THE CHRISTIAN ERA On this basis, it is interesting to look at Book 7 and how Orosius presents pagans in this context. Or, to express it in other words: How do pagans act and how is paganism present in the Christian era after the incarnation of Christ or, so to speak, the pax Romana of Augustus? 1. More Christianity Than Expected First of all, already in the first three centuries, before Constantine, the Christian era is less pagan and more Christian than expected – according to Orosius’ rhetoric. Let me present just some peculiar passages. From the earliest times, Christianity had the potential to be officially accepted. Orosius relates: After Christ the Lord had suffered, risen from the dead, and sent forth His disciples to preach, Pilate, the governor of the province of Palestine, made a report to the emperor Tiberius and the Senate concerning Christ’s suffering, resurrection, and the miracles which then followed, both those performed by Himself in public and those performed by His disciples in His name. He also reported that He was believed to be God by the growing faith of a great number of men. Tiberius proposed, and strongly recommended, to the Senate that Christ be considered as God, but the Senate was angry that this matter had not been brought to its notice first, as was the custom, in order that it might be the first to decree that a new cult be adopted. Therefore, it refused to consecrate Christ and passed a decree that Christians be completely extirpated from the City, above all because Tiberius’s prefect, Sejanus62, strongly opposed adopting the religion. Tiberius then passed a decree threatening death to those who denounce Christians63. 61. OROSIUS, Hist. 6.1; 7.1.7. Cf. above n. 28. 62. Cf. on Sejanus the commentary of FEAR, Orosius (n. 1), p. 326, n. 40: “He had an extremely black reputation in antiquity and fell spectacularly from grace in AD 31. It was a wise apologetic move by Orosius to link him to opposition to Christianity which would appear in a favourable light simply because it was disliked by Sejanus”. 63. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.4.5-7 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 23-24): At postquam passus est Dominus Christus atque a mortuis resurrexit et discipulos suos ad praedicandum dimisit, Pilatus,

74

U. HEIL

This story sounds surprising nowadays: It was Pilate himself who informed emperor Tiberius about Christ’s passion and resurrection as well as about Christ’s miracles, and he even relates that many people venerate him as god. Therefore, Tiberius filed a petition to the Senate to accept Christ as a god. But this was refused because it was not the task of Tiberius to file such a petition first. Therefore, a deviation from agenda hindered his effort! Tiberius, accordingly, issued a law threatening death to those who denounced Christians. Orosius relies here on Eusebius’ Church History, more precisely on Rufinus’ translation of it, as one can read almost the same in book 2.2, and Eusebius himself refers to Tertullian and quotes from his apology (Apology 5.2) which seems to be the main source for this estimation64. One reason for Orosius to present this story was of course his aim to quote rather a pagan than a Christian or biblical source. Another reason may be that he wanted to relate this version of Pilate against other anti-Christian versions of Pilate’ memoires which were distributed since the fourth century65. The third reason is that it supports his estimation that the Christian praeses Palaestinae prouinciae, ad Tiberium imperatorem atque ad senatum retulit de passione et resurrectione Christi consequentibus que uirtutibus quae uel per ipsum palam factae fuerant, uel per discipulos ipsius in nomine eius fiebant, et de eo quod certatim crescente plurimorum fide deus crederetur. Tiberius cum suffragio magni fauoris retulit ad senatum ut Christus deus haberetur. Senatus indignatione motus cur non sibi prius secundum morem delatum esset ut de suscipiendo cultu prius ipse decerneret, consecrationem Christi recusauit edicto que constituit exterminandos esse Vrbe Christianos; praecipue cum et Seianus praefectus Tiberii suscipiendae religioni obstinatissime contradiceret. Tiberius tamen edicto accusatoribus Christianorum mortem comminatus est. 64. Also TERTULLIAN, Apology 21.24. Cf. also the chronicle of Eusebius in JEROME’s translation (Chronicle ad anno 35 [GCS 47, 176,24–177,8 HELM]), again with reference to Tertullian. The first reference to this material can be found already in JUSTIN, First Apology 35.9; 48.3; however, he seems to refer to some Acts of Pilate, not to this letter or report of Pilate to a Roman emperor. Cf. also M. SCHÄRTL, Die sonstige Pilatusliteratur, in C. MARKSCHIES – J. SCHRÖTER – A. HEISER (eds.), Antike christliche Apokryphen in deutscher Übersetzung I. Evangelien und Verwandtes, Teilband 1, Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2012, 262-279, on the transmitted letter of Pilate to emperor Claudius, “der vermutlich Grundlage der Aussage Tertullians war” (p. 263), and on the answer of Tiberius (pp. 265266). These texts have a strong anti-Jewish tendency and stress the responsibility of the Jews for the execution of Christ. Cf. on the Acts of Pilate M. SCHÄRTL, Das Nikodemusevangelium, die Pilatusakten und die “Höllenfahrt Christi”, ibid., 231-261. 65. EUSEBIUS complaints (in Church History 9.5.1 [GCS NF 6,1, 810,8-14, ed. F. WINKELMANN]; cf. also 9.7.1) on these anti-Christian texts produced and distributed during the persecution of Maximinus Daja at the beginning of the fourth century, which are now lost: Πλασάμενοι δῆτα Πιλάτου καὶ τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν ὑπομνήματα πάσης ἔμπλεα κατὰ τοῦ Χριστοῦ βλασφημίας, γνώμῃ τοῦ μείζονος ἐπὶ πᾶσαν διαπέμπονται τὴν ὑπ’ αὐτὸν ἀρχὴν διὰ προγραμμάτων παρακελευόμενοι κατὰ πάντα τόπον, ἀγρούς τε καὶ πόλεις, ἐν ἐκφανεῖ ταῦτα τοῖς πᾶσιν ἐκθεῖναι τοῖς τε παισὶ τοὺς γραμματοδιδασκάλους ἀντὶ μαθημάτων ταῦτα μελετᾶν καὶ διὰ μνήμης κατέχειν παραδιδόναι. Cf. on these legends: J.-D. DUBOIS, L’utilisation des Actes de Pilate au IVe siècle, in Apocrypha 2 (1991) 85-98.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

75

era had already begun in those times. For Orosius, it is obvious that an era of clemency emerged since the numbers of Christians in Rome grew, following the arrival of the apostle Peter (Hist. 7.6.1-2, 8, 11). Besides this pseudepigraphic text, Orosius presents an interesting integration of the early Christian apologetic literature: He states that Hadrian learned much about Christianity because of Quadratus’ and Aristides’ apologies (Hist. 7.14). Therefore, he can even state that in his war in Palestine against the Jewish revolt under Bar Kochba, Hadrian avenged the Christians (Hist. 7.14.4). His description of Antoninus Pius is similar: Justin made him look favorable to Christians66. On this basis it is not surprising to observe that Orosius also uses suitable miracle stories. The progress of Christianity is for example proven by the famous rain miracle at the battle against the Quadi by Marc Aurel (in Hist. 7.15.7-11). Orosius states confidently: As they turned their backs in flight, the Romans fell on them and slaughtered them to a man, winning with a few untrained troops, but also with the mighty aid of Christ, a glorious victory that outshone almost all those of the old. The majority of authors say that Antonius’s report, in which he admits that it was the invocation of Christ’s name by his Christian soldiers that remedied his lack of water and won the victory, is still extant to this days67.

Again, his main “hidden” source is Jerome’s Chronicle68 and he ignores the remark in Rufinus’ translation of Eusebius’ Church History that the pagan sources are critical about the Christian versions because this did not suit his aim69. 66. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.14.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 47): Verum Iustinus philosophus librum pro Christiana religione compositum Antonino tradidit, benignum que eum erga Christianos homines fecit. Orosius takes it for granted that these early Christian apologetic texts were indeed delivered to the envisaged emperor. There is a long scholarly debate if this is a real option or mere fictitious. Cf. now the introduction of J. ULRICH in Justin, Apologien (Kommentar zu frühchristlichen Apologeten), Freiburg i.Br., Herder, 2019, who again opts for a primary version of Justin’s apology actually sent to the emperors. Cf. also JUSTIN, Philosopher and Martyr, Apologies. Edited with an Introduction, Translation, and Commentary on the Text by D. MINNS – P. PARVIS (Oxford Early Christian Texts), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2009. 67. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.15.10-11 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 49): Quorum terga Romani usque ad internecionem caedentes gloriosissimam uictoriam et omnibus paene antiquorum titulis praeferendam rudi paruo que militum numero, sed potentissimo Christi auxilio reportarunt. Exstare etiam nunc apud plerosque dicuntur litterae imperatoris Antonini, ubi inuocatione nominis Christi per milites Christianos et sitim illam depulsam et conlatam fatetur fuisse uictoriam. 68. JEROME, Chronicle ad anno 175 (GCS 47, 207,6-10 HELM): Extant litterae Marci Aurelii grauissimi imperatorie, quibus illam Germanicam sitim Christianorum forte militum precationibus impetrato imbri discussam contestatur. 69. RUFINUS, Church History 5.5.3 (GCS NF 6, 435,20–437,2 WINKELMANN): quod factum refertur quidem et ab historicis gentilium, sed quia nostrorum id orationibus inpetratum sit,

76

U. HEIL

Another indication and prominent example for the success of Christianity is the mother of Severus Alexander, Julia Mamea, who, according to Orosius, was a Christian, namely a pupil of Origen (7.18.7) – she “took pains to be taught by the presbyter Origen”70. If one takes a look at this story as it is presented in Eusebius or in Rufinus (Church History 6.21.3-4) one can detect that Orosius changes her description as religiosa femina (or θεοσεβεστάτη γυνή) in Christiana. Hence, the event, although abbreviated, loses in Orosius its open ambivalence. Orosius reuses this story in his speculation as to why the successor Maximinus Thrax reinitiated the persecution of Christians: He considers that Maximinus Thrax “especially persecuted priests and clergyman, that is to say, the teachers of doctrine: either because the family of Severus Alexander, whom he had succeeded, and Alexanders’ mother were Christians, or because he had a special hatred of the presbyter Origen”71. Orosius also includes in his narrative that Philippus Arabs was actually the first Christian emperor – a tradition which was established already by Eusebius and conveniently adopted by Orosius72. He uses it to state confidently that now, one thousand years after the foundation of Rome, this city’s birthday was celebrated by a Christian emperor73. 2. Morality and Persecutions The previously mentioned emphasis on morality, not idolatry, is important again here. As Orosius states: With the presence of Christians in Rome, an era of clemency began74. Nevertheless, Christians had to endure phases non refertur, quippe apud quos etiam cetera miracula, quae a nostris gesta sunt, non habent fidem. Cf. on this miracle and the stories: P. KOVÁCS, Marcus Aurelius’ Rain Miracle and the Marcomannic Wars (Mnemosyne Supplements, 308), Leiden – Boston, MA, Brill, 2009. 70. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.18.7 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 54): Cuius mater Mamea christiana Origenem presbyterum audire curauit. 71. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.19.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 54): Qui maxime propter christianam Alexandri cui successerat, et Mameae matris eius familiam, persecutionem in sacerdotes et clericos, id est doctores, uel praecipue propter Origenem presbyterum miserat. The information on the persecution of clerics stems from JEROME, Chronicle ad anno 236 (GCS 47, 216,14-15 HELM: Maximinius adversum ecclesiarum sacerdotes persecutionem facit), but the interpretation as revenge on Origen’s catechism is Orosius’ invention. 72. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.20.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 55), cf. also 7.28.1. Cf. with EUSEBIUS, Church History 6.34. Again, Orosius abbreviates or even omits the story of Eusebius or Rufinus that the emperor just wanted to attend a church service – he just states the “fact”, that the emperor was a Christian. 73. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.20.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 55): Hic primus imperatorum omnium Christianus fuit ac post tertium imperii eius annum millesimus a conditione Romae annus impletus est. Ita magnificis ludis augustissimus omnium praeteritorum hic natalis annus a Christiano imperatore celebratus est. 74. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.6.1-2 – since the apostle Peter began to preach in Rome. Cf. above p. 75.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

77

of persecution. Interestingly, especially during this Christian era, the nonChristian emperors persecute Christians more because of their cruelty than because of their paganism. The era is Christian despite Caligula and his cruelties (Hist. 7.5.4, 11): he is full of hatred of all mankind and seeks to find grounds for waging war and committing murder and incest75. Also, Nero (Hist. 7.7) is not described as a pagan and idolater, but with moral categories: full of vices, committing crimes, driven by lust and sexual depravity76. Nero conducted the first persecution of Christians and started with killing the apostles Peter and Paul – but this is seen as the escalation of his former deeds, arising out of greed, cruelty, and even including parricide77. This ended with his suicide which “put an end to the entire family of the Caesars”78. Domitian, the instigator of the second persecution (Hist. 7.10), is described as proud, full of envy, greedy, “driven wild by the pride that made him wish to be worshipped as a god” – therefore, pride is in the foreground, not paganism, which led to his self-aggrandizement79. Trajan (Hist. 7.12) persecuted Christians the third time and forced them to sacrifice to idols (sacrificandum idolis, Hist. 7.12.3). But this was only the case before he was informed by Plinius that Christians “apart from confessing their belief in Christ and holding small harmless meetings, did nothing contrary to Roman law and that because of their unob75. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.5.7 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 27): He was only to extend his idolatry to the Jewish temple. 76. Orosius quotes Suetonius in this chapter. 77. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.7.10 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 34): Auxit hanc molem facinorum eius temeritas impietatis in Deum: nam primus Romae Christianos suppliciis et mortibus affecit ac per omnes prouincias pari persecutione excruciari imperauit, ipsum que nomen exstirpare conatus beatissimos Christi apostolos Petrum cruce, Paulum gladio occidit. In this context, Orosius refers to his impiety (impietatis in Deum); see n. 50 above. Again, JEROME’s Chronicle (Chronicle ad anno 68 [GCS 47, 185 HELM]) as well as RUFINUS’ Church History (2.25 [GCS NF 6, 175,20–179,16 WINKELMANN], with a quotation of TERTULLIAN, Apology 5) are the “hidden” sources. Orosius introduced to parallel the persecutions, or the divine punishment they tempted, with the ten plagues against the Egyptians (Exodus 7–11); cf. GOETZ, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 58-70; further VAN NUFFELEN, Orosius (n. 1), pp. 159-160. Perhaps Orosius got the idea from SULPICIUS SEVERUS who listed nine plagues/persecutions (Chronicle 2.33) – the last and tenth one was reserved to the Antichrist. In contrast, LACTANTIUS (De mortibus persecutorum 1.2) spoke of six persecutions; cf. also the critical note in AUGUSTINUS, De civitate Dei 18.52. These ten persecutions of Orosius still form the masterplan in P. GUYOT – R. KLEIN, Das frühe Christentum bis zum Ende der Verfolgungen: Eine Dokumentation, 2 vols. (Texte zur Forschung, 60; 62), Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 32006. 78. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.7.13. His suicide is therefore the summit of his depravity. 79. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.10.5 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 42): idem que efferatus superbia qua se deum coli uellet, persecutionem in Christianos agi secundus a Nerone imperauit; quo tempore etiam beatissimus Iohannes apostolus in Patmum insulam relegatus fuit.

78

U. HEIL

jectionable faith none of them thought that death was a serious or frightening matter”. Therefore, Trajan issued “some more merciful rescripts to mitigate his decree”. In addition, his persecution lasted for a short time only80. Perhaps, his judgement on Trajan as merciful emperor relies on the part of his rescript where he repudiates anonymous complaints and inquiring Christians (cf. Rufinus, Church History 3.33). Hadrian was already mentioned as an emperor who learned much about Christianity from Quadratus and Aristides81. He decreed that no one could condemn a Christian without charging them of a crime or presenting a proof (Hist. 7.13.2). It has been stated already that, according to Orosius, in his war in Palestine against the Jewish revolt under Bar Kochba, Hadrian avenged the Christians (Hist. 7.14.4)82. Decius, number seven, is only described as “issuing death-laden edicts for the persecution and murder of Christians”83, without hinting at his religious policy. Only the eighth persecution of Valerian mentions some paganism: Christians were tortured into committing idolatry84. However, Aurelian is portrayed as the ninth persecutor, but his religion is not mentioned, not even his building of a temple to the sun god (Hist. 7.23.3-585). Even Diocletian, number ten, is portrayed without regard to his religious policy. Orosius only mentioned that his persecution lasted longer and was more brutal than almost all the previous ones (Hist. 7.25.13). 80. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.12.3 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 43-44): In persequendis sane Christianis errore deceptus, tertius a Nerone, cum passim repertos cogi ad sacrificandum idolis ac detrectantes interfici praecepisset plurimi que interficerentur, Plinii Secundi, qui inter ceteros iudices persecutor datus erat, relatu admonitus, eos homines praeter confessionem Christi honesta que conuenticula nihil contrarium Romanis legibus facere, fiducia sane innocentis confessionis nemini mortem grauem ac formidulosam uideri, rescriptis ilico lenioribus temperauit edictum. 81. See above p. 75. Orosius even describes the governor Serenus Granius as a Christian. 82. See above p. 75. Severus, the fifth persecutor, is described with (Hist. 7.17.5 [ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 53]): hanc profanam in Christianos et Ecclesiam Dei praesumptionem. 83. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.21.2 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 55): Idem continuo, in quo se etiam ob hoc Philippos interfecisse docuit, ad persequendos interficiendos que Christianos septimus post Neronem feralia dispersit edicta, plurimos que sanctorum ad coronas Christi de suis crucibus misit. 84. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.22.3 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 57): Valerianus siquidem mox ut arripuit imperium octauus a Nerone, adigi per tormenta Christianos ad idololatriam abnegantes que interfici iussit, fuso per omnem Romani regni latitudinem sanctorum sanguine. 85. On Aurelian and his promotion of the cult of sol invictus, see A. WATSON, Aurelian and the Third Century, London – New York, Routledge, 1999, pp. 188-202 with notes on pp. 271-275. Cf. also in general J.F. WHITE, The Roman Emperor Aurelian: Restorer of the World, revised edition, Yorkshire, Pen & Sword, Barnsley, 2016.

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

79

Interestingly, after Constantine, there was a mandate to worship idols, a threat of paganism, from Emperor Julian. He forced the Christians to worship idols again (Hist. 7.30.2; 7.32.2), and committed idolatry with the blood of Christians himself, as Orosius states: Julian prepared to fight a war against the Parthians, and when he had gathered together Roman troops from all over the empire to drag down with him to the foreordained destruction, he dedicated the blood of the Christians to his gods, promising that he would openly persecute the Church if he were able to win a victory86.

Orosius did not use the term paganus for Julian, but impious (Hist. 7.30.6): Julian died in Persia; “thus God’s mercy ended these blasphemous plans through the blasphemer’s death”87. 3. Peace and Clemency In concurrence with the observations mentioned above, Orosius is focused more on war and peace. As stated already, beginning with Christians in Rome, an era of clemency and peace began – and wars diminished: e.g. Claudius surrendered Britain without war (Hist. 7.6.9-10); Rome experienced bloodless expansions to Achaia, Lycia, Rhodes, Byzantium, Samos, Thrace, Cilicia, and Commagene (Hist. 7.9.10); even the troubles during the year with four emperors were harmless – “for the church, though troubled by persecution, was already to be found in Rome, and made supplications to Christ, the Judge of all men, even on behalf of her enemies and persecutors”88. Interestingly, Orosius many times hints here at the Gates of Ianus, which were either opened during war or closed in times of peace. Of course, in order to demonstrate eras of peace, he stresses the three times Augustus closed the gates. And he underscores that only two times before Augustus were the gates closed, and then only briefly89. This feature is perhaps a 86. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.30.4 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 83): Iulianus autem bellum aduersum Parthos parans cum Romanas uires contractas undique ad destinatam se cum traheret perditionem, Christianorum sanguinem diis suis uouit, palam persecuturus ecclesias si uictoriam potuisset adipisci. 87. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.30.6 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 83): sic misericors Deus impia consilia impii morte dissoluit. Cf. on impius n. 50 above. 88. OROSIUS, Hist. 7.8.5 (ARNAUD-LINDET 3, 36): Iam enim erat Romae, quamuis persecutione uexata, Ecclesia quae iudici omnium Christo etiam pro inimicis et persecutoribus supplicaret. 89. OROSIUS, Hist. 1.1.6 (Augustus: gates were closed); 3.8.2 (open); 3.8.4 (closed for 1 year); 4.12.4, 6-7 (closed for 1 year); 6.20.1, 8 (Augustus closed gates); 6.21.1 (opened by Caesar); 6.21.11 (closed); 6.22.1 (closed); 7.2.16; 7.3.4 (closed at birth of

80

U. HEIL

significant hint of Orosius’ approach towards paganism: Without criticizing this pagan rite, he uses it as an additional support for his claim of growing peace in the Christian era. VI. SUMMARY The title of this article is “Where Have All the Pagans Gone?” because of the lack of evidence for this term paganus in almost all of Orosius’ seven books against the pagans – although he mentions them already in the prologue90. Of course, this term as a classification of non-Christian and non-Jewish people was a peculiar Christian reinterpretation – therefore, he was perhaps hesitant using it in a work also addressed to and against these “pagans”91. However, there may be more behind it. This observation can be explained, furthermore, a) with his use of non-Christian sources, b) with his concept of two eras, c) with the required opposition to Christianity, which is lacking in the pre-Christian era, and d) with his focus on moral categories. Orosius is more concerned with Roman war and peace than with Roman religion. Therefore, it is of relevance that also some Goths as barbarians are labelled paganus (Hist. 7). The triad pagan, Scythian and barbarian is striking and supports the “othering” effect: Paganism goes along with barbarians and Christianity with Romans. Interestingly, however, some Goths are not a threat but a useful force to restore and save the Roman Empire, that is, the Pax Romana. And, these Goths themselves strive to avoid war and love peace (7.43.7). But these are, of course, the Christian Goths under Alaric I – in contrast to the barbarian, pagan Goths under Radagaisus. Therefore, the war and plundering of Rome in 410 was harmless compared to all the wars before. In sum, paganus means for Orosius something like “the savages from the wilderness”, comparable to the wild barbarians, although there are Christ for 12 years); 7.3.7 (opened again for battle against the Jews, then closed again (7.3.8); 7.3.19 (opened, but nevertheless no battle – by Orosius combined with a quotation of Matt 24,6-9!); 7.19.4 (opened – last mention). Perhaps this line stops here, because the next emperor Philippus Arabs is named as the first Christian emperor (see above n. 72). 90. This has caused probably the adoption of the title of this work in the manuscripts in different manners: … adversus paganos … / … historiarum contra accusatores Christianorum … / contra detrahentes temporibus Christianis … Cf. ARNAUD-LINDET 1, 6. 91. For sure, Orosius wished these “pagans” to read his books as well, but the main recipients and audience of the Histories are Christians and those who sympathized with Christianity, as Peter VAN NUFFELEN has restated convincingly (Orosius [n. 1], pp. 1618).

81

OROSIUS, HISTORIAE ADVERSUS PAGANOS

exceptions as the noble savage as well92. However, these noble savages are Christians or live under Christian influence which mainly is an improvement in morality for Orosius. Universität Wien Evangelisch-Theologische Fakultät Schenkenstr. 8-10 AT-1010 Wien Austria [email protected]

Uta HEIL

92. Cf. on “barbarus” and the Greek-Roman view on them J. VOGT, Kulturwelt und Barbaren: Zum Menschheitsbild der spätantiken Gesellschaft (Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur. Abhandlungen der Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaftlichen Klasse, 1967, nr. 1), Wiesbaden, Steiner, 1967; I. OPELT – W. SPEYER, Art. Barbar, in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 10, Stuttgart, Hiersemann, 1967, 251-290.

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION ANOTHER LOOK AT THE CARMEN CONTRA PAGANOS

The Carmen contra paganos (CP) is a poem of 122 dactylic hexameters that offers a biting critique of late-antique (and older) pagan religious tradition. It has been preserved in one manuscript only, the Codex Parisinus Latinus 8084 of the 6th century, that contains works of Prudence, but concludes with CP (fol. 156r-158v), which is written in a different script from the rest. The work is known from the early 17th century and there are traces of an even earlier circulation (see below), but a complete edition followed only in the 19th century. Since then, it has been edited several times, which is quite remarkable for such an unassuming little piece. It has also been translated more than once, and there is no lack of secondary literature1.

1. Two of the more detailed studies, both of them with ample bibliographical information, are the essay by C. MARKSCHIES, “Leben wir nicht alle unter demselben Sternenzeit?”: Übersetzung und Bemerkungen zum Traktätchen ‘Contra paganos’ (Cod. Paris. Lat. 8084, fol. 156r-158v = CPL 1431), in R. FELDMEIER – U. HECKEL (eds.), Die Heiden: Juden, Christen und das Problem des Fremden (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament, 70), Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 1994, 325-377 and the set of publications by A.-M. BOXUS – J. POUCET, Carmen contra paganos: Texte et traduction (12 pp.), Présentation générale (8 pp.), Un premier commentaire (52 pp.), and Bibliographie sélective (10 pp.), all of them published electronically in Folia Electronica Classica (FEC – Louvain-laNeuve) 19 (2010) in the period of January till June. In addition, there is also the monograph, with edition, Italian translation, and commentary by A. BARTALUCCI, ‘Contro i pagani’: Carmen cod. Paris. lat. 8084: Introduzione, testo critici, traduzione e commento (Poeti cristiani, 3), Pisa, ETS, 1998. I did not have access to C. MARTINEZ MAZA, Carmen contra paganos: Edición, traducción y comentario histórico, Huelva, Universidad de Huelva, 1999, which according to the references in the secondary literature is not a verse-by-verse commentary, but focuses above all on historical questions and issues related to imperial antipagan legislation under Theodosius. Among more recent publications, one should mention the general survey by C. MARKSCHIES, Carmen contra paganos, in New Pauly Online, Leiden, Brill, 2006, and essays by A. Cameron, S. Ratti, R. Green, and D.E. Trout, on which more below. Of merely historical interest is the Leuven dissertation by G. DOBBELSTEIN, De carmine christiano cod. Paris. 8084 contra fautores paganae superstitionis ultimos, Diss. Leuven, 1879. On the editions and translations, see MARKSCHIES, “Leben”, pp. 327-328 and BOXUS – POUCET, Présentation, p. 2. I have used the edition of D.R. SHACKLETON BAILEY in Antologia Latina. I: Carmina in codicibus scripta. Fasc. 1: Libri Salmanisani aliorumque carmina, Stuttgart, Teubner, 1982, pp. 17-23. English translation in the collection of late antique texts by B. CROKE – J. HARRIES (eds.), Religious Conflict in Fourth-Century Rome (Sources in Ancient History), Sydney, Sydney University Press, 1982, pp. 80-83.

84

J. VERHEYDEN

Literary and stylistically the poem is far from being a masterpiece, but it is not without any charm2. Its title is a modern invention, and is only one of several suggestions that have been made. Its author remains unknown. There is no reason to think that it was composed by Prudence, though it is commonly dated in his lifetime (see below)3. It may have ended up in the codex because a scribe erroneously considered it to be the work of the great poet, or just to fill the last pages in the manuscript4. The author often refers to Rome and the poem may well have been written in the capital, though it cannot be excluded that it originated elsewhere. As for topic and genre, CP is commonly said to belong to the broader field of antipagan literature, however this is further to be qualified (see below), and more particularly, it is one of three such anonymous short poems with little pretence for literary genius targeting pagan religious tradition and practices5. 2. It has been qualified as “scurrilous” and its author as showing “exhilarating nastiness” – none of them really positive qualifications: for the first, see D.E. TROUT, Napkin Art: Carmina contra paganos and the Difference Satire Made in Fourth-Century Rome, in M.R. SALZMAN – M. SÁGHY – R. LIZZI TESTA (eds.), Pagans and Christians in Late Antique Rome: Conflict, Competition, and Coexistence in the Fourth Century, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016, 213-231, here p. 214; for the second qualification, N. MCLYNN, Poetry and Pagans in Late Antique Rome: The Case of the Senator “Converted from the Christian Religion to Servitude to the Idols”, in the same volume, 232-250, p. 232. 3. See the sarcastic commentary on the anonymous author by J.F. MATTHEWS, The Historical Setting of the ‘Carmen contra paganos’ (Cod. Par. Lat. 8084), in Historia: Zeitschrift für die Alte Geschichte 19 (1970) 464-479, here p. 464: “The authorship of the Carmen is … unknown, and beyond reasonable conjecture – which, although inconvenient, is in other ways perhaps a kindness”. The essay is reprinted in ID., Political Life and Culture in Late Roman Society, London, Variorum, 1985. On the date, see BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 36-42. 4. On the early transmission of Prudence’s’ work, see the older but still valuable essay by A. BARTALUCCI, Il carme del Cod. Paris. 8084 e i problemi della trasmissione antica delle opere di Prudenzio, in Studi Classici e Orientali 10 (1961) 161-178. Cf. on the manuscript itself, BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 25-30 and MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), pp. 329-335. 5. The other two are the so-called Carmen ad Antonium, or Carmen ultimum (or Poema ultimum) of some 250 verses, and the Carmen ad quendam senatorem (often with the full title that says it all: ex christiana religione ad idolorum servitutem conversum) of 85 verses. On the former, see R. PALLA – M. CORSANO (eds.), Ps.-Paulino Nolano: Poema ultimum (carm. 32) (Poeti cristiani, 5), Pisa, ETS, 2003. On the latter, R. PALLA – M. CORSANO (eds.), Ps.-Cipriano: Ad un senatore convertitosi dalla religione cristiana alla schiavitù degli idoli (Poeti cristiani, 7), Pisa, ETS, 2006; MCLYNN, Poetry and Pagans (n. 2). On all three, TROUT, Napkin Art (n. 2). On the wider context in the fourth century, R. ALEXANDRE, Prudence et les trois poèmes anonymes de polémique anti-païenne: Un manifeste caché pour une satire christianisée?, in P. GALAND-HALLYN – V. ZARINI (eds.), Manifestes littéraires dans la latinité tardive: Poétique et rhétorique (Collection des études augustiniennes. Série Antiquité, 188), Paris, Institut d’études augustiniennes, 2009, 71-88. Christian anti-pagan polemics had by then already a long history reaching back to the apologists of the second

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

85

The text does not provide much of a formal structure6, but can nevertheless rather easily be divided in separate sections based on contents. A rather obvious and straightforward way to divide the text is to split it into two parts of uneven length. The first one covers vv. 1-24, which itself can be further divided into three: a general survey of Roman gods, or gods who “made it” in Rome (vv. 1-8), a critique of two of these, Jupiter and Venus (vv. 9-22), and a first short conclusion addressed at the proceres of the city and the empire (vv. 23-24). The second part covers all the rest; it can be divided into a further six sections. It opens with a brief evocation of the reactions to the passing away of a Roman prefect (vv. 25-33). This is followed by a first wave of criticism (vv. 34-56), in which the man’s attachment to the ancient religion is pictured through the iconic figure of Numa (vv. 34-37), his administrative skills are questioned and his participation in all sorts of ceremonies evoked as well as his stance against such people who held different views and who are later identified as Christians (vv. 38-45), and his own religious beliefs and secretive actions against adherents of the true god respectively belittled and exposed (vv. 46-56). In the next section, the man’s participation in the cult of Cybele is targeted (vv. 57-66), as is the fact that he nevertheless also tries to stick to the ancient cults (vv. 67-77). Then the author returns in more detail to the efforts and initiatives of the prefect, apparently mostly secretive, but some at least with public results, to convince Christians to apostatise (vv. 78-86). The next section shows the uselessness of the ancient cults for the man’s personal salvation (vv. 87-97), as well as of more recent cults, be it that of Isis and Osiris (vv. 98-102), or that of Cybele and her companion Attis (vv. 103-109). The poem ends with an even more personal invective against the prefect, in which his promotion to the function of consul is belittled (vv. 110-114), his stubborn belief in ancient rites is contrasted to his wife’s futile efforts to save him from eternal loss (vv. 115-120), and finally the latter is addressed in person with the request to stop mourning her husband who had put his trust in the wrong god (vv. 121-122)7. and third century, and most prominent among these in the West, Tertullian. Cf. A. CAMERON, The Last Pagans of Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 283, cited by TROUT, Napkin Art (n. 2), p. 213, n. 2. For a critical assessment of the book of Cameron, see several essays in R. LIZZI TESTA (ed.), The Strange Death of Pagan Rome: Reflections on a Historiographical Controversy (Giornale Italiano di Filologia: Bibliotheca, 16), Turnhout, Brepols, 2013, esp. the one by the editor, When the Romans Became pagani, 31-52. 6. MATTHEWS (Historical Setting [n. 3], p. 464) continues his criticism of the poor qualities of the poet when noting, “The author has little sense of structure; his work contains many serious errors of metre and of grammar, his choice of words is unimaginative and often obscure in meaning”. Few, if any, will disagree. 7. On this structure, see BOXUS – POUCET, Texte et traduction (n. 1). Alternative proposals in MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 342; BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 42-43.

86

J. VERHEYDEN

I do not wish to offer a full interpretation of each and every aspect of the text8. Instead, I will mainly comment on three things: the genre and the aim of the work, the means and methods used, and its author. First, I will show that the poem, in addition to being a satire or persiflage, which it certainly is, also reflects a good deal of frustration on the part of its author. Second, I will demonstrate that the author proceeds on two levels, basically uses three strategies, and heavily relies on recycled material to make his case. Third, and probably quite more debatable, I will try to show that it cannot be taken for granted that the poem was composed by a Christian, as is usually assumed, though hardly ever argued.

I. WHAT ARE WE FIGHTING FOR? CP has been called, most generally, an invective or polemical text9, but also an apology10, and a satire11. The poem opens in style – Virgil’s style. Indeed, the first eight verses contain a number of words and phrases that recall verses from the Aeneid, along with a few allusions to Ovid12. This opening section, and actually the whole up to v. 22, reads like a kind of counter-litany of the Roman pantheon, whether from western or oriental provenance. The references are as a rule succinct, but clear and even almost evident for readers who possess a basic knowledge of Virgil and of Rome’s religious tradition. The personality and status of the various divinities is evoked rather than pictured. There is nothing new in it and it all sounds almost trivial13. The first two verses may serve as an illustration: 8. For more detailed and systematic text-critical, philological and historical comments, see, a.o., MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), pp. 352-356 and passim; and esp. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 68-83 and 87-168; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1). 9. So most scholars. Cf. on the genre in general, BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 4347. The suggestion that it would be a school exercise (so BOXUS – POUCET, Présentation [n. 1], p. 5) would explain a lot about the poor quality of the work, but is a bit gratuitous while otherwise unfounded. 10. See esp. MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 357: “das carmen gehört zur Gattung apologetischer Deutungen”; with reference to, a.o., COMMODIANUS’ Carmen apologeticum and PS.-TERTULLIAN’s Carmen adv. Marcionistas. There is obviously an element of apologetics in the text, but it is quite marginal and indirect for this kind of work. 11. So definitely, ALEXANDRE, Prudence (n. 5), and TROUT, Napkin Art (n. 2). The satire, however, is often mixed up with other sentiments, as I will try to show. 12. On these opening verses, see BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 87-94; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 2-8. “Le texte trahit une indiscutable tonalité virgilienne” (p. 2). Many examples in Bartalucci. 13. Cf. CAMERON, Last Pagans of Rome (n. 5), p. 275; TROUT, Napkin Art (n. 2), p. 215: “it has all been said before”.

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

87

Dicite, qui colitis lucos antrumque Sibyllae Idaeumque nemus, Capitolia celsa Tonantis

Each verse consists of two geographical references. The first ones are to woods, in strict parallel, the second to places that are rather each other’s opposite (a cave and the heights of Rome’s most famous hill). The section is addressed to a still unidentified group, which will turn out at the end of the first part to be the proceres, the notables of Roman society (vv. 23-24), apparently all of them, with no exception, and as a distinct group. The whole looks like an incomplete, and worse, most chaotic “who is who” of Roman religion. Several of the Olympians, though not all, are mentioned – Minerva, Jupiter, Juno, Venus, and Apollo; and, with the apparent exception of Minerva, they are all “killed off” with one word. Jupiter may be called Tonans, as he is known also from other poets (Martial), and he may well reside on the Capitol hill (v. 2b; the two elements together also in Ovid, Fasti 2.69-70), but he is rightly reckoned among the incestos deos (v. 4)14, just as is his sister-wife. His daughter vies with her father in impiety (v. 5, Veneris monumenta nefandae)15, while his son Apollo has never been able to produce a word of truth from his cauldron in Delphi (v. 7). Only Minerva seems to escape this fate, but that may be a delusion, for the apparently neutral verse 3, Palladium Priamique Lares Vestaeque sacellum, which mentions the talisman-like statue that represents her and alludes to its origin in Troy and its presence in Rome16, is squeezed in between a reference to Jupiter Capitolinus, who turns out to be a parricide, and the general disqualification incestosque deos that makes the transition from Minerva to the other Olympians; moreover, her claim to protect the city was moot, as Troy did not stand and Rome, her new home, was soon to be besieged and captured (or had indeed already been threatened, if one wishes to see here an allusion to the first siege by Alaric). The Olympians do not take the first place in the list, but are packed together in vv. 2b-7. They are preceded by a general reference to the sacredness of the woods (ancient Silvanus?), the Sibyl (probably of Cumae, the one that led Aeneas to the underworld), and mount Ida in Crete, dedicated to the cult 14. The word incestus may well have a broader sense than just incestuous (so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 5), but there is no reason to doubt that the latter is the primary meaning here (see BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], p. 90). 15. On this verse, see A. PERELLI, Nefanda Venus (Contra paganos 5), in Giornale italiano di Filologia 40 (1988) 241-254. The “cruel child” (v. 5, inmitem puerum), in combination with Venus, is most probably Cupido (BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], pp. 90-92 and the phrase “demonizzazione di Amore” on p. 92). 16. On the identification of Pallas Athena (palladium) with Minerva and the links between Rome and Troy, see BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 4-5.

88

J. VERHEYDEN

of Cybele17, and followed by an equally general reference to the vain claims of Etruscan soothsayers in v. 8 (Etruscus ludit semper quos uanus haruspex). What is evoked is a strange mixture of old and new, of “authentic” Roman tradition (Silvanus?), allusions to Trojan descent that sound quite hollow at the end of the fourth century when taking into account the social, political and military situation of the empire, Greek gods Latinised, and even a not-so-implicit reference to a cult of “barbaric” origin that will become a favourite target of the poet all through the work. It is not only a strange world, it is also a cruel and vile one. It is a world in which the leading god is unmasked as a most despicable murderer who on top of that also commits incest with his sister, that god’s daughter follows in her father’s footsteps when it comes to performing (undisclosed) acts of impiety, his son is exposed as a cheat, and a bloody barbaric cult has found favour among the best and the brightest of society. The latter, moreover, are all fake, focused on utter glory; the dress does not make one a pious man (v. 6). But what precisely is the problem? All of this is well known, and since long. Clearly, this is what the author thinks Roman religion is, or has become. And it obviously is not what he thinks it should be in essence, but that latter is not further developed. One category of gods and semidivine figures is missing in this survey. There is no mention in this section of Mars, or Hercules, or any other such heroes, let alone any of Rome’s famous emperors. Is this (part of) the problem? That Rome has ignored its true gods and has grown tired of war, or at least is no longer able to rise to its former military glory? It is notoriously difficult to build assured conclusions on an argument e silentio, but the next section will show that this is most probably not the issue. Are these opening lines a satire? Is this fun? One might think so, but I am in doubt. It all sounds too serious to me, too dramatic also. But perhaps one should read a bit more before reaching any sort of conclusion. Jupiter and Venus, and through the latter also Cybele, are the protagonists of the next section18. Of the first, the poet recalls his amorous adventures (vv. 9-12)19, but also the way he ousted his father (vv. 14-16)20, and the 17. Ibid., p. 4. 18. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 94-105; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 8-12. 19. What the author says about Parthenopes is not very clear or in line with ancient mythology. Cf. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 97; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 9-10. 20. The poet calls it “monstruous” (v. 13 haec si monstra), a word he uses, as parenthesis, also later to express his disgust (see vv. 66 and 115). MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 355. It is not impossible that he also wants to extend it to include those who venerate

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

89

fact that this super god is after all bound to fate, as is everyone else (v. 17). How can those who put their hopes on such a divinity ever aspire at higher values (vv. 13 and 18)? But it is not only Jupiter who poses a problem; the same goes also for his children. This is where Cybele comes in, indirectly and in the background, but quite present after all. Those who deplore the death of beautiful Adonis, so the poet continues, take part in a drama that stars two other members of the Olympian family. Adonis’ death leaves Venus in tears and his rival Mars, here referred to as the hero Mavortius, filled with joy. Jupiter is clueless of how to solve the family drama, and the ancient Roman war goddess Bellona stirs up the enmity (vv. 19-22)21. Once more, is this fun or persiflage? There may be some of this in the opening lines recalling Jupiter’s ridiculous travesties to satisfy his lusts, but the latter part is dead-serious again and leads the author to exclaim, almost in despair, how prominent citizens could ever put their faith in such a bunch and their priests (vv. 23-24)22. The poet continues by bringing to mind the recent death of the prefect, above all the spectacle he made of what apparently was a slow process, and also the dangers he caused to the city and its inhabitants (vv. 25-33)23. The triad concitus, rabies animi, and insania mentis (vv. 28, 30)24 more such a kind of deity; so BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 98; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 10. It makes good sense in combination with the criticism in v. 15 of those who worship a tyrant. Scholars have duly pointed out that this is a topos in Christian apologetics, but it was not unknown already in the classical world: “Il faut dire que les Anciens euxmêmes (Xénophane, Platon) condamnaient déjà ceux qui attribuaient aux dieux des conduites humaines immorales” (BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 11). The latter is not unimportant in view of what I will say below about the author of CP. 21. At one point the latter (also mentioned in v. 68) came to be identified with the Cappadocian goddess Mâ, and through her, with Cybele. The little section reads as a catalogue of divine vices. Cf. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 105, who notes that this presentation of the deity is in line with the evidence from the imperial period; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 11-12. 22. BARTALUCCI (Carmen [n. 1], p. 106) reads these two verses as “due segmenti interrogativi”. As for their contents, “Bref, vos dieux ne peuvent pas vous apporter le salut après la mort, et il ne faut pas compter sur leurs prêtres pour vous apporter ici-bas la concorde et la paix” (BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 12). A truly sad and tragic situation pagan humankind is in. 23. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 106-115; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 14-20. Several verses in this section pose problems and quite some emendations have been proposed; see BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 106-109 and MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), pp. 353-354. 24. “Termes hyperboliques”, which BOXUS – POUCET (Commentaire [n. 1], p. 17) link to the attitude of the target, all while accepting that they could also refer to the city and its inhabitants. The former seems to make the best fit. No doubt hyperbolical is also the allusion to the chaos that is created in Rome, which should warn against finding here historically reliable information (so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 19: “Son propos peut être exagéré, caricatural, ironique”).

90

J. VERHEYDEN

than suffices completely to discredit this figure25. Again there is little reason to make fun of the situation, though the figure of the prefect in vain running around, probably looking for healing26, certainly makes him totally out of character, hence ridiculous. But it is irritation, and frustration, that seems to have the upper hand. But even more so than the prefect’s zeal for a cause that obviously is not worth it, it is the man’s religious bigotry that irritates the poet (vv. 3456)27. This was a man who dabbled in sooth-saying (vv. 35 and 50), participated in all sorts of strange rituals – sacrifices (vv. 36-3728) and others (vv. 41-42, 4729), took all sorts of ridiculous initiatives and measures, not all of these apparently linked to religion (vv. 38-40)30, enthusiastically supported peasant lore (vv. 48-49)31, felt at home in every single cult, whatever its origin (vv. 34, 47, 50), but then also, more perversely and dangerously, sought to kill innocent people because of their faith (vv. 43-45, 51-53) and to raise the whole empire against them (vv. 54-55)32. If there 25. Cf. A. PERELLI, Suggestioni claudianee nel Carmen contra paganos, in V. TANDOI (ed.), Disiecti membra poetae: Studi di poesia latina in frammenti, Foggia, Atlantica, 1988, 209-225, p. 211, n. 9: “un esagitato … un uomo privo di controllo”. 26. That is likely what lustrauit in v. 29 hints at, rather than referring to a ritual of purification: the man is touring the city and its temples in search for a cure or healing; so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 17, ctr. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 110 (“valore sacrale”) and MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 354: “Wer urbem liest [he follows Mommsen and others in reading orbem], wird kaum mit ‘durcheilen’ übersetzen”, but why not? 27. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 115-129; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 20-27. 28. Note the strongly negative verb polluere (also vv. 42 and 60), “sempre in rapporto a ceremonie pagane” (BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], p. 116). “Ces vers insistent sur l’‘addiction’ particulière (sacratior) du préfet à tout ce qui est rites et sacrifices” (BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 20). 29. None of these are very clear, even if the instruments used (lauro … conuiuia ... ture) are well known in Roman religious praxis. Cf. BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 23. In light of what will follow, BARTALUCCI (Carmen [n. 1], p. 120) links them to the Cybele cult, which is quite probably of course. 30. BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 21 and 22, think of exactions and “mauvaise gestion en matière édilitaire”. Note once more the “tonalité virgilienne”. 31. “Ces vers semblent surtout mettre en évidence la crédulité du personnage” (BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 26). 32. The little section vv. 43-45 is particularly difficult to understand. It has been suggested that vv. 43-44 (with the “impossible” gallaribus) allude to the galli, Cybele’s adepts (BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], pp. 121-122, in a long line of scholars; but see MARKSCHIES, “Leben” [n. 1], p. 355: wirkt ausserordentlich gesucht”), or to gladiator games in which Christians were forced to partake as easy victims (so tentatively, BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], pp. 24-25), but was such a spectacle still possible at that time? Several scholars have proposed emendations (invisum for in risum and collaribus for gallaribus) that take away the slightly artificial “laughing” and focus on means to arrest and imprison a person (so MARKSCHIES, “Leben” [n. 1], pp. 354-355). Maybe it is safest not to try to be too concrete and to focus on the general picture that emerges of a vicious and perverse

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

91

is a trace of humour to be found in the way our hero is linked to peasant folk, it is his far more darker side that should have worried everyone with a bit of common sense. One aspect in particular raises the ire of the poet. It is the fact that this “saint” prefect (v. 46) saw no problem in becoming initiated in the cult of Cybele while at the same time promoting the ancient Roman religious tradition (vv. 57-77)33. The author dwells at length on this topic, which shows how important it is for him, and how much he is frustrated by it. The taurobolium naturally takes place of pride in the lament (vv. 57-66)34. The poet pretends to try to find out what the poor creature thought to discover in all of this – a temporary salvation (v. 62), or perhaps also a way to obscure his true self (v. 64)35? Anyway, it is a sad sight to see a venerable member of the Roman senate take part in all possible cults, old and new ones – and our hero attended many of these, but sadder still, or so it seems, is the knowledge that people like him then lose all honour by also joining the Cybele cult (vv. 76-77)36. Here is no place for satire anymore; it is a truly deplorable situation37. But more ominous still is that darker side of the illustrious prefect that had been mentioned before, and that is now illustrated in more detail in the next section (vv. 78-86)38. The man was a major force in fighting Christianity39. He worked on two levels. He succeeded in converting back civil servant: “le préfet, profondément anti-chrétien, se doublait d’un méchant pervers” (p. 25). For the “thousand means to harm” in v. 52, see VIRGIL, Aeneid 7.338. 33. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 129-143; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 27-37. 34. See the comments by N. ADKIN, Carmen contra paganos 63, in Wiener Studien 117 (2004) 219-223. Cf. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 130-135; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 28-33. 35. ADKIN, Carmen (n. 34), sees in vv. 63-64 an allusion to Aeneid 5.483-484, though this remains doubtful (so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 31) and may also ask too much of the poor poet. 36. Cf. the slightly baroque comment of BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 142: “Viene ripreso e completato il motivo del v. 13; come nessuna donna consacrata è pudica, così nessun uomo consacrato che rende effeminata la propria voce nelle feste della Mater può mantenere il pudore”. See the similar motif in vv. 65-66 and 106-107. I am not sure if the enthusiasm for Cybele, however ridiculous, had anything do so with hiding one’s sins (so apparently MCLYNN, Poetry and Pagans [n. 2], p. 241). 37. Pace BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 37, who speak of “exagération hyperbolique et ironique de la satire”. Exaggeration there may be and it is true that “il ne faut pas toujours essayer de faire correspondre le texte et la réalité historique”, but I have the strong impression that by now most of the fun is gone; it is dead-earnest. 38. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 144-148; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 37-39. 39. Literature on the “last stand” of (Roman) paganism against Christianity abounds. In most of it CP hardly gets a mention. Three studies I read with benefit are J. WYTZES, Der letzte Kampf des Heidentums in Rome (Études préliminaires aux religions orientales

92

J. VERHEYDEN

individuals by threat, or in exchange for money and status (vv. 79-83)40. In addition, he also worked in a more structural way, trying to change existing laws and agreements (v. 84) and appointing certain persons – not necessarily themselves apostates41 – in important places (vv. 85-86), but no concrete successes are cited. His efforts gain him another sobriquet – the man is demens (v. 78)42. Once again, there is little opportunity to make fun of the whole situation, unless one likes some morbid humour, as there is to be found in a phrase such as, mittereque inferias miseros sub Tartara secum (v. 83). But finally then it all becomes a bit more light-heartedly, when the poet makes fun of the fact that all this religious zeal for Roman and foreign cults did not help the man much (vv. 87-109)43. How the poet knows this, we do not know, and he does not tell, but he is very much convinced of the fact that this must be so. The whole first section reads like a litany repeating the same question time and again: “how did it benefit you to worship …?” (vv. 87-97)44. The ridicule becomes more concrete when he continues to describe the man’s initiation and participation in the cult of Isis and Osiris (vv. 98-102, the latter had been mentioned in passing in v. 50), staging the bald-shaven supplicant with his broken olive branch in the company of Anubis latrator (v. 100, cf. v. 95) and adding quis non risit…? (v. 98). Cybele does not fare any better, with her silly and bloody dans l’Empire romain, 56), Leiden, Brill, 1977; P. THRAMS, Christianisierung des Römerreiches und heidnischer Widerstand, Heidelberg, Winter, 1992; and M. KAHLOS, Debate and Dialogue: Christian and Pagan Cultures, c. 360-430, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2007. 40. It is documented and certainly true that apostasy went in both directions, hence was a matter of concern for both sides, even if Christians tended to use it above all for their anti-pagan propaganda. Cf. BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 37. 41. So correctly BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 38 (ctr. BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], pp. 146-147), with reference to further literature on the persons mentioned here. 42. Cf. the nice parallel in HORACE, Satires 2.3.208, cited by BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 144; it is all a matter of self-deception. 43. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 148-159; BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), pp. 39-46. 44. BARTALUCCI (Carmen [n. 1], p. 148) cites ample evidence of similar rhetorical passages in Christian apologetics and homilies. Grouping several gods (“tante divinità”) together in this way, as if evoking the whole pantheon, certainly strengthens the impression that no help is to be found with whatsoever a deity. BOXUS – POUCET (Commentaire [n. 1], p. 39) entitle the list, quite appropriately, “Des dieux inefficaces”. The long list consists mainly of “traditional” Roman gods, with two exceptions – Serapis and Anubis (vv. 91 and 95). It am not sure it is a firm indication that for late-antique Romans all these gods were on the same level, as part of the ancestral tradition (so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], pp. 39-40), or rather an indication of the sloppiness of the author who mentions Anubis again right after in v. 100 (while Serapis is implicitly present through Isis and Osiris in vv. 99-100), or maybe just an indication that this is not an issue here.

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

93

procession, the prefect’s adoring gestures, and the senatorial rank watching eagerly (vv. 103-109)45. The tone is more ambivalent again in the final section, with on the one hand the jab at the man’s poor tomb and at the fact that his enthusiasm for magic bought him nothing, followed by the unexpected reference to his interests in the cult of Flora, that ancient Roman goddess of plants and trees – hence, of life, who ended up a symbol of libertinism – hence of depravation (vv. 112-114)46, and on the other the insults at the mourning widow who desperately tries to save her husband from Acheron by turning to magic, but only brings about his sad fate in Tartarus (vv. 115-12047; for the latter motif see the contrast with v. 83), before ending with a last insult at the man (hydrops)48 and a last jab at Jupiter (vv. 121-122)49. As indicated before, this is not just fun, and indeed far less so than one might have expected in a work tackling such a topic and presenting such a character. Satire there is, but it seems the light-hearted tone is above all found in the description of the target’s meddling with oriental cults. I find it is far less prominent when the poet speaks of the “good old” Roman 45. As elsewhere in CP, this whole section mixes fantasy with reality. Individual elements can be linked to various aspects of the cult, but the presentation as a whole seems to combine the Megalenses in honour of Cybele with the Hilaria. The author does not care, so maybe we should not either. Cf. BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 46 “ne correspond peut-être pas à la réalité”. Particularly offensive is the absurdity that speaks from the scene depicted in v. 109 when the proceres are said to announce castrated Attis as the Sun deity; so BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 158. 46. On the importance of this passage for dating the poem and identifying the target, see BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 161. However, the reference to “your successor Symmachus” (v. 114) offers less than one might expect in terms of contextualising the scene or identifying the target, as the Symmachi were a large family. Christian apologists obviously picked up on this (BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], pp. 47-48), but one can imagine such kind of developments was not applauded by all pagans. The little section does not fit too well in its immediate context (so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], pp. 49 and 52, without offering a solution or answer). 47. “Dévotions stériles” (BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 49). Verse 115 is best taken with what follows (so BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], p. 164). 48. The verse picks up on what was said before about the man’s agony, but now gives a diagnosis. The fact that the man is identified through his illness is not very polite, to say the least. His specific illness could also be given an ethical interpretation in ancient literature, as argued by BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 166. In light of the tone and subject of the poem, this may also well be the case here, even if the motif is not further developed in any detail. It would be most surprising and completely out of character if this was meant as a sort of comfort for the widow (ctr. K. SEEFELDER, Abhandlung über das carmen adversus Flavianum, in Programm des Königlichen Realgymnasiums Gmünd, Gmünd, B. Kraus, 1901, i-vi [Text] and 1-65 [Commentary], p. 63; rightly sceptic is MARKSCHIES, “Leben” [n. 1], p. 356). 49. BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire (n. 1), p. 50: “sa conclusion est sans appel”. The term salvation (also in v. 22) may refer to both physical and spiritual healing, though in this case the former is the more probably one (so also BARTALUCCI, Carmen [n. 1], p. 168).

94

J. VERHEYDEN

tradition. The author is above all concerned, and irritated, and perhaps also frustrated, but because of what precisely as a matter of fact? To try and answer this, I refer to the third part. II. WHERE DOES THE INSPIRATION COME FROM? The author develops his criticism along two lines, or rather on two levels. On a general level it exposes the ancient and less ancient gods of the Roman pantheon as vile and untrustworthy. On a more personal one, it aims at the way part of Rome’s political and cultural elite continues to embrace its religious tradition, and in particular, at how one recently deceased individual of senatorial rank, who is said, without any further details, to have been a prefect and a consul (v. 112), showed himself to be a representative of the sorry state of that tradition and culture in his time. Scholars have put lots of energy in trying to identify the man. Four persons have been listed as possible candidates; three of them are known to have been in touch with one of the others; all four flourished in the second half of the fourth century, which would then also indicate when the poem was composed50. The first to be suggested as the target was Virius Nicomachus Flavianus (c. 340-394), senator of Rome, known for his efforts to maintain Roman religion, prefect of the praetorium of the provinces of Italy, Africa and Illyria in 390-392, and consul in 394, the year in which he committed suicide after the failed coup of the usurper Eugenius, whom he had supported51. Many scholars agreed, probably not in the least because of the one who had made the suggestion. A counterproposal followed only almost a century later. The target was Gabinius Barbarus Pompeianus, also known for his support of the ancient cause, who was prefect of the city for a couple of months before he was executed in an uproar caused by famine in February 40952. A third candidate is Lucius Aurelius Avianus Symmachus Phosphorius (c. 316-377), the father of the better known orator Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, an ally of 50. Cf. the surveys of the discussion in BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), pp. 31-36; MARK“Leben” (n. 1), pp. 346-351; BOXUS – POUCET, Présentation (n. 1), pp. 3-5. 51. Th. MOMMSEN, Carmen codicis Parisini 8084, in Hermes 4 (1870) 351-353, repr. in his Gesammelte Schriften, 7, Berlin, Weidmann, 1909, 485-493. For a recent defense of this option, see A. COSKUN, Virius Nicomachus Flavianus, der Praefectus und Consul des “Carmen contra paganos”, in Vigiliae Christianae 58 (2004) 152-178. 52. G. MANGANARO, La reazione pagana a Roma nel 408-409 D.C. e il poemetto anonimo “contra paganos”, in Giornale italiano di filologia 13 (1960) 210-224 and ID., Il poemetto anonimo “contra paganos”: Testo, traduzione e commento, in Nuovo Didaskaleion 11 (1961) 23-45. Critical response in MATTHEWS, Historical Setting (n. 3), who pleads in favour of Flavianus. SCHIES,

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

95

Flavianus in the battle for preserving the ancient tradition, prefect of the city in 364-365 and designated consul in 377 at the time of his death53. These two proposals never found much support54. That is different with the fourth one, Vettius Agorius Praetextatus (c. 320-384), another ally of Flavianus and Symmachus, who is known to have been a priest in several cults, was prefect of the city in 367-368, and died as designated consul55. There seems to be no way to decide the issue; in a sense it does not matter that much, as these characters were all close to each other, in time and in what they stood for56. It cannot be excluded that the poet had not just one specific person in mind, but was aiming at such proceres who indulged in the Cybele cult and were openly hostile to Christianity to the point that they would risk an open conflict in their zeal to subdue it, but that he crystallised this in one anonymous representative of that group. Suffice it to say that, because of the genre, the information that might be gained from the poem should best be handled with care and not used at face value to speak out in absolute terms on any of these persons. That said, it should be noted that the interest in the personal level should not be underestimated and perhaps also added that the combination of the two levels, whatever the reliability of the information given on the second one, makes CP somehow unique when compared to others authors of antipagan literature, be it Tertullian, Lactance, Commodianus, or Prudence, or the author of the Carmen ad quendam senatorem, who focuses more exclusively on his personal target. Of course, there is nothing spectacular about the move, but it adds something to the text57. 53. S. MAZZARINO, La conversion del senato: Il carmen “contro I pagani” e il problema dell’“èra costantiniana”, in Antico, tardoantico ed èra costantiniana, I (Storia e civiltà, 13), Bari, Dedalo, 1974, 398-465, repr; in 2003 as Basso Imperio: Antico, tardoantico ed èra costantiniana. 54. For a critique of all three these proposals, see L. LENAZ, Annotazioni sul ‘Carmen contra paganos’, in Studia Patavina 25 (1978) 541-572. 55. See already U. MORICCA, Il carme del codice Paris. 8084, in Didaskaleion 4/2 (1926) 94-107, but above all L. CRACCO RUGGINI, Il paganesimo romano tra religione e politica (384-394 D.C.): Per una reinterpretazione del “Carmen contra paganos”, in Memorie dell’ Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Classe di Scienze morali, storiche e filologiche, VIII.23/1, Roma, Accademia dei Lincei, 1979, 3-141. See now also, most forcefully, CAMERON, Last Pagans (n. 5), pp. 273-319. The suggestion was strongly rejected by L. MUSSO, Il praefectus del “Carmen contra paganos”: Tra vecchie e nuove interpretazioni, in Archeologia Classica 31 (1979) 185-240. 56. The fact that Flavianus was not prefect of the city but only in the province is perhaps less strong an argument against him than some have thought, because the poem does not say which sort of prefect the deceased target had been. 57. Scholars’ criticism of the literary qualities of the poem, has not prevented many to highlight the value of the text as a reliable source for contemporary events. As one example, see the comments by MATTHEWS, Historical Setting (n. 3), at the beginning and the end of his essay: “The little pamphlet is nothing if not vivid and outspoken; otherwise it

96

J. VERHEYDEN

In developing his criticism the author basically follows three strategies – ridiculing the target and the tradition he stands for, accusing him of immorality and of (politically) dangerous ambitions, and lamenting the whole situation. As I tried to argue in the previous part, the lament is perhaps more prominent than most scholars have thought, because they have too readily focused on the ridicule and made that the central point from which to assess the whole poem. The accusative aspect comes to the fore above all in the section in which the target’s actions against Christians are referred to, but it is also met when hinting at his political aspirations. Again, there is nothing spectacular about this. All three strategies had proven their value before in polemical literature, all three can easily be used, without too much concern for historicity or truth claims, all three are flexible enough to be used also when reality is to be adapted or bent to fit an author’s intention. The author of CP knows how to handle them, but, once more, one does not have to be a genius to make this work. The inspiration for the poem, apart from the assumed or claimed “facts”, and the language used to convey the message stem from pagan and Christian tradition. Here as well, there is nothing new or spectacular about this, though it is worth noting that the amount of pagan material that has been “recycled” is quite impressive and spices up the criticism that is ventilated. Here is a pagan devotee being confronted with the deficiencies of his own religion and his own behaviour in a language known to him from his own tradition. Virgil is all over the place, as one can see by simply browsing through the commentaries and as I indicated above with reference to the opening verses58. But it is not just Virgil; occasionally Ovid too may have contributed his part. It would lead too far to illustrate the influence of Virgil in all detail, so I limit myself to just two cases in which Ovid may have been the first source of inspiration. Verses 53-54, evoking the target’s actions against opponents, most probably Christians, read as follows: would require an indulgent judgement to regard it as other than irretrievably incompetent” (p. 464) and (on the assumption that Matthews’ interpretation is correct, as he notes) “the Carmen has an invaluable and distinctive contribution to make to our knowledge of the ‘pagan revival’ of the time of Eugenius – less, perhaps, as an expression of religious propaganda, than for the precise details which it can offer of what actually took place in 394” (p. 477). More cautious are BOXUS – POUCET when noting, “La plus grande prudence s’impose donc lorsqu’on veut utiliser le texte comme une source historique” (Présentation [n. 1], p. 6); more plastic, when comparing CP to “une auberge espagnole” (p. 7). 58. Note again the biting sarcasm of MATTHEWS, Historical Setting (n. 3), p. 464: “It might have been expected that he [the poet] would be safe in imitating Vergil, from whom he derives many expressions, but he cannot always be allowed even this degree of credit”. BOXUS – POUCET (Présentation [n. 1], pp. 5-6) are more clement.

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

97

perdere quos uoluit, percussit, luridus anguis, contra deum uerum frustra bellare paratus,

All commentators have noted the parallel with Virgil’s Aeneid 5.108 and 8.400 for the phrase bellare paratus. It remains disputed if the words can be taken as a reference to a presumed rebellion by Flavianus – a nice instance of the ambiguity of the evidence and the difficulties in using it for historical conclusions59. Commentators have also been used to compare the phrase luridus anguis to Virgil’s lubricus anguis (Aeneid 5.84)60. The combination in CP may be rather unusual, but the adjective is found with another term for (a kind of) snake in Ovid (Tristia 5.7.16, uipereo lurida felle)61. Verses 65-66 offer a vivid description of the chaotic bunch of Cybele followers the target socialises with: cum canibus Megales semper circumdatus esses, quem lasciva cohors (monstrum) comitaret ovantem.

The dogs are not a mistake for the lions that usually are associated with Cybele, for CP knows the latter are the companions of the goddess (v. 103, vidimus argento facto iuga ferre leones). They have been taken as a reference to the galli who were well known for their turbulent behaviour, including shouting or howling, as shown by Lucretius (2.611-612 and 628) and Ovid (Fasti 4.185-186, ipsa sedens molli comitum cervice feretur / urbis per medias exululata vias, and 341-342, exululant comites, furiosaque tibia flatur / et feriunt molles taurea terga manus). There are no strict parallel phrases in CP, only isolated words, but the presence of the latter and the broader context may point to a more complex dependence on the Roman poet. Drums, cymbals and flutes, all played as if in rage, are the usual instruments that accompany the goddess’ procession, as Ovid says repeatedly, but he also adds that Cybele’s unmanly companions 59. See BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 128. 60. Cf. ibid.: “Variazione del cliché virgiliano”, or perhaps rather of the phrase lucidus anguis (Georgics 1.205). Others have pointed to PRUDENCE’s callidus anguis (Hamartigenia 711) and the whole set of synonyms he and other Christian poets have used for picturing the devil, but the poet remains quite reserved in identifying the culprit in this way and it is possible to read the motif without the connotation Christians used to make as “un serpent symbolisant la dissimulation” (so BOXUS – POUCET, Commentaire [n. 1], p. 27). 61. Cf. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 128: “luridus sembra un epiteto insolito per anguis”. Bartalucci mentions another passage from OVID (Metamorphoses 1.147, lurida terribiles miscent aconita novercae) that illustrates the negative use of luridus as connoting paleness with death (so PETRONIUS 124.1 v. 257, imago mortis and SILIUS ITALICUS 13.560, mors lurida) and points out the figurative sense of the colour “chi è pieno di livore e di odio” (ibid.).

98

J. VERHEYDEN

(molles and comites, cf. CP v. 66, comitaret 62) make a hell of a noise; it is not chanting, it is not human, it is exululare. That is what dogs do63. Add to this the mention, in the immediate context, of the surname Berecyntia for Cybele (Fasti 4.181, see also v. 355 and cf. CP v. 73, cymbala quem inbuerat quatere Berecyntia mater; also in Virgil, Aeneid 6.784 and 9.82) and above all, the fact that also in Ovid the Roman elite is called upon to come and watch the procession (Fasti 4.187, spectate, Quirites), which is what CP’s target and others of his rank are of course also supposed to do, and more (vv. 106-107, egregios proceres currum seruare Cybellae / quem traheret conducta manus Megalensibus actis). So, this could be an instance in which CP did not just borrow one or two stock phrases, but worked with a passage from the ancient poets to construct his own version, all while being very much influenced by the former. He is recycling old material for a new purpose, and as said, the irony of it cannot have escaped him or his readers. The inspiration taken from Christian authors for specific words or phrases is perhaps less spectacular, but there are a couple of cases in which it is most probable. One such case is the use of the term Christicolas (v. 78). In Latin literature before CP it is almost exclusively attested in the work of Prudence (Cathemerinon 3.56 and 8.80; Peristephanon 3.72; pl. in c. Symmachum 2.1002)64. The phrase uerus deus (v. 54, contra uerum deum frustra bellare paratus) is attested only in Christian authors, including Prudence, but has its origin in biblical tradition65. Here we encounter, if not a different type of recycling, at least a different purpose. The author is in good Christian company and demonstrates acquaintance of Christian poetry. Inspiration is not a sign of limited capacity, but very much of knowledgeability. III. WHO IS THIS MAN? CP was not authored by Prudence, even if it ended up among his works. It would be like an insult to the famous poet’s genius, unless one 62. For the phrase comitaret ovantem, see VIRGIL, Georgics 1.346 (MARKSCHIES, “Leben” [n. 1], p. 355). 63. See the evidence from older secondary literature for such an interpretation cited by BARTALUCCI (Carmen [n. 1], p. 135), who adds that the epithet canes was given to pagans by HILARY OF POITIERS (in Matthaeum 6.1, canes … de oblatrandi adversus deum rabie gentes sunt nuncupatae) and that the term had a long history as an (ambivalent) synonym for loyal servants of a god. 64. Cf. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 144: “conio poetico attestato spesso a partire da Prudenzio e passato in seguito anche alla prosa”. 65. Ibid., p. 128.

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

99

wishes to speculate about it being an early work of the still immature author, but how to prove this? The cento-like outlook of the poem has made some to suggest it is somehow linked to Proba, but again there is nothing really to go on qua style and content66. The proposal to identify the author with Pope Damasus, known to have composed epigraphical poetry, looked more promising67. However, the little note in an old catalogue of the library of the Benedictine abbey of Lobbes (now in Belgium) that names “bishop” Damasus as the author of a poem on the city prefect Praetextatus, one of the four candidates for being the target in CP, may have less weight than one might think, because we do not know anything about the author and origin of the note and the tentative suggestion at best offers extra support for the Praetextatus hypothesis, but in itself does not prove it, as the editor of the catalogue duly recognises68. The fact that abbot Heriger (†1007), an accomplished poet himself, seems to have known and used CP, another fine discovery by the same editor, does not change this69. The evidence remains circumstantial. Lately a strong case has also been made against the identification with Damasus on the basis of stylistic differences70. 66. Cf. D. SHANZER, The Anonymous Carmen contra paganos and the Date and Identity of the Centonist Proba, in Revue des Études Augustiniennes 32 (1986) 232-248. See the critical reply by MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 343. CP is also mentioned in this regard by T.D. BARNES, An Urban Prefect and His Wife, in The Classical Quarterly 56 (2006) 249-256. 67. See F. DOLBEAU, Damase, le Carmen contra paganos et Hériger de Lobbes, in Revue des Études Augustiniennes 27 (1981) 38-43. For an edition of his poetry, see now D.E. TROUT (ed.), Damasus of Rome: The Epigraphic Poetry (Oxford Early Christian Texts), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2015. 68. The note reads as follows: Damasi episcopi versus de Praetextato praefecto urbis (DOLBEAU, Damase [n. 67], p. 39). 69. The parallels DOLBEAU cites between CP and a couple of verses in HERIGER’s Vita S. Ursmari prove that Heriger knew a copy of CP (Damase [n. 67], p. 41). He is then also fully entitled in calling the identification of the versus de Praetextato with CP “une conjecture extrêmement vraisemblable” (p. 43), while rightly remaining more hesitant about the two other elements – the mention of Praetextatus (“précieuse”) and of Damasus (“étonnante”). Cf. MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 333: “problematisch”; BOXUS – POUCET, Présentation (n. 1), p. 3: “une simple hypothèse”. The evidence in favour of the link with Praetextatus was positively assessed by L. CRACCO RUGGINI, En marge d’une mésalliance: Prétextat, Damase et le Carmen contra paganos, in Académie des inscriptions et belleslettres: Comptes-rendus des séances de l’année 142 (1998) 493-516, followed by CAMERON, Last Pagans (n. 5), pp. 273-285. The suggestion actually specifies an earlier one which linked the author of CP to the circle of Damasus: so SEEFELDER, Abhandlung über das carmen adversus Flavianum (n. 48), p. 25 (the author does not give a first name), which finds some favour with MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 344. On the parallels in the Vita S. Ursmari, see also PERELLI, Nefanda Venus (n. 15). 70. S. RATTI, Pourquoi Damase n’est pas l’auteur du Carmen contra paganos, in Giornale italiano di filologia 67 (2015) 239-254 and R. GREEN, Did Damasus Write the

100

J. VERHEYDEN

But these complications notwithstanding, scholars have never doubted for one moment that the author of CP was a Christian who used the death of a prominent adversary of his religion as an opportunity to mock the whole pagan religious system of his time and from its outset. It seems to be the easiest, indeed the only, way to make sense of the text. The prefect’s stance against “the true god” (v. 54) has most naturally been linked to what is said a bit later about his actions against Christians (vv. 78-86), to which, in the same line of thought, should then probably also be added the passage on how he picked out victims to be killed (vv. 43-45). It fits with other such criticism of pagan authorities and it would explain why the text ended up in a manuscript of a Christian author. However, this may be too easy a solution to be true. Does all of this really make the poet a Christian? I dare to doubt it. For one, the author never directly identifies himself as a Christian and he connects himself with them in any specific way. Further, his compassion with the man’s victims, if vv. 43-45 are about attempts at persecuting (or harassing) Christians, which I think they are, is formulated in a rather sober way; they are called miseros (v. 45), a favourite of the author who uses it also for others (see vv. 18, 83, 120, and miserande in 96), but that is where it stays. Moreover, he similarly is quite detached when evoking the fate of those who have apostatised: they have forgotten about their salvation (v. 80, oblitos)71, chosen to die outside of their faith (v. 79, qui uellent sine lege mori)72, or become sad funeral offerings (v. 83, mittereque inferias miseros sub Tartara secum), but not a word about a coming judgement or any sort of divine wrath. All of this could also be written by a compassionate pagan. Two things seem to plead against this: the phrases uerus deus (v. 54) and Christicolas (v. 78). But here as well the same comment applies. The poet uses a term, but he does not say in any way that he swears by it. These are phrases that adherents of a particular cult use to refer to their own god and tradition. Taking it over does not automatically mean one believes in them or make one a Christian. The author may have come across these terms from his own reading of Christian texts, or from hearsay. The latter of the two is after all a construct that was not totally new to a pagan ear73. The former may be exclusively Christian, but Carmen contra paganos? The Evidence of et, in The Classical Quarterly 66 (2016) 691704 (based, among others, on the use of non-use of the conjunction et). 71. BOXUS – POUCET (Commentaire [n. 1], p. 38) identify the loss of hope on salvation with a loss of personal identity, which may well be what the author had in mind. 72. So ibid., p. 37. 73. Cf. BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 144: “Christicola, da confrontare con i composti nominali deicola e daemonicola”. The stem -colus (cf. Iunonicola, OVID, Fasti 6.49) is but

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

101

it is remarkable that it is more often used with further qualifications rather than in this absolute form in which it occurs in CP74. The fact that the author does not openly criticise Christianity in the way he attacks Roman religion does not argue against such a conclusion. The target is a naively enthusiast adherent of all sorts and types of “pagan” cults; that is where the focus lies. It does not by itself render more valuable such cults the target opposes to. The author is not interested in any sort of defence of other cults. In this respect, the fact that Christians are merely referred to as miseri may be revealing; these are some poor deluded characters, like so many others who indulge in strange cults. But it is not a reason to persecute or exploit them for political reasons as the target is accused to trying to do. By contrast, there are apparently three things that raise the ire of the author. Two of these have directly to do with his main target. One is the prefect’s (and others of his rank) meddling with Cybele. His enthusiasm and involvement in the cult is considered ludicrous. The other is the man’s efforts to endanger the political and social situation in his zeal to protect and promote pagan religious traditions. The latter might cause great damage to the stability of the state. The two are obviously not of the same level and character. One is more dangerous than the other, but both are to be avoided. The third factor that receives the poet’s attention is broader and has to do with the very principles of Roman religion as such, in which all sorts of divinities and rituals are invoked, feared, or cherished that are either ridiculous, immoral, or untrustworthy. The one principle that seems to rule the world and that is acceptable to the poet is Fate (v. 17, Postremo, regitur fato si Iuppiter ipse)75. He clearly shows an aversion of religious practices and religion as such. To express this, one of several options to express a person’s adherence to a particular god: see Dianaticus (MAXIMUS OF TURIN, ap. Murat., Anecdota Latina 4, p. 100), Diane(n)sis (CIL 11.3210 and 13.1495), Minerualis (CIL 5.7565), Ianuli, Iunonii, Mineruii (PAUL, Festus p. 3M), Apollineus (OVID, Metamorphoses 11.8). 74. Note the two instances quoted by MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 359, n. 260: Deus christianus, Deus noster, uerus Deus (TERTULLIAN, To the Nations 1.13-14) and τὸν παρ᾿ ἡμῶν προσκυνούμενον, καὶ κηρυττόμενον τοῦτον μόνον εἶναι Θεὸν ἀληϑῆ, τὸν καὶ τῆς κτίσεως Κύριον καὶ πάσης ὑποστάσεως δημιουργόν (ATHANASIUS, c. Gentes 40). 75. On this verse, which echoes TERTULLIAN’s fato stat Iuppiter ipse (Apology 25.8) but is not an exclusively Christian thought, see L. LENAZ, Regitur fato si Iuppiter ipse … Una postilla al Carmen contra paganos, in Perennitas: Studi in onore di A. Brelich, Roma, Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1980, 293-309; BARTALUCCI, Carmen (n. 1), p. 102. MARKSCHIES (“Leben” [n. 1], pp. 358-359) connects with it a general disregard for the usefulness of religion as such, with reference to Firmicus MATERNUS, The Error of the Pagan Religions 4.2, and the formula dic mihi that has its equivalent in CP in the repeated dicite.

102

J. VERHEYDEN

he does not present himself as a philosopher, and he does not write a philosophical tractate, but in some respect his criticism of religion sounds like that found in the more critical branches of the Second Sophistic of decades ago as witnessed by Lucian of Samosata76. How to make sense of this? I do not like to psychologise and am aware of the limits of such an approach, but if forced to draw a picture of the poet it would come down to the following. He is well versed in ancient poetry, including perhaps Christian poetry, and relies on it to evoke some of the principles and effects of Roman religious tradition. Maybe he is just trying to kill off a political opponent, though the critique comes a bit late77 and the focus on religion is perhaps too one-sided a way to proceed, even if it is an easy one to mock the target. His critical stand against Oriental cults might give the impression that we hear the voice of a concerned conservative, but there is more to the author’s criticism. It is not just a lament on the downfall of an ideal religious past. That past itself is targeted, together with the current situation in general. So maybe the author is better captured when described as one who has lost faith in all sorts of faith and has become a sort of nihilist in matters of religion; or perhaps just a mere pragmatist who puts the safety of the empire before anything else and certainly before risking to run into chaos because of religious quarrels and differences with Christians78. His concerns for exposing Roman religion as promoted by the prefect make him a critic, first and foremost, of a tradition he probably once belonged to or identified with, but had left, at least mentally and probably also physically. These concerns about what some are trying to do to revive that tradition (or keep it afloat) are expressed above all in the form of irritation because of how it may affect the status quo, or perhaps even 76. One thinks of his Zeus Rants, The Parliament of the Gods, or the Dialogues of the Gods, and several other of his works. Of course, Lucian plays in another league than the author of CP, but the latter’s focus on a particular target, whether historical or not, adds a more ominous element to the criticism. 77. Cf. MCLYNN, Poetry and Pagans (n. 2), p. 242: on the author “flaying a safely dead prefect”, and TROUT’s “hapless targets” (Napkin Art [n. 2], p. 227). 78. This is indeed the more urgent issue that underlies all the ridicule and satire and surpasses it, and in my opinion makes the poet less of a satirist or even an apologist and more of a politician. This is seen correctly (all while keeping to the label “apology”) by MARKSCHIES, “Leben” (n. 1), p. 364, when noting, “Trotz aller Polemik und inhaltlichen Problematik trifft das apologetische Gedicht genau die umstrittene, zugleich aber Heiden und Christen gemeinsam bewegende Frage: Von wem ist unter den Bedingungen der allgemeinen Reichskrise Heil zu erwarten? … Wer hilft? Wer nützt in dieser Situation?”. Markschies thinks a Christian is speaking, but the same question could be asked, and certainly was, by pagans, and some of the latter may well have thought that blindly clinging to the old traditions was not the answer.

BETWEEN PERSIFLAGE AND FRUSTRATION

103

of frustration and despair because of what is happening, mixed with a pinch of satire79. So here is a “former pagan” criticising “paganism” for what it is or has become and for what some are trying to do with it80. KU Leuven Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies St.-Michielsstraat 4/3101 BE-3000 Leuven Belgium [email protected]

Joseph VERHEYDEN

79. Cf. the double qualification at the beginning and the end in GREEN, Damasus (n. 70), p. 691: “a blistering invective against worshippers of the traditional gods and their practices” (I would nuance the reference to “traditional gods” with reference to Cybele) and p. 703: “a spectacular satire”. 80. In that sense, the general assessment TROUT (Napkin Art [n. 2], p. 221) gives of the carmina contra paganos as “making the religious past and its partisans laughable as well as lamentable”, in order to offer “a safe and sensible way to leave that weary world behind”, would also work for this individual.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IN HISTORIOGRAPHIE, BRIEFEN UND KREUZZUGSAUFRUFEN DES HOHEN MITTELALTERS MARKEN, BURGEN UND BISTÜMER IN OTTONISCHER ZEIT Die historiographische Beschäftigung mit den religiösen Vorstellungen der Elb- und Ostseeslawen war eine Folge ihrer militärischen Unterwerfung durch Krieger der sächsisch-liudolfingischen Könige des ostfränkischen Reiches seit den Jahren 928 und 9291. Als Otto der Große dann im Jahr 968 nach langwieriger Überzeugungsarbeit an Halberstädter Bischof, Mainzer Erzbischof und römischem Papst die Einrichtung des Erzbistums Magdeburg durchgesetzt hatte2, da gehörten zu dessen wenigen Suffraganen neben den schon bestehenden Brandenburg an der Havel und Havelberg die gleichzeitig gegründeten Bistümer Merseburg, Zeitz und Meißen. Alle diese Orte waren bis dahin Mittelpunkte von Militärbezirken, sogenannten Marken, die im Zuge oder nach der Eroberung des Landes östlich der Saale in der Zeit König Heinrichs I. und unter Otto dem Großen entstanden waren3. 1. C. LÜBKE, Die Ausdehnung ottonischer Herrschaft über die slawische Bevölkerung zwischen Elbe/Saale und Oder, in M. PUHLE (Hg.), Otto der Große, Magdeburg und Europa. Band I: Essays, Mainz, Philipp von Zabern, 2001, 65-74, hier S. 68-69; ID., Das östliche Europa (Die Deutschen und das europäische Mittelalter), Berlin, Siedler, 2004, S. 137-147. 2. D. CLAUDE, Geschichte des Erzbistums Magdeburg bis in das 12. Jahrhundert. Teil 1: Die Geschichte der Erzbischöfe bis auf Ruotger (1124) (Mitteldeutsche Forschungen, 67/1), Köln – Wien, Böhlau, 1972, S. 63-113. 3. LÜBKE, Die Ausdehnung ottonischer Herrschaft (Anm. 1), S. 66. Vgl. zum Folgenden auch M. HARDT, Kirchenorganisation oder Aufstand: Die Christianisierung von Sorben, Elbund Ostseeslawen in Ottonen- und Salierzeit, in H. KAMP – M. KROKER (Hgg.), Schwertmission: Gewalt und Christianisierung im Mittelalter, Paderborn – München – Wien – Zürich, Schöningh, 2013, 53-66; ID., Gentilreligion und christliche Mission bei den Sorben (10.-12. Jahrhundert), in C. RUHMANN – V. BRIESKE (Hgg.), Dying Gods: Religious Beliefs in Northern and Eastern Europe in the Time of Christianisation (Neue Studien zur Sachsenforschung, 5), Hannover, Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum, 2015, 263-268; ID., Die Christianisierung Ostmitteleuropas, in C. STIEGEMANN – M. KROKER – W. WALTER (Hgg.), Credo: Christianisierung Europas im Mittelalter, Petersberg, Imhof, 2013, I, 358-369, hier S. 364-367; P. SOMMER – M. HARDT, Beiderseits der Grenze – Die Christianisierung Böhmens und der Slawen nördlich des Erzgebirges und in der Oberlausitz / Po obou stranách hranice – Christianizace Čech a Slovanoů na severovýchod od Krušných hora v Horní Lužici, in S. WOLFRAM – J. FAJT – D. MÖLDERS – M. WINZELER (Hgg.), Sachsen – Böhmen. 7000 Sasko Čechy: Begleitband zur Sonderausstellung/Doprovodna publikace k výstavě smac – Staatliches Museum für Archäologie Chemnitz vom 28. September 2018 bis 31. März 2019 (Ausstellungskataloge des Staatlichen Museums für Archäologie Chemnitz, 2), Dresden, Landesamt für Archäologie Sachsen, 2018, 127-136.

106

M. HARDT

Merseburg4 hatte schon in der älteren Grenzorganisation des Frankenreiches, dem Limes Sorabicus5, eine Rolle gespielt, und Meißen6 war im Jahr 929 von den Truppen Heinrichs oder in dessen Auftrag erbaut worden, um mit der Elbe einen Fluß zu überwachen, der als mögliche Grenze ebenso wie zum Transit in weitere slawische Länder wie zum Beispiel Böhmen von Bedeutung war. Die Moritzburg in Zeitz über der weißen Elster kontrollierte die slawische Region Puonzowa-Bosau7. Die Installierung der Bischofssitze in solchen Burgen seit 968 war bezeichnend für die Lage des Christentums im sorbischen Gebiet: noch brauchte es den Schutz der militärischen Anlagen, mit deren Inhabern es ins Land gekommen war, und so verwundert es auch nicht, dass die Kirchengebäude, die Orte von Liturgie und Predigt, in der sorbischen Sprache als kostel bezeichnet wurden8, abgeleitet vom lateinischen Wort castellum, das die Burg, nicht aber das sakrale Gebäude bezeichnete. Diese in ihrer Bedeutung für die sorbische Bevölkerung also untrennbar miteinander verbundenen Befestigungen und christlichen Kirchen fanden sich aber nicht erst an 4. W. SCHLESINGER, Merseburg: Versuch eines Modells zukünftiger Pfalzbearbeitungen, in Deutsche Königspfalzen: Beiträge zu ihrer historischen und archäologischen Erforschung, Bd. I (Veröffentlichungen des Max-Planck-Instituts für Geschichte, 11/1), Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1963, 158-206. 5. M. HARDT, Der Limes sorabicus im Vergleich früh- und hochmittelalterlicher Grenzentwicklungen, in H.-J. BEIER – P. FÜTTERER – A. HUMMEL – V. SCHIMPFF (Hgg.), Jena und der Saale-Holzland-Kreis im frühen und hohen Mittelalter (Beiträge zur Frühgeschichte und zum Mittelalter Ostthüringens, 8), Langenweissbach, Beier & Beran, 2018, 199-214. 6. A. SCHMID-HECKLAU, Die archäologischen Ausgrabungen auf dem Burgberg in Meißen: Die Grabungen 1959-1963 (Veröffentlichungen des Landesamtes für Archäologie mit Landesmuseum für Vorgeschichte, 43), Dresden, Landesamt für Archäologie, 2004; W. SCHLESINGER, Verfassung und Wirtschaft des mittelalterlichen Bistums Meißen, in F. LAU (Hg.), Das Hochstift Meißen: Aufsätze zur sächsischen Kirchengeschichte (Herbergen der Christenheit, Sonderband), Berlin, Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1973, 33-53. 7. H. TRIMPERT, Der Gau Puonzowa und die Wallburg Posa, in STADT ZEITZ – R. DRÖSSLER (Hgg.), Zeitz: Geschichte der Stadt im Rahmen überregionaler Ereignisse und Entwicklungen. Bd. 1: Die Anfänge: Von der ur- und frühgeschichtlichen Besiedlung der Zeitzer Region und dem ältesten Zeitz bis zur Verlegung des Zeitzer Bischofssitzes nach Naumburg 1028/1030, Langenweißbach, Beier & Beran, 2004, 25-28; W. SCHLESINGER, Kirchengeschichte Sachsens, I (Mitteldeutsche Forschungen, 27/1), Köln – Wien, Böhlau, 1962, S. 34-35. 8. F. ROSENFELD (Hg.), Urkundenbuch des Hochstifts Naumburg. Teil 1 (967-1207) (Geschichtsquellen der Provinz Sachsen und des Freistaates Anhalt. Neue Reihe, 1), Magdeburg, Selbstverlag der Historischen Kommission, 1925, Nr. 152: 1140 Ztarecoztol – Altkirchen bei Altenburg. Vgl. W. SCHLESINGER, Die deutsche Kirche im Sorbenland und die Kirchenverfassung auf westslavischem Boden, in ID., Mitteldeutsche Beiträge zur deutschen Verfassungsgeschichte des Mittelalters, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1961, 133157, hier S. 141; H. WALTHER, Frühe kirchliche Aktivitäten in der Diözese Zeitz-Naumburg im Spiegel der Toponymie: Mission – Kirchengründung – Siedlung, in E. EICHLER – D. KRÜGER (Hgg.), Studia Onomastica IX (Namenkundliche Informationen, Beiheft 18), Leipzig, Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 1995, 197-214, hier S. 202.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

107

den Bischofssitzen, sondern waren schon vor dem Jahr 968 Kennzeichen jener Orte, welche die Eroberer zu ihren Stützpunkten auserwählt hatten und die sie in den folgenden Jahrzehnten zu sogenannten Burgwardmittelpunkten9 ausbauen würden. Dort hatte die frühe Kirche militärischen und institutionellen Rückhalt, und von dort setzten auch die missionarischen Aktivitäten ein, von denen insbesondere der Bischof Thietmar von Merseburg in seiner in den ersten Jahrzehnten des 11. Jahrhunderts geschriebenen Chronik10 zu berichten wusste, weil sie von seinen Vorgängern Wigbert und Boso voran getrieben worden waren. Im Zusammenhang damit werden auch die wenigen Informationen überliefert, die überhaupt als Quellen für die gentilreligiösen Verhältnisse bei den Sorben verwendet werden können. CHRISTLICHE MISSION UND IHR UMGANG MIT NATURRELIGION

SORBISCHER

Die missionarische Tätigkeit des Mönches Boso hatte schon begonnen, bevor die mitteldeutschen Bistümer im Jahr 968 eingerichtet worden waren11. Er war im Kloster St. Emmeram12 ausgebildet worden, jenem ins 8. Jahrhundert zurückgehenden Kloster in Regensburg, von dem aus frühzeitig auf die slawischen Nachbarn, insbesondere Böhmens, eingewirkt wurde, so dass sich im Jahr 845 vierzehn slawische Fürsten an der Residenz des ostfränkischen Königs hatten taufen lassen13. Auch aufgrund 9. G. BILLIG, Die Burgwardorganisation im obersächsisch-meißnischen Raum: Archäologisch-archivalisch vergleichende Untersuchungen (Veröffentlichungen des Landesmuseums für Vorgeschichte Dresden, 20), Berlin, VEB Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, 1989. 10. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon, hg. R. HOLTZMANN: Die Chronik des Bischofs Thietmar von Merseburg und ihre Korveier Überarbeitung (Thietmari Merseburgensis episcopi Chronicon) (Monumenta Germanica Historica [MGH]. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum, NS 9), Berlin, Weidmann, 1935. 11. L.E. VON PADBERG, Festigung und Ausbau des lateinischen Christentums: Die ottonische Mission bei den Westslawen und Ungarn, in A. WIECZOREK – H.-M. HINZ (Hgg.), Europas Mitte um 1000: Beiträge zur Geschichte, Kunst und Archäologie, Bd. 2, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2000, 671-675, hier S. 672; SCHLESINGER, Kirchengeschichte Sachsens I (Anm. 7), S. 23-26; L. DRALLE, Zu Vorgeschichte und Hintergründen der Ostpolitik Heinrichs I, in K.-D. GROTHUSEN – K. ZERNACK (Hgg.), Europa slavica – Europa orientalis [Festschr. H. Ludat] (Osteuropastudien der Hochschulen des Landes Hessen, Reihe I = Giessener Abhandlungen zur Agrar- und Wirtschaftsforschung des europäischen Ostens, 100), Berlin, Duncker & Humblot, 1980, 99-126, hier S. 112. 12. C. RÄDLINGER-PRÖMPER, St. Emmeram in Regensburg: Struktur- und Funktionswandel eines bayerischen Klosters im früheren Mittelalter (Thurn und Taxis-Studien, 16), Kallmünz, Lassleben, 1987. 13. Annales Fuldenses sive Annales regni Francorum orientalis, hg. F. KURZE (MGH. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, [7]), Hannover, Hahnsche Buchhandlung, 1891, ad a. 845, S. 35.

108

M. HARDT

des langjährigen Kontakts der Mönche von St. Emmeram zur Königspfalz14 und der Beobachtung der Mission Kyrills und Methods in Mähren15 wird zu erklären sein, dass sich Boso nach erfolgreichem Wirken in kaiserlichem Dienst zu den einstmals zeitweise zum Mährerreich gehörenden Sorben begeben hatte und zur Erleichterung der Predigt bei ihnen slawische Worte aufgeschrieben hatte. Thietmar berichtet mit der ihm eigenen Gelehrsamkeit darüber wie folgt: Zu bequemerer Unterweisung der ihm Anvertrauten hatte er eine Anweisung in slawischer Sprache geschrieben und den Gesang des Kyrie eleison verlangt, dessen Sinn er ihnen erläuterte. Doch die Heillosen verdrehten es zum Spott in wkrivolsa; das bedeutet in unserer Sprache: „Die Erle steht im Busch“; trotz seiner richtigen Erklärung behaupteten sie, so habe Boso gesagt16.

Die Episode aus der Tätigkeit Bosos, der zunächst in der Umgebung von Zeitz gewirkt und dort mindestens eine steinerne Kirche inmitten von Wäldern hatte errichten lassen17, zeigt eine der Hauptschwierigkeiten der christlichen Glaubensboten. Um die sorbische Bevölkerung erreichen zu können, mussten sie die slawische Sprache beherrschen. Zumindest Boso hatte sich mit Hilfe seiner Regensburger Ausbildung dieser Aufgabe gestellt, und auch Bischof Thietmar war, wie seine zahlreichen in die Merseburger Chronik eingebauten etymologischen Deutungsversuche slawischer Namen zeigen, in der Lage, in sorbischer Sprache zu kommunizieren18. Die Predigt in slawischen Sprachen war allerdings im 10. Jahrhundert nicht der Regelfall in der Auseinandersetzung zwischen christlichen Glaubensboten 14. P. SCHMID, König – Herzog – Bischof: Regensburg und seine Pfalzen, in L. FENSKE (Hg.), Deutsche Königspfalzen: Beiträge zu ihrer historischen und archäologischen Erforschung. Bd. 4: Pfalzen – Reichsgut – Königshöfe (Veröffentlichungen des Max-PlanckInstituts für Geschichte, 11/4), Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996, 53-83. 15. H. WOLFRAM, Die Geburt Mitteleuropas: Geschichte Österreichs vor seiner Entstehung 378-907, Berlin, Siedler, 1987, S. 292-301; LÜBKE, Das östliche Europa (Anm. 1), S. 73-90. 16. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon II, 37, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 8586: Hic ut sibi commissos eo facilius instrueret, Sclavonica scripserat verba et eos kirieleison cantare rogavit exponens eis huius utilitatem. Qui vecordes hoc in malum irrisorie mutabant ukrivolsa, quod nostra lingua dicitur: aeleri stat in frutectum, dicentes: „Sic locutus est Boso“, cum ille aliter dixerit. Die Übersetzung angelehnt an diejenige von W. TRILLMICH, Thietmar von Merseburg, Chronik (Ausgewählte Quellen zur deutschen Geschichte des Mittelalters; Freiherr vom Stein-Gedächtnisausgabe, 9), Berlin, Rütten & Loening, 1958, S. 75. Vgl. auch H.-D. KAHL, Heidenfrage und Slawenfrage im deutschen Mittelalter: Ausgewählte Studien 1953-2008 (East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 450-1450, 4), Leiden – Boston, MA, Brill, 2011, XIV, S. 474; SCHLESINGER, Kirchengeschichte Sachsens I (Anm. 7), S. 221. 17. SCHLESINGER, Kirchengeschichte Sachsens I (Anm. 7), S. 24. 18. Ibid., S. 224.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

109

und Gentilreligiösen. Die Verhältnisse waren trotz militärischer Eroberung, Markenorganisation und Burgwardsystem immer noch unruhig, so dass sich Boso, vor die Wahl gestellt, welchen Bischofssitz er 968 einnehmen wolle, für das sichere und deshalb friedliche Merseburg und gegen Zeitz entschied19. Diese Unruhe mag auch dadurch zu erklären sein, dass sich manche Kirchenmänner nicht für die Predigt entschieden, sondern in bester Tradition der schon von Alkuin kritisierten Schwertmission20 nach bonifatianischem Vorbild wie dieser an der Jupiter-Eiche in Geismar bei Fritzlar21 zur Tat schritten. Solches überliefert Thietmar über seinen 1009 verstorbenen Vorgänger Wigbert, der als Bischof von Merseburg wie folgt handelte: Durch ständige Verkündigungen suchte er die ihm Anvertrauten von ihrem nichtigen Irrglauben abzubringen; den heiligen Hain (lucum) Zutibure, Schkeitbar, der bei den Umwohnern immer in göttlichem Ansehen gestanden hatte und seit Urzeiten niemals verletzt worden war, ließ er völlig ausroden (radicitus eruens); an seiner Stelle errichtete er eine Kirche für den heiligen Märtyrer Romanus22.

Der ab evo antiquo nie beschädigte Hain in Schkeitbar wirft ein Schlaglicht auf die Naturreligion der Sorben, sofern Thietmar bei seiner Schilderung nicht auf Vorlagen etwa aus der Germania des Tacitus23 oder Willibalds Vita Bonifatii zurückgegriffen hat. Die Verehrung natürlicher Heiligtümer durch die slawische Bevölkerung der Region um Lommatzsch beschreibt der Merseburger Bischof allerdings noch an einer anderen Stelle seiner Chronik: 19. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon II, 36, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 85. 20. M. BECHER, Der Prediger mit der eisernen Zunge: Die Unterwerfung und Christianisierung der Sachsen durch Karl den Großen, in KAMP – KROKER (Hgg.), Schwertmission (Anm. 3), 23-52, hier S. 48. 21. Vita Bonifatii auctore Willibaldo, hg. W. LEVISON (MGH Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, [57]), Hannover – Leipzig, Hahn, 1905, cap. 6, S. 1-58, hier S. 31-32; M. HARDT, Hessen im frühen Mittelalter, in H.W. BÖHME – C. DOBIAT (Hgg.), Handbuch der hessischen Geschichte. Bd. 5: Grundlagen und Anfänge hessischer Geschichte bis 900 (Veröffentlichungen der Historischen Kommission für Hessen, 63; Handbuch der hessischen Geschichte, 5), Marburg, Historische Kommission für Hessen, 2018, 635-713, hier S. 644-645. 22. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon VI, 37, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 321: Predicacione assidua commissos a vana supersticione erroris reduxit, lucumque Zutibure dictum, ab accolis ut Deum in omnibus honoratum et ab evo antiquo numquam violatum, radicitus eruens, sancto martiri Romano in eo ecclesiam construxit. Die Übersetzung angelehnt an diejenige von TRILLMICH, Thietmar von Merseburg, Chronik (Anm. 16), S. 283. 23. TACITUS, Germania 9, lateinisch und deutsch v. G. PERL, in J. HERRMANN, Griechische und lateinische Quellen zur Frühgeschichte Mitteleuropas bis zur Mitte des 1. Jahrtausends u. Z. (Schriften und Quellen der Alten Welt, 37/2), Berlin, Akademie-Verlag, 1990, S. 88-89.

110

M. HARDT

Doch nun muß ich erzählen, wie dieser Gau zu seinem Namen gekommen ist. Glomaci ist eine nicht weiter als zwei Meilen von der Elbe entfernte Quelle; sie speist einen See, der nach Versicherungen der Einheimischen und Bestätigung durch viele Augenzeugen häufig wunderbare Erscheinungen hervorbringt. Wenn die örtlichen Bewohner (indigenae) Ruhe und Frieden zu erwarten haben und der Boden die Frucht nicht versagt, erfreut er, bedeckt mit Weizen, Hafer und Eicheln, die Herzen der sich oft an ihm versammelnden Umwohner (laetos vicinorum). Brechen dagegen wilde Kriegsstürme los, gibt es durch Blut und Asche im voraus gewisse Kunde vom künftigen Ausgang. Ihn verehren und scheuen alle Einwohner mehr als Kirchen, wenn auch in ungewisser Erwartung. Von ihm also ist der Name des Gaues abgeleitet, der sich von der Elbe bis an die Chemnitz erstreckt24.

DER AUFSTAND

DER

LUTIZEN UND IHR RELIGIÖSES ZENTRUM RETHRA

Im Jahr 983 erhoben sich gentes, quae suscepta christianitate regibus et imperatoribus tributariae serviebant25, offenbar deshalb, weil sie sich von der superbia des Grafen Dietrich von der Nordmark bedrückt fühlten und den fortschreitenden Ausbau des Burgwardsystems auch im Norden als Einschränkung ihrer überkommenen Lebensweise empfanden26. Und während bisher von Gewalt nie explizit die Rede war, so wird Thietmar von Merseburg seitdem nicht müde, nun die Exzesse der Rebellierenden hervorzuheben: in Havelberg wurden die Besatzung der Burg niedergemacht und der Bischofssitz zerstört27; in Brandenburg an der Havel wurden die Priester gefangen, Dodilo, der zweite Bischof des Ortes, der von den Seinen erdrosselt nun schon drei Jahre im Grab lag, aus seiner Gruft gerissen; seine Leiche und sein Bischofsornat waren noch unversehrt; die habgierigen 24. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon I, 3, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 6: Glomuzi est fons, non plus ab Albi quam duo miliaria positus, qui unam de se paludem generans, mira, ut incolae pro vero asserunt oculisque approbatum est a multis, sepe opertur. Cum bona pax est indigenis profutura, suumque haec terra non mentitur fructum, idem tritico et avena ac glandine refertus, laetos vicinorum ad se crebro confluentium efficit animos. Quando autem seva belli tempestas ingruerit, sanguine et cinere certum futuri exitus indicium premonstrat. Hunc omnis incola plus quam aecclesias, spe quamvis dubia, veneratur et timet. Et haec provincia ab Albi usque in Caminizi fluvium porrecta vocabulum ab eo trahit dirivatum. Die Übersetzung angelehnt an diejenige von TRILLMICH, Thietmar von Merseburg, Chronik (Anm. 16), S. 7. 25. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon III, 17, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 118. 26. L.E. VON PADBERG, Die Inszenierung religiöser Konfrontationen: Theorie und Praxis der Missionspredigt im frühen Mittelalter (Monographien zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 51), Stuttgart, Hiersemann, 2003, S. 378-379; W.H. FRITZE, Der slawische Aufstand von 983 – eine Schicksalswende in der Geschichte Mitteleuropas, in E. HENNING – W. VOGEL (Hgg.), Festschrift der Landesgeschichtlichen Vereinigung für die Mark Brandenburg zu ihrem hundertjährigen Bestehen 1884-1984, Berlin, Landesgeschichtliche Vereinigung für die Mark Brandenburg, 1984, 9-55. 27. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon III, 17, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 118.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

111

Hunde plünderten sie aus und warfen sie dann achtlos zurück. Alle Kostbarkeiten der Kirche wurden geraubt und das Blut vieler elendiglich vergossen. An Stelle Christi und seines Fischers, des hochwürdigsten Petrus, wurden fortan verschiedene Kulte teuflischen Aberglaubens gefeiert (varia demoniacae heresis), und nicht nur Gentile, sondern auch Christen lobten diese traurige Wendung28.

Die Aufständischen schlossen sich in einem von Priestern geleiteten Bund zusammen; ihr Zentrum wurde der Tempel von Rethra, einem Ort, der seit den guten Darstellungen von Volker Schmidt in der Lieps am Südwestende des Tollensesees bei Neubrandenburg lokalisiert wird29. Thietmar erzählt dazu: Im Redariergau liegt die dreieckige und dreitorige Burg Riedegost, rings umgeben von einem großen, für die Einwohner unverletzlich heiligen Walde (silva ab incolis intacta et venerabilis). Zwei ihrer Tore sind dem Zutritt aller geöffnet. Das dritte und kleinste Osttor mündet in einen Pfad, der zu einem nahe gelegenen, sehr düsteren See führt. In der Burg befindet sich nur ein kunstfertig errichtetes, hölzernes Heiligtum, das auf einem Fundament aus Hörnern verschiedenartiger Tiere steht. Außen schmücken seine Wände, soviel man sehen kann, verschiedene, prächtig geschnitzte Bilder von Göttern und Göttinnen. Innen aber stehen von Menschenhänden gemachte Götter, jeder mit eingeschnitzten Namen; furchterregend sind sie mit Helmen und Panzern bekleidet; der höchste heißt Swarozyc, und alle Heiden achten und verehren ihn besonders. Auch dürfen ihre Feldzeichen nur im Falle eines Krieges, und zwar durch Krieger zu Fuß, von dort weggenommen werden. Für die sorgfältige Wartung dieses Heiligtums haben die Eingeborenen besondere Priester eingesetzt. Wenn man sich dort zum Opfer für die Götzen oder zur Sühnung ihres Zorns versammelt, dürfen sie sitzen, während alle anderen stehen; geheimnisvoll murmeln sie zusammen, während die zitternd die Erde aufgraben, um dort durch Loswurf Gewissheit über fragliche Dinge zu erlangen. Dann bedecken sie die Lose mit grünem Rasen, stecken zwei Lanzenspitzen kreuzweise in die Erde und führen in demütigender Ergebenheit ein Roß darüber, das als das größte unter allen von ihnen für heilig gehalten wird; haben sie zunächst durch Loswurf Antwort erhalten, weissagen sie durch das gleichsam göttliche Tier nochmals. Ergibt sich beide 28. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon III, 17, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 119120: Clerus ibidem capitur, et Dodilo, eiusdem sedis antistes II., qui a suis strangulatus tres annos iacuit tunc sepultus, e tumulo eruitur et, integro adhuc eius corpore ac sacerdotali apparatu, ab avaris canibus predatur et iterum temere reponitur; omnis aecclesiae thesaurus distrahitur et sanguis multorum miserabiliter effunditur. Vice Christi et piscatoris eiusdem venerabilis Petri varia demoniacae heresis cultura deinceps veneratur, et flebilis haec mutacio non solum a gentilibus, verum etiam a christianis extollitur. Die Übersetzung angelehnt an diejenige von TRILLMICH, Thietmar von Merseburg, Chronik (Anm. 16), S. 105. 29. V. SCHMIDT, Lieps: Eine slawische Siedlungskammer am Südende des Tollensesees (Beiträge zur Ur- und Frühgeschichte der Bezirke Rostock, Schwerin und Neubrandenburg, 16), Berlin, VEB Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, 1984, S. 70.

112

M. HARDT

Male das gleiche Vorzeichen, dann setzt man es in die Tat um. Andernfalls lässt das Volk niedergeschlagen davon ab. Auch bezeugt eine alte, schon mehrfach als falsch erwiesene Kunde, aus dem See steige ein großer Eber mit weißen, von Schaum glänzenden Hauern empor, wälze sich voller Freude schrecklich im Morast und zeige sich vielen, wenn schwere grausame und langwierige innere Kriege bevorstehen30.

Thietmar berichtet im anschließenden Kapitel noch, dass jede Region im Lutizenland einen Tempel mit einem Götzenbild habe; Rethra jedoch sei das unumstrittene Zentrum, von dem Kriegszüge ausgingen, an dem Volksversammlungen abgehalten und an dem gelegentlich auch Menschen- und Tieropfer dargebracht würden31. Trotz der Parallelen zu den eben geschilderten Hainen und heiligen Seen der Sorben ist nicht sicher, ob Thietmars Bild von der lutizischen Tempelburg Rethra als authentisches Zeugnis slawischen Gentilreligiosentums akzeptiert werden kann32. 30. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon VI, 23-24, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 302-304: Est urbs quaedam in pago Riedirierun Riedegost nomine, tricornis ac tres in se continens portas, quam undique silva ab incolis intacta et venerabilis circumdat magna. Duae eiusdem portae cunctis introeuntibus patent: tercia, quae orientem respicit et minima est, tramitem ad mare iuxta positum et visu nimis horribile monstrat. In eadem est nil nisi fanum de ligno artificiose compositum, quod pro basibus diversarum sustenatur cornibus bestiarum. Huius parietes variae deorum dearumque imagines mirifice insculptae, ut cernentibus videtur, exterius ornant; interius autem dii stant manu facti, singulis nominibus insculptis, galeis atque loricis terribiliter vestiti, quorum primus Zuarasici dicitur et pre caeteris a cunctis gentilibus honoratur et colitur. Vexilla quoque eorum, nisi ad expeditionis necessaria, et tunc per pedites, hinc nullatenus moventur. Ad haec curiose tuenda ministri sunt specialiter ab indigenis constituti. Qui cum huc idolis immolare seu iram eorundem placare conveniunt, sedent hii, dumtaxat caeteris asstantibus, et invicem clanculum mussantes terram cum tremore infodiunt, quo sortibus emissis rerum certitudinem dubiarum perquirant. Quibus finitis cespite viridi eas operientes, equum, qui maximus inter alios habetur et ut sacer ab his veneratur, super fixas in terram duarum cuspides hastilium inter se transmissarum supplici obsequio ducunt et, premissis sortibus, quibus id exploravere prius, per hunc quasi divinum denuo auguriantur. Et si in duabus hiis rebus par omen apparet, factis completur; sin autem, a tristibus populis hoc prorsus omittitur. Testatur idem antiquitas errore delusa vario, si quando his seva longae rebellionis assperitas immineat, ut e mari predicto aper magnus et candido dente e spumis lucescente exeat seque in volutabro delectatum terribili quassatione multis ostendat. Die Übersetzung angelehnt an diejenige von TRILLMICH, Thietmar von Merseburg, Chronik (Anm. 16), S. 267, 269. 31. THIETMAR VON MERSEBURG, Chronicon VI, 25, hg. HOLTZMANN (Anm. 10), S. 304: Quot regiones sunt in his partibus, tot templa habentur et simulacra demonum singula ab infidelibus coluntur, inter quae civitas supra memorata principalem tenet monarchiam. Hanc ad bellum properantes salutant, illam prospere redeuntes muneribus debitis honorant … Hominum ac sanguine pecudum ineffabilis horum furor mitigatur … Unanimi consilio ad placitum suimet necessaria discucientes, in rebus efficiendis omnes concordant. 32. Vgl. dazu R. SCHMIDT, Rethra: Das Heiligtum der Lutizen als Heiden-Metropole, in H. BEUMANN (Hg.), Festschrift für Walter Schlesinger, Bd. 2 (Mitteldeutsche Forschungen, 74/2), Köln – Wien, Böhlau, 1974, 366-394. Ndr. in R. SCHMIDT, Das historische Pommern: Personen – Orte – Ereignisse (Veröffentlichungen der Historischen Kommission

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

113

Obwohl von der Fischerinsel im Tollensesee, an dessen südwestlichem Ende in der Lieps der Neubrandenburger Archäologe Volker Schmidt auch Rethra lokalisieren wollte, ein doppel-, vielleicht sogar dreiköpfiges Kultbild aus gesicherten archäologischen Zusammenhängen vorliegt33, ist doch nicht sicher, ob dem Merseburger Bischof in Bezug auf die Kultbilder und Tempelanlagen Glauben geschenkt werden sollte. Seine Schilderungen sind nämlich in hohem Maße intentionell, parteiisch also, hatte doch König Heinrich II. im Jahr 1003 in Quedlinburg ein von vielen Geistlichen des Reiches kritisiertes Bündnis mit den aufständischen Lutizen gegen den christlichen polnischen Fürsten Bolesław Chrobry geschlossen34. Mit liutizischen Kontingenten zog der König 1005 durch die Niederlausitz in Richtung Großpolen35, und es ist nicht auszuschließen, dass Thietmar seine teilweise auch von antiken Texten inspirierte Darstellung Rethras um entscheidende Details, etwa bei den angeblich namentlich gekennzeichneten Tempelstatuen, aus seiner reichlich vorhandenen Bildung und zugehöriger Phantasie, vielleicht aber auch aus den Berichten der an solchen Feldzügen beteiligten Militärs erweiterte36. BRUN VON QUERFURT UND DER UMGANG MIT APOSTATEN Einen diplomatisch geschickt formulierten Protest gegen das Bündnis Heinrichs II. mit den Lutizen hatte bereits Brun von Querfurt in einem Brief an den König gerichtet, den er während eines Aufenthaltes bei Heinrichs II. langjährigem Gegner Bolesław Chrobry im Jahr 1008 geschrieben hatte37. Ist es recht, ein christliches Volk zu verfolgen und ein heidnisches zum Freunde zu haben? Wie stimmt Christus mit Belial (2. Kor. 6,15)? Welcher für Pommern, Reihe V: Forschungen zur pommerschen Geschichte, 41), Köln – Weimar – Wien, Böhlau, 2007, 73-100. 33. SCHMIDT, Lieps (Anm. 29), Tafel 8, S. 132. 34. C. LÜBKE, Regesten zur Geschichte der Slaven an Elbe und Oder (vom Jahr 900 an). Teil III: Regesten 983-1013 (Osteuropastudien der Hochschulen des Landes Hessen, Reihe I; Gießener Abhandlungen zur Agrar- und Wirtschaftsforschung des europäischen Ostens, 134), Berlin, Duncker & Humblot, 1986, Nr. 366, S. 211-213. 35. Ibid., Nr. 398-399, S. 248-250. 36. LÜBKE, Das östliche Europa (Anm. 1), S. 234-236. 37. Brunonis Querfurtensis epistola ad Henricum regem, hg. H. KARWASIŃSKA (Monumenta Poloniae Historica. Series nova, IV/3), Warszawa, Państw. Wydawn. Naukowe, 1973, S. 97-106, hier S. 101-102: bonumne est persequi christianum, et habere in amicitia populum paganum? Quae conventio Christi ad Belial? Quae comparatio luci ad tenebras? quo modo conueniunt Zuarasiz diabolus et dux sanctorum, uester et noster Mauritius? qua fronte coeunt sacra lancea et qui pascuntur humano sanguine diabolica vexilla? Non credis peccatum, o rex, quando christianum caput, quod nefas est dictu, inmolatur sub demonum

114

M. HARDT

Vergleich ist zwischen Licht und Finsternis? Wie kommen Swarasiz der Teufel, und der Fürst der Heiligen, Euer und unser Mauritius, zusammen? Mit welcher Stirn gehen nebeneinander die heilige Lanze und die teuflischen Feldzeichen (diabolica vexilla) derer, die von Menschenblut sich nähren? Hältst Du es nicht für eine Sünde, oh König, wenn ein Christenhaupt – es ist schrecklich zu sagen, unter der Fahne der Dämonen geopfert wird? Wäre es nicht besser, die Treue eines solchen Mannes zu besitzen, mit dessen Hilfe und Rat Du Tribut empfangen und aus dem heidnischen Volke ein heiliges, allerchristlichstes machen könntest?

Brun von Querfurt drängte Heinrich zum Bündnis mit Bolesław statt mit den Lutizen, die er wenige Zeilen später wie folgt charakterisierte und daraus Forderungen ableitete: Während die Lutizen Heiden sind und Götterbilder verehren, gab Gott nicht in des Königs Herz, solche Feinde um des Christentums willen in ruhmvollem Kampfe zu bekriegen, das heißt nach dem Befehl des Evangeliums zu nötigen, hereinzukommen (Lukas 14,23: compellere intrare). Wäre es nicht eine große Ehre und ein großes Heil des Königs, damit er die Kirche mehre und einen apostolischen Namen vor Gott finde, darauf hinzuarbeiten, daß der Heide getauft werde, und den ihm dabei helfenden Christen den Frieden zu schenken?38.

Bruns Appell an Heinrich II., die verfolgungswürdigen lutizischen Apostaten mit Krieg zu überziehen und sie so in die Kirche zurückzutreiben, blieb wirkungslos, auch, weil Brun von Querfurt seinem Anliegen keinen Nachdruck mehr verleihen konnte, sondern am 9. März 1009 den Märtyrertod bei den Pruzzen erlitt39. Die Lutizen weiteten ihren Einfluss dagegen weiter aus. Im Jahr 1066 versank auch die Herrschaft des christlichen uexillo? Nonne melius esset talem hominem hebere fidelem, cuius auxilio et consilio tributum accipere, et sacrum, christianissimum fecere de populo pagano posses?. H.-D. KAHL, Compellere intrare: Die Wendenpolitik Bruns von Querfurt im Lichte hochmittelalterlichen Missions- und Völkerrechts, in Zeitschrift für Ostforschung 4 (1955) 161-193 und 260-401; Ndr. in H. BEUMANN (Hg.), Heidenmission und Kreuzzugsgedanke in der deutschen Ostpolitik des Mittelalters (Wege der Forschung, 7), Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1973, 177-274, hier S. 177-183. 38. Brunonis Querfurtensis epistola ad Henricum regem, hg. KARWASIŃSKA (Anm. 37), S. 103-104: Rursum cum Lutici pagani sint, et idola colant, non misit Deus in cor regis, hos tales propter christianismum glorioso certamine debellare, quod est iubente euangelico compellere intrare. Nonne magnus honor magnaque salus regis esset, ut aecclesiam augeret, et apostolicum nomen coram Deo inueniret, hoc laborare, ut baptizaretur paganus, pacemque donare adiuuantibus se ad hoc christianis? Übersetzung nach H.G. VOIGT, Brun von Querfurt: Mönch, Eremit, Erzbischof der Heiden und Märtyrer, Stuttgart, Steinkopf, 1907, S. 440-442; VON PADBERG, Die Inszenierung religiöser Konfrontationen (Anm. 26), S. 381382; KAHL, Compellere intrare (Anm. 37), Ndr. S. 183-189. 39. Die Annales Quedlinburgenses, hg. M. GIESE (MGH. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, [72]), Hannover, Hahn, 2004, ad a. 1009, S. 527: Sanctus Bruno, qui cognominatur Bonifacius, archiepiscopus et monachus, XI. suae conversionis anno in confinio Rusciae et Lituae a paganis capite plexus cum suis XVIII, VII. Id. Martii petiit coelos.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

115

Abodritenfürsten Gottschalk in einem großen Aufstand40. Gottschalk selbst wurde in Lenzen in der Prignitz ermordet41, Bischof Johannes Scotus wurde nach Helmold von Bosau auf seiner sedes Mecklenburg gefangen genommen, in demütigender Weise durch die verschiedenen Burgbezirke geführt und schließlich nach Rethra gebracht. Dort wurden ihm Hände und Füße abgehackt und schließlich sein Kopf auf einer Lanze dem Gott Radegost geopfert42, was an die Darstellungn Adalberts von Prag auf der Gnesener Domtür erinnert, auf welcher der Kopf des Märtyrers ebenfalls auf eine Stange gesteckt dargestellt ist43. Die sächsische Reaktion auf diese Vorfälle kam prompt: gemäß Informationen der Augsburger Annalen ließ Bischof Burchard von Halberstadt im Jahr 1068 nach einem erfolgreichen Feldzug gegen die Lutizen den Tempel in Rethra zerstören und ritt auf dem heiligen Pferd persönlich zurück nach Sachsen44. Im weiteren 11. Jahrhundert wandelte sich die Vorstellung darüber, warum sich die Slawen in den Jahren 983 und 1066 gegen die christliche Herrschaft erhoben hatten. Während noch Wipo im 33. Kapitel seiner Lebensbeschreibung Konrads II. davon ausging, die Lutizen seien von semichristiani zu pagani geworden per apostaticam nequitiam, „durch ruchlose Apostasie“45, setzte Adam von Bremen in seiner Hamburgischen Kirchengeschichte bereits andere Akzente: 40. J. PETERSOHN, Der südliche Ostseeraum im kirchlich-politischen Kräftespiel des Reichs, Polens und Dänemarks vom 10. bis 13. Jahrhundert. Mission – Kirchenorganisation – Kultpolitik (Ostmitteleuropa in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 17), Köln – Wien, Böhlau, 1979, S. 26-27. 41. ADAM VON BREMEN, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte, hg. B. SCHMEIDLER (MGH. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, [2]), Hannover – Leipzig, Hahn, 1917, lib. III, cap. 50, S. 193; HELMOLDI PRESBYTERI BOZOVIENSIS Cronica Slavorum, hg. B. SCHMEIDLER (MGH. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, [32]), Hannover, Hahn, 1937, lib. I, cap. 22, S. 45-46; PETERSOHN, Der südliche Ostseeraum (Anm. 40), S. 27. 42. HELMOLD, Cronica Slavorum, hg. SCHMEIDLER (Anm. 41), lib. I, cap. 23, S. 46: Iohannes episcopus senex cum ceteris Christianis in Magnopoli, id est Mikilenburg, captus servabatur ad triumphum. Ille igitur pro confessione Christi fustibus cesus, deinde per singulas civitates Slavorum ductus ad ludibrium, cum a Christi nomine flecti non posset, truncatis manibus ac pedibus corpus eius in platea proiectum est. Caput vero descetum, quod barbari conto prefigentes in titulum victoriae Deo suo Radigasto inmolaverunt. Haec in metropoli Slavorum Rethre gesta sunt IIII. Idus Novembris. Vgl. auch PETERSOHN, Der südliche Ostseeraum (Anm. 40), S. 27. 43. Porta regia. Drzwi Gnieźnieńskie. Photography: A. BUJAK, Text: A.S. LABUDA, Gniezno, Fundacja Świętega Wojciecha, 1998, Scena XV, S. 154-157. 44. Annales Augustani, hg. G.H. PERTZ (MGH. Scriptores, 3), Hannover, Hahn, 1839, ad a. 1068, S. 123-136, hier S. 128: Burchardus Halberstatensis episcopus Liuticiorum provinciam ingressus incendit, vastavit, avectoque equo quem pro Deo in Rheda colebant, super eum sedens in Saxoniam rediit. 45. Gesta Chuonradi, in Wiponis opera, hg. H. BRESSLAU (MGH. Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, [61]), Hannover – Leipzig, Hahn, 31915, cap. 33, S. 52; KAHL, Compellere intrare (Anm. 37), Ndr. S. 208.

116

M. HARDT

Alle Slawen, die zwischen Elbe und Oder wohnen, hatten über 70 Jahre lang in der gesamten Zeit der Ottonen Christus verehrt, und nun rissen sie sich auf diese Weise los vom Leibe Christi und der Kirche, dem sie bis dahin angehört hatten. Oh, wie geheimnisvoll sind doch Gottes Gerichte über die Menschen; er erbarmt sich, wessen er will und er verhärtet, wen er will. Im Staunen über seine Allmacht sehen wir vordem Gläubige ins Heidentum (paganismum) zurückfallen, und die scheinbar die Letzten waren, sehen wir sich zu Christus bekehren. Er, der gerechte, starke und geduldige Richter, der einstmals im Angesichte Israels sieben Stämme der Kanaanäer vertilgte und nur Fremdlinge übrig ließ, um Gesetzesbrecher zu züchtigen, er, meine ich, wollte jetzt einen gewissen Teil der Gentilen verhärten, um durch sie unseren Unglauben zu strafen46.

EIN KREUZZUGSAUFRUF VON 1108? Eine besondere, aber quellenkritisch sorgfältig auf ihre Intention zu überprüfende Qualität erhielt die Beschreibung slawischen Heidentums in einem nur in einer Handschrift des westfälischen Klosters Grafschaft überlieferten Aufruf zum Kreuzzug, der bisher in das Umfeld des Magdeburger Erzbischopfs Adalgoz und das Jahr 1108 gesetzt wurde47, vielleicht aber auch erst im Vorfeld des sogenannten Wendenkreuzzugs48 im Jahr 1147 gefälscht wurde, wie unlängst Michael Menzel vermutete49. Offenkundig an alttestamentarischen Texten ausgerichtet, wie es als interpretatio christiana in allerdings weniger direkter Art in den Chroniken Thietmars, 46. ADAM VON BREMEN, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte, hg. SCHMEIDLER (Anm. 41), lib. II, cap. 44, S. 105: Omnes igitur Sclavi, qui inter Albiam et Oddaram habitant, per annos LXX et amplius christianitatem coluerunt, omni tempore Ottonum, talique modo se absciderunt a corpore Christi et ecclesiae, cui antea coniuncti fuerant. O vere occulta super homines Dei iudicia, qui miseretur, cui vult, et quem vult indurat! Cuius omnipotentiam mirantes videmus eos ad paganismum esse relapsos, qui primi crediderunt, illis autem conversis ad Christum, qui videbantur novissimi. Ille igitur, „iudex iustus, fortis et patiens“, qui olim deletis coram Israel septem gentibus Chanaan solos reservavit Allophilos, a quibus transgressi punirentur, ille, inquam, modicam gentilium portionem nunc indurare voluit, per quos nostra confunderetur perfidia. Die Übersetzung angelehnt an diejenige von W. TRILLMICH, Quellen des 9. und 10. Jahrhunderts zur Geschichte der Hamburgischen Kirche und des Reiches (Ausgewählte Quellen zur deutschen Geschichte des Mittelalters; Freiherr vom Stein-Gedächtnisausgabe, 11), Berlin, Rütten & Loening, 1961, S. 281, 283. 47. G. CONSTABLE, The Place of the Magdeburg Charter of 1107/1108 in the History of Eastern Germany and of the Crusades, in F.J. FELTEN – N. JASPERT unter Mitarbeit von S. HAARLÄNDER (Hgg.), Vita Religiosa im Mittelalter. Festschrift für Kaspar Elm zum 70. Geburtstag (Berliner Historische Studien, 31; Ordensstudien, 13), Berlin, Duncker & Humblot 1999, 283-299. 48. H. KAMP, Der Wendenkreuzzug, in ID. – KROKER (Hgg.), Schwertmission (Anm. 3), 115-138. 49. M. MENZEL, Der Wendenkreuzzug und die sächsischen Fürsten, in Jahrbuch für brandenburgische Landesgeschichte 66 (2015) 9-28.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

117

Adams und Helmolds schon von dem Breslauer Historiker Stanisław Rosik nachgewiesen wurde50, hieß es da wie folgt: Durch mannigfache Bedrückungen und Unglücksfälle von Seiten der Heiden (pagani) sehr lange bedrängt, erflehen wir seufzend eure Barmherzigkeit, daß ihr zusammen mit uns den Untergang eurer Mutter Kirche verhindern helft. Erhoben haben sie sich wider uns (Ps. 26,12) die grausamen Feinde, Männer ohne Barmherzigkeit, und sie bedrücken uns hart. (Ps. 64,4); ja, in ihrer Bosheit sich rühmend, entweihen sie die Kirchen Christi mit ihrem Götzendienst (ydolatria), zerstören die Altäre und schrecken nicht davor zurück, das gegen uns zu vollführen, was zu hören des Menschen Herz schaudert. In unser Gebiet werden sie gar oft geführt, schonen niemand und rauben, morden, vernichten und bringen mit ausgesuchten Martern um, enthaupten viele und opfern die Köpfe ihren Götzen. Einigen holten sie die Eingeweide aus dem Leib, schnitten die Hände ab, banden die Füße zusammen und sagten, indem sie unseren Christus beschimpften: „Wo ist nun Gott?“ Einige zogen sie am Galgen hoch und ließen sie ihr Leben, das elender war als jeder Tod, zu noch größeren Martern verlängern, da sie noch lebend zuschauen mussten, wie man sie durch Abschneiden einzelner Glieder zu Tode brachte, zuletzt ihnen den Leib aufschnitt und erbärmlich die Eingeweide heraus nahm. Recht viele schinden sie bei lebendigem Leibe. Und, wenn sie so die Kopfhaut abgezogen haben, brechen sie, damit maskiert, ins Gebiet der Christen ein, geben vor, Christen zu sein, und führen ihre Beute ungestraft davon. Die Fanatiker (phanatici) unter ihnen aber sagen, wenn es ihnen einmal gefällt, ein Trinkgelage zu halten, und ein Fest angesagt wird: „Köpfe will unser Pripegal! Solche Opfer soll er haben!“ Pripegal ist, wie es heißt, der Priapus und unzüchtige Beelphegor. Darauf enthaupten sie die Christen vor den Altären ihres Götzendienstes (prophanationis sue aras), halten Krüge voller Menschenblut und heulen mit schrecklichen Rufen: „Machen wir uns einen Tag der Freude! (Tob. 13,10) Besiegt ist Christus, gesiegt hat Pripegal, der große Sieger!“ Solches Elend ertragen oder fürchten wir ohne Unterlass, denn wir müssen darüber seufzen, daß sie stets vorankommen und alles ihnen wohl gelingt51. 50. S. ROSIK, Interpretacja chrześcijańska religii poganńskich Słowian w świetle kronik niemieckich XI-XII wieku (Thietmar, Adam z Bremy, Helmold) (Historia, 144; Acta Universitatis Wratislaviensis, 2235), Wrocław, Wydawn. Uniw. Wrocławskiego, 2000. 51. Urkunden und erzählende Quellen zur deutschen Ostsiedlung im Mittelalter, hg. H. HELBIG – L. WEINRICH, Bd. I (Ausgewählte Quellen zur deutschen Geschichte des Mittelalters; Freiherr vom Stein-Gedächtnisausgabe, 26a), Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1970, Nr. II, 19, S. 96-102, hier S. 96, 98: Multimodis paganorum oppressionibus et calamitatibus diutissime oppressi ad vestram suspiramus misericordiam, quatenus ecclesie matris vestre nobiscum sublevetis ruinam. Insurrexerunt in nos et prevaluerunt crudelissimi gentiles, viri absque misericordia, et de inhumanitatis sue gloriantes malicia ecclesias Christi ydolatria prophanaverunt, altaria demoliti sunt et, quod humana mens refugit audire, ipsi non abhorrent in nos perpetrare. In nostram regionem sepissime efferantur nullique parcentes rapiunt, cedunt, fundunt et exquisitis tormentis affligunt, quosdam decollant et capita demoniis suis immolant. De quibusdam visceribus extractis manus abscissas et pedes alligant Christumque nostrum suggilantes: „Ubi est“, inquiunt, „deus eorum“? Quosdam in patibulo sublatos permittunt ad maiores cruciatus omni morte miserabiliorum vitam protrahere, cum vivi aspiciant per se abscisionem singulorum

118

M. HARDT

Daher, geliebte Brüder, ihr Bischöfe, Kleriker und Mönche aus ganz Sachsen, Franken, Lothringen und Flandern, nehmt Euch ein Beispiel an guten Taten und seid auch darin Nachfolger der Franzosen: „Rufet dies in den Kirchen, heiliget ein Fasten, rufet die Gemeinde, versammelt das Volk, verkündiget dieses und lasset es hören in allen Grenzen eures Amtsbereiches, heiliget einen Streit, erwecket den Starken, gürtet Euch, ihr starken Söhne, und kommt, all ihr Kriegsleute ... Die Heiden sind schlimm, aber ihr Land ist sehr gut an Fleisch, Honig, Geflügel und Mehl und, wenn es bebaut wird, voller Reichtum der Ernten vom Lande, so daß ihm keins verglichen werden kann. So sagen die, denen es bekannt ist. Daher, oh ihr Sachsen und Franken, Männer aus Lothringen und Flandern, ihr berühmten Bezwinger der Welt, hier könnt ihr eure Seele retten und, wenn es euch so gefällt, das beste Land zum Bewohnen gewinnen. Er, der die Franzosen, die vom fernen Westen aufgebrochen sind, im entlegensten Osten mit seinem starken Arm über seine Feinde triumphieren ließ, er gebe euch den Willen und die Macht, diese Nachbarn und so unmenschliche Heiden zu unterwerfen, und daß euch alles wohl gelinge“52.

DIE ZERSTÖRUNG DES PROVE-HAINS NAHE OLDENBURG/HOLSTEIN Der Aufruf, der erstmals den Gedanken des Kreuzzugs und der Heidenbekämpfung mit der Werbung um Siedler verband, also auf territoriale Gewinne und Landesausbau abzielte, leitete eine neue und schließlich im membrorum mortificari et ad ultimum ceso ventre miserabiliter eviscerari. Quam plures vivos excoriant et cute capitis abstracta hoc modo larvati in christianorum fines erumpunt et se christianos mentientes predas impune abigunt. Phanatici autem illorum, quotiens commessationibus vacare libet, feriis indictis: „Capita“, inquiunt, „vult noster Pripegala! Huiusmodi fieri oportet sacrificia“. Pripegala, ut aiunt, Priapus est et Beelphegor impudicus. Tunc decollatis ante prophanationis sue aras christianis crateras tenent humano sanguine plenas et horrendis vocibus ululantes: „Agamus“, inquiunt, „diem leticie. Victus est Christus; vicit Pripegala victoriosissimus!“ Huiusmodi afflictiones sine intermissione vel toleramus vel formidamus, quoniam eos semper progredi et in omnibus ingemiscimus bene prosperari. 52. Urkunden und erzählende Quellen zur deutschen Ostsiedlung im Mittelalter (Anm. 51), Nr. II, 19, S. 96-102, hier S. 98, 102: Itaque, fratres karissimi, tocius Saxonie, Francie, Lutaringie, Flandrie episcopi, clerici et monachi, de bonis sumite exemplum et Gallorum imitatores in hoc etiam estote: „Clamate hoc in ecclesiis, sanctificate ieunium, vocate cetum, congregate populum, annunciate hoc et auditum facite in omnibus terminis prelationis vestre! Sanctificate bellum, suscitate robustos! Surgite, principes, contra inimicos Christi, arripuite clypeos, accingimini, filii potentes, et venite omnes, viri bellatores! … Gentiles isti pessimi sunt, sed terra eorum optima carne, melle, farina … avibus, et si excolatur, omnium de terra ubertate proventuum, ita ut nulla ei possit comparari. Sic aiunt illi, quibus nota est. Quapropter, o Saxones, Franci, Lotaringi, Flandrigene famosissimi et domitores mundi, hic poteritis et animas vestras salvificare et, si ita placet, optimam terram ad inhabitandum acpuirere. Qui Gallos ab extremo occidente progressos in brachio virtutis sue contra inimicos suos in remotissimo triumphavit oriente, ipsi tribuat vobis voluntatem et potentiam hos affines et inhumanissimos gentiles subiugare et in omnibus bene prosperari“. Die Übersetzung hier zitiert nach LÜBKE, Das östliche Europa (Anm. 1), S. 276. Vgl. auch P. KNOCH, Kreuzzug und Siedlung: Studien zum Aufruf der Magdeburger Kirche von 1108, in Jahrbuch für die Geschichte Mittel- und Ostdeutschlands 23 (1974) 1-33; VON PADBERG, Die Inszenierung religiöser Konfrontationen (Anm. 26), S. 383-384.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

119

christlichen Sinne erfolgreichere Phase der Bekämpfung des Paganismus bei den Slawen ein. So berichtet Helmold von Bosau in seiner Cronica Slavorum über die Zerstörung eines dem Gott Prove gehörigen Hains in Oldenburg in Wagrien, dem heutigen Ostholstein, im Jahr 1156: Da geschah es, dass wir … in einen Wald kamen, den einzigen in jenem Lande … Dort sahen wir zwischen sehr alten Bäumen heilige Eichen, die dem Landesgott (deo terrae) Prove geweiht waren; ein freier Hofraum umgab sie und ein sorgfältig von Holz gefügter Zaun mit zwei Pforten. Denn neben den Hausgöttern (penates) und (Orts-)Götzen, von denen die einzelnen Ortschaften voll sind (ydola, quibus singula oppida redundabant), bildete dieser Ort ein Heiligtum des ganzen Landes (sanctimonium universae terrae), für das ein eigener Priester, Festlichkeiten und verschiedene Opferhandlungen bestimmt waren. Dort pflegte jeden Dienstag die Landesgemeinde mit Fürst (regulus) und Priester (flaminus) zum Gericht zusammen zu kommen. Der Eintritt in den Hofraum war allen verboten außer dem Priester und denen, die opfern wollten oder von Todesgefahr bedrängt wurden; denn diesen blieb die Zuflucht niemals verwehrt. Die Slawen haben nämlich solche Ehrfurcht vor ihren Heiligtümern, daß sie den Tempelbezirk auch nicht mit Feindesblut beflecken lassen. Eidesleistungen lassen sie sehr selten zu, denn schwören heißt bei den Slawen gleichsam sich verschwören gegen den rächenden Zorn der Götter. Sie haben vielerlei Götzendienst, denn nicht alle hängen dem gleichen abergläubischen Brauchtum an. Die einen stellen phantastische Götzenbilder in Tempeln zur Schau, wie etwa das Plöner Idol namens Podaga, die anderen (Götter) wohnen in Wäldern und Hainen, wie der Gott Prove von Oldenburg, und werden nicht abgebildet. Viele stellen sie auch mit zwei, drei oder mehr Köpfen dar. Bei all den vielgestaltigen Gottheiten, mit denen sie Fluren und Wälder, Leiden und Freuden beleben, leugnen sie doch nicht, daß ein Gott im Himmel über die herrsche; dieser Allmächtige sorge nur für den Himmel, die anderen aber gehorchten ihm im anvertrauten Pflichtenkreise, seien aus seinem Blute hervorgegangen, und jeder von ihnen sei umso vornehmer, desto näher er jenem Gott der Götter stehe. Als wir zu jenem Hort der Unheiligkeit kamen, rief uns der Bischof (Gerold von Oldenburg) auf, tüchtig zuzupacken und das Heiligtum zu zerstören. Er sprang auch selbst vom Pferde und zerschlug mit seinem Stabe die prächtig verzierten Vorderseiten der Tore: wir drangen in den Hof ein, häuften alle Zäune desselben um jene heiligen Bäume herum auf, warfen Feuer in den Holzstapel und machten ihn zum Scheiterhaufen, in steter Angst, von den Einwohnern (incolae) überfallen zu werden. Doch Gott schützte uns. Danach zogen wir fort zu dem gastlichen Hause, wo uns Thessemar mit großem Gepränge empfing53. 53. HELMOLD, Cronica Slavorum, hg. SCHMEIDLER (Anm. 41), lib. I, cap. 84, S. 159-160: Accidit autem, ut in transitu veniremus in nemus, quod unicum est in terra illa … Illic inter vetustissimas arbores vidimus sacras quercus, quae dictae fuerant deo terrae illius Proven, quas ambiebat atrium et sepes accuratior lignis constructa, continens duas portas Preter penates enim et ydola, quibus singula oppida redundabant, locus ille sanctimonium fuit universae terrae, cui flamen et feriaciones et sacrificiorum varii ritus deputati fuerant. Illic omni secunda feria populus terrae cum regulo et flamine convenire solebant propter iudicia. Ingresus atrii omnibus inhitibus nisi sacerdoti tantum et sacrificare volentibus,

120

M. HARDT

ARKONA AUF RÜGEN Die Rolle des gentilreligiösen Hauptheiligtums im Norden übernahm in der Folgezeit der Tempel des Svantevit in Arkona auf Rügen, in dem der dänische König Waldemar im Jahr 1168 einen gewaltigen Schatz erbeuten konnte, bevor Kultbild und Tempel zerstört wurden54. Saxo Grammaticus schreibt im 14. Buch der Gesta Danorum, diesmal in englischer Übersetzung: In the middle of the city was a level space, on which could be seen a wooden temple of fine craftsmanship, inspiring reverence not only for the splendour of its decoration, but also because of the religious authority attaching to the idol set up there. Elaborate carvings glinted over the whole exterior circuit of the building, varied figures and shapes wrought with crude, primitive artistry. A single door gave admittance. The temple itself was enclosed by two surrounding screens, one inside the other; the outer one was solid and topped with a red roof, while the inner consisted, not of walls, but of bright curtains, hanging between four pillars, and was only linked with the outer structure by the roof and a few ceiling panels55. vel quos mortis urgebat periculum, his enim minime negabatur asilum. Tantam enim sacris suis Slavi exhibent reverentiam, ut ambitum fani nec in hostibus sanguine pollui sinant. Iuraciones difficilime admittunt, nam iurare apud Slavos quasi periurare est ob vindicem deorum iram. Est autem Slavis multiplex ydolatriae modus, non enim omnes in eandem supersticiones consuetudinem consentiunt. Hii enim simulachrorum ymaginarias formas pretundunt de templis, veluti Plunense ydolum, cui nomen Podaga, alii silvas vel lucos inhabitant, ut est Prove deus Aldenburg, quibus nullae sunt effigies expressae. Multos etiam duobus vel tribus vel eo amplius capitibus exsculpunt. Inter multiformia vero deorum numina, quibus arva, silvas, tristicias atque voluptates attribuunt, non diffitentur unum deum in celis ceteris imperitantem, illum prepotentem celestia tantum curare, hos vero distributis officiis obsequentes de sanguine eius processisse et unumquemque eo prestantiorem, quo proximiorem illi deo deorum. Venientibus autem nobis ad nemus illud et profanacionis locum adhortatus est nos episcopus, ut valenter accederemus ad destruendum lucum. Ipse quoque desiliens equo contrivit de conto insignes portarum frontes, et ingressi atrium omnia septa atrii congessimus circum sacras illas arbores et de strue lignorum iniecto igne fecimus pyram, non tamen sine metu, ne forte tumultu incolarum [lapidibus] obrueremur. Sed divinitus protecti sumus. Post haec divertimus ad hospicium, ubi Thessemar suscepit nos cum grandi apparatu. Die Übersetzung ist angelehnt an diejenige von H. STOOB, Helmold von Bosau, Slawenchronik (Ausgewählte Quellen zur deutschen Geschichte des Mittelalters; Freiherr vom Stein-Gedächtnisausgaben, 19), Berlin, Rütten & Loening, 1963, S. 289, 291. 54. H. REIMANN – F. RUCHHÖFT – C. WILLICH, Rügen im Mittelalter: Eine interdisziplinäre Studie zur mittelalterlichen Besiedlung auf Rügen (Forschungen zur Geschichte und Kultur des östlichen Mitteleuropa, 36), Stuttgart, Steiner, 2011, S. 55-58; LÜBKE, Das östliche Europa (Anm. 1), S. 239; K.V. JENSEN, Bring dem Herrn ein blutiges Opfer: Gewalt und Mission in der dänischen Ostsee-Expansion des 12. und 13. Jahrhunderts, in KAMP – KROKER (Hgg.), Schwertmission (Anm. 3), 139-157, hier S. 143-144; J. HERRMANN, Arkona auf Rügen – Tempelburg und politisches Zentrum der Ranen vom 9.-12. Jahrhundert – Ergebnisse der archäologischen Ausgrabungen 1969-1971, in Zeitschrift für Archäologie 8 (1974) 177-209. 55. SAXO GRAMMATICUS, Gesta Danorum. The History of the Danes, hg. K. FRIIS-JENSEN, übers. P. FISHER (Oxford Medieval Texts), Oxford, Clarendon, 2015, 14, 39, 2, 1274-1275: Medium urbis planicies habebat, in qua delubrum materia ligneum, opere elegantissimum uisebatur, non solum magnificentia cultus, sed etiam simulacri in eo collocati numine

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

121

Within the shrine stood a huge effigy, its size surpassing the height of any human figure, and it was amazing to look upon in that it possessed four heads and necks, two of which looked over its chest, two over its back. They were so arranged that, before and behind, one head appeared to direct its gaze to the right, the other to the left. They were fashioned with shaved beards and cropped hair, so that you would have thought the sculptor had tried hard to imitate the Rügen style of head adornment. In its right hand the idol carried a horn embellished with various types of metal, into which the priest, who was versed in the god’s rituals would once a year pour wine, and from the appearance of the liquid would predict the degree of plenty in the coming year. The left arm was bow-shaped, for the artist had shown it bent back into the statue’s side. The god was represented with a tunic extending to its shins; these were made from a different species of wood and were attached at the knees, with the join so well hidden that the point of connection could scarcely be detected except by minute scrutiny. The feet were to be seen touching the floor, but the base on which they stood was hidden beneath ground level. Not far away the deity’s bridle and saddle were on view, together with a great many of its divine accoutrements. People’s astonishment at these was enhanced by the sight of a remarkably large sword, whose scabbard and hilt, quite apart from the exceptional beauty of the engraving, were set off by the silver sheen of their surface56.

Saxo’s Bericht hat zu ebenso zahlreichen wie fragwürdigen Versuchen geführt, Svantevits Statue und seinen Tempel zu rekonstruieren57. Die archäologischen Ausgrabungen im wenigen, noch erhaltenen und nicht in die Ostsee abgerutschten Areal waren demgegenüber deutlich reuerendum. Exterior edis ambitus accurato celamine renitebat, rudi atque impolito picture artifico uarias rerum formas complectens. Vnicum in eo ostium intraturis patebat. Ipsum uero fanum duplex septorum ordo claudebat. E quibus exterior parietibus contextus puniceo culmine tegebatur. Interior uero quatuor subnixus postibus parietum loco pensilibus auleis nitebat, nec quicquam cum exteriore preter tectum et pauca laquearia communicabat. 56. SAXO GRAMMATICUS, Gesta Danorum, hg. FRIIS-JENSEN (Anm. 55), 14, 39, 3, 12761277: Ingens in ede simulacrum omnem humani corporis habitum granditate transcendens quatuor capitibus totidemque ceruicibus mirandum perstabat, e quibus duo pectus totidemque tergum respicere uidebantur. Ceterum tam ante quam retro collocatorum unum dextrorsum, alterum leuorsum contemplationem dirigere uidebatur. Corrase barbe, crines attonsi figurabantur, ut artificis industriam Rugianorum ritum in cultu capitum emulatam putares. In destra cornu uario metalli genere excultum gestabat, quod sacerdos sacrorum eius peritus annuatim mero perfundere consueuerat, ex ipso liquoris habitu sequentis anni copias prospecturus. Leua arcum reflexo in latus brachio figurabat. Tunica ad tibias prominens fingebatur, que ex diuersa ligni materia create tam arcano nexu genibus iungebantur, ut compaginis locus non nisi curiosiori contemplatione deprehendi potuerit. Pedes humo contigui cernebantur, eorum basi intra solum latente. Haud procul frenum ac sella simulacri compluraque diuinitatis insignia uisebantur. Quorum ammirationem conspicue granditatis ensis augebat, cuius uaginam ac capulum preter excellentem celature decorem exterior argenti species commendabat. 57. F. RUCHHÖFT, Die Burg am Kap Arkona: Götter, Macht und Mythos (Archäologie in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, 7), Schwerin, Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, 2016, S. 52-59, 85-87; J. HERRMANN, Ein Versuch zu Arkona: Tempel und Tempelrekonstruktionen nach schriftlicher Überlieferung und nach Ausgrabungsbefunden im nordwestslawischen Gebiet, in Ausgrabungen und Funde 38 (1993) 136-144.

122

M. HARDT

unspektakulärer58. Sie konnten zeigen, dass im Bereich einer 23 × 29 m messenden freien Fläche geopfert wurde und Fragmente von Waffen, militärischer Ausrüstung, Glasperlen, Waagen und Gewichte in Gruben vergraben wurden. Bemerkenswert war eine Grube mit den Überresten von acht bis zwölf menschlichen Schädeln und vier eisernen Pfeilspitzen59. Nachdem der Tempelschatz von den Kriegern Waldemars and Absalons, des Bischofs von Roskilde, im Jahr 1168 abtransportiert worden war60, nahmen die Fürsten der Rügenslawen das Christentum an61. Die Erinnerungen an den slawischen Glauben62 wurden in die nun errichteten Kirchen eingebaut. Nicht weit entfernt von Arkona ist in der Kirche von Altenkirchen ein steinernes Bild eines Gottes in die Mauern integriert63: er ist als Svantevit interpretiert worden, weil er sein Trinkhorn so unter dem Arm trägt, wie es von Saxo Grammaticus beschrieben wurde. Beim Rugard, der Residenz der Ranenfürsten in Bergen auf Rügen, ist eine andere Figur, der sogenannte Jaromarstein, nahe der Tür in ein Benediktinerinnenkloster eingemauert worden. Allerdings ist hier noch in der Diskussion, ob es sich dabei um eine Götterdarstellung handelt oder um den Grabstein eines der frühen christlichen Fürsten, die vielleicht dort begraben wurden64. 58. HERRMANN, Arkona auf Rügen (Anm. 54); H. BERLEKAMP, Die Funde aus den Grabungen im Burgwall von Arkona auf Rügen in den Jahren 1969-1971, in Zeitschrift für Archäologie 8 (1974) 211-254; H.-H. MÜLLER, Die Tierreste aus der slawischen Burganlage von Arkona auf der Insel Rügen, ibid., 255-295. 59. P. HERFERT, Arkona – das letzte große Heiligtum der Nordwestslaven. Faltblatt, hg. Amt Wittow, Putgarten, ohne Jahr, ca. 2000; A. TUMMUSCHEIT, Der Herd aller Irrtümer – Die Tempelburg Arkona an der Nordspitze Rügens, in Archäologische Entdeckungen in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (Archäologie in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, 5), Schwerin, Landesamt für Kultur- und Denkmalpflege, 2009, 157-158. RUCHHÖFT, Burg (Anm. 57). 60. H.-O. GAETHKE, Herzog Heinrich der Löwe und die Slawen nordöstlich der unteren Elbe (Kieler Werkstücke Reihe A: Beiträge zur schleswig-holsteinischen und skandinavischen Geschichte, 24), Frankfurt a.M. – Berlin – Bern, Peter Lang, 1999, S. 347-393; RUCHHÖFT, Burg (Anm. 57), S. 64-71, 84. 61. GAETHKE, Heinrich der Löwe (Anm. 60), S. 347-393; RUCHHÖFT, Burg (Anm. 57), S. 82-84. 62. I. GABRIEL, Hof- und Sakralkultur sowie Gebrauchs- und Handelsgut im Spiegel der Kleinfunde von Starigard/Oldenburg, in Bericht der Römisch-Germanischen Kommission 69 (1988) 103-291, S. 184-194; C. LÜBKE, Arkona brennt! Religion der Slawen, in W. MENGHIN – D. PLANCK (Hgg.), Menschen, Zeiten, Räume: Archäologie in Deutschland. Begleitband zur Ausstellung Berlin 6. Dezember 2002 bis 31. März 2003, Berlin – Stuttgart, Theiss, 2002, 357-359. 63. B. KUNKEL, Bildstein von Altenkirchen, in STIEGEMANN – KROKER – WALTER (Hgg.), Credo: Christianisierung Europas im Mittelalter (Anm. 3), II, 629-631; RUCHHÖFT, Burg (Anm. 57), S. 88-90, Abb. 122. 64. F. BIERMANN, Die Christianisierung der Nordwestslaven aus archäologischer Sicht, in STIEGEMANN – KROKER – WALTER (Hgg.), Credo: Christianisierung Europas im Mittelalter (Anm. 3), I, 409-416, hier S. 414-415 mit Abb. 237; RUCHHÖFT, Burg (Anm. 57), S. 88-89, Abb. 123.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

123

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGIOSITÄT Abschließend soll der Frage nachgegangen werden, warum heute in der Forschung von Gentilreligiosität und nicht von Heidentum oder Paganismus gesprochen wird65. Das hängt zunächst damit zusammen, dass Paganismus ein pejorativer Begriff ist und Geringschätzung ausdrückt. Gentilreligion dagegen zeigt den hochmittelalterlichen Bezug des Glaubens auf die jeweils eigene Gruppe. Dies wird recht deutlich in einer Geschichte, die in den um 1165 aufgezeichneten Miracula Sancti Heinrici überliefert wird und sich im Gebiet um Merseburg abgespielt haben soll. Demnach habe dort ein blinder Bettler einen freudigen Jubel vernommen, weil der himmlische Patron Heinrich soeben ein Heilungswunder vollbracht habe. Er war aber aus dem Lande und Volke der Slawen, die durch die Verkehrtheit ihrer natürlichen Veranlagung dermaßen einfältig und unvernünftig sind, dass sie offensichtlich kaum ein schwaches Fünklein Glauben haben66.

Als er nach dem Grund des Jubels fragte und von der Heilung erfuhr, sagte der Bettler: „Dieser Heinrich ist ja ein Deutscher, und so gewährt er seine Gnadenhilfe nur Deutschen; mir aber und den Menschen meiner gens hat er noch niemals irgendeine Wohltat erwiesen“67. Aufgefordert, doch auch einmal zum Heiligen Kaiser Heinrich zu beten, warf sich der Bettler vor den Reliquien nieder, „und unmittelbar nach dieser frommen Handlung erfährt der Slawe die Gnade des Deutschen, die ihm, wie er klagte, angeblich vorenthalten war, am eigenen Leibe“68. Er wurde wieder sehend, und in den Miracula heißt es weiter, seitdem genieße der Heilige Heinrich bei dieser Gens, die, „wie gesagt, in ihrer bäurischen Einfalt und 65. Vgl. zum Folgenden auch M. HARDT, Sorbische Gentilreligion und christliche Mission (10. bis 12. Jahrhundert), in E. BÜNZ – A. KOHNLE (Hgg.), Das religiöse Leipzig: Stadt und Glauben vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart (Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte der Stadt Leipzig, 6), Leipzig, Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2013, 15-25, hier S. 24-25. 66. Ex aliis Miraculis s. Heinrici, hg. G. WAITZ (MGH. Scriptores, 4), Hannover, Hahn, 1841, S. 814-816, cap. 10, S. 815-816: Erat autem hic de terra et de genere Sclavorum; quibus simplicitas vel irrationalitas pravitate quadam ingenii naturalis est, adeo ut vix vel tenuem fidei videantur habere scintillam. 67. Ibid., cap. 10, S. 816: Iste Heinricus Teutonicus cum sit, solis Teutonicis gratie sue prestat subsidium; mihi vero gentisque mee hominibus nichil umquam beneficii contulit. 68. Ibid.: Ductus itaque, ubi reliquie beati confessoris servabantur, humo prosternitur; et paulo post pietatem Teutonici Sclavus ipse, quam negari sibi querebatur, gratiam experitur.

124

M. HARDT

Kleingläubigkeit sich verschmäht wähnte, große Verehrung“69. HansDietrich Kahl hat diese Episode gedeutet als Zeichen für den großen Gegensatz des sich als Universalreligion verstehenden Christentums und den auf die gentilen Gruppen der Frühzeit bezogenen Glaubensformen, in denen angenommen oder für selbstverständlich gehalten wurde, „dass jedes Land oder jede Gens seine eigenen Gottheiten habe“. Für solche regional begrenzten Glaubensformen prägte Hans-Dietrich Kahl den Begriff der Gentilreligion, der sich seit der Mitte der sechziger Jahre des vergangenen Jahrhunderts durchgesetzt hat. Der blinde, bettelnde Merseburger Slawe der Miracula Sancti Heinrici steht aber auch dafür, dass noch nach der Mitte des 12. Jahrhunderts zwischen Saale und Elbe zumindest die Erinnerung an die slawische, gentilreligiösen Vorstellungen anhängende Bevölkerung noch nicht verblasst war. Tatsächlich hatte sich der Einfluß des Christentums im Gebiet der Bistümer Merseburg, Meißen und Zeitz, das noch im Jahr 1028 aus Sicherheitsgründen nach Naumburg verlegt worden war, nur sehr langsam durchgesetzt. Einen neuen Schub erhielt das Niederkirchenwesen, als gegen Ende des 11. Jahrhunderts mit Wiprecht von Groitzsch ein erster großflächigerer Landesausbau im Gebiet beiderseits der Elster initiiert wurde, der zahlreiche Burgkapellen, das Kloster Pegau, in dem der Fürst schließlich auch begraben werden sollte, und zahlreiche Pfarrkirchen in den neu gegründeten Dörfern mit ihren Bewohnerschaften aus Autochthonen und zugewanderten Franken entstehen ließ70. Erst mit dem Fortschreiten des Landesausbaus im 12. und 13. Jahrhundert und dem damit einher gehenden völligen Wandel der Bevölkerungsstruktur und der Kulturlandschaft setzte 69. Ibid., cap. 10, S. 815: Unde gens illa, que, ut dixi, rustica simplicitate et fidei pusillanimitate se sperni arbitrabatur, hoc beneficio fiducia speque resumpta, ultra omnes beatum Heinricum studio devociori venerabatur. Die Übersetzung nach H.-D. KAHL, Slawen und Deutsche in der brandenburgischen Geschichte des 12. Jahrhunderts, 1. Halbband (Mitteldeutsche Forschungen, 30/1), Köln – Graz, Böhlau, 1964, S. 76-77. 70. M. HARDT, Westliche Zuwanderer im hochmittelalterlichen Landesausbau Ostmitteleuropas, in H. MELLER – F. DAIM – J. KRAUSE – R. RISCH (Hgg.), Migration und Integration von der Urgeschichte bis zum Mittelalter. 9. Mitteldeutscher Archäologentag vom 20. bis 22. Oktober 2016 in Halle (Saale) (Tagungen des Landesmuseums für Vorgeschichte Halle (Saale), 17), Halle (Saale), Landesmuseum für Vorgeschichte, 2017, 335343, hier S. 336; M. HARDT, The Beginning of Colonisation in Eastern Central Europe in the High Middle Ages, in C. MACHAT (Hg.), Conservation and Rehabilitation of Vernacular Heritage: The Cultural Landscape of the Wendland Circular Villages. International Conference and Annual Meeting of the ICOMOS International Scientific Committee on Vernacular Architecture (CIAV), Organised with ICOMOS Germany, the State Officer for Monument Conservation and Archaeology of Lower Saxony, and the Samtgemeinde of Lüchow-Wendland, Lübeln, September 28 – October 2, 2016 (ICOMOS: Hefte des deutschen Nationalkomitees, 67), Aachen – Berlin, Geymüller Verlag für Architektur, 2018, 613, hier S. 6.

SLAWISCHE GENTILRELIGION IM HOHEN MITTELALTER

125

sich der neue Glauben endgültig durch, an dessen Missionierungsphase bald schließlich bis zum heutigen Tag nur noch jene Kirchen erinnern sollten, die ihren ursprünglichen Platz in den Burgwarden der Eroberungszeit gefunden hatten. Leibniz-Institut für Geschichte und Kultur des östlichen Europa Reichsstr. 4-6 DE-04109 Leipzig Deutschland [email protected]

Matthias HARDT

WEDER UNZIVILISIERTE BARBAREN NOCH TEUFLISCHE GÖTZENDIENER DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH BARTOLOMÉ DE LAS CASAS

Die „Entdeckung“ der Neuen Welt stellte ein hermeneutisches Problem dar: Wie sollten die neuen Menschen, ihre natürliche Umwelt, ihre Kulturen und Religionen vor dem Hintergrund des abendländischen Welt-, Gottes- und Menschenverständnisses beschrieben und interpretiert werden? Um diese Frage zu beantworten, griffen die Europäer der „Renaissance“ auf die Hermeneutik des Fremden zurück, die ihnen aus der antiken Expansion von Griechen und Römern oder aus der christlichen Theologie vertraut war. Und viele wählten daraus eher die Exklusions- als die Inklusionshermeneutik: Demnach waren die Indianer auf der einen Seite unzivilisierte Barbaren, ja „Sklaven von Natur“, und auf der anderen Seite Heiden schlimmer Art, nämlich Götzendiener, die teuflische Religionen praktizierten. Barbarei und Heidentum fielen bei ihnen zusammen, d.h. die Barbarei verschlimmerte ihr Heidentum. Beides müsste dann durch Zivilisierung (Hispanisierung) und Evangelisierung überwunden werden, um aus den Einwohnern der Neuen Welt Christen machen zu können. Dagegen kämpfte vor allem Bartolomé de Las Casas (1484-1566) mit seiner Apologie der indianischen Kulturen und Religionen, die dem Inklusionsdenken verpflichtet ist. Las Casas klagte einen Perspektivenwechsel ein. Mit gesundem Menschenverstand sowie mit großer Sensibilität für die Reziprozität im Rechtsdiskurs bzw. für das, was wir heute „interkulturelles Recht“1 nennen, fragte sich Las Casas, ob die Verleumder der Indianer so sprechen würden, „wenn sie selbst Indianer wären“2. Aus diesem Grund hat er eine neue Gattung apologetischer Literatur begründet, die Europa und dem Christentum zur Ehre gereicht. Während man seit Sokrates unter Apologie die Verteidigung der eigenen Position gegen unsachliche Vorwürfe verstand, schrieb Las Casas zwei besondere Werke mit dem Titel Apologie – Adversus persecutores et calumniatores gentium novi orbis 1. Vgl. dazu O. HÖFFE, Gibt es ein Interkulturelles Strafrecht? Ein philosophischer Versuch, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp, 1999; ID., Menschenrechte: Europäischer Kulturexport oder universales Ethos?, in M. DELGADO – M. LUTZ-BACHMANN (Hgg.), Herausforderung Europa: Wege zu einer europäischen Identität, München, Beck, 1995, 114-131. 2. B. DE LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9, hg. P. CASTAÑEDA, Madrid, Alianza, 1988, S. 604.

128

M. DELGADO

ad oceanum reperti apologia, ein Werk, das er während und nach der Kontroverse von Valladolid schrieb und das bis in die Mitte des 20. Jahrhunderts hinein unveröffentlicht blieb3, und Apologética Historia Sumaria4, größtenteils nach der Kontroverse von Valladolid geschrieben und erst 19095 veröffentlicht – zur Widerlegung des negativen Indianerbildes (Barbaren und Heiden schlimmster Art) und zur Verteidigung ihrer Menschenwürde, ihrer Freiheit, ihrer Gleichberechtigung, der Logik und der Werte ihrer Kulturen und Religionen: damit „man all diese so unendlich vielen Völker in diesem überaus weiten Erdkreis kennenlernte“, „sie wurden nämlich von einigen Leuten verleumdet“, die verbreiteten, „diesen Menschen fehle es an gesunder Vernunft, um sich selbst zu regieren, sie hätten keine menschengemäße Regierungsform und keine geordneten Gemeinwesen“6. Während Las Casas’ Apologie der indianischen Kulturen auf die Widerlegung ihrer Barbarei hinzielt, geht es in seiner Apologie der indianischen Religiosität um eine Betrachtung ihres Heidentums quasi als Vorbereitung auf das Evangelium. I. DIE INDIANER: „SKLAVEN VON NATUR“ ODER MENSCHEN WIE WIR? Bei der Einstufung der Indianer als „Sklaven von Natur“ spielte die Politik des Aristoteles eine besondere Rolle. Dieses Buch stellt bekanntlich „die erste im vollen Sinne diskursive Theorie des Politischen“7 dar. Sieht man davon ab, dass sie nicht zuletzt der Legitimation des Herrschaftsanspruchs der Hellenen über die vielfach als „Sklaven von Natur“ betrachteten asiatischen Barbaren im Schatten des Eroberungszugs Alexanders diente8, so kann man wohlwollend sagen, dass Aristoteles im Grunde 3. Ibid., Bd. 9. 4. Vgl. B. DE LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bde. 6, 7, 8, hg. V. ABRIL CASTELLÓ, Madrid, Alianza, 1992, deutsche Auswahl in B. DE LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2: Historische und ethnographische Studien, hg. M. DELGADO, Paderborn, Schöningh, 1995, S. 343-512. 5. Vgl. dazu: M. DELGADO, Las Casas als „Anthropologe des Glaubens“, in Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 327-342; L. DUCH, Religión y Religiosidad en la „Apologética Historia“ de Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, in M. KESSLER – W. PANNENBERG – H.J. POTTMEYER (Hgg.), Fides quaerens intellectum: Beiträge zur Fundamentaltheologie, Tübingen – Basel, Francke, 1992, 41-48. 6. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 443. 7. O. HÖFFE, Politische Gerechtigkeit: Grundlegung einer kritischen Philosophie von Recht und Staat, Frankfurt a.M., Suhrkamp, 1987, S. 261. 8. ARISTOTELES, Politik. Übersetzt und mit erklärenden Anmerkungen versehen von E. ROLFES, mit einer Einleitung von G. BIEN (Philosophische Bibliothek, 7), Hamburg, F. Meiner, 41981, zitiert wird im Folgenden nach dieser Ausgabe, hier 1.2 (1252b): „Darum sagen die Dichter: ‚Billig ist, dass über die Barbaren der Hellene herrscht‘, um damit auszudrücken, dass ein Barbar von Natur und ein Sklave dasselbe ist“.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

129

für „ein differenziertes Herrschaftsverhältnis“ (von der despotischen Tyrannei bis hin zur idealen Polis-Regierung der „Besten“, die als eine auf das Gemeinwohl gerichtete Regierung über Freie sowohl politische Unterdrückung wie auch Ausbeutung ausschließen soll) plädiert und eine „politische Anthropologie“ skizziert, „die in der epochemachenden These von der politischen Natur des Menschen gipfelt“, einer Natur, die im Menschen „historisch betrachtet zunächst nur potentiell vorhanden ist und erst im Laufe eines Entwicklungsprozesses nach und nach zutage tritt“9. Die Indianergegner interessierte aber nicht die These der politischen Natur des Menschen, sondern eher die der „Sklaven von Natur“. So wurde anhand der aristotelischen Philosophie ein negativer „politischer Determinismus“ konstruiert. Demnach sind Menschen, die es bisher nicht zu einer „PolisZivilisation“ gebracht haben, wohl als „Sklaven von Natur“ zu sehen, denen es an der Fähigkeit zum selbständigen Überlegen mangelt und die folglich dazu bestimmt sind, sich von anderen bevormunden und als Diener einspannen zu lassen. Kennzeichnend für Aristoteles ist der doppelte Sklavenbegriff. Denn er spricht nicht nur, ja nicht primär von den Sklaven, die akzidentiell, d.h. infolge von gerechten Kriegen oder als Strafe für ein Verbrechen die Freiheit verloren haben, sondern vor allem von jenen barbarischen Menschen, die prinzipiell als Sklaven von Natur zu betrachten sind, d.h. als ein Besitzstück oder ein Werkzeug, weil sie nicht imstande sind, ohne fremde Hilfe „vernünftig“ zu leben: Wer von Natur nicht sein, sondern eines anderen, aber ein Mensch ist, der ist ein Sklave von Natur. Eines anderen aber ist ein Mensch, der, wenn auch Mensch, ein Besitzstück ist. Ein Besitzstück aber ist ein tätiges und getrennt für sich bestehendes Werkzeug10.

Bei weiteren Präzisierungen wird klar, dass der Sklave von Natur für Aristoteles ein Mensch ist, kein Tier, aber eben einer, der die Vernunft zwar vernimmt, sie aber nicht aktiv besitzt, „da ihm von Natur aus die ‚Überlegung‘ (βουλευτικόν) fehlt“11, wie eben den asiatischen Nichtgriechen. Solche Sklaven können nichts Besseres tun – und zwar zum eigenen Nutzen wie zum Nutzen der Gesellschaft –, als dem natürlichen, harmonischen Lauf der Dinge zu folgen, der in der Leitung des von Natur Herrschenden über das von Natur Beherrschte oder Sklavische besteht, und sich 9. HÖFFE, Politische Gerechtigkeit (Anm. 7), S. 262, 268. 10. ARISTOTELES, Politik 1.4 (1254a: 10ff.). 11. E. FLAIG, Art. „Sklaverei“, in J. RITTER – K. GRÜNDER (Hgg.), Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, 9, Basel, Schwabe, 1995, 976-985, S. 978; vgl. ARISTOTELES, Politik 1.5 (1254b: 20ff.).

130

M. DELGADO

freiwillig dieser Leitung anzuvertrauen: „Denn die Leitung Besserer ist besser“12. Notfalls können die Sklaven von Natur mit Gewalt unterworfen werden, denn der Krieg gegen sie wäre naturrechtlich legitimiert. Der Krieg gegen sie wird als eine Erwerbskunde von Natur betrachtet, d.h. als eine Handlung, in der sich die Überlegenheit an Tugend zeige und durch die man natürliche Sklaven zu faktischen mache: Daher wird auch die Kriegskunde in gewissem Sinne von Natur eine Erwerbskunde sein. Denn die Jagdkunst ist ein Teil von ihr, und sie kommt teils gegen die Tiere, teils gegen solche Menschen zur Anwendung, die von Natur zu dienen bestimmt sind, aber nicht freiwillig dienen wollen, so dass ein solcher Krieg dem Naturrecht entspricht13.

Die Einstufung der Einwohner der Neuen Welt als „Sklaven von Natur“ im Sinne der aristotelischen Theorie begegnet uns zunächst im Werk des in Paris lehrenden nominalistischen Philosophen und Theologen Johannes Major (1467-1550), der Mitglied des Collège de Mantaigu war. Dieses Kolleg wurde um 1500 zum Zentrum einer Theologie, die das Gespräch mit der antiken Moralphilosophie suchte14. Im 1509 und 1519 gedruckten Kommentar zu 2 Sententiarum dist. 44, q. 3 tangiert er die Amerika-Frage, um mit Aristoteles’ Politik zu schließen, dass die Spanier über die Indianer herrschen können wie „die Griechen über die Barbaren“, dass die Indianer also „Sklaven von Natur“ seien: Diese Völker leben wie Bestien; auf beiden Seiten des Äquators und unter den Polen befinden sich wilde Menschen, wie Ptholomäus in seinem „Tetrabiblos“ sagt. Und das wird in unseren Tagen durch die Erfahrung bewiesen. Da sie nun Sklaven von Natur sind, regiert sie rechtens die erste Person, die sie erobert. Wie der Philosoph in den Kapiteln 3 und 4 aus dem ersten Buch der Politik sagt, ist es klar, dass einige Menschen Sklaven von Natur und andere Herren von Natur sind; und bei einigen Menschen ist es determiniert, dass es so wird und andere daraus Nutzen ziehen. Und es ist gerecht, dass der eine Sklave ist und der andere Herr, und es ist zweckmäßig, dass einer befiehlt und der andere gehorcht, denn auch die Befehlsqualität gehört zum natürlichen Herrn. Daher sagt der Philosoph im ersten Kapitel des erwähnten Buches, dass dies der Grund ist, weshalb die Hellenen Herren über die Barbaren sein sollen, denn von Natur sind Barbaren und Sklaven ein und dasselbe15. 12. ARISTOTELES, Politik 1.5 (1254a: 25). 13. ARISTOTELES, Politik 1.8 (1256b: 25ff.). 14. Vgl. M.D. CHENU, L’humanisme et la réforme au collège de Saint Jacques, in Archives d’histoire dominicaine 1 (1946) 130-154. 15. J. MAJOR, In secundum librum sententiarum, Paris, 1519, f. clxxxvijr. Etiam aliud est: Populus ille bestialiter vivit; citra ultraque equatorum et sub polis vivunt homines ferini, ut Ptholomaeus in Quadripartito dicit. Et iam hoc experientia compertum est […]. Von Las Casas zitiert in: LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 622; vgl. auch A. PAGDEN, La caída del hombre natural: El indio americano y los orígenes de la etnología comparativa, Madrid, Alianza, 1988, S. 66.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

131

Bald darauf rüttelten bekanntlich die ersten Dominikaner in der Neuen Welt, die seit September 1510 in Española (heute: Dominikanische Republik und Haiti) waren, am vierten Adventssonntag 1511 das Gewissen der Spanier mit diesen Fragen auf, deren epochale Bedeutung in der Geschichte der Menschheit wir nie hoch genug schätzen werden: Sagt, mit welchem Recht und mit welcher Gerechtigkeit haltet ihr diese Indianer in solch grausamer und entsetzlicher Knechtschaft? […] Sind sie etwa keine Menschen? Haben sie keine vernunftbegabten Seelen? Seid ihr nicht verpflichtet, sie wie euch selbst zu lieben?16.

Dieser Aufstand des christlichen Gewissens konnte aber nicht verhindern, dass die Indianer von vielen weiterhin nicht als zivilisierte Menschen wie die damaligen Europäer, sondern als „Sklaven von Natur“ eingestuft wurden, die zu einer niedrigeren, barbarischen Kulturstufe gehörten. Und dies blieb auch so trotz der Bulle Veritas ipsa (auch Sublimis Deus genannt), mit der Paul III. 1537 auf Bitten indiophiler Missionare die Glaubensfähigkeit, die Freiheit und die Eigentumsrechte der Indianer proklamierte17. Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, der Kontrahent von Bartolomé de Las Casas bei der berühmten Kontroverse von Valladolid 1550/1551, berief sich später ausdrücklich nicht nur auf Aristoteles, sondern auch auf die Autorität des Magisters Major18, und Las Casas vermutete – nicht ohne Grund –, dass er daraus „sein Gift“ bezogen habe19. Wir lassen hier die Entwicklung der Diskussion über die Natur und Kultur der Indianer vor Sepúlveda außer Acht und konzentrieren uns auf die Kontroverse zwischen diesem und Las Casas. II. DER ARISTOTELISCHE HUMANIST JUAN GINÉS DE SEPÚLVEDA Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda (um 1489/90-1573) gehörte in Bologna zum Schülerkreis des Humanisten Pietro Pomponazzi, einer führenden Autorität im Aristotelismus der Renaissance. Im Auftrag von Julius Medici, 16. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 226 (Historia de las Indias, Buch III, Kap. 4). 17. Vgl. Wortlaut und Sitz-im-Leben in B. DE LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 1: Missionstheologische Schriften, hg. M. DELGADO, Paderborn, Schöningh, 1994, S. 245-251. 18. Vgl. Á. LOSADA (Hg.), Apología de Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda contra Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas y de Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas contra Sepúlveda, Madrid, Editorial Nacional, 1966, Blatt 32 (Eigenzählung) des nicht paginierten Faksimiledrucks der Apología Sepúlvedas. Dieser verweist darin auf den Kommentar Majors in 2 Sententiarum dist. 44, q. 3. 19. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 622: Hinc (ni fallor) venena sua collegit Sepúlveda.

132

M. DELGADO

dem späteren Papst Clemens VII., übersetzte er Werke des Aristoteles ins Lateinische, darunter auch die Politik. Er gehörte auch zu den Beratern von Papst Hadrian VI. Im Dienste der Kurie verweilte er bis 1536. Danach wurde er von Karl V. zum offiziellen Reichschronisten ernannt. In seinen Schriften zur politischen Situation der Zeit hielt er einen Krieg des Kaisers gegen Türken und Protestanten für zweckmäßig und gerecht. Ähnlich denkt er über den spanischen ingressus und progressus in der Neuen Welt. Sein Werk Democrates secundus (1544-1545) trägt den Untertitel Über die gerechten Gründe des Krieges gegen die Indianer20; nicht zuletzt aufgrund der Einwände des Bartolomé de Las Casas durfte dieses Werk damals nicht erscheinen. Sepúlvedas Denken wird darin am konsequentesten begründet, während die anderen Schriften nur Nuancen liefern angesichts der Einwände des Las Casas. Das aristotelische Argument der „Sklaven von Natur“ ist der wichtigste Beitrag Sepúlvedas zur Kontroverse. Demnach können diejenigen, deren natürliche Verfassung so beschaffen ist, dass sie anderen gehorchen müssten, „mit den Waffen“ unterworfen werden, „wenn sie nun deren Herrschaft ablehnen und kein anderer Weg da ist“. Auf den Einwand, das sei eine erstaunliche Lehre „und weit entfernt von der allgemeinen Meinung“, lässt Sepúlveda antworten: Erstaunlich vielleicht, aber nur für diejenigen, die die Philosophie nur von der Schwelle begrüßt haben. So erstaune ich darüber, dass ein so gelehrter Mann wie Du, eine Lehre für neues Dogma hält, die unter den Philosophen alt ist und dem Naturrecht sehr entspricht21.

Viele Seiten widmet Sepúlveda dem sorgfältigen Beweis der naturgegebenen Ungleichheit der Menschen, d.h. der Teilung zwischen Zivilisierten und Sklaven von Natur, um den Führungsanspruch der Spanier zu begründen. Diese sind für ihn nämlich nicht nur das Israel des Neuen Testamentes, sondern auch in politischer Klugheit, im Scharfsinn, in allerlei Tugenden und guten Sitten, in Theologie, Philosophie, Astrologie, Charakterstärke, Menschlichkeit, Gerechtigkeitssinn und Religion usw. die Griechen und Römer der Renaissance, die kultiviertesten Träger der abendländischen Zivilisation, also die Übermenschen des 16. Jahrhunderts. Dass die Indianer, ähnlich den aristotelischen Barbaren, als Knechte oder Sklaven von Natur zu betrachten seien, ist nur die logische Schlussfolgerung aus dieser chauvinistischen Überhöhung des eigenen Volkes zur Legitimierung des geschichtlichen Führungsanspruchs in der Welt des 16. Jahrhunderts. 20. Vgl. J.G. DE SEPÚLVEDA, Demócrates segundo – o De las justas causas de la guerra contra los Indios (lat.-span.), hg. Á. LOSADA, Madrid, CSIC, 1984. 21. Ibid., S. 19.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

133

Sepúlveda bezieht sich vor allem auf das dritte, das fünfte und das achte Kapitel des ersten Buches der Politik des Aristoteles. Zunächst unterscheidet Sepúlveda zwischen dem juristischen und dem philosophischen Sklavereibegriff. Nach dem ersten bestehe die Sklaverei in einem akzidentiellen Grund, der zum Freiheitsverlust führe; nach dem zweiten geht sie auf ein angeborenes Unvermögen des Verstandes zur Selbstregierung sowie unmenschliche und barbarische Sitten zurück. Die verschiedenen Formen der Herrschaftsverhältnisse – des Vaters über den Sohn, des Mannes über die Frau, des Herrn über die Sklaven, des Richters über die Bürger, des Königs über die Völker, die seiner Herrschaft unterworfen sind – wurzeln im Naturrecht, das, wie die Weisen lehren, auf ein einziges Prinzip und Dogma zurückgehe: „Die Befehlsgewalt und Herrschaft des Vollkommenen über das Unvollkommene, der Stärke über die Schwäche, der erhabenen Tugend über das Laster“22. Wer diesem Prinzip nicht freiwillig Folge leisten möchte, der könne dazu mit Gewalt legitimer Weise gezwungen werden, etwa im Rahmen eines gerechten Krieges, wie die Philosophen lehren, wofür Sepúlveda sich auf die bereits zitierte Stelle aus der Politik des Aristoteles beruft: Daher wird auch die Kriegskunde in gewissem Sinne von Natur eine Erwerbskunde sein. Denn die Jagdkunst ist ein Teil von ihr, und sie kommt teils gegen die Tiere, teils gegen solche Menschen zur Anwendung, die von Natur zu dienen bestimmt sind, aber nicht freiwillig dienen wollen, so dass ein solcher Krieg dem Naturrecht entspricht23.

Unter Berufung auf Aristoteles stuft Sepúlveda dann alle Einwohner der Neuen Welt bezüglich Klugheit, Scharfsinn, allerlei Tugenden und menschlichen Gefühlen im Vergleich mit den Spaniern als so unterlegen ein „wie die Kinder den Erwachsenen, die Frauen den Männern, die grausamen und inhumanen Menschen den sehr sanften, die äußerst Unbeherrschten den Beherrschten und Maßvollen“, kurzum: Alle Indianer sind für ihn homunculi, barbarische Menschenfresser wie die Skythen der Antike, schwache Geschöpfe einer niederen Kulturentwicklung, die kaum eine erwähnenswerte Kulturleistung zustande gebracht hätten und die man folglich, laut Aristoteles, wenn sie sich freiwillig nicht unterordneten, wie Tiere zu jagen habe. Wenn einige von ihnen, wie etwa die Völker Mexikos, genug Geschick zu besitzen schienen, um manche handwerkliche Tätigkeiten mit einer gewissen Kunstfertigkeit zu verrichten, so sei dies dennoch kein hinreichendes Argument gegen die obige Einschätzung; denn auch gewisse Tiere wie die Bienen und die Spinnen vermöchten Kunstfertigkeiten zu verrichten, die 22. Ibid., S. 20. 23. Ibid., S. 22 (ARISTOTELES, Politik 1.8).

134

M. DELGADO

kein menschliches Geschick nachzuahmen imstande sei. Und dass einige Indianer über Häuser und ein gewissermaßen vernünftiges politisches Regiment in ihren Königreichen verfügten, zeige schließlich nur, dass sie keine bloßen Bären oder Affen bar jeder Vernunft seien. Sie seien außerdem überaus feige und schüchterne Wesen, die der aggressiven Gegenwart der Christen kaum Widerstand zu leisten vermögen, ja, zu Abertausenden seien sie wie Frauen panikartig geflüchtet, nachdem sie von einer kleinen Schar Spanier besiegt worden waren. Als Sklaven von Natur müssten sie sich bereitwillig den Spaniern unterwerfen, denn nur so könnten sie sich weiterentwickeln24 – wobei bei der Sprachwahl von Sepúlveda eher unwahrscheinlich ist, dass die Indianer für ihn jemals, jedenfalls nicht in absehbarer Zeit, mehr sein könnten als zweibeinige „Bienen und Spinnen“25. Francisco López de Gómara wird schließlich 1552 im Vorwort seiner Siegergeschichte Hispania victrix festhalten, die Indianer seien mit Ausnahme der Hautfarbe zwar dieselben Menschen wie die Europäer, denn wenn es sich um wilde Tiere und Ungeheuer handelte, könnten sie nicht von Adam abstammen, wie es der Fall sei; aber zugleich betont er die Minderwertigkeit der Fauna und Flora der Neuen Welt, sowie dass die Indianer ob ihrer ungeheuerlichen Sünden wider das göttliche Gesetz und das Naturrecht allesamt Barbaren oder Sklaven von Natur seien. Die Indianer wurden also von vielen für einen minderwertigen Teil der Menschheit gehalten. III. DER CHRISTLICHE HUMANIST LAS CASAS Anders als Sepúlveda kannte Las Casas die Neue Welt (die Karibik und Zentralamerika) aus eigener Erfahrung. Zwischen 1502 und 1547 war er fünf Mal zwischen Spanien und Westindien hin und her gesegelt. Seit seiner Bekehrung 1514, als er in Kuba seine eigenen Indianersklaven frei ließ und versprach, sich fortan für die Sache der Indianer einzusetzen26, hatte er nicht aufgehört, für eine Besserung ihrer Lage zu kämpfen – manchmal, wie in Sachen der schwarzen Sklaven, mit Vorschlägen, die er bei weiteren Bekehrungen als falsch einsah und bitter bereute. Nach seinem 24. Vgl. ibid., S. 19ff., 33ff. 25. Auch nach der Kontroverse von Valladolid blieb Sepúlveda seiner aristotelischen Weltsicht treu und hielt die Indianer weiterhin für „Sklaven von Natur“. Denn in seinem Spätwerk De regno (1571) wiederholt er dieselben Ansichten. Vgl. J.G. de SEPÚLVEDA, Del reino y los deberes del rey, in Á. LOSADA (Hg.), Tratados políticos de Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Políticos, 1963, 29-125, S. 34ff. 26. Vgl. dazu M. DELGADO, Stein des Anstoßes: Bartolomé de Las Casas als Anwalt der Indios, St. Ottilien, Eos, 2011, S. 13-40.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

135

Eintritt in den Predigerorden 1522 hatte er geschwiegen und sich dem Studium und der Seelsorge gewidmet. Aber ab 1531 sandte er an den Indienrat und den Hof viele Briefe und Denkschriften zur Verteidigung der Indianer. Nach der kurzen Erfahrung als Bischof in Chiapas und dem Scheitern bei der Durchsetzung der Neuen Gesetze kehrte er 1547 definitiv nach Spanien zurück. Von nun an hatte er nur ein Ziel: die Argumente derjenigen wie Sepúlveda zu entkräften, die Conquista und Encomienda (d.h. die Eroberung und Sklaverei ähnliche Zuteilung von Indianern an die Spanier, damit diese ihre Arbeitskraft ausbeuten konnten, wenn auch mit der formellen Auflage, die Arbeit der Missionare nicht zu stören) schönfärben wollten. Seine Sternstunde kam im Umfeld der Kontroverse von Valladolid (1550-1551), als er in Auseinandersetzung mit Sepúlveda sich der zentralen Bedeutung des anthropologischen, „aristotelischen“ Argumentes bewusst wurde und diesem nun seine ganz besondere Aufmerksamkeit schenkte. Wir wollen uns nun darauf beschränken, seine Kritik am „aristotelischen“ Argument (die Indianer als „Sklaven von Natur“) in seinem Werk Apologética Historia Sumaria darzustellen. Für Las Casas27 war der Barbarenbegriff bei Aristoteles nicht so eindeutig, wie Sepúlveda meint; auch waren die Indianer nicht als Barbaren im engen aristotelischen Sinne zu bezeichnen. Ein Barbar war erstens28 jeder Mensch, der, wider die Vernunft und das Naturgesetz handelnd, sich zum allerschlimmsten Lebewesen entwickelt („Denn wie der Mensch in seiner Vollendung das vornehmste Geschöpf ist, so ist er auch, des Gesetzes und Rechtes ledig, das schlechteste von allen“)29, was auch bekanntlich unter „Zivilisierten“ vorkommen kann. Zweitens galt als Barbar, wer eine fremde Sprache spricht, keine literarische Bildung hat oder einer uns fremden Kultur angehört30. Barbaren im engen aristotelischen Sinne des Wortes waren aber drittens nur solche, die Monstern gleichen und wie wilde Tiere leben, ohne jedes politische Regiment; diese dritte Art wäre aber äußerst selten im Menschengeschlecht anzutreffen31. Auf diese letzte 27. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 495-512 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 264–267); ID., Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), 76-125 (Apologia, Kap. 1–5). 28. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 496-497 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 264). 29. ARISTOTELES, Politik 1.2 (1253a: 30ff.). 30. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 497-499 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 264). 31. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 499-502 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 265). Die Nikomachische Ethik wird nach folgender Ausgabe zitiert: ARISTOTELES, Nikomachische Ethik. Auf der Grundlage der Übersetzung von E. ROLFES herausgegeben von G. BIEN (Philosophische Bibliothek, 5), Hamburg, F. Meiner, 1972, hier 7.1 (1145a: 25ff.).

136

M. DELGADO

Gruppe beziehe sich Aristoteles in Politik 1.2, 832, während er etwa in Politik 3.1433 und 534 von der zweiten Gruppe spreche und betone, dass es auch unter manchen Barbaren wahre Reiche und natürliche Könige und Herren samt politischem Regiment gebe (diesen Verweis auf Aristoteles werden wir bei Sepúlveda vergeblich suchen). Zu dieser zweiten Gruppe gehörten nun die Indianer, wobei wir nach diesen Kriterien – fremde Sprache usw. – für sie genauso Barbaren wären wie sie für uns35. Eine vierte – nun rein theologische – Barbarenkategorie führt Las Casas zusätzlich ein, nämlich das Heidentum oder das Fehlen des ausdrücklichen christlichen Glaubens. Doch träfe auch dies auf die Indianer nicht zu, da ihr Unglaube kein positiver (bewusste Ablehnung des richtig verkündigten Evangeliums) wäre, sondern nur ein rein negativer, der lediglich im Fehlen des Glaubens mangels Kenntnis desselben bestünde36. Aber selbst wenn die Indianer Barbaren im engen Sinne des Wortes wären, also Monstern glichen, so dürften sie in keiner Weise mittels gerechter Kriege wie Tiere gejagt werden, wie Sepúlveda mit Aristoteles behauptete, „[...] vielmehr müssen sie sanft überzeugt und mit Liebe angelockt werden, ein Leben nach den besten Sitten zu führen“37. Denn gegen den Willen der Untergebenen erworbene Herrschaft müsste, wie Aristoteles in Politik 3 erhellt, tyrannisch, gewaltsam und ohne Dauer sein; und die tyrannische Herrschaft wäre, wie Aristoteles wiederum in Nikomachische Ethik 8.12 sagt38, die schlechteste aller politischen Herrschaftsweisen, etwas, was man keineswegs dulden sollte. Demgegenüber hielt Las Casas daran fest, dass einzig und allein die freiwillige Anerkennung der spanischen Herrschaft durch die natürlichen Herren der indianischen Völker der legitime Weg zur Herrschaftserlangung wäre; und diese Herrschaft sollte nur als subsidiäre Oberhoheit ausgeübt werden, die sich 32. „Allein jene Barbaren, die zu der besonderen Hauptgruppe der dritten Gattung gehören, heißen und sind schlechthin Barbaren im eigentlichen und engeren Sinne, weil sie sich weit von der Vernunft abgewandt haben, nicht nach deren Regeln leben und dies auch nicht können oder weil es ihnen an Verstand fehlt oder weil sie auch ein Übermaß an Bosheit und verderbten Sitten haben. Und ausdrücklich diese und keine anderen meint der Philosoph, wenn er (Politik 1.2: 1252b) von Barbaren spricht“. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 510-511 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Epilog). 33. Vgl. ARISTOTELES, Politik 3.14 (1285a); 3.16 (1287b); 3.17 (1287b-1288ª). 34. Vgl. ARISTOTELES, Politik 5.11 (1314a); 5.10 (1311a). 35. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 510-512 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Epilog). 36. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 502-510 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 266–267). 37. LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 98-99: deinde advertendum quod barbari non ut Philosophus rigide inquit, cogendi, sed blande adducendi et alliciendi caritate sunt ad optimos mores suscipiendos. 38. Vgl. ARISTOTELES, Nikomachische Ethik 8.12 (1160b).

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

137

in die partikularen Belange der indianischen Gesellschaften nicht einmischen und die dort vorhandenen Herrschaftsstrukturen respektieren sollte. Die Existenz der „Sklaven von Natur“ war also für Las Casas, wie übrigens auch für alle Vertreter der so genannten „Schule von Salamanca“, theoretisch möglich, doch de facto bisher nicht nachweisbar: […] die Schule von Salamanca konnte letztlich die Theorie der „Sklaven von Natur“ nur logisch und moralisch vertretbar machen, indem sie die Existenz der Kreatur leugnete, die sie zu beschreiben versuchte39.

Es fällt auf, dass Las Casas Aristoteles oft gegen den wörtlichen Sinn lesen muss, um ihn – etwa im Sinne eines verchristlichten Aristoteles – als Autoritätsargument verwenden zu können. Las Casas blieb aber bei der Zuordnung der Indianer zur zweiten Barbarengruppe und bei der Kritik der kolonialen Kriegsführung nicht stehen, sondern ging einen Schritt weiter. In Politik 7.8 und Nikomachische Ethik 6 beschreibt Aristoteles40 bekanntlich die Bedingungen der Möglichkeit eines idealen Staates, nämlich das Vorhandensein von sechs Teilen, die bewirken, dass jedes Gemeinwesen sich selbst genügt und zeitliche Glückseligkeit gewährt, nämlich: Bauern, Handwerker, Krieger, Wohlhabende, Priesterschaft (deren allgemeine Aufgabe es ist, sich mit der Religion, den Opfern und allem, was den Gottesdienst betrifft, zu befassen), Richter und Gerichtsräte sowie die Leute, denen die gute Führung der Staatsgeschäfte obliegt41.

Und diese sollten sich nach Aristoteles durch ökonomische, monastische und politische Klugheit auszeichnen. Las Casas versuchte daher zu zeigen, dass diese Bedingungen auch bei den indianischen Gemeinwesen erfüllt, ja, dass sie in manchen indianischen Königreichen besser ausgeprägt seien als bei den heidnischen Völkern der europäischen Antike und bei manchen christlichen Völkern42. Seine Apologética Historia Sumaria, mit der er beweisen möchte, dass es sich bei den indianischen Kulturen um das „Gegenteil“ von dem handelt, was die Verleumder behaupten, folgte durchaus einem aristotelischen Schema: So behandelte er in diesem Werk zunächst die natürliche Umwelt (Beschaffenheit und Fruchtbarkeit: Kap. 1–22) sowie die sechs Ursachen 39. PAGDEN, Caída (Anm. 15), S. 138. 40. Vgl. ARISTOTELES, Politik 7.8 (1328b); Nikomachische Ethik 6 (1138b-1145a). 41. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 344. 42. Diese Denkform entfaltet er vor allem in seinem Werk Apologética Historia Sumaria, das als eine „optimistische Anthropologie des Glaubens in eschatologischer Perspektive“ gelesen werden sollte. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 343512.

138

M. DELGADO

(Einfluss des Himmels, Lage der verschiedenen Regionen, Ordnung der Gliedmaßen und der äußeren und inneren Sinnesorgane, Milde und Lieblichkeit des Klimas, Alter der Eltern, gute und gesunde Art der Speisen: Kap. 23–39), zu denen sich auch akzidentielle Ursachen (Mäßigung im Essen und Trinken, Enthaltsamkeit bei den sinnlichen Regungen, mangelndes Verlangen nach weltlichen und zeitlichen Dingen und fehlende Sorge um sie, Fehlen der von den seelischen Leidenschaften bewirkten Verwirrungen, wie Zorn, Freude, Liebe usw.: Kap. 27–28) gesellen. In einem zweiten Schritt möchte Las Casas beweisen, dass die Indianer allesamt „ebenfalls klug und von Natur mit den drei Arten der Klugheit begabt sind, die Aristoteles anführt, nämlich der monastischen, der ökonomischen und der politischen“ (Kap. 40–262). Dabei werden der grundsätzlichen Erörterung der Klugheit (Kap. 40–41) wie der monastischen (Kap. 42) und ökonomischen (Kap. 43–44) Klugheit wenige Kapitel gewidmet, während der politischen Klugheit ganz besondere Aufmerksamkeit (Kap. 45–262) geschenkt wird. Las Casas’ Interesse galt dabei vor allem der Priesterschaft (Kap. 71–194) und den Richtern (Kap. 195–262), während die Bauern (Kap. 59–60), die Handwerker (Kap. 61–65), die Krieger (Kap. 66–68) und die Wohlhabenden (Kap. 69–70) sozusagen pflichtgemäß abgehakt werden. Am Ende konnte Las Casas schlussfolgern, was er mit seinem durch und durch apologetischen Werk zu beweisen trachtete, dass die Indianer nämlich als vernunftbegabte Wesen, als Angehörige derselben Spezies Mensch wie die Europäer, durchaus zivilisations- und glaubensfähig, ja dazu besser als andere Völker geeignet wären (Kap. 263). Wo Sepúlveda den außereuropäischen Barbaren die zivilisierten europäischen Christen entgegenstellt, um den natürlichen Herrschaftsanspruch der letzteren über die ersteren hervorzuheben, stellt Las Casas der christlichabendländischen Zivilisation eine andere Art von gleichberechtigter Zivilisation gegenüber. Las Casas interpretiert Aristoteles anders als der Aristoteles-Fachmann Sepúlveda, weil er den Philosophen dem naturrechtlichen Universalismus sowie dem schöpfungstheologischen Dogma der Einheit, d.h. „Gottebenbildlichkeit“ des Menschengeschlechts unterordnet, so dass Las Casas letztlich eine „Anthropologie des Glaubens“ entwirft. Während Aristoteles die Barbaren oder Sklaven von Natur generell vom Entwicklungsprozess in Richtung „Polis-Regierung“ ausnimmt, da es ihnen an der Fähigkeit zur selbständigen Urteilskraft mangele, ist Las Casas der Überzeugung, dass Ausnahmen von dieser Regel äußerst selten im Menschengeschlecht vorkommen können, und wenn schon, dann nicht weniger bei den Zivilisierten als bei den sogenannten Barbaren oder Wilden. Alle Menschen sind für

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

139

den historischen Prozess von Zivilisation und Glauben, auf den sie seit Anbeginn der Schöpfung hingeordnet sind, potentiell geeignet. Die anzutreffenden Unterschiede (warum die einen früher und die anderen später diese Bestimmung erreichen) werden in dieser evolutiven Sicht auf historisch-kulturelle und nicht auf natürliche Ursachen zurückgeführt. Andernfalls hätte sich ja die göttliche Vorsehung geirrt, die im Prinzip – Las Casas betrachtet hier die Vorsehung als eine Art „verteilende Gerechtigkeit“, die alle mit dem für ihr Heil Notwendigen versieht – „alle Menschen“ mit Vernunft und freiem Willen ausgestattet hat. Diese Sicht ist bei Las Casas nicht Zeichen eines vermeintlichen Unvermögens, zu einem „differenzierten Menschenbild“ zu kommen, wie ihm immer wieder vorgehalten wird; denn er sagt ja wiederholt, dass es bei den Indianern verschiedene Kultur- und Zivilisationsgrade gibt. Vielmehr ist sie Ausdruck einer grundsätzlichen „Anthropologie des Glaubens“, die von der prinzipiellen Wahrheits- und Freiheitsfähigkeit, Gleichheit, Güte und Perfektibilität aller Menschen ausgeht, denn für alle gilt die eschatologische Bestimmung der Gottebenbildlichkeit. Mit Hilfe Ciceros und Thomas’ fasst Las Casas seine „Anthropologie des Glaubens“ in folgendem Manifest zusammen: Alle Völker der Welt bestehen ja aus Menschen, und für alle Menschen und jeden einzelnen gibt es nur eine Definition, und diese ist, dass sie vernunftbegabte Lebewesen sind; alle haben eigenen Verstand und Willen und Entscheidungsfreiheit, weil sie nach dem Ebenbild Gottes geschaffen sind […]. So gibt es denn ein einziges Menschengeschlecht, und alle Menschen sind, was ihre Schöpfung und die natürlichen Bedingungen betrifft, einander ähnlich, und niemand wird bereits unterrichtet geboren […]. Alle Völker der Welt haben Verstand und Willen und das, was sich beim Menschen aus diesen beiden ergibt, nämlich die Entscheidungsfreiheit, und demzufolge haben alle die innere Kraft und Befähigung oder Eignung und den natürlichen Hang zum Guten, um in Ordnung, Vernunft, Gesetzen, Tugend und allem Guten unterwiesen, für sie gewonnen und zu ihnen geführt zu werden43.

Man kann dies natürlich für einen „frommen Wunsch“ halten, der durch die Erfahrung des Bösen tagtäglich widerlegt wird. Das ist aber nicht der Punkt, denn Las Casas wusste auch bei allem anthropologischen Optimismus von der Macht der „Sünde“. Doch dies macht sein Manifest genauso wenig obsolet, wie die Verletzung der Menschenrechte die Menschenrechtserklärung ad absurdum führt. Entscheidend ist, dass Las Casas unter Rückgriff auf die Schöpfungstheologie wie auf das universalistische Naturrecht ein Menschenbild idealtypisch verteidigt, das im Prinzip allen Völkern 43. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 377 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 48).

140

M. DELGADO

einen gleichberechtigten Platz in der Welt zuweist. Ein solches Menschenbild ist die Bedingung der Möglichkeit einer postkolonialen partnerschaftlichen Weltordnung mit universellen Menschenrechten, wie sie heute intendiert wird. Und dennoch ist Las Casas’ Apologie nicht frei von einer advokatorischen Idealisierung des Anderen, weil er nicht nur die Vorwürfe der Verleumder sachlich entkräftet, sondern darüber hinaus vielfach eine Umkehrung des kosmologischen, psychologischen und politischen Determinismus betreibt. So wenn er die Naturbedingungen der Neuen Welt zumeist für lebensfreundlicher als die der Alten hält oder die Indianer vieler Stämme körperlich für besser proportioniert, so dass ihre Körper-Geist-Relation eine günstigere sei, viele indianische Völker schließlich für politisch klüger sowie für das Christentum besser geeignet als die meisten der Alten Welt. Das führt uns unausweichlich zu der Frage, ob Las Casas im Endergebnis das negative Vorurteil seiner Gegner durch ein positives ersetzt und den modernen Mythos vom „edlen Wilden“ vorwegnimmt. Davon können wir bei Las Casas aber nur reden, wenn wir seinen „edlen Wilden“ von dem der Aufklärung und Romantik grundsätzlich unterscheiden. Im humanistischen Entdeckungszeitalter kehrten viele Motive wieder, die schon im Schatten antiker Expansionen eine Rolle spielten: so der Mythos vom „Goldenen Zeitalter“, der zwar nicht einen Gegensatz zwischen Natur und Kultur bedeutet, doch die Kulturgeschichte nicht zuletzt als eine Verfallsgeschichte, ausgehend von einem „primitiven“ glücklichen und harmonischen Zeitalter, betrachtet. Manche Züge dieses „Primitivismus“ sind in der Tat bei Las Casas vorhanden, wenn er die Indianer mit Worten lobt, die aus ihnen quasi ein „engelgleiches Geschlecht“ (genus angelicum) machen: „denn da sie von dieser Welt nur das nahmen, was für sie lebensnotwendig war, hatten sie dies im Überfluss, ohne Sorgen und Ängste, ohne Zwistigkeiten und ohne jemandem etwas wegzunehmen, vielmehr lebten sie ganz ruhig und still, liebevoll, friedlich und froh“. Doch gleichzeitig wird Las Casas unmissverständlich hinzufügen: „Oh, welch glückselige Leute wären sie gewesen, wenn sie [den wahren] Gott gekannt hätten!“44. Während dem „edlen Wilden“ der Aufklärer nichts fehlt, sieht Las Casas bei allem Primitivismus im christlichen Glauben eine notwendige Vervollkommnung der menschlichen Natur. Darin ist Las Casas ein thomanischer Anthropologe des Glaubens geblieben. Er betont, besonders bei den Indianern, eher die Kooperationsnatur als die Konfliktnatur (Hobbes) des Menschen, weil er bei aller Macht der Erbsünde doch von 44. Ibid., S. 365 (Apologética Historia Sumaria, Kap. 44).

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

141

der eschatologischen Bestimmung des Menschen ausgeht. Mit der thomanischen Tradition hält Las Casas daran fest, dass die göttliche Gnade die Natur voraussetzt und vervollkommnet, zur Vollendung bringt, sie aber nicht verwirft oder zerstört. Von Las Casas und den Bettelbrüdern des 16. Jahrhunderts führt also keine direkte Linie zum „edlen Wilden“ der Aufklärer. IV. LAS CASAS’ APOLOGIE INDIANISCHER RELIGIOSITÄT Es war schon davon die Rede, dass Las Casas die indianischen Religionen als Ausdruck der natürlichen Sehnsucht nach dem wahren Gott grundsätzlich positiv interpretiert. Nun wollen wir das hier näher entfalten. Zunächst geht Las Casas von der neuen Heidentypologie Cajetans aus. Der dominikanische Magister und Kardinal hatte in seinem Kommentar zu Summa Theologica II-II q. 66, a. 8 des Thomas von Aquin drei Arten von Ungläubigen oder Heiden unterschieden: einige – wie etwa die Juden und die Muslime in christlichen Territorien – sind de facto und de iure Untertanen christlicher Fürsten, gegen die diese und die Kirche zum Wohle der christlichen Religion Zwangsgesetze erlassen können; andere Heiden – wie etwa solche, die ehemalige christliche Länder erobert haben und dort leben – sind zwar de iure, aber nicht de facto Untertanen christlicher Fürsten. Diese können gegen solche Heiden einen gerechten Verteidigungskrieg führen, um ihre alten Territorien wieder zu bekommen (so wurden z.B. die Kreuzzüge gerechtfertigt, auch der lange Kampf der christlichen Spanier gegen die muslimischen Spanier). Die Heiden der neu entdeckten Welt jenseits des Atlantiks stellten aber für Cajetan eine neue Art von Ungläubigen dar, die bisher weder de iure noch de facto christlichen Fürsten untertan waren: Gegen solche Ungläubigen kann kein König und kein Kaiser, auch nicht die Römische Kirche einen Krieg führen, um ihre Länder zu besetzen oder sie der zeitlichen Gewalt zu unterwerfen; es gibt nämlich keinerlei Grund für einen gerechten Krieg, denn Jesus Christus […] sandte doch, um von der Welt Besitz zu ergreifen, keine Soldaten noch eine bewaffnete Miliz, sondern die heiligen Prediger „wie Schafe unter Wölfe“ (Mt 10,16; Lk 10,3)45.

Darauf wird sich Las Casas immer wieder beziehen, um die friedliche Evangelisierung der Indianer ohne Soldatenbegleitung oder vorhergehende Eroberung ihrer Länder zu verteidigen. 45. THOMAS VON AQUIN, Opera Omnia (hg. Leonina), Bd. 9, Roma, 1897, S. 94. Von Las Casas zitiert u.a. in: LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 245-246 (Historia de las Indias, Buch III, Kap. 38).

142

M. DELGADO

Wie bereits angedeutet, herrschte auch die Meinung, dass die Einwohner der Neuen Welt überaus fleißige und verstockte götzendienerische Heiden sein müssten. Denn die festgestellte Religiosität – etwa bei den Maya und den Völkern des Azteken- und Inkareiches – mit Götterbildern, Tempeln, Priestern und Riten wurde als Zeichen der Unentschuldbarkeit der Indianer nach dem Römerbrief 1,18-21 interpretiert: Der Zorn Gottes wird vom Himmel herab offenbart wider alle Gottlosigkeit und Ungerechtigkeit der Menschen, die die Wahrheit durch Ungerechtigkeit niederhalten. Denn was man von Gott erkennen kann, ist ihnen offenbart. Seit der Erschaffung der Welt wird seine unsichtbare Wirklichkeit an den Werken der Schöpfung mit der Vernunft wahrgenommen, seine ewige Macht und Gottheit. Daher sind sie unentschuldbar. Denn sie haben Gott erkannt, ihn aber nicht als Gott geehrt und ihm nicht gedankt. Sie verfielen in ihrem Denken der Nichtigkeit, und ihr unverständiges Herz wurde verfinstert.

Aus diesem Grund hielt auch der Jesuit José de Acosta (1539-1600) die Indianer Mexikos und Perus letztlich für unentschuldbar, da sie zwar dem höchsten Gott zahlreiche Tempel bauten, aber gleichzeitig dort ihren absonderlichen Götzendiensten nachgingen und polytheistische Darstellungen des Teufels anbeteten46. „Unentschuldbar“ heißt auf Griechisch „ánapologétous“, also apologielos oder ohne jede Verteidigung. So wurden die Indianer in religiöser Hinsicht gesehen und auch behandelt47, wenn sie nicht zum Christentum konvertierten. Lediglich Bartolomé de Las Casas ging hier andere Wege. Seine Innovation liegt darin, dass er einen hermeneutischen Ansatz entfaltet, der der Würde und Logik indianischer Religiosität gerecht wird. Nach der scholastischen Lehre des natürlichen Verlangens (desiderium naturale) nach dem wahren Gott kann der Mensch mit dem Licht der natürlichen Vernunft erkennen, „dass“ es einen Gott gibt, nicht aber „was“ oder „wer“ er sei. Die Ursprünge dieser Lehre gehen auf die Bibel zurück (Röm 1,19-20), sie erhielt aber ihre entscheidende Prägung durch Thomas 46. Vgl. J. DE ACOSTA, Historia natural y moral de las Indias, hg. J. ALCINA FRANCH (Crónicas de América, 34), Madrid, Historia 16, 1987, S. 314ff. Gleichwohl betont Acosta mit Bezug auf Röm 2,12, dass allein Gott, nicht den einfallenden Christen, die Richterrolle zusteht. Vgl. ID., De procuranda indorum salute. 2 Bde., hg. L. PEREÑA et al. (Corpus hispanorum de pace, 23-24), Madrid, CSIC, 1984-1987, Bd. 1, S. 124-125, 272-273; Bd. 2, S. 252ff. 47. Vgl. u.a. M. DELGADO, Von der Verteufelung zur Anerkennung durch Umdeutung: Der „Wandel“ in der Beurteilung der indianischen Religionen durch die christliche Theologie im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert, in Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft 49 (1993) 257-289; ID., Abschied vom erobernden Gott: Studien zur Geschichte und Gegenwart des Christentums in Lateinamerika (Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft, Supplementa 43), Immensee, NZM, 1996.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

143

von Aquin. Demnach gibt es eine „duale“ Gotteserkenntnis, die natürliche und die durch den Glaubensakt gnadenhaft erfasste, die einander aber nicht widersprechen, sondern ergänzen, so wie die Gnadenordnung die Naturordnung voraussetzt und zur Vollendung bringt. Wenn aber die „Möglichkeit“ (der wahre Gott kann mit der natürlichen Vernunft erkannt werden, wenn auch dunkel und konfus) natürlicher Gotteserkenntnis auch als „Notwendigkeit“ (der wahre Gott soll mit der natürlichen Vernunft erkannt und angebetet werden) verstanden wird, dann folgt daraus, dass Götzendienst „unentschuldbar“ ist. Genauso dachte die anklagende Partei, die, sich auf die sichtbaren Zeichen von Götzendienst und Menschenopfern stützend, den Indianern vorwarf, „unentschuldbar“ den wahren Gott verkannt zu haben und den falschen Göttern gefolgt zu sein. Auch hierfür konnte man sich auf Röm 1,18-23 berufen. Daraus (wie aus Weish 13,1-9 und Ps 96,5) spricht der biblische Zorn gegen Polytheismus und Götzendienst, die aus monotheistischer Sicht für die Wurzel aller Übel gehalten werden. Las Casas geht vom natürlichen Verlangen nach dem wahren Gott aus, hält aber die authentische, d.h. durch die Gnade des Glaubens offenbarte Gotteserkenntnis in den indianischen Kulturen vor der Ankunft der Christen für faktisch unwirksam, da die Indianer weder von weisen Philosophen noch von Aposteln über den wahren Gott genügend unterrichtet worden wären. Daher sind für ihn Götzendienst und Menschenopfer als redliche Ergebnisse der konfusen natürlichen Gotteserkenntnis zu verstehen. Paulus, so Las Casas weiter, beziehe sich im Römerbrief auf die heidnischen Philosophen der Antike, welche die Existenz eines höchsten Gottes wohl erkannt hätten, ihn aber nicht entsprechend anbeteten. Das paulinische „unentschuldbar“ sei jedoch nicht auf die „unüberwindliche Unwissenheit“ der Indianer anwendbar48. Denjenigen, die verächtlich behaupten, „Steine“ anstelle des wahren Gottes anzubeten (also „Idolatrie“ oder Götzenverehrung zu treiben statt „Latrie“ oder Gottesanbetung) verstoße gegen die natürliche Vernunft, entgegnet Las Casas mit gesundem Menschenverstand, die wahre Absicht (communis et finalis intentio) der Götzendiener bestehe nicht darin, „Steine“ anzubeten, sondern in ihnen und durch gewisse Erscheinungen der göttlichen Macht den Weltenschöpfer und -beweger zu würdigen, gemäß der fragmentarischen Kenntnis, die sie von ihm besäßen. So bestehe die wahre Absicht der Götzendiener letztlich darin, den wahren Gott anzubeten, von dem sie mit dem Licht der bloß natürlichen Vernunft wissen, „dass“ es ihn 48. LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 255-266; ID., Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 381-388.

144

M. DELGADO

gibt, ohne wirklich sagen zu können, „was“ er in seinem Wesen letztlich sei49. Im Schatten des Götzendienstes haben wir es also primär mit authentischer Religiosität zu tun und nicht mit teuflischen Phänomenen. Durch die Kritik der Gewalt und der Habgier als der „Götzen“ der Christen bekommt Las Casas’ Götzendiensttheorie zudem eine überraschende Wende: Der Götzendienst gedeiht auch im Schatten der wahren Religion, wobei der Götzendienst der Christen gravierender ist, denn ihnen war bereits nicht nur die natürliche, sondern auch die übernatürliche Gotteserkenntnis zuteil geworden. Las Casas ist fest davon überzeugt, man könne den Indianern nicht so schnell und mit zwingender Evidenz beweisen, dass die bestialischen Menschenopfer zu Ehren des wahren oder für wahr gehaltenen Gottes wider die bloße natürliche Vernunft seien. Dabei war er sich seiner „Sonderrolle“ im 16. Jahrhundert durchaus bewusst. In seinem „Brief an die Dominikaner von Chiapas und Guatemala“ von 1564 rühmt er sich, viele Thesen vertreten und bewiesen zu haben, „die vor mir kein Mann zu fassen oder aufzuschreiben wagte“. Dazu zählt er die These, dass es nicht gegen das Naturgesetz oder die natürliche Vernunft ist, wenn diese von jedem positiven menschlichen wie göttlichen Gesetz getrennt ist (seclusa omni lege positive humana vel divina), dem falschen oder wahren Gott (wenn man den falschen für den wahren hält) Menschenopfer darzubringen50.

Da alle Menschen durch die natürliche Tendenz der Vernunft den wahren Gott ersehnen, ihn mit dem Besten, was sie haben, anbeten wollen, und die Menschen eben das höchste Gut seien, müsse man bei den Menschenopfern der Indianer zuerst von einer rechten Absicht ausgehen. Außerdem glauben die Indianer, das allgemeine Wohl und Glück ihrer Gemeinwesen hänge von den Menschenopfern ab, womit es nicht verwunderlich sei, wenn sie in der Not Gott das opfern, was in ihren Augen das Kostbarste und Gottgefälligste sei. So befänden sich diejenigen, die vom Licht des Glaubens noch nicht erreicht wurden und nur der bloßen natürlichen Vernunft folgen konnten, im Zustand einer entschuldbaren Unwissenheit, wenn sie sich freiwillig opfern ließen oder Menschenopfer vollzögen. Die Praxis der Menschenopfer in der biblischen Zeit (Abrahamsgeschichte) und in der vorchristlichen Antike einschließlich des alten Spaniens sei auch so zu deuten. 49. LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 266-271; ID., Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 388-399. 50. B. de LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 3/1: Sozialethische und staatsrechtliche Schriften, hg. M. DELGADO, Paderborn, Schöningh, 1996, S. 501.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

145

Mit dieser Deutung der Menschenopfer wollte Las Casas vermeiden, dass sie als Vorwand für die Eroberungskriege instrumentalisiert werden, denn in der Diskussion über die legitimen Rechtsgründe für die spanische Herrschaft, die im 16. Jahrhundert lebhaft geführt wurde und an der sich auch die besten Theologen Salamancas wie etwa Francisco de Vitoria beteiligten, spielte die defensio innocentium (die Verteidigung der Unschuldigen, die den Göttern geopfert wurden, also die Kriegführung aus „humanitären Gründen“) eine zentrale Rolle. In einem seiner späteren Werke nuanciert er seine Position: Wenn die Indianer nach wiederholter Ermahnung Menschenopfer und Anthropophagie beibehalten und Unschuldige dabei zum Opfer fallen sollten, könnte man sie unter Anwendung eines gemäßigten Zwangs zur Aufgabe solcher Praktiken nötigen. Die Intervention sollte allerdings nur zur Verteidigung der Unschuldigen geschehen und nicht etwa, um die Indianer für solche kriminellen Handlungen zu bestrafen oder sie gar als Knechte zu unterwerfen und sie ihrer Güter zu berauben, wie dies in der Tat geschehe; und zuvor sollte genau abgewogen werden, ob die Zahl der Unschuldigen, die der gewaltsamen Intervention letztlich zum Opfer fallen würden, größer sei, als die Zahl, die man vor dem ungerechten Tod zu retten beabsichtige; man müsse aber auch bedenken, ob der Skandal, der aus einer solchen Intervention notwendigerweise entstehen würde, am Ende doch überwiegen und der christlichen Predigt hinderlich sein würde. In einem solchen Falle müsse man, der göttlichen Weisung folgend, von einer derartigen Befreiung der Unschuldigen absehen, wäre doch ein solcher Akt vitiös zu nennen, da er doch gegen die Vernunftregel verstoßen würde, die uns vorschreibt, das kleinere Übel zu wählen. Da Las Casas der Meinung ist, die Menschenopfer der Indianer seien weniger schlimm als die Eroberungskriege der Spanier, empfiehlt er, die Menschenopfer (und den Götzendienst) so lange zu dulden, bis sie mittels Überzeugung des Verstandes mit Argumenten und sanfter Ermahnung des Willens mit guten Lebensbeispielen freiwillig aus der Welt geschafft werden können. Den Befürwortern eines gewaltsamen Vorgehens wirft Las Casas vor, sie seien offenbar der Meinung, der Zweck könne die Mittel heiligen51. Las Casas’ These im Zusammenhang mit Götzendienst und Menschenopfern steht und fällt mit der vorausgesetzten faktischen Unwirksamkeit einer unentschuldbar verpflichtenden natürlichen Gotteserkenntnis (vgl. Röm 1,18-23). Waren die Indianer wirklich aufgrund einer „unüberwindlichen Unwissenheit“ entschuldigt? Las Casas ist nicht verborgen 51. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 360-421, 478-491; ID., Obras completas. Bd. 11/1, hg. Á. LOSADA, Madrid, Alianza, 1992, S. 432-439.

146

M. DELGADO

geblieben, dass im Hochtal Mexikos der Kulturheros Quetzalcóatl wirksam war, „der [...] nichts von Kriegen, Menschenopfern und anderen dem Gemeinwesen abträglichen Dingen wissen wollte“52. Auch wenn er sich von seiner Apologie der indianischen Religiosität nicht abbringen ließ, hat er doch immer wieder betont, worum es ihm ging: Er will nämlich nicht in Frage stellen, dass die Indianer, wie übrigens die Spanier auch, vielleicht „vor Gott unentschuldbar“ sind, der am Tag des Gerichtes über sie richten wird; wohl aber bestreitet er, dass die Indianer „vor den Spaniern unentschuldbar“ sind, denn sie haben diesen „nichts angetan“. So läuft seine Apologie im Grunde auf eine Widerlegung der Anmaßung hinaus, dass die Christen berechtigt seien, den vermeintlichen „Zorn Gottes“ gegenüber den Indianern innerweltlich vorwegzunehmen. Es ist kein Wunder, dass Las Casas sich dabei auf das Gleichnis vom Unkraut unter dem Weizen (Mt 13,24-30) beruft53 und die Überzeugung des Verstandes mit Argumenten sowie die sanfte Anlockung und Ermahnung des Willens mit dem Beispiel eines guten Lebenswandels für die einzige evangeliumskonforme Art christlicher Mission hält54. Für Las Casas ist das Christentum selbstverständlich die „wahre Religion“. Doch durch seine Entdeckung von „authentischer Religiosität“ im Schatten des Götzendienstes sowie seine Ablehnung eines innerweltlichen Absolutheitsanspruchs gegenüber den Indianern stellt er eine Innovation im Religionsverständnis der Renaissance dar. Seine Apologie indianischer Religiosität gipfelt in der Aussage, dass Christen von den indianischen Formen der Gottesverehrung genug lernen könnten. So schreibt er über die Religion der Azteken: Und alle Taten und Werke, die sie beim Kult ihrer Götter ausführten, waren derart ehrbar, anständig, frei und rein von jeder Gemeinheit, Schändlichkeit und Unzüchtigkeit, dass – wenn man von den entsetzlichen und blutigen Opfern, die sie darbrachten und die von unserer Religion und dem sanften und leichten Gesetz Jesu Christi verboten werden, und von einigen Zeremonien und Akten absieht, die offenbar den Götzen gewidmet waren – alles übrige es durchaus verdiente, dass es in unserer universalen Kirche ausgeführt und vollzogen würde und dass man es von ihnen lernte55.

Las Casas öffnet in der Renaissance bei der Begegnung des Evangeliums mit anderen Religionen und Kulturen reale Möglichkeiten einer echten Inkulturation und nimmt damit die Konzilserklärung über die 52. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 402. 53. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 1 (Anm. 17), S. 369; ID. Obras completas. Bd. 9 (Anm. 2), S. 398-407; ID. Werkauswahl. Bd. 3/1 (Anm. 50), S. 83, 306. 54. Vgl. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl, Bd. 1 (Anm. 17). 55. LAS CASAS, Werkauswahl. Bd. 2 (Anm. 4), S. 464.

DIE KULTUREN UND DIE RELIGIONEN DER INDIANER NACH LAS CASAS

147

nicht-christlichen Religionen vorweg: „Die katholische Kirche verwirft nichts von dem, was in diesen Religionen wahr und heilig ist“ (Nostra aetate 2). V. SCHLUSS Vor dem Hintergrund einer schöpferischen Rezeption des naturrechtlichen und des thomanisch-aristotelischen Denkens hat Las Casas die indianischen Kulturen und Religionen „neu interpretiert“ und die gängige Einstufung der Indianer als unzivilisierte Barbaren und besonders verstockte, götzendienerische Heiden zu widerlegen versucht. Man könnte sagen, dass Las Casas von zwei unverrückbaren „anthropologischen Konstanten“ ausgeht: von der politischen Natur des Menschen und vom natürlichen Verlangen des Menschen nach dem wahren Gott. Dies hilft ihm, die innere Logik fremder (heidnischer) Religiosität samt Götzendienst und Menschenopfer als Ausdruck eben dieses Verlangens grundsätzlich positiv zu verstehen, nicht primär als dämonische Erscheinung und unentschuldbare Verfehlung gegen den wahren Gott; und hinter jeder indianischen Lebensart vermutet er auch eine Logik, also durchaus zivilisierte Gesellschaftsstrukturen, auch wenn sie für uns auf den ersten Blick nicht als solche erkennbar sind und barbarisch, d.h. fremd anmuten. Die Indianer sind demnach keine Barbaren bzw. „Sklaven von Natur“, sondern Menschen wie wir, und sie sind auch keine teuflischen Heiden, sondern vielmehr quasi „anonyme Christen“. Lehrstuhl für Mittlere und Neuere Kirchengeschichte Universität Freiburg Avenue de l’Europe 20 CH-1700 Freiburg Schweiz [email protected]

Mariano DELGADO

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“? GLAUBENSWISSEN UND GLAUBENSPRAXIS IN DER FRÜHNEUZEITLICHEN POLEMIK ZWISCHEN LATEINERN UND ORTHODOXEN (CA. 1550-1650)

Schon Plato wusste: Je weiter man nach Norden kommt, desto rauer werden nicht nur das Klima, sondern auch die Sitten der Bewohner. Der Firnis der Zivilisation nimmt ab, und das Leben wird gefährlich. An die Stelle der Religion, die doch nicht zuletzt für ein sittliches Leben im Hinblick auf das Heil im Diesseits und Jenseits sorgt, treten Ignoranz, Aberglauben und – theoretisch und faktisch – Heidentum und Barbarei. „BARBARISCHE“ MOSKOWITER, „QUASI-HEIDNISCHE“ ORTHODOXE Für die West- und Mitteleuropäer der Frühen Neuzeit bezogen sich solche Vorstellungen seit dem späten Mittelalter in großem Umfang auch auf die Angehörigen der orthodoxen Kirche in demjenigen Teil Europas, den wir heute als Osten kennen. In der Perspektive Europas lag Russland schließlich noch bis ins frühe 19. Jahrhundert nicht im Osten – von dort kam das Licht, dort suchte und fand man Jerusalem – sondern im Norden, mit allen Vorstellungen von Rauheit, Kälte und Wildheit, die die mentale Geographie der Zeit nicht nur Land und Klima, sondern auch den Bewohnern zuschrieben1. Dabei ist zunächst an das Moskauer Russland zu denken, von wo inzwischen, seit dem 16. Jahrhundert, Reisende in größerer Zahl zurückkehrten und ihre irritierenden Geschichten zum Besten, und in die Druckerpresse gaben. Die hier anzutreffenden Stereotype allein reichten schon aus, um das Russlandbild, und auch das der Ostkirche bis weit in die Neuzeit hinein zu prägen: Ein Bild von Ignoranz, Aberglauben und Barbarei2. Zivilisation aber hatte auch immer mit Religion zu tun. Der Bezug auf die Religion fehlte nirgends in einer Zeit, die sich kulturelle Formung und Verfeinerung nirgends ohne die Komponente der 1. Vgl. H. LEMBERG, Zur Entstehung des Osteuropa-Begriffs im 19. Jahrhundert: Vom „Norden“ zum „Osten“ Europas, in Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas Neue Folge 33 (1985) 48-91. 2. Vgl. G. SCHEIDEGGER, Perverses Abendland – Barbarisches Russland: Begegnungen des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts im Schatten kultureller Missverständnisse, Zürich, Chronos, 1993.

150

A. BRÜNING

Frömmigkeit und Gottesfurcht vorstellen konnte. Nicht zuletzt deswegen kamen die östlichen Christen schlecht weg. Zu den stets wiederholten Stereotypen zählte dasjenige von den abergläubischen und unwissenden Russen, der Ignoranz ihrer Priester und einem unreflektierten, stumpfsinnigen Ritualismus und frömmelnden Fanatismus, der am Ende auch keinen großen Unterschied machte zwischen göttlicher Liturgie, Idolatrie und halb oder ganz heidnischen Zaubereien3. „Miserere mei Domine (which they call Hospody pomele) they repeat an hundred times, and that Priest is counted the best fellow that can mumble most in a breath. You shall have five or six reading confusedly together, one a Chapter, another a Psalm, a third a Prayer, & c.“, schrieb der Engländer Samuel Collins, Leibarzt des Zaren Alexej Michajlovič, noch im Jahr 16714. Aber auch dort, wo der räumliche, und damit wohl auch kulturelle Abstand viel geringer war als bei den im Westen aufgebrochenen und nach langem Weg in Russland eintreffenden Reisenden, dachte man über die orthodoxen Christen nicht besser. In Polen-Litauen, wo sich seit den Expansionen des 14. Jahrhunderts die große Begegnungs- und Überlappungszone zwischen westlichem und östlichem Christentum befand, war das Bild der Orthodoxen gleichermaßen von kulturbewusster Herablassung bestimmt. Ungeachtet der Tatsache, dass in Gebieten wie Rotreußen (im wesentlichen die heutige Westukraine), aber auch Litauen oder dem westlichen Weißrussland lateinische und orthodoxe Christen in Stadt und Land nebeneinander lebten, betrachteten die gebildeten Polen, Kleriker wie Laien, ihre ostchristlichen Nachbarn mit Verachtung. Der Bildungsgegensatz wurde umso stärker fühlbar, je höher man in der sozialen Hierarchie aufstieg. So war das Zusammenleben unter der eher einfachen Bevölkerung in diesen Regionen überwiegend friedlich und sogar von vielerlei Formen religiöser Interaktion oder kulturellen Austausches geprägt; auch im einfachen Adel gab es vielfältige Formen der Interaktion und der Koexistenz5. Aber vielleicht gerade deswegen ließ die gelehrte 3. Ibid., S. 223-259. 4. Samuel COLLINS, The Present State of Russia, in a Letter to a Friend in London. Written by an eminent person residing at the Great Tzars court at Mosco for the space of nine years, London, 1671 (hier nach SCHEIDEGGER, Perverses Abendland [Anm. 2], S. 229). „Hospody pomole“ meint die kirchenslavische Form des „Gospodi pomiluj“ („Herr erbarme Dich“), das in der Tat während der östlichen Liturgie häufig, und bisweilen in schneller Folge intoniert wird. Die Praxis des mnogoglasie („Vieltönens“), des gleichzeitigen Absingens von verschiedenen Teilen der – ansonsten sehr langen – Liturgie, war im alten Moskau vor allem des 16. Jh. eine geläufige Praxis, die allerdings während mehrerer Reformsynoden des 17. Jh. untersagt worden war. 5. Spuren davon lassen sich etwa in der Ikonenmalerei jener Regionen finden. Siehe L. BEREZHNAYA – J.P. HIMKA, The World to Come: Ukrainian Images of the Last Judgment, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014; die Intensität religiöser Gegensätze hing

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

151

Elite unter Geistlichen keine Gelegenheit aus, dieses synkretistische Durcheinander zu kritisieren. Aus der Sicht der gelehrten katholischen Kleriker kamen die östlichen Christen in der Tat den Heiden gleich. Repräsentativ hierfür steht die 1500 vom Krakauer Kanoniker Jan Sacranus veröffentlichte Zusammenstellung über die „Irrtümer“ der Ruthenen (Elucidarium errorum ritus ruthenici), worin offen für eine Wiedertaufe der Ostchristen plädiert wird. Die orthodoxen Ruthenen6 seien noch schlimmere Häretiker als die Griechen, die doch nach der Verweigerung der gut 60 Jahre zuvor in Florenz geschlossenen Union schon mit dem Untergang Konstantinopels bestraft worden waren. Alle abstrusen Praktiken, die seither unter ihnen Verbreitung gefunden hätten, könne man gar nicht aufzählen. Ihre einzige Chance bestehe in einer Rückkehr zur wahren, katholischen Kirche des römischen Papstes in Lehre und Ritus, und diese Rückkehr sei einzuleiten mit einer neuen Taufe. Denn, so argumentierte Sacranus, mit ihrem Abfall von der Union hätten sich die Orthodoxen geradezu in eine Art „Union der Ungläubigen“ mit Juden und Moslems begeben. Sacranus’ Schrift steht für eine seit längerem in der katholischen Kirche PolenLitauens geführte Debatte um den Umgang mit den östlichen Christen7. Der Verweis auf die Union steht in der Tat für ein gewisses Nachleben des Unionsgedankens in Polen-Litauen seit der 2. Hälfte des 16. Jahrhunderts, freilich bereits im 16. Jh. stark ab sowohl von der sozialen Schicht als vom Bildungsgrad. Sie war offenbar unter den Eliten stärker als im „einfachen Volk“ oder im niederen Adel, und in Städten waren die Spannungen deutlicher fühlbar als auf dem Land. Aus der inzwischen reichhaltigen, an manchen Punkten (wie unter Bauern und Landbevölkerung) freilich noch immer lückenhaften Forschung vgl. etwa T. WIŚLICZ, Zarobić na duszne zbawienie: Religijność chłopów małopolskich od połowy XVI do końca XVIII wieków, Warschau, Neriton, 2001; N. JAKOVENKO, Ukrajins’ka šljachta z kincja XIV do seredyny XVII st. (Volyn’ i central’na Ukrajina), Kiew, Krytyka, 1993; EAD., Relihijni konversii: Sproba pohljadu zseredyni, in EAD., Paralel’nyj svit: Doslidžennja z istoriji ujavlen’ ta idei v Ukrajini XVI-XVII st., Kiew, Krytyka, 2002; M. DOVBYŠČENKO, Realii ta mify relihyjnoho protystojannja na Volyni v kinci XVI – peršoj polovyni XVII st., in Socium: Al’manach social’noji istoriji 2 (2003) 57-82. 6. Der Begriff „Ruthenen“ bezieht sich, entsprechend dem inzwischen etablierten Usus, hier auf die – damals noch nicht sprachlich und ethnisch getrennten – Vorläufer der heutigen Weißrussen und Ukrainer, „ruthenisch“ auf die damals in diesen Regionen und Ethnien überall verwendete, linguistisch dem Ostslavischen zuzurechnende Umgangs- und Kanzleisprache. 7. Zu Sacranus zuletzt etwa T. WÜNSCH, Religion oder Staat? Die Orthodoxen in Ruthenien zwischen religiöser und staatlicher Vereinnahmung vom 15. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert, in J. GLEIXNER – L. HÖLZLWIMMER – C. PREUSSE – D. TRICOIRE (Hgg.), Konkurrierende Ordnungen: Verschränkung von Religion, Staat und Nation in Ostmitteleuropa vom 16. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert (DigiOst, 2), Berlin, Peter Lang, 2018, 77-125, hier bes. S. 79-89; aus der älteren Literatur J. KRAJCAR, A Report on the Ruthenians and Their Errors, Prepared for the Fifth Lateran Council, in Orientalia Christiana Periodica 29 (1963) 79-94; zuletzt M. NIECHWIEJ, O błędach rusińskiego obrządku to jest Elucidarius errorum ritus ruthenici (1501) czyli Jan z Oświęcimia wobec idei unii kościelnej z prawosławnymi Rusinami, Krakau, Collegium Columbinum, 2012.

152

A. BRÜNING

aber während die Orthodoxen vereinzelte Versuche unternahmen, die Einheit in Verschiedenheit wieder aufleben zu lassen, bedeutete Vervollständigung der Union aus katholischer Sicht nahezu immer eine Angleichung auf allen Ebenen. Katholische Geistliche und Laien sprachen weiter und ausschließlich von den „Verirrungen“ der Ruthenen8. Das beruhte im Übrigen offenbar auf Gegenseitigkeit; die These, dass sich unter den orthodoxen Ruthenen die Idee der Union einer breiten und bleibenden Popularität erfreut habe, ist in der Forschung umstritten. Auch die meisten Orthodoxen hielten nicht mehr viel davon9. Zwar hatte im gleichen Jahr 1501 Papst Alexander VI. die Frage der „Griechentaufe“ bereits per Dekret negativ entschieden, und Übertretungen seiner Verfügung sogar mit der Exkommunikation bedroht10. Doch die Debatten, nicht zuletzt als Ausdruck gegenseitiger Entfremdung, waren hiermit nicht vorbei11. Sacranus’ Werk erlebte mehrere Auflagen, und ging selbst ein halbes Jahrhundert nach seinem Ableben im Jahr 1582 in Speyer erneut in Druck. WEST GEGEN OST: GLAUBENSWISSEN UND GLAUBENSPRAXIS Der zentrale Topos bereits in dieser Phase war auch in Polen-Litauen derjenige von den unwissenden, abergläubischen und letztendlich dummen und ungebildeten Orthodoxen. Wie angedeutet, machte man in dieser Hinsicht wenig Unterschied zwischen den ostkirchlichen Gläubigen im polnisch-litauischen Osten und den Russen des Moskauer Reiches. Zumindest teilweise geschah dies zu Unrecht, und der heutige Historiker wird eher einen Unterschied der Bildungskulturen feststellen, als ein Gefälle. Bibelkundige und auch in der Väterliteratur bewanderte Schriftsteller 8. Vgl. I. MONČAK, Florentine Ecumenism in the Kievan Church, Roma, Opera GraecoCatholicae Academiae Theologicae, Bd. LXIII-LXIV, 1987, S. 226-308. 9. Kritische zur These von Mončak etwa B. GUDZIAK, Crisis and Reform: The Kyivan Metropolitanate, the Patriarchate of Constantinople and the Genesis of the Union of Brest, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1998, S. 43-58. 10. Vgl. A.G. WELYKYJ (Hg.), Documenta Pontificum Romanorum Historiam Ucrainae Illustrantes, Bd. 1, Roma, P.P. Basiliani, 1953, no. 104, S. 181-183; WÜNSCH, Religion oder Staat? (Anm. 7), S. 84-85. 11. Generell zum Thema der „rebaptisatio ruthenorum“ E. PRZEKOP, Die „rebaptisatio ruthenorum“ auf dem Gebiet Polens vor der Union von Brest, in Ostkirchliche Studien 29 (1980) 272-282; J. SAWICKI, „Rebaptisatio Ruthenorum“ in the Light of 15th and 16th Century Polish Synodal Legislation, in J. KŁOCZOWSKI (Hg.), The Christian Community of Medieval Poland, Wrocław, Zaklad Narodowy im. Ossolinskich, 1981, 57-72; A.M. AMMANN, Zur Geschichte der Geltung der Florentiner Konzilsentscheidungen in Polen-Litauen: Der Streit um die Gültigkeit der „Griechentaufe“, in Orientalia Christiana Periodica 8 (1942) 289-342.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

153

kannte, namentlich unter den Mönchen und im höheren Klerus, auch der ruthenische und moskowitische Osten sehr wohl. Nur dachte man über den Wert von Glaubenswissen anders als im Westen. Man kann von einer anderen Balance zwischen Glaubenswissen einerseits, und Glaubenspraxis andererseits sprechen. Was nämlich im Westen zusehends als Defizit und Mangel angesehen wurde, hatte in der östlichen Tradition den Vorrang. „Orthodoxie“ (russ. pravoslavie), meint gerade die rechte Weise der Anbetung und Verehrung, nicht das Bekenntnis zu formulierten Lehrsätzen, ohne dass damit notwendigerweise eine komplette Geringschätzung von Wissen und Gelehrsamkeit einhergehen musste. Einer der großen Kirchenväter des Ostens, Johannes von Damaskus, hatte im 8. Jahrhundert ausdrücklich auch zum Studium der „äußeren Wissenschaften“ aufgerufen. „Vielleicht werden wir auch bei ihnen etwas Passendes finden und für die Seele Nützliches ernten … auch der Königin kommt es zu, von einigen Dienerinnen bedient zu werden“12. Trotzdem war bereits für die byzantinische Tradition ein Philosoph etwas anderes als (nur) ein Gelehrter; spirituelle Erfahrung stand über Belesenheit, und „heilige Einfalt“ im Zweifelsfall über geschultem Denken. Genau genommen war das selbst im hohen Mittelalter freilich noch kein absoluter Trennfaktor zwischen Ost und West gewesen. Denn etwa um die Zeit als Anselm von Canterbury sein berühmtes Programm vom „den Intellekt fragenden Glauben“ (fides quaerens intellectum) formulierte, verteidigte der Benediktinermönch und Kardinal Petrus Damiani exemplarisch einen ob seiner Unbildung geschmähten einfachen Mönch mit seiner Schrift über die „heilige Einfalt“. Glauben an Christus sei wichtiger als die Rhetorik des Cicero, und die Gesetze der Logik hätten vor Gott ohnehin keinen Bestand13. Wohl erst in der Zeit danach, mit der Durchsetzung der Scholastik, fielen die beiden Traditionen – wenn auch nie ganz – auseinander. Das alte Russland hatte schon die Florentiner Union geradezu spiegelbildlich gedeutet, und den Fall Konstantinopels gerade auf den Pakt des Kaisers mit den schismatischen Lateinern geschoben. Die alte Formel vom „Dritten Rom“ – freilich historisch-eschatologisch, noch lange nicht politisch verstanden – hatte hier ihren Ursprung. Moskau hatte auf seine 12. Hier zit. nach W. GOERDT, Russische Philosophie: Zugänge und Durchblicke, Freiburg i.Br. – München, Alber, 1984, S. 322. 13. PETRUS DAMIANI, De sanctae simplicitate scientiae inflanti anteponenda, vgl. Patrologia Latina 145, Sp. 695-704; zum Hintergrund z.B. N. BROX, Der einfache Glaube und die Theologie: Zur altkirchlichen Geschichte eines Dauerproblems, in Kairos 14 (1972) 161-187; A. VAUCHEZ, Kirche und Bildung – Veränderungen und Spannungen, in Die Geschichte des Christentums, Bd. 5, Freiburg i.Br., Herder, 1995, bes. S. 469-477.

154

A. BRÜNING

Art mit der byzantinischen Tradition auch das klassische Problem von Glaubenswissen und Glaubenspraxis übernommen, und in seiner Art verarbeitet. Die Biographie des hl. Stefan von Perm aus dem 15. Jahrhundert beschreibt den Heiligen als jemanden der immer bestrebt war der Wahrheit bis auf den Grund nachzugehen, und zu diesem Zweck auch die „äußeren Wissenschaften“ schätzte. Aber noch kein Jahrhundert später distanzierte sich Josif Volockij, der Abt des Klosters von Volokolamsk, in seinem weit verbreiteten „Aufklärer“ (prosvetitel‘) resolut von den „heidnischen“ Philosophen und ihrer Idolatrie, und empfiehlt, in den „weltlichen Wissenschaften“ ein Tor, aber ein Weiser in Christo zu sein, „denn eines ist Seine Weisheit, ein anderes die Weisheit dieser Welt“14. Zwischen den beiden Autoren lag die erste und verstörende Erfahrung der Moskauer Kirche mit häretischen Abweichungen, den strigol’niki und den „Judaisierenden“ um die Jahrhundertwende zum 16. Jahrhundert, deren schädliche Verirrungen Josifs Werk vor allem wieder in die rechte Ordnung zu bringen suchte. Deren Alternative hatte gerade mit einer intellektuell geführten Attacke auf die Trinitätslehre, im Verein mit moralischer Kritik an der Gebetspraxis und dem Lebenswandel von Priester und Gläubigen begonnen – in manchem der reformatorischen Impulsen des Westens ähnlich, teils sogar von dort inspiriert, aber schnell in sich zusammenfallend. So blieb es bei einem schnell verhallenden „Echo“ (Stökl) von Renaissance und Reformation im Moskauer Russland15. Intellektuelle Kritik wurde damit im Namen der Tradition zurück in den Kontext der Gottesverehrung verwiesen. Ein Zuviel dessen, was im Altkirchenslawischen als „klügeln, weise tun“ (mudrstvovati) bezeichnet wurde, das hatte man hier gelernt, führte in die Orientierungslosigkeit und schließlich zu Irrlehren und Häresie. Mudrstvovati war eigentlich einfach der Begriff für Lesen, für Interpretation und rechte Bewahrung der Tradition; das Problem bestand weniger in der Gelehrsamkeit und Verstandestätigkeit an sich, sondern vielmehr in der damit verbundenen Versuchung des Stolzes, der den, der sich überlegen im Besitz der Wahrheit wähnt, auf Dauer isoliert (also, kirchlich gesprochen, zum Sektierertum treibt) und zur Verachtung seiner Mitmenschen führt. Schon Paulus warnte davor (vgl. Röm 12,3). Aber genau dies „Zuviel“ des Gelehrten, der Buchweisheit, der logischen Spielereien und der sektiererischen Anmaßung warf man auch in Moskau den westlichen Christen, den „Lateinern“ vor. Ihnen, so lautete die Unterstellung, kam über ihre intellektuellen Kapriolen gerade die rechte 14. Beide Beispiele nach GOERDT, Russische Philosophie (Anm. 12), S. 320, 325. 15. Vgl. bereits G. STÖKL, Das Echo von Renaissance und Reformation im Moskauer Russland, in Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 7 (1959) 413-430.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

155

Frömmigkeit und Gottesverehrung abhanden, auf die es angesichts der Unzugänglichkeit Gottes für den menschlichen Verstand (hier wirkt die im Osten weit stärker rezipierte Tradition der apophatischen, „nichtwissenden“ Theologie) doch gerade ankam. Von dort kommt dann die im Moskauer Russland des 16. und noch des frühen 17. Jahrhunderts so ausgeprägte Skepsis gegenüber den „Wissenschaften“, aber auch gegenüber gelehrten Disputen, die die westlichen Reisenden wiederum so irritierte16. KONFESSIONALISIERUNG: NEUE MASSSTÄBE

IM

WESTEN

Ein gutes halbes Jahrhundert nach Sacranus und Josif von Volokolamsk (deren Zeitgenossenschaft in der Forschung kaum einmal thematisiert wird) hatte vor allem der Westen im Zuge von Reformation und Gegenreformation – also mit Beginn des „konfessionellen Zeitalters“ die Balance zwischen Glaubenswissen und Glaubenspraxis noch einmal neu austariert, und zwar noch einmal mehr zugunsten von Dogma, Verstand und Wissen. Konfession als gesellschaftliche Großgruppe, nicht mehr nur als liturgisches Bekenntnis definierte sich nun vor allem über Texte. Zugehörigkeit zu einer Konfession bedeutete nun in erster Linie Zustimmung zu gewissen Lehrsätzen, und erst in zweiter Instanz schlug sich dies dann auch in den Formen der Liturgie, im Gebet, Abendmahl oder Messe nieder17. Vor allem die reduktionistischen Ambitionen, die „sola“-Prinzipien (sola fide, sola scriptura) der protestantischen Kirchen mussten den Abstand zur orthodoxen Sicht der Dinge notwendigerweise noch vergrößern. Wie sehr man es inzwischen mit zwei unterschiedlichen Kulturen zu tun hatte, ließ sich im Jahr 1570 verfolgen, als der böhmische Pastor und Vorsteher der litauischen Brüdergemeinden Jan Rokyta anlässlich einer Gesandtschaft an den Hof Zar Ivans IV. mit diesem ein Gespräch über die Lehren seiner Glaubensgemeinschaft führte. Der Zar – später mit dem Beinamen „der Gestrenge“, „der Schreckliche“ versehen – verriet in diesem Gespräch durchaus einige Belesenheit und gute Vertrautheit mit der kirchlichen Tradition. Aber genau diese wohlgehütete ostkirchliche Tradition machte es ihm unmöglich, seinem protestantischen Gesprächspartner etwa in die 16. Vgl. auch SCHEIDEGGER, Perverses Abendland (Anm. 2), S. 226. 17. Als einschlägige Zusammenfassung des Paradigmas „Konfessionalisierung“ durch einen seiner „Erfinder“ einschließlich der hier genannten Implikationen und mit einem ersten Blick auf Osteuropa, vgl. H. SCHILLING, Das konfessionelle Europa: Die Konfessionalisierung der europäischen Länder seit Mitte des 16. Jahrhunderts und ihre Folgen für Kirche, Staat, Gesellschaft und Kultur, in J. BAHLCKE – A. STROHMEYER (Hgg.), Konfessionalisierung in Ostmitteleuropa im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert in Staat, Gesellschaft und Kultur, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner 1999, 13-62.

156

A. BRÜNING

Abgründe der Rechtfertigungslehre zu folgen, oder die Bedeutung guter Werke ähnlich zu relativieren. Ebenso wenig konnte er den reformerischen Ansichten zur Ekklesiologie und Tradition folgen. Gänzlich inakzeptabel, ja eine Provokation aber war es für den Zaren, dass sein Gegenüber sich kritisch über die Verehrung der Ikonen äußerte, also eines der zentralen liturgischen Elemente der ostkirchlichen Überlieferung in Frage stellte. Tatsächlich wurde die Ikonenverehrung im Laufe der Zeit generell zu einem der wichtigsten Indikatoren zwischen westlicher, „konfessioneller“ und ostkirchlicher religiöser Kultur des Zeitalters. Vor allem die Protestanten zogen gegen diese „superstitiones“ zu Felde, aber auch die Katholiken hielten die Ikonen für Götzenbilder18. Rokyta erhielt zwar Gelegenheit zur Darlegung seiner Ansichten, und der Zar hakte sogar mit Fragen nach, wo er genauere Auskunft wünschte. Doch am Ende konnte er mit den protestantischen Lehren nichts anfangen, und glaubte sie im Namen seiner christlichen Tradition zurückweisen zu müssen. Schon nach wenigen Tagen erhielt Rokyta ein äußerst polemisch gehaltenes Schreiben als Antwort, sehr wahrscheinlich verfasst vom Zaren selbst, der allerdings hierfür das Pseudonym Parfenij Urodivyj (Parfenij, der Narr in Christo) benutzte19. Die im westlichen „konfessionellen Zeitalter“ neu, und anders bestimmte Balance zwischen Glaubenspraxis und Glaubenswissen implizierte eine generelle Aufwertung der Bildung und der – meist kontrovers verstandenen – Theologie, aber ebenso eine neue Akzentuierung auf die Vermittlung jener grundlegenden Glaubenssätze, ohne die nach allgemeiner Ansicht niemand gerettet werden könne. Voraussetzung waren, so will es zumindest das Schema der „Konfessionalisierung“, die Gewinnung fester theoretischer Grundlagen, und die Ausmerzung von Unklarheiten. Was folgte, waren Propaganda und die Verhinderung von Gegenpropaganda – gemeint ist hier nicht zuletzt der Gang ins Volk, die Verbreitung und Verteidigung der einmal definierten Glaubenssätze in der frühneuzeitlichen Gesellschaft, und vor allem unter den Laien und einfachen Gläubigen. Mittel der neuen „Propaganda“, die in Wirklichkeit mehr und mehr eine neue Art Mission wurde, waren Buchdruck und Katechese. Andererseits folgte der Ritus, bisher eine der beiden gleichwertigen Säulen christlicher Tradition, nun den theoretischen Vorgaben erst nach, bis auf die Ebene von 18. Vgl. SCHEIDEGGER, Perverses Abendland (Anm. 2), S. 67, 239. 19. Vgl. O. CHUMICHEVA, Ivan der Schreckliche und Jan Rokyta: Der Zusammenstoß zweier Kulturen, in Historisches Jahrbuch 124 (2004) 77-96; allgemein E. DONNERT, Begegnung von Luthertum und russischer Orthodoxie im Moskauer Reich des 16. Jahrhunderts, in E. HÜBNER – E. KLUG – J. KUSBER (Hgg.), Zwischen Christianisierung und Europäisierung. Festschrift für Peter Nitsche zum 65. Geburtstag, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner 1998, 179-200, der im Fall von Rokyta allerdings die Zuschreibung des Antwortschreibens von „Parfenij Urodivyj“ an Ivan IV. übersieht.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

157

sogenannten „Unterscheidungsriten“ (wie etwa der katholischen Fronleichnamsprozession), anhand derer die zuerst theoretisch gewonnene und formulierte Differenz zwischen wahrer Kirche und Ketzerei öffentlich manifest wurde20. Im Licht dieser Entwicklungen waren dann die Ostchristen gleichsam noch dümmer als zuvor. Für die Beziehung zur orthodoxen Kirche bedeutete dies einerseits eine Vertiefung der Gegensätze, andererseits eine neuartige Herausforderung, die die Orthodoxen mittelfristig dazu zwang, die eigene Position klarer zu definieren, und die Konsequenzen daraus abzuleiten. Die äußere, institutionelle Seite, also die praktischen Konsequenzen bestanden in der Einführung des Buchdrucks, der Entwicklung eines eigenen Schulwesens und einer Katechese für die Masse der Geistlichen und Laien. Das Verhältnis von Glaubenswissen und Glaubenspraxis wurde hierbei, wenngleich in der Polemik selten in eigenen Titeln thematisiert, zum wiederkehrenden und prinzipiellen Thema, auf das auch die orthodoxen Theoretiker immer wieder mit grundsätzlichen Aussagen zurückkommen mussten. Gegenüber den verschiedenen Konfessionen führte dies in der Orthodoxie zu unterschiedlichen Positionen. Sehr vereinfacht gesagt, waren für die östlichen Christen im Verhältnis zum Protestantismus in seinen verschiedenen Ausprägungen die Fronten vergleichsweise schnell geklärt, auch dort wo man im Alltag auf sie traf. Zwar haben die humanistisch inspirierten Bildungsfortschritte und neuen Schuleinrichtungen etwa in Polen-Litauen eine Zeit lang große Anziehungskraft namentlich auf den Adel ausgeübt, und sogar zeitweilig für eine Welle von Konversionen auch von Orthodoxen in den höheren Gesellschaftsschichten gesorgt. Aber so wie der anfangs große Erfolg der protestantischen Gemeinden und Schulen in diesen Gebieten bereits um 1600 zum Stehen gekommen war, verließen auch spätestens in der nächsten Generation die zahlreichen Bekehrten aus der Orthodoxie die reformatorischen Bekenntnisse wieder – dann aber in Richtung Katholizismus21. Theoretisch war recht bald klar geworden, dass sich die orthodoxe Tradition auf Dauer weder mit den Eigenheiten 20. Programmatisch in dieser Hinsicht bereits W. REINHARD, Zwang zur Konfessionalisierung? Prolegomena zu einer Theorie des konfessionellen Zeitalters, in Zeitschrift für historische Forschung 10 (1983) 257-277. 21. Für die Entwicklung des Protestantismus in Polen-Litauen nach wie vor wichtig ist G. SCHRAMM, Der polnische Adel und die Reformation, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 1965. Allerdings enthält die Studie noch vergleichsweise wenig zur Ostkirche; für die religiössozialen Entwicklungen vor allem der breiten Adelsschicht „von der Orthodoxie zum Katholizismus“ eingehend M. LIEDTKE, Od prawosławia do katolicyzmu: Ruscy możni i szlachta Wielkiego Księstwa Litewskiego wobec wyznań reformacyjnych, Białystok, Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu w Białymstoku, 2004.

158

A. BRÜNING

der protestantischen Rechtfertigungslehre, dem alleinigen Schriftprinzip noch mit dem daraus abgeleiteten liturgischen Reduktionismus einschließlich Wortgottesdienst und Bildersturm anfreunden konnte. Zu Beginn des 17. Jahrhunderts war das zumindest Konsens in der Orthodoxen Welt, dass man es weitgehend mit Häresie zu tun habe – Ausnahmen, die immer noch der intellektuellen Anziehungskraft bestimmter Denksysteme zu verdanken sind, bestätigen eher die Regel. Die Aufregung etwa um das vermeintlich calvinistische Glaubensbekenntnis des umstrittenen Konstantinopeler Patriarchen Kyrillos Lukaris überschätzt jedenfalls den eigentlich viel unverbindlicheren Stellenwert, den ein solches Bekenntnis im Gesamtrahmen der Ostkirche hatte. Selbst dieser „calvinistische“ Patriarch änderte denn auch nichts an der Feier der Liturgie, und fuhr in gewohnter Weise fort mit der Verehrung von Ikonen22. Generell blieb von jetzt an der Einfluss des Protestantismus auf die Ostkirche sehr begrenzt; erst im 18. Jahrhundert, dann unter dem Eindruck des Pietismus, sind wieder theologische Fernwirkungen nachweisbar. Komplexer gestalteten sich die Relationen zum römischen Katholizismus, auch im Hinblick auf Glauben und Wissen. Das Konzil von Trient hatte, neben einigen grundlegenden Lehrsätzen und der „Professio fidei“, die am Ende verabschiedet wurde, vor allem eine exclusivistische Ekklesiologie betont, die unter anderem das Bekenntnis zu Papst und bischöflicher Hierarchie zum Dreh- und Angelpunkt rechten Glaubens gemacht hatte23. In Polen wurde dies von Kardinal Stanislaus Hosius, Kardinal und Bischof von Ermland, der zeitweise auch die Sitzungen des Konzils geleitet hatte, gerade mit Blick auf die „geistig Schwachen“ zugespitzt: Folgendes ist es, wodurch wir uns zum Glauben bekennen: die heilige katholische Kirche, die der heilige Chrysostomus mit einem Haus verglich, das aus unseren Seelen erbaut sei. […] Die Kraft dieses Glaubensartikels ist so groß, dass für jemanden geistig Schwachen, der nichts anderes erfassen kann, der aber mit Paulus bekennt: er wisse dass Jesus Christus gelebt hat und gekreuzigt wurde, schon dieses zum Heil genügen kann. Denn nicht, 22. Klassisch hierzu nach wie vor G. HERING, Ökumenisches Patriarchat und Europäische Politik, 1620-1638, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 1965. Politisch wie theologisch war Lukaris demnach offenkundig, von der Frontstellung zur katholischen Kirche geleitet, nicht vom Wunsch nach eigens theologischen Neuerungen. Instruktiv zur Rolle von Bekenntnissen in der Ostkirche zuletzt C. GASTGEBER, Annäherung an eine orthodoxe Konfessionalisierung: Schriftliche Bekenntnisse zum Glauben in Byzanz am Beispiel des Patriarchatsregisters von Konstantinopel (14. Jahrhundert), in M.-D. GRIGORE – F. KÜHLER-WIELACH (Hgg.), Confessio Orthodoxa? Konfessionsbildung, Konfessionalisierung und ihre Folgen in der östlichen Christenheit Europas, Göttingen, Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, 2018, 163188. 23. Vgl. D. WENDEBOURG, Die Ekklesiologie des Konzils von Trient, in W. REINHARD – H. SCHILLING (Hgg.), Die katholische Konfessionalisierung, Gütersloh, Aschendorff, 1995, 70-87.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

159

wer andere an Weisheit, sondern wer sie an Frömmigkeit übertrifft, ist dem Himmelreich näher. […] Dein Glaube, sagt Christus, macht dich selig, nicht die Schriftgelehrtheit. Nichts wissen, heißt alles wissen…24.

Das bedeutet durchaus eine Verschiebung, da die traditionelle Skepsis gegenüber reinem Intellektualismus, den die alte Kirche schon kannte, hier einher geht mit der Anweisung zu einem vorbehaltlichen Bekenntnis zur Institution. Hosius war es auch, der ab 1564 die Jesuiten nach Braunsberg (Braniewo) in sein ermländisches Bistum holte. Von dort begann der Orden als Speerspitze der Gegenreformation seinen Aufstieg in PolenLitauen25. Die landesweiten Erfolge der Jesuiten – der erwähnte Zulauf zum Katholizismus von ehemals Orthodoxen und Protestanten ging zu nicht geringen Teilen auf deren Wirken zurück – beruhten vor allem auf deren Errungenschaften im Bildungswesen. Die jesuitischen Kollegien, die bald überall im Land, von Posen über Warschau bis nach Lemberg, Wilna und Kiew, ihre Pforten öffneten, boten gediegenen und – für manch einen Kleinadligen mit Karriereambitionen entscheidend – kostenfreien Unterricht an. Illustrativ für diese Zeit ist das Testament eines orthodoxen Adligen aus dem letzten Drittel des 16. Jahrhunderts, des Kastellans von Braclav, Vasyl Zahorovs’kyj, der seinen Kindern nach der Grundunterweisung durch einen tugendhaften Diakon den Besuch der Wilnaer Jesuitenschule nahe legt, von der es heißt, es gebe dort die beste Ausbildung. Gefolgt wird diese Empfehlung von der eindringlichen, im gegebenen Kontext freilich etwas naiv anmutenden Mahnung, den angestammten orthodoxen Glauben der Vorfahren stets standhaft zu bewahren26. Naiv deswegen, weil auch der Unterricht in den Jesuitenkollegien nicht allein der Aneignung von Wissen, sondern vor allem der Frömmigkeit – dann freilich mehr oder weniger deutlich im Sinne von Kardinal Hosius und dem Tridentinum – ausgelegt war. Die Studienordnung der Jesuiten, die ratio studiorum, legte als Ziel fest, dass die Schüler „zur Ehre Gottes den bestmöglichen Fortschritt in der 24. S. HOSIUS, Quae sit uis huius articuli, credo sanctam Ecclesiam Catholicam, in ID., Confessio catholicae fidei Christiana, Wien, 1559, fol. XVII; hier deutsch nach St. HAFNER – O. TUREČEK – G. WYTRZENS (Hgg.), Slavische Geisteswelt. Band 3: West- und Südslaven. Mensch und Welt, Baden-Baden, Holle-Verlag, 1959, S. 54-55. 25. Zur Gegenreformation in Polen, einschließlich des Verhältnisses zur Ostkirche die Übersicht bei A. BRÜNING, Unio non est Unitas – Polen-Litauens Weg im Konfessionellen Zeitalter (1569-1648), Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2008, S. 192-247; das Standardwerk zu den Jesuiten ist S. OBIREK, Jezuici w Rzeczypospolitej Obojga Narodów w latach 15641668: Działalność religijna, społeczno-kulturalna i polityczna, Krakau, Wydział Filozoficzny Tow. Jezusowego, 1996, zur ersten Phase der Tätigkeiten ibid., S. 21-43. 26. Text bei M. HRUŠEVS’KYJ, Istorija Ukrajins’koji literatury, Bd. 5 (Ndr. Kiew, Naukova Dumka 1995), Tl. 1, S. 227-228. Vgl. OBIREK, Jezuici (Anm. 25), S. 183-186; BRÜNING, Unio (Anm. 25), S. 206.

160

A. BRÜNING

Lebenskunst, den feinen Künsten und christlicher Lehre“ erreichen sollten. Jedenfalls habe, so hieß es weiter, alles bewusst so geordnet zu werden, dass der Frömmigkeit unter allen Studien der erste Rang zukomme. In den Kollegien waren die Studenten gehalten, mehrmals in der Woche die Messe zu besuchen. Feste Gebetszeiten strukturierten den Studientag27. Freilich war das nur die jesuitische Variante eines eigentlich überall, auch auf den protestantischen Kollegien angewandten Grundschemas, der „gelehrten Frömmigkeit“ (pietas litterata), die Kenntnisse in den „freien Künsten“ (artes liberales) auf der Grundlage eindeutiger, freilich zuvor im konfessionellen Rahmen festgeschriebener Glaubensüberzeugungen zu vermitteln suchte28. Im Kontext der westlichen Konfessionalisierung haben neue Ansätze unter anderem von der Gewichtung zwischen Frömmigkeit und Glaubenswissen, die bei Katholiken und Protestanten jeweils anders ausfiel, als Kennzeichen einer je spezifischen „Konfessionskultur“ gesprochen – in einer Reihe mit anderen Indikatoren wie etwa der Rolle der Priester (zölibatäre Priester oder protestantisches Pfarrhaus), Kirchenmusik oder Bilderverehrung. Über Möglichkeiten und Grenzen des Konzepts „Konfessionskultur“, das teils das Erbe des Konfessionalisierungsparadigmas der letzten drei Jahrzehnte angetreten hat, wird in der Geschichtswissenschaft gegenwärtig lebhaft debattiert29. Die Debatte konzentriert sich freilich ausschließlich auf den europäischen Westen. Ob anhand der gleichen Indikatoren – langfristig – auch von einer orthodoxen Konfessionskultur zu sprechen ist, gehört zwar als Frage eigentlich zur Debatte, ist aber bisher nicht thematisiert worden30. Es gibt indes, wie die folgende Darstellung zu zeigen versucht, gute Gründe, genau das zu tun. „HEIDEN“: DAS BILD DER OSTKIRCHE IN ZEITEN DER KONFESSIONALISIERUNG Im Hinblick auf die Ostkirche ergab sich aus Sicht der westlichen Konfessionen aus der genannten Neubestimmung mehrerlei. Zunächst war das östliche Christentum ganz einfach Missionsgebiet, hierin freilich 27. Vgl. J. BOWEN, A History of Western Education, Bd. 2, London, Routledge, 2003, S. 420-432. Zum Bildungswesen der Jesuiten in Polen OBIREK, Jezuici (Anm. 25), S. 69105. 28. Ibid., S. 395-399, 430-432. 29. Vgl. die Beiträge von G. WASSILOWSKY, M. POHLIG, B. EMICH in Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 109 (2018). 30. Vgl. M. MAURER, Konfessionskulturen: Die Europäer als Protestanten und Katholiken, Paderborn, Ferdinand Schöningh, 2019; zu „Konfession und Bildung“ als Indikator ibid., S. 121-133.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

161

nur graduell verschieden von den anderen, formell bereits christianisierten Landgebieten Polen-Litauens. Visitationen, wie sie Hosius bereits initiiert hatte, hatten auch unter der katholischen Bevölkerung den Befund bestätigt, den man ebenso gut von anderen Teilen Europas kannte, dass nämlich die Mehrheit der Gläubigen reichlich ahnungslos gegenüber dem Glaubenswissen der kirchlichen Tradition war, und eine grundlegende Unterweisung – nicht zuletzt zur Vorbeugung gegen die Häresie – dringend nötig hatte. Die Jesuitenbrüder zogen nun einzeln oder in kleinen Gruppen von Dorf zu Dorf und von Gemeinde zu Gemeinde, hielten sich im Schnitt 3-4 Tage dort auf und feierten die Messe mit Aussetzung des Allerheiligsten, hielten belehrende Predigten, und katechetische Einheiten vor allem für die Jüngeren. Etwas andere Qualitäten erforderten die Missionen an den Adelshöfen31. Wie groß man sich die Herausforderung dachte, erhellt sich aus der Tatsache, dass die Jesuiten offenbar im Gebet auch ihrer Glaubensbrüder in der Heidenmission in fernen Erdteilen gedachten, sich aber gleichsam selbst ebenfalls in Indien wähnten, wenn auch im „Indien vor Ort“32. In diesem Zusammenhang ist es zu sehen, wenn ab 1570 zwei führende Vertreter des Orden, der italienische Diplomat Antonio Possevino, und der Pole Piotr Skarga, insbesondere von Litauen als einem „wahren Indien“ sprachen, wo Reste des alten Heidentums mit ketzerischen Protestanten, ignoranten orthodoxen Popen und einer nur formell christlichen, in Wahrheit weitgehend unwissenden und abergläubischen Landbevölkerung nebeneinander lebten. Daraus den Kern einer neuen Christenheit zu formen, gehört zu den großartigen Visionen, wie sie ähnlich auch den katholischen Missionaren in Amerika und Asien vorschwebten33. Possevinos Mission zu Zar Ivan IV. brachte 1582 bekanntlich einen Waffenstillstand zwischen dem Moskauer Reich und Polen, und zugleich eines der Juwelen der frühneuzeitlichen Reiseliteratur über Moskau hervor34, aber den päpstlichen Auftrag, den Zaren für eine Union mit Rom und zum gemeinsamen Vorgehen gegen die Türken zu gewinnen, konnte Possevino nicht umsetzen. In Polen-Litauen selbst machte sich dessen Ordensbruder Piotr Skarga daran, die schismatischen Orthodoxen wieder der römischen Kirche zuzuführen. Mehr noch als bei der diplomatischen und sehr von politischen Bündnisfragen bestimmten Reise von Possevino 31. OBIREK, Jezuici (Anm. 25), S. 38, 60-61. 32. Vgl. M. VENARD, Die neuen Schwerpunkte in der Seelsorge, als Teil 2, Kap. VI in ID. (Hg.), Die Geschichte des Christentums, Bd. 9, Freiburg i.Br., Herder 1998, bes. S. 309314, zu „Indien vor Ort“, S. 312-314. 33. Vgl. SCHRAMM, Der polnische Adel (Anm. 21), S. 153. 34. Antonio POSSEVINO, Moscovia et alia opera de status hujus seculi, adversus Catholicae Ecclesiae hostes, Köln, 1587.

162

A. BRÜNING

handelte es sich diesmal nahezu ganz um eine missionarische Aufgabe. Skarga, und mit ihm die Mehrheit der katholischen Geistlichen, dachte über die benachbarten östlichen Christen und insbesondere deren Geistliche und Priester offenkundig noch immer nicht wesentlich anders als der Krakauer Kanoniker Sacranus zwei Generationen vorher. Dennoch wird auch im Verhältnis zur östlichen Kirche deutlich, dass sich die Gewichtungen unterdessen verschoben hatten. 1577 erschien in erster Auflage seine Schrift „Über die Einheit der Kirche Gottes unter einem Hirten, und über die Abweichung der Griechen von dieser Einheit, mit einer Warnung und Mahnung an die Völker der Rus‘“35. Skarga legt hier umfassend und Schritt für Schritt dar, dass bereits seit der Florentiner Union im Jahrhundert zuvor alle Christen wieder unter dem Oberhaupt des römischen Papstes vereint seien, aber die Ruthenen irrtümlicherweise einigen starrköpfigen Griechen wie Markos Eugenios in ihrer Verneinung dieser Union gefolgt seien36. Von einer Wiedertaufe ist zwar nicht mehr die Rede. Aber auch Skarga weist eingehend nach, wie aufgrund der irrigen Lehrsätze, an denen Griechen und mit ihnen Ruthenen unsinnigerweise festgehalten hätten, auch in ihrer Glaubenspraxis und in ihren Riten sich allerlei Missbräuche, abergläubische Praktiken und Unregelmäßigkeiten eingeschlichen hätten; hierzu gehören die Verehrung des Meßbrotes ohne dessen Weihe, die Verheiratung von eigentlich nach kanonischem Recht hierfür ungeeigneten Paaren, ja sogar Beispiele von Vielehe und anderes mehr. Ihre Priester seien verheiratet, auch unter ihnen sogar manche mehrfach, sie würden ohne besondere Qualifikation die Sakramente spenden, den Rest des Leibes Christi nach der Messe als Mahlzeit verspeisen, ihre Bischöfe ließen sich jede Art von Weihe teuer bezahlen. Große Gefahr für die Rettung der Seelen gehe aus von diesem Verfall von Ritus und Sitten. Für einen solchen Verfall aber sei gerade die Trennung vom Leib der wahren, nämlich der römischen Kirche verantwortlich, und ohne eine Rückkehr sei die Ursache nicht zu beseitigen37. Skarga macht ausdrücklich den Mangel an Wissen, als Resultat der langen Trennung von der „wahren Kirche“ und ihren Lehrentscheidungen, verantwortlich für die große Zahl von überflüssigen Zeremonien, von Idolatrie und Aberglauben, die bei den „Popen“ anzutreffen sei38. Ein weiterer Grund, neben der Ehe der Priester – die der zölibatäre 35. Piotr SKARGA, O jednośći kościoła bożego pod jednym pasterzem i o greckim od tej jedności odstąpieniu, z przrestrogą i upominaniem do narodów ruskich, przy Grekach stojących, Wilna, 1577; publiziert in Russkaja istoričeskaja biblioteka, Bd. 7 (Pamjatniki polemičeskoj literatury v Zapadnoj Rusi), Teil 2, St. Petersburg, 1882, Sp. 223-526. 36. Ibid., Sp. 456-460. 37. Ibid., Sp. 471-477. 38. Ibid., Sp. 477.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

163

Katholik für einen Skandal hält – für den Verfall sei die kirchenslawische Sprache. Denn alle Wissenschaft sei überliefert in den Sprachen Griechisch und Latein. Die Griechen aber hätten den Ruthenen gar nicht ihre Sprache weitergegeben, sondern sie im alten Slawisch verharren lassen, in dem es keine Wissenschaft geben könne. Mehr noch, in der alten Sprache könnten jetzt die Priester gar nicht mehr richtig sprechen, sie verstünden selbst nicht was sie rezitierten. So seien die Popen den Bauern gleich geworden [a popi zachłopieli39], während andererseits und anderswo die lateinische Sprache den einen christlichen Glauben über die ganze Welt verbreitet habe. „Selbst ein Christ aus Indien kann mit einem Polen über Gott sprechen und ihn verstehen“40. Mit anderen Worten, auch für Skarga, wie wohl generell für die römische Kirche der Gegenreformation, kommt Wissen um Dogma und Lehre vor Ritus, und formt und beeinflusst den letzteren. Einmal wieder vereint mit dem gesunden Leib der römischen Kirche, so suggeriert er weiter, kämen auch die Verirrungen und Verfallserscheinungen in der Glaubenspraxis wieder in Ordnung. Folglich – und hier ist der sonst so kompromisslose Skarga dann erstaunlich großzügig – sei es auch nicht nötig, dass die Griechen von ihren überlieferten Riten abließen und die römischen Bräuche annähmen. Auch in der lateinischen Kirche gäbe es schließlich überall Variationen41. Vielmehr müsse allein ihr Metropolit von Rom eingesetzt werden, sowie der päpstliche Primat und die wesentlichen Lehrsätze des römischen Glaubens anerkannt werden42. Skarga lag hier durchaus ganz auf der Linie, die um diese Zeit in Rom für den Umgang mit den Ostkirchen festgelegt worden war. Aus dem 1575 von der Glaubenskongregation ausgegebenen „Dekret für die Griechisch-Russische Kirche“ geht hervor, dass man von den östlichen Christen für den Fall einer Union vor allem die Anerkennung des Papsttums, des filioque43 und die Ablegung des tridentinischen Glaubensbekenntnisses erwartete44. Der Ritus, der den Ostchristen doch das Herzstück ihres Christentums bildete, wurde für weniger wichtig gehalten. Skarga ist zwar in der Argumentation eindeutig und 39. Ibid., Sp. 485. 40. Ibid., Sp. 483-488. Zitat Sp. 487. 41. Ibid., Sp. 491-492. 42. Ibid., Sp. 490-494. 43. Gemeint ist der Zusatz zum Text des Glaubensbekenntnisses von Nicaea, demzufolge der Heilige Geist vom Vater und vom Sohn (filioque) ausgehe. Der Zusatz erschien zuerst im lateinischen Westen des frühen Mittelalters, wurde im Katholizismus im IV. Laterankonzil (1215) festgeschrieben, von der Ostkirche aber stets als unzulässige Verfälschung angesehen. 44. Vgl. H. DENZINGER, Enchiridion symbolorum, definitionum et declarationum de rebus fidei et morum (hg. P. HÜNERMANN), Freiburg i.Br., Herder, 1991, nos. 1985-1987.

164

A. BRÜNING

kompromisslos, aber noch vergleichsweise moderat in seiner Zustandsbeschreibung der östlichen Kirche. Nur vorsichtig macht er Gebrauch von den Zerrbildern von einer liturgisch und theologisch zerfallenen Kirche, die anderswo unter den Katholiken gang und gäbe waren. Deutlich weiter ging eine 1586 von Skargas Ordensbruder Benedykt Herbest verfasste Broschüre, der die Orthodoxen – ganz wie einst Sacranus – in eine Reihe stellt mit „ungläubigen Juden“ und des Pakts mit den Mohammedanern beschuldigt. In der Schlusssequenz ist zu lesen: Gott, als er die Juden in Gnade strafte, gab ihnen die Propheten. Jetzt aber haben sie, gefangen in Gottes Zorn, keine Propheten. Ebenso hat Gott auch den Griechen, und unserer Rus‘ mit ihnen, alles genommen. Sie haben weder Gedächtnis, um das „Vater unser“ im Glauben an Gott [zu sprechen], noch Verstand, um die heilsnotwendigen Dinge zu sehen, noch guten Willen um gut [sittsam] zu leben. Was die Sakramente angeht, töten sie den Kindern die Seelen, haben keine bischöfliche Firmung, noch wissen sie was eine ordentliche Absolution bedeutet. Vor Gottes Himmel lassen sie allerlei Götzendienerei zu, bei der Ehe gestatten sie offenkundigen Ehebruch; was Charakter [character] der Sakramente bedeutet, darf man gar nicht fragen, etc. Herr Gott erbarme dich und nimm weg die blinden Führer45.

So ungefähr urteilten um diese Zeit immer noch viele; freilich erschien die Schärfe des Tons in diesem konkreten Fall selbst den jesuitischen Ordensoberen so wenig zweckdienlich, dass sie die Schrift aus dem Verkehr zu ziehen versuchten46. Angesichts solcher Anklagen und Zerrbilder standen die Orthodoxen vor einer Herausforderung auf mehreren Ebenen, die jeweils mit der Bedeutung von Bildung zu tun hatten. Zunächst bedurfte es eines sowohl verlässlichen als auch gleichsam konkurrenzfähigen Kanons, der einerseits Orientierung nach innen bot, und die Unterscheidung zwischen kirchlicher Tradition und Irrlehren erlaubte. Zugleich musste in der gegebenen Situation ein solcher verlässlicher Bestand nicht allein jene Kritiker, nach deren Ansicht die östliche Kirche „selbst nicht weiß was sie glaubt“, eines Besseren belehren können, sondern auch belastbare Antworten auf theologische Debatten der Zeit bereithalten. Für die Orthodoxen blieb freilich der Ritus, die Liturgie und die Anbetung zentral – aber Glaubenswissen war dennoch notwendig, um wahre Überlieferung und authentische Sakramente qualifiziert von allen möglichen, streng genommen unkanonischen Bräuchen und folkloristischen Beimengungen zu unterscheiden, die sich seit langem in die kirchliche Praxis eingeschlichen hatten, und von den Kritikern jetzt so bereitwillig aufs Korn genommen wurden. 45. Benedykt HERBEST, Wiary Kościoła rzymskiego wywody i greckiego niewolstwa historia, Krakau, 1586, fol. 14 (nicht paginiert, dt. A.B.). 46. Vgl. J. KRAJCAR, Jesuits and the Genesis of the Union of Brest, in Orientalia Christiana Periodica 44 (1978) 131-153, hier S. 139-140.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

165

EIN NEUES ELEMENT: BILDUNG ALS „ZIVILISATION“ Hinzu kam eine Dimension, die erst im Laufe des 16. Jahrhunderts hinzugetreten war, und die vor allem den gesellschaftlichen Mehrwert der „freien Künste“ (artes liberales) betraf, von denen in der Zeit von Sacranus und dem Moskauer Abt Josif Volockij noch weniger die Rede gewesen war. Mehr und mehr wurde nämlich Bildung von nun an ein notwendiges Ornament der höheren Stände, eine Voraussetzung für akzeptables Verhalten auf gesellschaftlichem Parkett. Auch im westlichen Europa genügte es allmählich für Adlige im höheren Dienst des Staates und vornehme Bürger nicht mehr, gegebenenfalls Pferd und Rüstung handhaben zu können oder sein Handwerk und ein paar unerlässliche Rechenkünste zu beherrschen. Es erschien „der neue Mensch“ der frühen Moderne, gekennzeichnet durch Triebkontrolle, gesellschaftlichen Schliff, Fähigkeit zur Konversation. Es ging nicht mehr allein um Heils- und Orientierungswissen; Kenntnis hieß hier Kultiviertheit, in gewissem Sinne Ornament. Gefragt waren vor diesem Hintergrund ein gewisser Grad humanistischer Bildung, Kenntnisse in den wichtigsten Sprachen einschließlich Latein, waren höfische Manieren, Reiten, Fechten, oder auch Gesellschaftstanz und geschliffene Konversation. Sigismund von Herberstein, der als kaiserlicher Gesandter im ersten Drittel des 16. Jahrhunderts nach Russland reiste, wurde angesichts seiner in Wien erworbenen akademischen Grade noch von den Standesgenossen ausgelacht. Aber bereits die nächste Generation kam ohne solchen Hintergrund nicht mehr aus. Sinnbildlich für die neue Entwicklung steht das 1528 zuerst in Venedig aufgelegte „Buch des Hofmannes“ (Il libro del Cortegiano) des Renaissance-Adligen Baldassare Castiglione, das zahlreiche Übersetzungen erlebte und über ganz Europa hinweg einer neuen Generation ihr Idealbild lieferte. Der Hofmann war nun ausgezeichnet durch eine gewisse souveräne Lässigkeit (sprezzatura) im Umgang mit seiner Umgebung und seinen Aufgaben; er wusste im rechten Ton, humorvoll und wenn nötig schlagfertig, zu kommunizieren mit seinesgleichen, mit der nötigen Aufrichtigkeit zu parlieren mit den Fürsten, und pflegte Galanterie gegenüber den Frauen47. Castiglione steht nicht allein, vielmehr brachte eine Wandlung der höfischen Sitten, im Verein mit humanistischen pädagogischen Impulsen, ein ganzes Genre hervor, das gleichsam am Beginn der modernen Vorstellungen von „Kultur“ und „civilitas“ steht48. In Polen erschien 1566 eine Adaptation des „Hofmannes“ 47. P. BURKE, The Fortunes of the Courtier: The European Reception of Castiglione’s Cortegiano, Cambridge, John Wiley, 1995. 48. Vgl. auch J. FISCH, s.v. „Zivilisation, Kultur“, in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, Bd. 7, Stuttgart, Klett Cotta 1992, 696-700. Fisch weist eigens darauf hin dass „civilitas“

166

A. BRÜNING

aus der Feder von Sigismund II. Augusts Kanzler Łukasz Górnicki. Der „polnische Hofmann“ (Dworzanin Polski) präsentierte seine Manieren und seine Weltläufigkeit nun nicht mehr am Renaissancehof im italienischen Urbino, sondern in der Umgebung des katholischen Bischofs Samuel Maciejowski in der Nähe von Krakau. Das Buch, und weitere Schriften Górnickis stellten auch in Polen-Litauen endgültig die Weichen in Richtung eines höfischen Ideals, zu dem neben den hergebrachten Elementen des Kriegers nun Manieren ebenso gehörten wie Belesenheit, Sprachfertigkeit, Konversationskunst. Hinzu kamen, angesichts der politischen Organisation der „Adelsrepublik“, die auf lokalen Landtagen und im Sejm den Adligen weitgehende Partizipationsrechte einräumte, die Fertigkeiten einer im engeren Sinne „politischen“ Kommunikation, also Rhetorik, Überzeugungskraft und Parteienbildung. Ein geschliffenes Latein wurde hier in einem Maße zum Standesmerkmal, dass die Reden führender Politiker eine Mischung aus polnischer Ansprache und langen oder kurzen lateinischen Sequenzen darstellten. Die Attraktivität der neuen Schulen, zunächst der Protestanten und dann der gegenreformatorischen Orden, allen voran der Jesuiten, die auch im oben zitierten Testament eines orthodoxen Kastellans noch durchscheint, beruhte folglich viel weniger auf deren Vermittlung religiösen Grundlagenwissens, als im Zugang zu den Elementen höfischer Kultiviertheit und Gewandtheit in den „freien Künsten“. Nicht zuletzt ein gediegenes Latein und Vertrautheit mit den antiken Autoren gehörte im Laufe der Zeit immer mehr zur Grundausstattung der Eliten, sowohl im lokalen wie im gesamtstaatlichen Rahmen. Bei Hofe, aber auch bei den lokalen Landtagen oder beim zentralen Sejm fiel sofort auf, wer „wie ein Bauer sprach“49. Der polnische Edelmann grenzte sich damit aber auch vom „barbarischen“ Moskau ab. Piotr Skarga hatte im eben genannten Werk „über die Einheit der Kirche Gottes“ die Kirche und Gläubigen Moskaus als „noch grober und ignoranter als die Ruthenen“ bezeichnet, während man andererseits, absurderweise, dort sogar der Meinung sei, die einzig wahre Kirche zu repräsentieren, und dass alle anderen Heiden seien50. Europäische (also Kultiviertheit, Zivilisiertheit) hier stets im Hinblick auf die „civitas“, die politisch organisierte Gemeinschaft, gedacht wird. 49. Vgl. J. TAZBIR, Kultura szlachecka w Polsce: Roskwit, Upadek, Relikty, Warschau, Wiedza Powszechna, 1978 (Zit. S. 26). Zum Bildungsideal des polnischen Adels dieser Zeit vgl. ferner U. FREYLICHÓWNA, Ideał wychowawczy szlachty polskiej w XVI i początku XVII wieku, Warschau, Nasza Księgarnia, 1938; D. ŻOŁĄDŹ, Ideały edukacyjne doby staropolskiej: Stanowe modele i potrzeby edukacyjne szesnastego i siedemnastego wieku, Warschau – Posen, Wydawnictwo Naukowe Stan, 1990. 50. SKARGA, O jednośći kościoła Bożego (Anm. 35), Sp. 496-497.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

167

Reisende, beginnend mit dem noch selbst zu Hause wegen seiner Bildung zunächst verlachten Herberstein, mokierten sich nun durchweg, und noch hundert Jahre später, über die „barbarischen Sitten“ und die Bildungsrückstände selbst der moskowitischen Eliten. Im fernen Moskau wollten selbst die führenden Schichten von derlei Zierat tatsächlich einstweilen noch nichts wissen; weder religiöse Kenntnisse jenseits einiger einfacher, gedankenlos gemurmelter Gebetsformeln, noch Kenntnisse in fremden Sprachen, Astronomie oder Philosophie waren hier, wie europäische Reisende stereotyp beschrieben, irgendwo anzutreffen, ja sie wurden sogar bewusst zurückgewiesen und für schädlich erklärt51. Der polnische, und dann eben auch der orthodoxe ruthenische Hofmann konnte sich eine vergleichbare Ablehnung nicht mehr leisten. Wer im Staat etwas werden wollte, konnte den neuen guten Ton nicht ignorieren. Wenn folglich die Anhänger der östlichen Kirche weiterhin „dumm“ genannt wurden, so bezog sich dies – je nach gesellschaftlichem Kontext – nicht mehr nur auf deren abergläubische Bräuche und chaotische Theologie, sondern eben auch, ganz ähnlich wie gegenüber den Moskowitern, auf deren mangelnde Parkettfähigkeit und Ungeschick in „politischen“ Dingen (w sprawach politycznych). „Politisch“ ist hier durchaus in zweierlei Bedeutungen zu verstehen: Zunächst im Hinblick auf politische Aktion innerhalb der (in Polen durch die Adelskreise konstituierten „civitas“), aber auch, im weiteren Sinne, entsprechend dem französischen homme politisé, auch als „kultiviert“, gesellschaftsfähig. Die Frage war dann allerdings, wie der Erwerb der entsprechenden Fähigkeiten einer „weltlichen Bildung“ mit dem Festhalten am orthodoxen Glauben, der „griechischen Religion“ zu vereinbaren war. ORTHODOXE REAKTIONEN In der Praxis sind die verschiedenen Ebenen von Bildung, die hier unterschieden wurden, natürlich schwer zu trennen, und so ging es einmal mehr darum, die rechte Gewichtung zu finden. Je nach ihrer jeweiligen Akzentuierung unterschieden sich auch in Polen mehr und mehr die Konfessionen untereinander. Bereits der Kulturhistoriker Alexander Brückner hat beobachtet, wie an der Wende zum 17. Jahrhundert auch das polnischlitauische Bildungswesen einen zunehmend konfessionell geprägten Charakter annahm52. Wenn in der Orthodoxie hierauf in diesen Jahrzehnten 51. Vgl. SCHEIDEGGER, Perverses Abendland (Anm. 2), bes. S. 224-231. 52. Vgl. A. BRÜCKNER, Dzieje kultury Polski, Bd. 2, Krakau, Anezyc & Spółka, 1933, S. 478ff.

168

A. BRÜNING

Antworten gesucht wurden, so fielen diese im Hinblick auf diese Balance je nach Stand und sozialem Umfeld unterschiedlich aus, ehe man zu einem Konsensus gefunden hatte. Auf die Angriffe der westlichen Konfessionen hatten die östlichen Christen bereits seit dem letzten Drittel des 16. Jahrhunderts zu reagieren begonnen. Zunächst musste es offensichtlich darum gehen, das eigene Glaubenswissen systematisch zu erfassen, und in zuverlässiger Form zu präsentieren und zu verbreiten. In diesen Kontext gehörten auch die neuen Medien. Mit dem Wunsch nach Vereinheitlichung und religiöser Homogenität begann der Buchdruck bei den Ostslaven. Es wurde oft darauf hingewiesen, dass die Verbreitung des Buchdrucks in der ostkirchlichen Hemisphäre in mancher Hinsicht anderen Leitlinien folgte als das westliche Vorbild: Religiöses Schrifttum, mit einem Schwerpunkt auf gleichsam offiziellen Texten, also Evangeliaren, Messbüchern und später Katechismen, machten gegenüber weltlichem Schrifttum einen weit größeren Anteil aus. Druckereien waren demnach auch oft in kirchlicher Hand, etwa bei Klöstern, oder sie arbeiteten unter mehr oder weniger direkter kirchlicher Aufsicht53. Eines der ersten Werke, ein von Ivan Fedorov, dem bekannten „Erstdrucker der Ostslawen“ 1569 im (heute ostpolnischen) Zabłudów in altkirchenslawischer Sprache gedrucktes Homiliar nennt im Vorwort gerade die Sorge um die Verbreitung der Häresie, und die Verwirrung der Gemüter sowie den daraus entstandenen Bedarf nach einer verlässlichen Ausgabe der Heiligen Schrift als das leitende Motiv des Unternehmens54. Die Motivation des Buchdrucks unter den ostslawischen Orthodoxen war demnach zunächst nach innen gerichtet und religiös, weniger nach außen orientiert und polemisch55. Fortgesetzt wurde dies Bemühen in der griechisch-slawischen Schule und Akademie in Ostroh, der auch eine Druckerei angeschlossen war, und die vom mächtigen und religiös interessierten orthodoxen Magnaten Konstantin Ostrozs’kyj 1578 eröffnet und in den Folgejahren finanziert wurde. Die hier versammelten Gelehrten sichteten die Bücher und die aus allen Teilen der östlichen Welt, bis nach Rumänien, Griechenland und die Athosklöster, zusammengetragenen Manuskripte, und erstellten sowohl autorisierte Textausgaben als auch Schriften zur Verteidigung des orthodoxen 53. I. TRUEB, Studien zum frühen russischen Buchdruck (Basler Studien zur Kulturgeschichte Osteuropas, 16), Zürich, Pano, 2008; J.D. ISAEVYČ, Preemniki Pervopečatnika, Moskau, Kniga, 1981; J. ZAPASKO – J.D. ISAEVYČ (Hgg.), Pamjatky knyžkvoho mystectva: Kataloh starodrukiv vydanych na Ukrajini, Bd. 1-2, L’viv, Vyšča Škola, 1981. 54. Vgl. J.D. ISAEVYČ, Literaturna spadščyna Ivana Fedorova, L’viv, Vyšča Škola, 1989, S. 68-79, hier bes. 71-72. 55. Entsprechend GUDZIAK, Crisis and Reform (Anm. 9), S. 107-117.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

169

Glaubens56. Viele dieser Texte hatten immer noch einen in erster Linie affirmativen, die östlichen Lehren konsistent zusammenstellenden Charakter, in denen zwar implizit auf die Anschuldigungen durch die „Lateiner“ reagiert wurde, ohne sich freilich auf die „heißen Eisen“ westlicher theologischer Debatten, wie die Rechtfertigungslehre, vertieft einzulassen. Neben die weiterhin hier erstellten authentischen Textausgaben traten aus der Feder der dort wirkenden Gelehrten, meistens Mönche, nun auch echte polemische Schriften, die die Wahrheit der ostkirchlichen Lehren gegen die Attacken der „Lateiner“ verteidigten. Herasym Smotryc’kyj verfasste eine scharfe Replik gegen Herbests Broschüre57. Ivan Vyšens’kyj, der sich bald darauf auf dem Athosberg in Griechenland niederlassen sollte, wurde von dort zum publizistischen Gegner Skargas. Besonders Vyšens’kyj war es, der im polemischen Streit mit den katholischen, meist jesuitischen Autoren aus der vermeintlichen „Dummheit“ der Ruthenen und Orthodoxen geradezu eine Tugend machte, indem der die Vorzüge einer schlichten Frömmigkeit und Glaubenstreue pries, und dem Hochmut der vermeintlich Gelehrten eine Absage erteilte. Er folgte noch weitgehend den auch aus Altrußland überlieferten Mustern. So trugen seine – meist im Ton sehr emotional gehaltenen – Texte auch die Charakteristiken der seit dem Mittelalter bekannten Polemik der Ostkirche gegen die Lateiner, und wiederholten die bekannten Vorwürfe des Glaubensabfalls. So geschieht es etwa im „Geplänkel eines weisen Lateiners mit einem dummen Ruthenen“ (um 1601)58. Vyšens’kyj kokettierte zwar wiederholt damit, dass er kein Latein verstehe, und sich mit den „weltlichen Wissenschaften“ nicht abgegeben habe. Doch war er in Wirklichkeit, spätestens nach den in Ostroh verbrachten Jahren, alles andere als ungebildet – nur entsprach sein Bildungsprofil einem traditionellen Typus, der Texte in spiritueller Intention kompilierte, nicht diskutierte, und – zumindest rhetorisch – der einfachen Frömmigkeit stets den Vorzug gab59. Er verteidigte das östliche Mönchtum gegen die Schmähungen der Katholiken, preist die Einfachheit des östlichen Kirchengesangs gegenüber den frühbarocken Anwandlungen der katholischen Messe, und die schlichten Glaubenssätze der östlichen Kirche 56. Zuletzt V.B. ATAMANENKO – P.M. KRALJUK et al. (eds.), Enciklopedija „Ostroz’ka Akademija XVI-XVII st.”, Ostroh, Vydavnictvo Nacional’noho Universitetu „Ostroz’ka akademija”, 2011; K.V. CHARLAMPOVIČ, Zapadnorusskija pravoslavnyja školy XVI I načala XVII veka, Kazan’, 1898, S. 237-276. 57. HRUŠEVS’KYJ, Istorija Ukrajins’koji literatury (Anm. 26), Bd. 5, Tl. 2, S. 62-63. 58. Vgl. I. VYŠENS’KYJ, Tvory (ins mod. Ukrainisch übersetzt von Valerij Ševčuk), Kiew, Dnipro, 1986, S. 180-213. 59. Vyšens’kyj folgt den „mittelalterlichen“ Regeln von Text und Tradition, nicht den „neuen“ von Gesetzmässigkeit und Logik: V. ZEMA, Seredn’ovična tradycija slova, movy ta knyhy v tvorach Ivana Vyšens’koho, in Medievalia Ukrainica 5 (1998) 82-92.

170

A. BRÜNING

gegenüber intellektualistischen Verdrehungen60. Damit weist er aber auch die vermeintlichen kulturellen Errungenschaften der „gebildeten“ Polen und Lateiner im Namen echter Frömmigkeit zurück. Bekannt geworden ist die Sequenz aus dem von ihm zusammengestellten, um 1599 veröffentlichten „Büchlein“, in der er, im für ihn beinah typischen emotional-appellativen Ton, ausruft: Ist es nicht besser für Dich, das Stundenbuch, den Psalter, den Oktoich61 zu lernen, den Apostol und das Evangelium mit anderen kirchlichen Büchern, und ein einfacher, gottgefälliger Mensch zu sein und das ewige Leben zu erlangen, als Aristoteles und Platon zu studieren, in diesem Leben ein weiser Philosoph genannt zu werden, und dann zur Hölle zu fahren?62.

Auch die kirchenslawische Sprache, die Skarga so abwertend beschrieben hatte, erfährt durch Vyšens’kyj eine Aufwertung gerade als „heilige“ Sprache. Ich verrate euch ein großes Geheimnis: Der Teufel hasst die slawische Sprache so sehr, dass er vor Wut kaum noch lebt. […] Den Kampf gegen die slawische Sprache aber hat er deshalb aufgenommen, weil diese die fruchtbarste unter allen Sprachen ist, und die Gott wohlgefälligste, da sie ohne heidnische Finten und Haarspalterei, ohne Grammatik, Rhetorik, Dialektik […], vielmehr Einfachheit und Vergebung hervorbringt und den Heiligen Geist herbeiruft63.

Freilich sprach hier ein Mönch, und in den Klöstern sollten sich auch in der Folgezeit die wirksamsten und beredtsten Gegner höherer Bildung finden. Beispiele sind Iov (Ioann) Kniahynyc’kyj, der Gründer der Einsiedelei von Manjava in den westukrainischen Karpathen64, oder Isaja Kopyns’kyj, Autor von geistlichen Unterweisungen nach Art der altkirchlichen Mönchsväter, und später kurzzeitig orthodoxer Bischof von Kiew. Georgij Florovskij beschrieb ihn als „Mensch von einfachem, aber starkem Glauben, ganz verwurzelt in der östlichen Theologie und Askese“, der sich den „äußeren Wissenschaften“ gegenüber kritisch und misstrauisch verhielt. In seinem „geistlichen Alphabet“ wettert er entsprechend 60. HRUŠEVS’KYJ, Istorija Ukrajins’koji literatury (Anm. 26), Bd. 5, Tl. 2, S. 111128. 61. Ein nach dem Vorbild des griechischen „Achtgesanges“ (oktoechon) zusammengestelltes Gesangbuch, das in der Liturgie häufig Verwendung fand. 62. VYŠENS’KYJ, Tvory (Anm. 58), S. 35. 63. Ibid. (Deutsch A.B.). 64. Zur Biographie s. etwa M. KAŠUBA, s.v. Kniahynyc’kyj, Ivan, in Enciklopedija istoriji Ukrajiny, Bd. 4, Kiew, Naukova Dumka, 2007, S. 365. Ferner den Eintrag Kopynsky, Isaia, in Encyklopedia of Ukraine, online unter http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/ display.asp?AddButton=pages\K\O\KopynskyIsaia.htm (zuletzt aufgerufen 5.11.2019).

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

171

gegen die Kultur seiner Zeit. „Heute lernen sie nicht mehr vom Heiligen Geist, sondern von Aristoteles, Cicero, Platon und anderen heidnischen Philosophen“65. POLEMIK NACH

DER

BRESTER UNION

Ab 1596 polemisierten diese Autoren auch gegen die Union von Brest, in der sich eine Mehrheit der ruthenischen orthodoxen Bischöfe der Jurisdiktion des römischen Papstes unterstellt hatte. Es war von Beginn an ein ambivalentes Projekt. Die genannten Bischöfe hatten diesen Schritt vor allem im Wunsch nach politischer Gleichberechtigung und machtvoller Unterstützung bei innerkirchlichen Reformen getan. Die von Autoren wie Skarga propagierte vollständige Unterwerfung hatten sie durchaus nicht vor Augen, doch obwohl die Ostkirche in der Union ihren Ritus, und sogar die Ehe der Gemeindepriester beibehalten durfte, lief die 1595 in Rom geschlossene, und ein Jahr später auf einer Synode in Brest proklamierte Union faktisch auf eine weitgehende Unterwerfung unter die lateinische Kirche in Dogma, kanonischem Recht und Jurisdiktion hinaus66. Auch von hierher erklärt sich die von nun an noch um einiges heftiger werdende Polemik, in der den Bischöfen von ihren nichtunierten Gegnern Verrat an der östlichen Tradition vorgeworfen wurde. Inhaltlich bewegte sich diese Polemik von den schon lange unter den östlichen Theologen üblichen Vorwürfen an die Adresse der „Lateiner“ – wie päpstlicher Primat, filioque als unzulässiges Addendum zum Glaubensbekenntnis, Fegefeuer, Zeitpunkt der Wandlung der Gaben in der Liturgie – auf beiden Seiten zusehends mehr in Richtung allgemein „kultureller“ Streitpunkte, und thematisierte Kiew als „das neue Jerusalem“, Fragen der Bestimmung des rechten Glaubens, den liturgischen Kalender oder Listen von Heiligen auf der einen oder anderen Seite67. Im Hintergrund aller Einzelwerke stand tatsächlich oft 65. G. FLOROVSKIJ, Puti russkago bogoslovija, Paris, YMCA Press, (3. Ausg.) 1983, S. 48 (Zitat ibid., deutsch A.B.). 66. Die wichtigsten Studien aus der inzwischen reichen Literatur über Voraussetzungen, Motive und Vollzug der Union, und der verschiedenen Vorstellungen die in sie eingingen, sind O. HALECKI, From Florence to Brest, Roma, Sacrum Poloniae Millenium, 1963; GUDZIAK, Crisis and Reform (Anm. 9); M.V. DMITRIEV, Meždu Rimom i Car’gradom: Genezis brestskoj unii 1595-1596, Moskau, Izdat. Moskovskogo Universiteta, 2003. 67. Neben den bereits genannten Literaturgeschichten wie von Mychajlo Hruševs’kyj vgl. hierzu I. ŠEVČENKO, Religious Polemical Literature in the Ukrainian and Belarus’ Lands in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, in ID., Ukraine between East and West: Essays in Cultural History to the Early Eighteenth Century, Edmonton – Toronto, CIUS 1996, 149-163; B. GUDZIAK – O. TURIJ (Hgg.), Berestejs’ka unija I ukrajins’ka kultura XVII stolittja, L’viv, Instytut Istoriji L’vivs’koji Bohoslovs’koji akademiji, 1996,

172

A. BRÜNING

die Frage nach einer Gewichtung zwischen Frömmigkeit, Gelehrsamkeit und Kultiviertheit, die, verschieden beantwortet, langfristig geradezu einen Unterschied in der Konfessionskultur hervorbrachte. Unmittelbar nach 1596 wurde Zustimmung oder Ablehnung im Hinblick auf die Union eine Frage nicht allein bestimmter theologischer Standpunkte, sondern entschied sich an der grundsätzlichen Zulässigkeit höherer Bildung, der Verwendung und Vermittlung von Sprache, dem damit verbundenen Verhältnis von Wissen und Glauben. Manch ein prominenter orthodoxer „Konvertit“ zur Union, zumal unter den Geistlichen, war in den nun folgenden zwei Jahrzehnten besonders geleitet durch die Hoffnung auf einen Zuwachs von Wissen und Kultur, der die ruthenische Kirche, die „Kirche der Rus‘“ dank der Verbindung mit Rom zugutekommen sollte. Meist ging diese Hoffnung einher mit deutlich geäußerter Enttäuschung über den noch immer nicht aufzuhaltenden Verfall der Bildung, der Sitten und der Liturgie in der östlichen Herkunftskirche. Derlei lässt sich feststellen über Meletij Smotryc’kyj (1577-1633), Sohn des oben erwähnten Gelehrten Herasym Smotryc’kyj von Ostroh, später Bischof von Polock, der um 1627 zur Union übertrat, gegen die er zunächst jahrelang heftig polemisiert hatte. Auch seine philologischen Studien, die u.a. in einer kirchenslawischen Grammatik resultierten, hatten erst der Verbesserung der Verhältnisse in der nichtunierten Orthodoxie gegolten. Schließlich, so sein Argument etwa gegen Skargas abfällige Kommentare, sei das Kirchenslawische sehr wohl unter die gelehrten Sprachen zu rechnen, und eine Wiederbelebung der Bildung der slawischen Väter sei dasjenige, was die Ruthenen nun bräuchten. Viele theologische Termini der Griechen seien korrekt in Kirchenslawisch wiedergegeben, nicht aber in Polnisch68. Doch die langsamen, noch immer von innerem Zwist begleiteten Kulturfortschritte seiner Kirche enttäuschten ihn schließlich. Nach seiner Konversion äußerte er sich unter anderem kritisch über das Schulwesen der östlichen Kirche, das dringend einer Verbesserung bedürfe: S. 161-176, bringen eine vollständige Liste der nach der Brester Union erschienenen Werke. Zur Sprachenfrage vgl. bereits A. MARTEL, La langue polonaise dans les pays ruthenes: Ukraine et Russie Blanche 1589-1667, Lille, 1938, bes. S. 132-141; eine instruktive Behandlung von Einzelaspekten bietet neuerdings L. BEREZHNAYA, Topography of Salvation: „The New Jerusalem“ in Ruthenian Polemical Literature (End of Sixteenth – Beginning of the Seventeenth Centuries), in S. ROHDEWALD – D. FRICK – S. WIEDERKEHR (Hgg.), Litauen und Ruthenien: Studien zu einer transkulturellen Kommunikationsregion (15.-18. Jh.), Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2007, 257-278; EAD., „True Faith“ and Salvation in the Works of Ipatii Potii, Meletii Smotryts’kyi, and in Early Modern Ruthenian Testaments, in Cahiers du Monde Russe 58 (2017) 435-463. 68. D.A. FRICK, Meletij Smotryc’kyj and the Ruthenian Language Question, in Harvard Ukrainian Studies 9 (1985) 27-52.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

173

Es gab einmal Reichtümer in unserer ruthenischen Nation; es gibt sie noch jetzt in Moskau. Gott der Herr aber hat nicht zugelassen Schulen zu errichten weder bei uns noch in Moskau. Und wo immer etwas zu ihrer Errichtung unternommen wird, raucht es, aber es brennt nicht. Die Kinder, die dorthin gehen erhalten allein den Nutzen, dass sie von Kälbern zu Ochsen auswachsen69.

Was den Übertritt bei einer solch komplexen Persönlichkeit schlussendlich motiviert hat, darüber existieren verschiedene Hypothesen. Die überzeugendsten unterstellen ihm eine Sorge um die „Kirche der Rus‘“, die orthodoxe Kirche in den ruthenischen Gebieten, und deren kulturellem Fortkommen, das er sich am Ende, allen Zweifeln zum Trotz, eher unter römischer und westlicher Ägide vorstellen konnte70. Offenbar ähnlich liegen die Dinge bei einem anderen der umstrittenen Konvertiten, Kassian Sakovyč (ca. 1578/80-1647), zunächst orthodoxer Gelehrter und polemischer Publizist, ab 1625 Anhänger der Union, ab 1640 noch einmal konvertiert zur römischen Kirche. Seine noch 1642 in Krakau publizierte, Perspektywa betitelte Kampfschrift vor allem gegen die nichtunierte, Orthodoxe Kirche liefert unzählige Anekdoten über abstrusen Aberglauben, bornierte und ahnungslose Popen, Sittenverfall – und trotz gewisser Bemühungen kann er keinerlei Verbesserung erkennen71. Dem Konvertiten ist der Verdruss über den noch immer betrüblichen Zustand seiner früheren Konfession anzumerken – unter anderem darin, dass er manche Schilderungen übertreibt, und mit seinen Verzerrungen für heftige Gegenreaktionen sorgt. Auch die ruthenische Sprache, vom Kirchenslawisch ganz zu schweigen, war seiner Ansicht nach für die Rückständigkeit der Geistlichen in der „dummen Rus‘“ verantwortlich. Im gleichen Jahr wie die Perspektywa war ein parodistisch gehaltener Dialog zwischen einem orthodoxen Popen und einem Polen über das Osterfest (das die orthodoxen nach wie vor nach dem julianischen Kalender feierten) erschienen. Der angeblich „weise Dionisij“, des Polnischen kaum mächtig, macht sich schon deswegen lächerlich, weil er die auf Polnisch vorgetragenen Fragen und Argumente seines normal gebildeten Gesprächspartners ständig missversteht, und entsprechend verquere Antworten gibt72. Sakovyčs ruthenische 69. M. SMOTRYC’KYJ, Exaethesis, L’viv, 1629, S. 100r-100v; hier nach D. FRICK, Meletij Smotryc’kyj and the Ruthenian Question in the Early Seventeenth Century, in Harvard Ukrainian Studies 8 (1984) 352-375, hier S. 367 (engl./poln., deutsch A.B.). 70. D.A. FRICK, Meletij Smotryc’kyj, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1995. 71. K. SAKOVYČ, Ἐπανόρθωσις abo perspektywa i objaśnienie błędów, herezjej i zabobonów w grekoruskiej cerkwi disunitskiej tak w artykułach wiary jako w administrowaniu sakramentów i w inszych obrządkach i ceremoniach znajdujących się, Krakau, 1642. 72. Dialog abo rozmowa Maćka z Dyonizym, popem schizmatyckim wileńskim, o Wielkanocy ruskiej roku 1641, Krakau, 1642.

174

A. BRÜNING

Kirche war voll von Priestern, die Kohlsuppe (boršč) statt Wein in den Messkelch gossen, die ständig betrunken waren und mit den Bechern die Liturgie abhielten, während der sie schmatzten, husteten und spuckten, die sich in der Kirche prügelten, Hostienbrot mit nach Hause nahmen für ihre Familien und ihre Schweine, und natürlich, wenn sie überhaupt lesekundig waren, zwischen kirchlichen Büchern und häretischen Postillen nicht unterscheiden konnten. Sakovyčs Kritik zielt offenkundig nicht allein auf unvollkommenes Verständnis und „Verwaltung“ der Sakramente, sondern hat zudem eine deutliche „zivilisatorische“ Komponente, die neben Aberglauben und theologischer Unkenntnis auch die ungehobelten Sitten aufs Korn nimmt73.

EIN NEUES GLEICHGEWICHT? Diejenigen unter den Orthodoxen, die sich unter diesen Voraussetzungen um eine Verbesserung des Bildungswesens kümmern wollten, hatten demnach bereits aus den eigenen Reihen die Kritik von zwei Richtungen auszuhalten. Die einen, traditionell und geistlich ausgerichteten Kreise sahen in jeder höheren Bildung eine Gefahr für das Heil der Seelen; den anderen gingen die Reformen, und deren Ergebnisse nicht weit genug. Wo demnach Initiativen gezeigt wurden, hatten die Protagonisten stets diese beiden Pole mit zu berücksichtigen. Den Anfang machten, nach der noch recht traditionell ausgerichteten Akademie in Ostroh, städtische Laienbruderschaften, allen voran die orthodoxe Bruderschaft in L’viv, deren Statuten 1586 sowohl vom König als von Ökumenischen Patriarchat approbiert wurden. Im gleichen Jahr wurde eine Schule errichtet, „…allen Kindern, damit sie, die auf anderen Lehranstalten das Wasser fremdsprachlichen Wissens trinken, von ihrem Glauben nicht abfallen…“74. Wie diese in den Schulstatuten wiederholt auftauchende Sequenz vermuten lässt, stand Unterweisung in Glaubensfragen vor dem Erwerb wissenschaftlicher Kenntnisse; die herrschende Ordnung legte großen Wert auf Disziplin und Auswendiglernen, tugendhafter und vorbildlicher Lebenswandel galt als Pflicht für Schüler und Lehrer. Die Motivation zur Errichtung der Lehranstalten war in erster Linie religiös motiviert – im eben beschriebenen Sinne 73. Vgl. D.A. FRICK, „Foolish Rus’“: On Polish Civilization, Ruthenian Self-Hatred, and Kasijan Sakovyč, in Harvard Ukrainian Studies 18 (1994) 210-248. 74. Archiv Jugo-Zapadnoj Rossii, I, Bd. 12, Kiew, 1904, S. 526; S.T. GOLUBEV, Kievskij Mitropolit Petr Mogila I ego spodvižniki, Bd. 1, Kiew, 1883, Appendix no. 36, S. 235-259 (Statuten der Bruderschaftsschule von Wilna); CHARLAMPOVIČ, Zapadnorusskija pravoslavnyja školy (Anm. 56), S. 348; s.a. ibid., S. 283-296, 305-309.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

175

der Festigung des Glaubens, aber auch als caritative Aktion zur Vermittlung heilsnotwendigen Glaubenswissens. So reihte sich die Gründung einer Schule ein in eine Reihe anderer caritativer Aktionen, wie den Unterhalt von Waisenhäusern oder Hospitälern75. Später traten auch in anderen Städten solche Bruderschaftsschulen hinzu, so etwa Wilna und in Kiew. Hier hatten zugleich seit Beginn des 17. Jahrhunderts die Äbte des altehrwürdigen Höhlenklosters eine Lehranstalt und eine Druckerei gegründet. Gelehrte, die erst in Ostroh und L’viv aktiv gewesen waren, setzten später oft ihre Tätigkeit in Kiew fort. Freilich, trotz aller Aktivitäten, der Erfolg dieser Einrichtungen ließ einstweilen zu wünschen übrig, vor allem was ihre Strahlkraft über den Kreis rein kirchlichen Unterrichts, und in der polnischlitauischen Adelsgesellschaft insgesamt betraf. Smotryc’kyj, der selbst zu den wohl gebildetsten Personen seiner Zeit und Region gehörte, und nach der Ostroger Akademie ein Jesuitenkollegium in Wilna und Studienaufenthalte in Deutschland durchlaufen hatte, meinte eben dies mit seiner noch 1629 gemachten, recht abfälligen Bewertung. Die Dinge begannen sich zu ändern, als 1631 der neue Abt des Höhlenklosters, der von moldawischen Fürsten abstammende Hochadlige Peter Mohyla (1596-1647) das Heft in die Hand nahm, die beiden bestehenden Schulen vereinigte, und ein neues, den protestantischen und katholischen Kollegien abgeschautes Unterrichtssystem einführte. Die damit verbundenen Kosten, etwa für die Anwerbung geeigneter Lehrer, finanzierte er großenteils aus eigener Tasche. Von Beginn an war das neu entstandene Kollegium umstritten, und sie blieb es noch in der Historiographie des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts – Orthodoxe Historiker etwa sprachen von einer dem Geist der Ostkirche fremden „Kiewer Scholastik“76. Zeitgenössische Kritiker hingegen – unter ihnen der vorhin erwähnte Isaia Kopyns’kyj, der 1632 von Mohyla mit Billigung des polnischen Hofes als Kiewer Metropolit abgesetzt und vertrieben wurde – sahen in dem neuen Programm einen Ausverkauf an die Welt und eine Gefahr für ihr Seelenheil77. Jedenfalls scheint es hier gelungen zu sein, nicht allein Katechese mit etwas Beiwerk, sondern einen vollständigen Kurs der sogenannten humaniora, einschließlich Poetik, Grammatik und Rhetorik zu etablieren. Schon im Jahr nach der Gründung feierte ein Panegyrikon die Wiederauferstehung 75. Vgl. zuletzt I. ISAIEVYCH, Voluntary Brotherhood: Confraternities of Laymen in Early Modern Ukraine, Edmonton – Toronto, CIUS, 2006, S. XXXIX, S. 141-200. 76. Eine Auswertung der Historiographie zur Kiewer Akademie bei A. BRÜNING, On Jesuit Schools, Scholasticism and the Kyivan Academy – Some Remarks on the Historical and Ideological Background of Its Founding, in Kyivs’ka akademija 4 (2007) 519. 77. S.T. GOLUBEV, Kievo-mogilianskaja kollegija pri žizni ego fundatora, Kievskago mitropolita Petr Mogila, in Trudy Kievskoj Duchovnoj Akademii 1890, no. 12, S. 541.

176

A. BRÜNING

der Wissenschaften und der „freien Künste“ unter den östlichen Gläubigen. Schüler des ersten Jahrgangs und Lehrer lieferten in hymnischen Versen auf den Gründer erste Übungsstücke als Beweis ihres Könnens78. Die „freien Künste“ standen von jetzt an weiter in Blüte, und das Programm begann auch für die Söhne des Adels der Region attraktiv zu werden. „Judging from the popularity of Poetics, the Kyivan student was less a scholar and more an aspiring bard“79. Die Verse in den frühen Druckwerken waren teils auf ruthenisch – das als Sprache somit auch eine Aufwertung erfuhr – teils aber auch auf Polnisch und Latein. Unterricht in diesen Sprachen bedurfte der besonderen Rechtfertigung, und erhielt sie mit Verweis auf das Rüstzeug, das die adligen Ruthenen vielleicht nicht in der Kirche, aber im sozialen Leben Polen-Litauens nötig hatten. Einer der Lehrer, Silvestr Kosiv (später Mohylas Nachfolger als Metropolit), zeichnet bei Gelegenheit die Karikatur eines ruthenischen Adligen auf dem Landtag oder vor Gericht, der sonst kein Wort von allen Verhandlungen verstehen würde. Der armselige Ruthene (rusyn) fährt zum Tribunal, zum Reichstag, zum Landtag, zum Burg- oder Landgericht, und ohne Kenntnis des Lateinischen muss er die Strafe zahlen (bez łaciny płaci winy). Er hat keinen Richter, keinen Anwalt, keinen Verstand und keinen Übersetzer; er sitzt nur da, öffnet die Augen weit, und starrt wie eine Krähe mal hierhin, mal dorthin80.

Das Argument wird später noch öfter wiederholt, besonders ausführlich in einer 1644 unter Pseudonym und mit dem Titel Lithos, albo kamień … erschienenen ausführlichen Replik auf die rabiaten Kritiken von Kassian Sakovyč. Sakovyč selbst scheint, wie aus seinen mitveröffentlichten Randnotizen hervorgeht, Metropolit Mohyla für den Autor gehalten zu haben. Faktisch dürfte aber ein Autorenkollektiv aus Kiewer Gelehrten für den theologisch exzellent informierten, teils aber auch sehr scharfen Text verantwortlich zeichnen. Die Autoren nehmen sich all die in ihren Augen hässlichen und haltlosen Anklagen Sakovyčs über Missbräuche in der Liturgie, beim Fasten, in der Kirchenordnung und in der Bildung Punkt für Punkt vor. Das Buch selbst ist auf Polnisch verfasst, mit teils ausführlichen lateinischen Zitaten. Gegen Ende wird das Lehren der lateinischen 78. Eucharisterion, Albo Vdiachnost’, Kiew, 1632. Ein Facsimile im Anhang zur der Kiewer Akademie gewidmeten Sondernummer der Harvard Ukrainian Studies 8 (1984) 251-288. Zum Hintergrund vgl. N. PYLYPIUK, Eucharisterion, Albo, Vdjačnost: The First Panegyric of the Kiev Mohyla School, ibid., 45-70. 79. A. SYDORENKO, The Kievan Academy in the 17th Century, Ottawa, University of Ottawa Press, 1977, S. 115; vgl. ferner MARTEL, La langue polonaise (Anm. 67), S. 280f. 80. S. KOSIV, Exegesis, Kiew, 1635, publiziert in Archiv Jugo-Zapadnoj Rossii, I, Bd. 8, Kiew, Universitetskaja Tipografija, 1914, S. 443.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

177

Sprache eigens gerechtfertigt: Im politischen Leben seien Polnisch und Latein unerlässlich, sei es auf den Land- und Reichstagen, sei es etwa gegenüber dem König. Hinzu kommt das Argument, dass Stellungnahmen zu religiösen Fragen kaum auf Griechisch oder Kirchenslawisch gemacht werden könnten, wenn der jeweilige Opponent auf Latein, oder auf Polnisch mit lateinischen Beimengungen (wie gesagt, eine unter den adligen Polen inzwischen weit verbreitete Redeform) gefragt habe. Außerdem gebe es nur wenige theologische Bücher in Kirchenslawisch, politische aber gar nicht81. Mit „politisch“ kann hier, wie angedeutet, sowohl Literatur mit Bezug auf – in heutigem Verständnis – politische und staatsrechtliche Zusammenhänge gemeint sein, als auch „höfische“ Literatur mit Elementen eines Verhaltenskodex für die höheren Stände. Es wäre nun allerdings voreilig, hinter diesen Voten für die Berechtigung der „freien Künste“ und einer auch für den gesellschaftlichen Umgang hinreichenden Bildung allein eine Kapitulation vor den Anforderungen einer Verweltlichung zu sehen, so wie es manche Zeitgenossen oft getan hatten. Vielmehr wurde auch am orthodoxen Kiewer Kollegium die pietas litterata auf jeweils eigene Weise durchgehalten. Der Kontext, in dem solche Bildungselemente gesehen wurden, erhellt sich etwa aus persönlichen Äußerungen des Gründers, Peter Mohyla, die eine den östlichen Mönchen und Kritikern weltlicher Bildung unerwartet nahekommende Frömmigkeit verraten. Wenn die eben genannten Passagen etwa den Unterricht in Latein auch mit der nötigen Vorbereitung auf religiöse Dispute verraten, sind damit zwar offensichtlich die unvermeidlichen Flurgespräche unter Adligen gemeint, aber kaum öffentliche Disputationen. An solchen haben ruthenische orthodoxe Geistliche auffälligerweise nirgends teilgenommen. Eine Sequenz aus Peter Mohylas eigenen Aufzeichnungen, wohl Ende der 1620er Jahre mit Blick auf spätere publizistische Verwendung zusammengestellt, verrät den Hintergrund dafür. Mohyla – der, wie gesagt, aus dem rumänischen Fürstentum Moldawien kam und von der dortigen orthodoxen Fürstendynastie der Movilă abstammte – berichtet hier eine Episode aus dem Jahr 1599, in der der walachische orthodoxe Fürst Michail, später als „der Tapfere“ bekannt, mit seinen Truppen im siebenbürgischen Alba Julia (in der Quelle slawisch Belgorod genannt) einzieht, und von den dortigen katholischen Geistlichen zu einem Streitgespräch zur Ermittlung des wahren Glaubens aufgefordert wird. Michail aber entzieht sich diesem Wunsch, und arrangiert stattdessen einen Beweis „nicht allein mit Worten“. Zwei Gefäße werden gebracht und mit Wasser 81. Lithos, albo kamień …, Kiew, 1644, publiziert in Archiv Jugo-Zapadnoj Rossii, I, Bd. 9, Kiew, Universitetskaja Tipografija, 1898, hier S. 375-377.

178

A. BRÜNING

gefüllt, und jede der Parteien, katholische wie orthodoxe Priester, spendet den Segen. Nach ein paar Tagen entströmt dem Gefäß der katholischen Partei ein fauliger Geruch, das von den orthodoxen Priestern gesegnete Weihwasser aber verströmt einen angenehmen Duft. So ist der Streit entschieden. „In Debatten entsteht nur endloser Ärger, aber ohne solche Wortgefechte können wir, mit Gottes Hilfe [den rechten Glauben] leicht beweisen…“, so die von Michail überlieferten Worte82. Etwa um diese Zeit hatte Mohyla offenbar auch eine Betrachtung über die hohe Würde des mönchischen Lebens verfasst, die ungeachtet einiger eigener Nuancen im Ton ähnlich klingt wie diejenige Ivan Vyšenskijs, und gut in die ostkirchliche monastische Tradition passt, wie sie auch schon im Moskau des 16. Jahrhunderts anzutreffen war83. Ebenfalls von Mohyla für die Publikation vorbereitet, dann aber zurückgehalten wurde eine Schrift unter dem Titel Kniga duši, narycaemoe zloto … [Buch der Seele, Gold genannt…]. Sie enthält unter anderem dies Bekenntnis: Wenn ich alle Sprachen könnte, die es in der Welt gibt, aber keine Barmherzigkeit hätte, was würde es mir helfen vor Gott, der doch anhand der Werke urteilt? […] Wenn Du also etwas Nützliches und Weises lernen willst, sei lieber unwissend und ohne allzu viel Belesenheit in irgendetwas …84.

Der Grund dafür, dass Mohyla schließlich von einer Publikation absah, liegt offensichtlich in der Tatsache, dass es sich um eine angepasste und ergänzte Übersetzung der Imitatio Christi Thomas von Kempens handelt, die Mohyla in einer polnischen Ausgabe in höfischer Umgebung kennengelernt hatte. Der vorreformatorische Katholizismus der devotio moderna war offenbar auch für einen orthodoxen Fürstensohn und Reformbischof 150 Jahre später noch ansprechend, nur zwangen ihn, den Bischof der nichtunierten Orthodoxie, die kontroversen Umstände nach der Brester Union, diese Sympathien einstweilen bedeckt zu halten85. Sowohl aus dem Lehrbetrieb am Kiewer Kollegium als auch aus den in der angeschlossenen Druckerei veröffentlichten, in der Folgezeit sehr 82. Vgl. Archiv Jugo-Zapadnoj Rossii, I, Bd. 7, Kiew, Universitetskaja Tipografija, 1887, S. 81ff. 83. Rassuždenie Petra Mogily o vysokom dostojnstve inočeskoj žizni, vgl. Archiv JugoZapadnoj Rossii, I, Bd. 7 (Anm. 82), S. 171-180. Vgl. V. KLIMOV, Asketiko-mistyčna problematyka v tvorach P. Mohyly, in A. KOLODNYJ – V. KLIMOV (Hgg.), P.Mohyla: Bohoslov, cerkovnyj i kulturnyi dijač, Kiew, Dnipro, 1997, 82-90. 84. V.N. PEREC, „Kniga duši, narycaemoe zloto“ – Neizdannoe sočinenie mitropolita Petra Mogily, in ID., Issledovanija i materialy po istorii starinoj ukrainskoj literatury XVI-XVII vv., Moskau, 1964, 117-136 (Zitat S. 123). Interessanterweise hatte Perec den Text in einer Sammlung von Ivan Vyšenskij zugeschriebenen Schriften entdeckt (ibid., S. 120)! 85. Cf. L. CHARIPOVA, Peter Mohyla´s Translation of The Imitation of Christ, in The Historical Journal 46 (2003) 237-261.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

179

einflussreichen Werken geht bei näherem Hinsehen hervor, dass es sich – allem äußeren Lob der nun wieder aufblühenden Wissenschaften zum Trotz – hier nicht allein um die Privatmeinung eines einzelnen Protagonisten handelte. Zunächst fehlte auch hier, wie schon bei den Bruderschaftsschulen, nicht die caritative Komponente. Noch die „Confessio Orthodoxa“, das auf Mohylas Geheiß bis 1640 zusammengestellte Glaubenskompendium, nennt als eine der aufgezählten Werke der Barmherzigkeit die Unterweisung der Unwissenden, und zwar besonders in der rechten Weise des Gebets und der Anbetung Gottes, sowie in der Einhaltung der kirchlichen, und damit göttlichen, Gebote86. Im gleichen Sinn ist der Priester vor allem ein Lehrer – so beschreibt es das Vorwort zum von Mohyla und seinem Kreis 1646 neu herausgegebenen umfangreichen Rituale (Trebnyk)87. Ein solcher Zugang setzt dann auch einer allzu spekulativen Theologie Grenzen. Entsprechend hat die eben genannte Confessio Orthodoxa – ein im Stil eines Katechismus mit Fragen und Antworten verfasstes Glaubenskompendium der orthodoxen Kirche, das erst eine Zeit nach Mohyla’s Tod in Druck ging, dann aber grossen Einfluss ausübte88 – noch immer den etwas lakonischen, die Tradition festhaltenden Ton früherer, auch bereits in der Polemik mit den „Lateinern“ verfasster Werke. Die Eingangsfrage: „Was muss der orthodox-katholische Christ tun um das ewige Leben zu gewinnen?“ erhält, untermauert mit einigen Schriftzitaten, die schlichte Antwort „rechter Glaube und gute Werke“. In der folgenden Sequenz erfährt das Thema nur wenig Präzisierung, immerhin in dem Sinne, dass am Anfang der Glaube in Gott steht, entsprechend dem der Christ seinem Leben Form gibt89. Dennoch gehört beides untrennbar zusammen. Wie? Tiefergehende Erörterungen der Rechtfertigungsfrage, die doch in den westlichen Konfessionen und noch der Kontroverstheologie des 17. Jahrhunderts eine so zentrale Stellung einnahm, sucht man im Weiteren vergeblich. Desgleichen spricht der Text, ganz in der Tradition der Orthodoxie, nicht von Sakramenten, sondern von Mysterien (kirchenslaw. tajna), von Geheimnissen also, die dem menschlichen Verstand nicht zugänglich 86. Confessio Orthodoxa II, No. 49. Vgl. A. MALVY – M. VILLER, La confession orthodoxe de Pierre Mogila, metropolite de Kiev, Texte latin inédit, Paris, Pont. Inst. Orientalium Studiorum, 1927, S. 91. 87. Vgl. Cf. F.I. TITOV (Hg.), Materialy dlja istoriji knyžnoiji spravy na Ukraijini, Kiew, 1924 (Nachdruck Köln: Böhlau, 1982 – Bausteine zur Geschichte der Literatur bei den Slawen, Bd. 16), no. 51, S. 368. 88. Zu Editionsgeschichte und zeitgeschichtlichem Kontext der Schrift vgl. A. BRÜNING, Confessio Orthodoxa und europäischer Konfessionalismus – einige Anhaltspunkte zur Verhältnisbestimmung, in R. CRUMMEY – H. SUNDHAUSSEN – R. VULPIUS (Hgg.), Russische und ukrainische Geschichte vom 16. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2002, 207-221. 89. Confessio Orthodoxa I, nos. 1-2.

180

A. BRÜNING

seien. Wenn dennoch hier ein offensichtlich scholastischer Begriff wie die transsubstantiatio als Verständnishilfe angeführt wird, so geschieht das illustrativ, mit einem Unterton von „so als ob“90. Denn gerade darin lag für die Theologie der Orthodoxie jener Zeit das Paradox, dass die Tiefen des christlichen Glaubens, der Mysterien und der Inkarnation und Auferstehung eben nicht mit dem Verstand zu begreifen seien, aber dennoch, etwa im Kontext der Katechese, erklärt werden mussten. Wiederum bleibt also der apophatische Zug der östlichen Theologie bei näherem Hinsehen erhalten. Auch viele Passagen im Rituale aus dem Kreis um Mohyla folgen letztendlich diesem Schema – wohl werden Begriffe aus der scholastischen katholischen Theologie verwendet, schon um dem Vorwurf entgegen zu wirken, die östliche Kirche sei unkultiviert und dumm und würde ihre Sakramente ohne Verstand vollziehen. Aber es fehlt selten der Hinweis, dass man diese Begriffe im Notfall zur Verdeutlichung heranziehen könne, diese aber nicht allein und vollständig das Wesen des Geschehens beschreiben91. DAS KIEWER KOLLEGIUM Andererseits folgten auch die Unterrichtsorganisation und der Schulalltag im Kiewer Kollegium der Maxime einer Vermittlung der pietas litterata, nun freilich in orthodoxer Färbung. Im Aufbau der Schule stand ein Rektor an der Spitze, der sich um Fragen der Lehrinhalte, des Lehrkörpers und der Disziplin zu kümmern hatte. Ihm zur Seite stand ein Präfekt, der assistierend vor allem Verwaltungsaufgaben, Logistik und Finanzfragen wahrnahm. Dahinter erschienen die Lehrer in den einzelnen Fächern. Disziplin innerhalb und außerhalb des Unterrichts, sowie regelmäßige Gebetszeiten spielten eine große Rolle, auf die Einhaltung wurde streng geachtet. Ein im Jahr 1636 herausgegebenes Kompendium von Gebeten und geistlichen Anleitungen verrät auch etwas über die Ordnung, die der Gründer in seiner Schuleinrichtung befolgt sehen wollte. Man hat es bis zu einem gewissen Grad als Schulordnung des Kollegiums angesehen92. Generell sollen die aufgestellten Regeln die Schüler zu jeder Zeit zu einem frommen und tugendhaften Lebenswandel anhalten, der zudem der Verarbeitung des Lehrstoffs noch entgegenkommt. Hier ist die Regel 90. Confessio Orthodoxa, I, Nos. 99, 106 – cf. MALVY – VILLER, La Confession Orthodoxe (Anm. 86), S. 56, 62. 91. Text des Vorworts nach TITOV, Materialy (Anm. 87), no. 51, S. 367-373. 92. Anthologion sireč molitvy..., Kiew, 1636; vgl. TITOV, Materialy (Anm. 87), no. 44, S. 316-321.

KONFESSIONSKULTUREN BEI DEN „UNGLÄUBIGEN“?

181

von regelmäßigen Schlafenszeiten (auf keinen Fall mehr als 7 Stunden), Gebets- und Gottesdienstzeiten, empfohlen werden zudem auch regelmäßige Gewissensprüfung (das Buch liefert dafür Texte) und besondere Zeiten zur Verehrung der lokalen Heiligen93. Aus all dem ergibt sich ein auch von den jesuitischen Kollegien und dem gegenreformatorischen katholischen Modell abweichendes Bildungsideal aus der orthodoxen Neustrukturierung des Bildungswesens. Der Absolvent des Kollegiums war nach wie vor ein vor allem frommer und disziplinierter Mensch, der um die Begrenztheit allen Glaubenswissens wusste, die Grundlagen seiner Tradition aber notfalls kohärent darlegen konnte. „Beweisen“ aber ließen sie sich ohnehin nicht; Kenntnis der authentischen Tradition musste genügen. Nicht Kirchentreue stand an erster Stelle, sondern spirituelle Praxis; vorbereitet auf die Welt durch das Studium der „freien Künste“, blieb das eigene Seelenheil doch das leitende Anliegen. Gerade in den apophatischen Nuancen der hier vermittelten Theologie, und der im Vergleich zum Westen viel weniger ausgeprägten Einschwörung auf bestimmte Lehrsätze oder Bekenntnistexte lagen wichtige Unterschiede zu den westlichen Vorbildern. FOLGEN Das Kiewer Kollegium avancierte, trotz aller Kontroversen, in den folgenden Jahrzehnten zu einer der führenden Bildungseinrichtungen der slawischen Orthodoxie, wenn nicht der orthodoxen Welt überhaupt94. Um die Mitte des 17. Jahrhunderts – im Vertrag von Andrusowo 1667 fielen die Gebiete östlich des Dnjepr einschließlich Kiews per Vertrag an das Reich der Zaren – traten die Kiewer Gelehrten ihren Zug nach Moskau an. Sie wurden wohl anfangs mit Misstrauen betrachtet, aber mehr und mehr – auch unter den Bojaren und am Zarenhof – mit Interesse willkommen geheißen. Wichtige Impulse für die im Abendland als Modernisierung und Kulturfortschritt im Westen so gefeierten Reformen Zar Peters „des Großen“, insbesondere für seine Kirchenreform, kamen zuvor direkt oder indirekt aus Kiew. Es begann, was der Berliner Historiker Hans-Joachim 93. Zum Kurssystem des Kiewer Kollegiums in der frühen Phase vgl. SYDORENKO, The Kievan Academy (Anm. 79), S. 79-80, zur Schulordnung ibid., S. 93-96. Ferner bereits A. JABŁONOWSKI, Akademia Kijowo-Mohiljańska: Zarys historyczny na tle rozwoju ogólnego ciwilizacyj zachoniej na Rusi, Krakau, Anczyc & Spółka, 1899/1900, S. 97-123. 94. Vgl. auch A. BRÜNING, Netzwerke der Kiewer Mohyla-Akademie, in Europäische Geschichte Online (EGO), hg. Leibniz-Institut für Europäische Geschichte (IEG), Mainz 2014-07-29. URL: http://www.ieg-ego.eu/brueninga-2014-de URN: urn:nbn:de:01592014072801 (letzter Aufruf 8.11.2019).

182

A. BRÜNING

Torke einmal „die Ruthenisierung der russischen Kultur“ genannt hat95. So zog einerseits die neugewonnene Kultiviertheit der orthodoxen Kirche nun auch gen Norden, im heutigen Sinne, aber auch im Sinne der damaligen mentalen Geographie. Andererseits bleibt die Frage, ob die in den vorangegangenen Kontroversen gewonnene neue Gewichtung von Glaubenswissen und Glaubenspraxis einerseits, von Frömmigkeit und weltlicher Kultiviertheit andererseits nicht auch den Ausgangspunkt lieferte für langfristige Entwicklungen eines zentralen Elementes einer, wenn man es so nennen will, „orthodoxen Konfessionskultur“. Die weiteren Schritte in diese Richtung gehören allerdings in andere Zeiten, und andere Abhandlungen. Institute of Eastern Christian Studies Erasmusplein 1, Room E 17.07 NL-6525 HT Nijmegen The Netherlands [email protected]

Alfons BRÜNING

95. H.-J. TORKE, Moskau und sein Westen: Die „Ruthenisierung“ der russischen Kultur, in Berliner Jahrbuch für Osteuropäische Geschichte 1 (1996) 101-120.

HERMANN SAMUEL REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND THE EMPEROR JULIAN

Not so long ago, a renowned expert in patristic theology, Wolfram Kinzig, made the following apodictic statement in an article with the crisp title Polemics Reheated? The Reception of Ancient Anti-Christian Writings in the Enlightenment: The influence of Celsus and Julian on the religious criticism of the eighteenth century […] appears to have been limited and to have been used to strengthen the extant attack on Christianity rather than actually constitute the offensive in the first place1.

This statement requires more than one rectification. First: The pagan – late antique – criticism of Christianity2 began to inspire anti-religious writers of the early modern period long before the 18th century. The surviving fragments of their texts became available in the 15th century (in the case of Celsus) and the early 16th century (in the case of Julian the Apostate). The earliest substantial reception of the pagan anti-Christian arguments is to be found in Jean Bodin’s Colloquium heptaplomeres, composed in the 1590s3. Second: It is somewhat strange that Kinzig fails to mention one late antique author, that is, Porphyry, although his influence, particularly on the early modern and Enlightenment philological criticism of the Bible, should not be underestimated. The first collection of Porphyry’s fragments dates back to the early 17th century. Equally surprising is the lack of any reference to other late antique critics of Christianity, like e.g. Sossianus Hierocles, whose Philalethes logos we encounter in dozens of books of freethinkers of that period. Third: As far as the 18th century is 1. W. KINZIG, Polemics Reheated? The Reception of Ancient Anti-Christian Writings in the Enlightenment, in Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum 13 (2009) 316-350. 2. CELSUS, Ἀληθὴς λόγος, ed. R. BADER, Stuttgart – Berlin, Kohlhammer, 1940; PORPHYRY, Contra Christianos: Porphyrios, “Contra Christianos”: Neue Sammlung der Fragmente, Testimonien und Dubia mit Einleitung, Übersetzung und Anmerkungen, ed. M. BECKER (Texte und Kommentare, 52), Berlin – Boston, MA, De Gruyter, 2016; JULIAN [Flavius Claudius Iulianus], Contra Galilaeos, ed. E. MASARACCHIA, Roma, Ed. dell’Ateneo, 1990; Porphyrius, “Gegen die Christen”, 15 Bücher: Zeugnisse, Fragmente und Referate, ed. A. VON HARNACK (Abhandlungen der Königl. Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philos.-histor. Klasse, 1916), Berlin, Verlag der Königl. Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1916. 3. See W. SCHRÖDER, Pagani ante portas: Les libertins érudits et leur contribution à la redécouverte de la pensée anti-chrétienne de l’antiquité tardive, in M.-H. QUÉVAL (ed.), Orthodoxie et hétérodoxie: Libertinage et religion en Europe au temps des Lumières, Saint-Étienne, Publications de l’Université de Saint-Étienne, 2010, 77-88.

184

W. SCHRÖDER

concerned, the influence of the three pagan anti-Christian philosophers was anything but limited or marginal. As Edward Herbert of Cherbury had already done in the early 17th century, English deists like Anthony Collins, Thomas Chubb or Thomas Woolston drew heavily upon the pagan objections against the Bible and Christian dogma. Furthermore, there is the large corpus of clandestine treatises of the radical Enlightenment, in which the three pagan authors are omnipresent. Let me only mention the flagship of the littérature clandestine, the anonymous Traité des trois imposteurs and Jean-Baptiste de Mirabaud’s mid-18th-century Celse moderne4. Soon after the works – or rather fragments – of the pagan critics re-emerged, they were vigorously combatted by theologians. Here are some of the most prominent and widely read apologetic writings: • Domenico Mellini, In veteres quosdam scriptores, Malevolos Christiani nominis obtrectatores (Florence 1577) • Philippe Duplessis-Mornay, De la vérité de la religion chrestienne: Contre les athées, épicuriens, payens, juifs, mahumédistes & autres infidèles (Paris 1582) • Ralph Cudworth, The True Intellectual System of the Universe (London 1678) • Pierre-Daniel Huet, Demonstratio evangelica (Paris 1679) • Christian Kortholt, Paganus obtrectator (Kiel – Frankfurt – Leipzig 1698) • Johann Albert Fabricius, Delectus argumentorum et syllabus scriptorum qui veritatem religionis Christianae adversus Atheos, Epicureos, deistas [...] asseruerunt (Hamburg 1725) • Johann Albert Fabricius, Bibliotheca Graeca (Hamburg 1705-1728) These books are full of quotations from the writings of the three pagan critics. There were also several translations, often equipped with extensive commentaries with the aim to invalidate the pagans’ objections. The apologetical texts as well as the editions and translations not only made the antiCristian objections of the ancient philosophers easily accessible, but also showed the size of the threat posed by them. In other words: they provided early modern freethinkers with an armoury of arguments, and they were the warmest possible recommendation to make use of them. And in fact, this is what happened. The objections of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian (as well as Hierocles and other authors) became substantial stimulating factors in the rise of anti-Christian thought during the early modern period and the Enlightenment. 4. See below, n. 5.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

185

Elsewhere I have tried to record the enormous resonance of this pagan troika from the 16th century onwards5. Instead of repeating this overview, in what follows a detailed analysis of the work of one of the most productive readers and beneficiaries of the three pagans will be given: Hermann Samuel Reimarus. If we want to assess the impact of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian, Reimarus is a most promising candidate, for it is he who caused, as it were, the most devastating earthquake in the history of anti-Christian thought in the 18th century. Its aftershocks can be registered throughout the 19th and (thanks to Albert Schweitzer and his Geschichte der Leben-Jesu-Forschung) even in the 20th century. So it seems to be worthwhile asking to what extent Reimarus was indebted to his late antique predecessors. Let us first of all have a brief look at the corpus of the late antique texts Reimarus had at his disposal. His library catalogue, which was published shortly after his death, contains an impressive number of relevant sources6, among them the apologetical texts just mentioned. Of course, he possessed Origen’s Contra Celsum and Cyril’s Contra Julianum, both in Greek as well as the available vernacular translations many of whom were fitted with extensive commentaries. It is also worth noting that Reimarus had inherited the library of his father in law, Johann Albert Fabricius. In Fabricius’ magisterial – 14 volume – Bibliotheca Graeca (the 18th-century Pauly-Wissowa Realencyclopädie, as it were) the available knowledge of the pagan opposition against Christianity was richly documented. For example, the collection of Porphyry’s fragments made by Leone Allaci in the early 17th century was reprinted here. 5. See W. SCHRÖDER, Athen und Jerusalem: Die philosophische Kritik am Christentum in Antike und Neuzeit, Stuttgart – Bad Cannstatt, Frommann-Holzboog, [2011], 22013. 6. As Schetelig’s Auktionskatalog shows, the Hamburg scholar was excellently equipped with the relevant sources (Auktionskatalog der Bibliothek von Hermann Samuel Reimarus. Redigiert von Johann Andreas Schetelig. Hamburg 1769 und 1770, Alphabetisches Register G. ALEXANDER, Hamburg, Reimarus-Kommission der Joachim-Jungius-Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, e.V. Hamburg – Lessing-Akademie e.V. Wolfenbüttel, 1978): – Origen’s Contra Celsum: ed. Spencer (²1677; Schetelig, vol. 1, p. 119 [n. 1488]), ed. Delarue and Erasmus (ibid. [n. 1460-1462]). – the first collection of Porphyry’s fragments in Holstenius’ De vita et scriptis Porphyrii: Reimarus possessed both the editio princeps from 1630 (vol. 2, p. 207 [n. 74]) and the Cambridge reprint from 1655 (vol. 2, p. 208 [n. 78]). – Julian: Spanheim’s standard edition of the Opera omnia (vol. 1, p. 118 [n. 1442]), as well as several separate editions: the Caesares, ed. Charles de Chantecler (1577; vol. 2, p. 207 [n. 68]) and the bilingual Césars, ed. Spanheim (vol. 2, p. 1683 [n. 1692]); see also La Bletterie’s Vie de Julien (vol. 2, p. 182 [n. 3164]). The Marquis d’Argens’ translation of Contra Galilaeos (Défense du paganisme, 1764) was purchased by Reimarus only a few years before his death (vol. 1, p. 154 [n. 1910c]). – Of course he had also the apologetical standard-works in his collection, like e.g. DuplessisMornay, Huet, Cudworth and some publications of Kortholt (vol. 2, p. 139 [n. 2043]; p. 143 [n. 2097b]).

186

W. SCHRÖDER

Reimarus’ engagement with the three pagan critics of Christianity dates back to the early years of his academic career, as is testified by his Vindicatio dictorum Veteris Testamenti in Novo allegatorum7. Given in 1731, at a time when Reimarus still held dear the orthodox Lutheran creeds, this lecture was designed to reject the ancient pagans’ and the contemporary deists’ attack on the typological interpretation of the so-called Old Testament8. In what follows, the main text under focus will be Reimarus’ Apologie9, this monumental work of more than a thousand pages, a text he worked on during the last three decades of his life, until his passing away in 1768. Though unpublished during his lifetime, several sections of the Apologie were published separately by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing in the 1770s under the title Wolfenbütteler Fragmente, and it was due to Lessing’s editorial enterprise that the mentioned intellectual earthquake took place. Reimarus did not address all of the topics dealt with in the fragments of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian. Their political objections against the new religion from Galilee as well as their defenses of the traditional GrecoRoman religion were not considered. Instead, Reimarus focused on four major issues: firstly, the philological critique of the Bible; secondly, the challenge of the biblical reports on miracles; thirdly, the critique of the Christian conception of morality; and finally, the rebuttal of the Christian conception of faith. I I can only give a glance at the philological and exegetical critique of the Bible by presenting three examples. They all pertain to topics which 7. H.S. REIMARUS, Vindicatio dictorum Veteris Testamenti in Novo allegatorum 1731. Text der Pars I und Conspectus der Pars II, ed. P. STEMMER, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983. 8. Ibid., pp. 54-55: Thesis VII: Inter gentiles et haereticos [...] reperti sunt, qui se in toto Veteri Testamento quicquam de Christo reperisse impudenter negarent. Quo pertinent Celsus, Julianus Apostata, Theodorus Mopsuestenus et Faustus Manichaeus. Explic.: §.1. Celsus quidem gentilis philosophus epicureus sub finem saeculi IIdi contra Judaeos et Christianos scripsit librum sub titulo λόγου ἀληθοῦς. Ubi inter alia hoc argumento contra Christianos pugnavit: Posse dicta prophetarum infinitis modis multo aptius et verosimilius accipi, quam si ad Jesum referantur [Celsus, 1.50]. Id quidem colligitur ex praeclaro opere Origenis contra Celsum, ubi libro II sic scribit: Debuerat etiam Celsus contra Christianorum validissimas rationes stare fortiter et accurate per singulas Prophetias declarare, quomodo melius quadrent aliis quam nostro Jesu quantoque probabilius. [Migne, PG XI, 847]. §.2. Julianus Apostata [frg. 101 Masaracchia] ut alia multa sic et hoc calumniatus est, locum Hoseae 11,1 ex Aegypto vocavi filium meum ad Christum translatum esse a Matthaeo, ut simplicitati eorum, qui de gentibus crediderant, illuderet. 9. H.S. REIMARUS, Apologie oder Schutzschrift für die vernünftigen Verehrer Gottes, ed. G. ALEXANDER, Frankfurt a.M., Insel, 1972.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

187

were intensively debated in the apologetical literature directed against the pagan critique of Christianity. The first one has to do with the typological interpretation of the Hebrew Bible. According to this interpretation Jesus – the Messiah – was prophesied in the so-called Old Testament. The fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies in the life of Christ had always been considered to be “the strongest and truest evidence” of the truth of the Christian religion, as Justin Martyr put it10. Most notably Isaiah’s words “Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son” (7,14) were understood as a prediction of Jesus’ birth from the virgin Mary. Against this interpretation Julian points out that Isaiah’s words do not refer to a virgin in the anatomical sense of the word: “a married woman who before her conception had lain with her husband was no virgin”11. And indeed the Hebrew text uses the word alma, which simply means “a young woman”. Furthermore, Julian stresses that in Isaiah’s words no mention whatsoever is made that the young woman would give birth to a divine figure. Reimarus, no wonder, did not miss out on touching this sore spot: Matthew’s words (2,14-5) “that Joseph fled with the little child to Egypt, so that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet [Hosea 11,1] saying, ‘Out of Egypt have I called my son’”12 violate “all standards of honesty”. For with his words Hosea “expressly referred to the people of Israel”. These examples show that the alleged fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies in the life of Christ offers no argument in favour of Christianity, but is rather “the weakest point” of Christian apologetics13. 10. JUSTIN MARTYR, Apologia I 30.1: μεγίστη καὶ ἀληθεστάτη ἀπόδειξις. For Tertullian, too, the fulfillment of a prophecy is an idoneum [...] testimonium divinitatis veritas divinationis; Apologeticum 20.3. 11. JULIAN, frg. 64, 262CD: “Isaiah says: Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son. Now granted that this is said about a god, though it is by no means so stated; for a married woman who before her conception had lain with her husband was no virgin, – but let us admit that it is said about her, – does Isaiah anywhere say that a god will be born of the virgin? But why do you not cease to call Mary the Mother of God [θεοτόκος]?”. 12. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 2, pp. 268-269: “Der heydnische Weltweise Celsus […] wirfft den Christen, an verschiedenen Stellen, die Mißdeutungen der Propheten auf Jesum, und die Nichtigkeit ihrer allegorischen Erklärungsart, vor. […] Der Kayser Julianus schmäht auch bey dem Cyrillo fleissig auf die Mißdeutung der prophetischen Stellen; und sagt unter andern: Was Matthäus aus dem Hosea auf Jesum gezogen habe, Aus Egypten hab ich meinen Sohn gerufen [Ex Aegypto vocavi filium meum], das hieße nichts anders, als der Einfalt der Heyden, welche gläubig geworden, spotten”. 13. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 2, pp. 265-256: “Wahrlich, die Beweise, welche aus dem A.T. hervorgesucht werden, machen die allerschwächste Seite des Christenthums aus. Stellen, die [...] falsch übersetzt, durch Zusätze, Auslassung und Veränderung der Worte verdrehet sind; Stellen, die bloß eine Redensart enthalten, welche ausser dem Zusammenhange auch auf die Begebenheiten des N. T. angewandt werden könnten; Stellen, die von gantz anderen Personen, Sachen, Zeiten, und Geschichten handeln [...]: alles ist gerecht zum

188

W. SCHRÖDER

The second example which I want to present in slightly greater detail is one of the most startling results of Reimarus’ biblical exegesis, which, again, shows that in his Apologie the pagan objections had fallen on fertile ground. I am referring to his uncovering of the political nature not only of Jewish (Old Testament) messianism, but also of the messianic ideas which Jesus and the apostles originally entertained. This political interpretation of the original Christian messianism entails an entirely new perspective on Christian soteriology. The essential points are as follows: (1) The apostles and Jesus himself entertained the “expectation of a worldly real king”14. (2) Jesus’ aspiration was to “attain royal dignity”15, not metaphorically, but in the very real sense that he aspired towards becoming the king of the Jewish people. (3) The crucifixion at Calvary was therefore not intended by Jesus, quite the contrary. And for the apostles the death of their leader Jesus was nothing less than the ultimate worst case scenario, because their political ambitions were thereby definitely frustrated. (4) In their trouble, the apostles, deprived of their political leader, invented a “stopgap-system”16. They replaced the original political messianism by a new, otherworldly soteriology. Its core is the idea of “a suffering saviour”17, according to Isaiah 52. In other words: Jesus had willingly suffered crucifixion. And the apostles made the world believe that Jesus had risen from the dead, and that his death and resurrection were necessary for mankind’s salvation – a salvation which no longer was understood as political liberation here on earth, but as a redemption in an afterlife18. Beweise des Christenthums, und es heist denn doch davon, Auf daß erfüllet würde was geschrieben steht. Jedoch ist unter allen Schreibern des N. T. keiner, der die Schriftörter gewaltsamer mißhandelt als Matthäus. [...] Gleich Anfangs soll die Empfängniß Mariä von dem Propheten Jesaia verkündiget seyn: Siehe eine Jungfrau wird schwanger seyn u.s.w. Da doch offenbar ein Knabe gemeynet wird, der zur Zeit Ahas geboren worden. Denn der Prophet fügt ja hinzu: Ehe der Knabe lernet Böses verwerffen und Gutes erwehlen [...]. Ferner sagt Matthäus: Joseph sey mit dem Kindlein nach Egypten geflohen, und sey da bis nach Herodis Tode geblieben; auf daß erfüllet werde was der Herr durch den Propheten gesagt hat, da er spricht: Aus Egypten hab ich meinen Sohn gerufen [Matth. ii.15. Hos. xi.1]. Das übergeht alle Schranken der Aufrichtigkeit. Hosea sagt dies ja ausdrücklich vom Volke Israel: Da Israel ein Knabe war, hatte ich ihn lieb, und rief meinen Sohn aus Ägypten”. 14. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 2, p. 145: “Erwartung eines weltlichen wirklichen Königes”. 15. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 174: “zu der Würde eines Königes der Juden steigen”. 16. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 153: “Noht-System”. 17. Ibid.: “System eines leydenden Erlösers”. 18. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 44: “[Die Jünger haben] ihr gantzes System, welches sie bey Jesu Leben hatten, nach seinem Tode geändert […]; und nun erst angefangen, ihn für einen geistlichen

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

189

Reimarus’ re-interpretation of Christian soteriology clearly echoes some of Celsus’ fragments. According to the 2nd-century philosopher, Jesus originally pretended to be a Messiah according to the Jewish tradition, a saviour who “would come to judge the holy and to punish the unrighteous” (Celsus 1.49), a political Messiah: “The prophets say that the one who will come will be a great prince, lord of the whole earth and of all nations and armies” (Celsus 2.29). But this is not consistent with the miserable death of Jesus, who was “not helped by his Father nor was he able to help himself” (Celsus 1.54). His death at the cross was a disaster. The prophets expected a triumphant Messiah – “they did not proclaim an unlucky and depraved fellow [ὄλεθρος] like him” (Celsus 2.29). In short: Jesus “caused difficulties for the Christian faith by the sufferings which he endured” (Celsus 2.42c). His death at Calvary was the shipwreck of the political mission of the would-be Messiah and his disciples: “As the disciples of Jesus were unable to conceal the self-evident fact [that Jesus had failed politically], they conceived this idea of saying that he foreknew everything”, and that he willingly underwent the crucifixion at Calvary (Celsus 2.15). They invented a new doctrine of salvation, no longer political, but modelled after the idea of “God’s Suffering Servant”. But, Celsus concludes, this idea of “God’s Suffering Servant” “could be applied to thousands of others far more plausibly than to Jesus” (Celsus 2.28). The interpretation of Christian soteriology as a de-politicized or, as it were, spiritualized Messianism has always been appreciated as one of Reimarus’ major exegetical achievements. Surprisingly, however, Reimarus scholars (there are not too many, it must be admitted) have so far failed to fully recognise the source of this revolutionary idea. As we have seen, it is Celsus, whose analysis of Christian soteriology is manifestly – and in some cases even verbatim – present in the Apologie. The third and last example are the objections of the pagans against the authenticity of the biblical texts, most notoriously of the book of Daniel. “None of the prophets has spoken so clearly of Christ as Daniel” – with these words a contemporary of Reimarus summarized the common view19 leydenden Erlöser der Menschen von ihren Sünden anzupreisen, da sie ihn vorhin beständig für einen weltlichen Erlöser der Juden gehalten hatten”. 19. W. WHISTON, Historical Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Dr. Samuel Clarke, 3rd ed., London, John Whiston, 1748, p. 104: “[Daniel’s prophecies are] the strongest Attestation of both the Jewish and Christian Revelations”; see also P. DUPLESSIS-MORNAY, De veritate religionis Christianae liber adversus atheos, Epicuraeos, ethnicos, Judaeos, Mahumedistas et coeteros infideles [...] Latine versus ac jam Notis quibusdam illustratus a Joh. Friderico Breithaupt, Jena, Bielke, [1696], p. 637; J. ABBADIE, Traité de la vérité de la religion chrétienne, La Haye, Neaulme, 1741, vol. 1, pp. 411ff.; R. SIMON, Histoire critique du texte du Nouveau Testament, Où l’on établit la Vérité des Actes sur lesquels la Religion Chrêtienne est fondée, Rotterdam, Leers, 1689, p. 255.

190

W. SCHRÖDER

which dates back to the earliest periods of Christian theology20. Porphyry21 had already proved that the book of Daniel was not, as Jews and Christians believe, composed during the Babylonian exile of the 6th century. Instead, it was composed after the middle of the 2nd century BC22. In other words, the book of Daniel is a fake. Reimarus23 adopted the dating established by “Porphyry, a man of great insight and critical skills”, which allowed him to draw some drastic conclusions. In the first place, as the book of Daniel turned out to be a spurious botch, it was no longer an appropriate basis for Christian messianism, the doctrine of the resurrection24, or the teachings about the coming of the Antichrist. The spuriousness of the book of Daniel even shed a most unfavourable light on Jesus himself. For Jesus more than once referred to this book as a text written by the exilic 6thcentury prophet Daniel. And that means that Jesus was not aware that he was referring to a forgery, although – being part of the devine trinity – he was supposedly omniscient. II As far as Reimarus’ critical examination of the biblical miracle stories is concerned, the most famous piece of the Apologie, which elicited the 20. JEROME, In Danielem, prologus: nullum prophetam tam aperte dixisse de Christo: non enim solum scribit eum esse venturum, quod est commune cum ceteris, sed quo tempore venturus sit docet, et reges per ordinem digerit et annos enumerat ac manifestissima signa praenuntiat; TERTULLIAN, Adversus Iudaeos 8,10 and 8,18; JUSTIN MARTYR, Apologia I 51.9; ATHANASIUS, De incarnatione verbi 39,2. 21. PORPHYRY, frg. 43A-W HARNACK, esp. frg. 43A: Porphyrius, nolens eum [librum Danielis] ab ipso, cuius inscriptus est nomine, esse compositum, sed a quodam, qui temporibus Antiochi, qui appellatus est Epiphanes, fuerit in Judaea, et non tam Danielem ventura dixisse, quam illum narrasse praeterita. Denique quidquid usque ad Antiochum dixerit, veram historiam continere. 22. The probative force of Porphyry’s arguments is still recognized today. 23. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 905: “Das Buch Daniels hat besonders, wegen der gar zu genauen und bestimmten Verkündigung des wirklich Geschehenen, einen billigen Verdacht auf sich. Denn es beschreibt dasjenige, was [...] bis auf Antiochum Epiphanem erfolgt ist [...], so umständlich, als wenn es eine Geschichte erzehlte [...]. Porphyrius [frg. 43A und 43L HARNACK] hat aber, als ein Heyde, desto dreister geurtheilt, daß das Buch erst nach den Geschichten als eine Weissagung geschrieben sey, zumal, da es von den Zeiten nach Antiocho Epiphane nichts als falsche Dinge sage. Grotius ist, wenigstens in der Auslegung, dem Porphyrio gefolgt; nämlich, daß die darin vorkommende Weissagungen nicht weiter als auf die Zeiten Antiochi gingen, und nicht auf einen noch künftigen Antichrist zu deuten wären”. 24. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, pp. 801-803: “Wenn wir die Meynung wollten annehmen, welche Porphyrius längst vorgetragen, daß Daniels Buch erst nach den Zeiten des Antiochus Epiphanes geschrieben sey: so wäre es gar kein Wunder, daß darin so deutlich von [...] dem ewigen Leben gesprochen würde. […] Dahin gehet der Greuel Verfolgung an heiliger Stette [...]. Kurtz, die Rede ist offenbar von der Religions-Verfolgung unter dem Antiocho Epiphane: und so hat auch Josephus die Weissagung Daniels gedeutet, imgleichen Porphyrius, nach Hieronymi Bericht, und Grotius gibt jenen Beyfall”.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

191

greatest outrage when Lessing published it in 1777, is his analysis of “the Israelites’ transit through the Red Sea”25. Reimarus spared no effort to meticulously calculate (1) the number of Israelites and the troops of Pharao who chased them, (2) the average speed of the fleeing Israelites, taking particularly into account the presence of little children, elderly and people with walking impediments, and (3) the time needed depending on the tides of the Red Sea. And his result was that (even if the Red Sea had parted in two) the Israelites simply could not have escaped their Egyptian pursuers. In the same vein the story told in the book of Genesis about the construction of the tower of Babel was torn into pieces by Julian, who estimated the number of bricks required to erect a building “reaching out to the edges of the moon” and dismissed the story as an outright “fabulous [μυθώδες]” tale (frg. 23, 135A). Admittedly, this way of attacking the biblical miracle stories is no intellectual highlight. It is a simple objection, but an objection which targets the biblical miracles in an appropriate way: namely as supposedly real events which occurred in this world. The second example concerns the miracle par excellence, the resurrection of Jesus. Like Celsus, Porphyry and Julian, Reimarus, too, denies the physical possibility of this alleged event. Furthermore, inspired by Celsus, he raises another objection which targets its insufficient attestation as a miraculous event. Celsus proceeds on the premise that it is extremely improbable that someone “who really died rose again with the same body” (2.55). We could believe such a story only if it were attested by independent, impartial and multiple witnesses. Celsus proposes a specific workable procedure which would have provided convincing attestation of Jesus’ resurrection: Jesus “ought to have appeared to the very man who treated him despitefully and to the man who condemned him and to everyone everywhere” (Celsus 2.63). But in the Bible we do not find such an attestation. “When [Jesus] was being punished he was seen by all; but only by one person after he rose again” (Celsus 2.70b). And this person, Mary Magdalene, was part of “his own confraternity” (ibid.). And what is worse, she was psychologically unstable, a “hysterical woman [πάροιστρος]”, “out of whom had come seven demons” (Celsus 2.55). In other words, the necessary conditions for a credible attestation are not met. The report of Jesus’ resurrection must therefore be considered as a figment just like the familiar Greek myths of Zamolxis, Heracles and Theseus and their fabulous resurrections (ibid.). In sum, Celsus concludes, the apostles who claimed that Jesus had risen from the dead are to be charged with “deception” (ibid.). This argument was taken up nearly verbatim by Reimarus 25. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, pp. 299-326: “Durchgang der Israeliten durchs Rohte Meer”.

192

W. SCHRÖDER

in his Apologie: Jesus’ resurrection “should have been made credible by impeccable heathen eye-witnesses”26. He should have appeared “in broad daylight, at a certain time, before the eyes of all of the unbelievers, particularly the elders of the Jews, in presence of invited infidels, and in particular the High Council of the Jews”27. But instead he “ascended to heaven incognito” and “posterity was eternally left in uncertainty about his resurrection”28. III The most important controversy concerning morality discussed in the fragments of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian revolves around a question that on unbiased consideration can only be considered to be rhetorical: Can a person’s morality be judged by anything other than the actions one takes and the dispositions one acquires on the basis of one’s own free will? For modern-day philosophers a trivial question with a trivial response, in antique times it brought to light the deeply antagonistic views of the conflicting parties. Admittedly, even in those days the Christian answers varied across a spectrum familiar to us today, where a person’s actions range from only partially to not at all relevant to the definitive judgement through which God grants the “righteous” eternal salvation, while handing over the “unrighteous” to eternal fire. But prescriptions on the proportions of human activity to divine grace, which were already manifold in patristics, can be neglected here. Important for present purposes is that there was agreement on one feature: the view that our voluntary decisions and active efforts alone determine whether or not we are “righteous” was unanimously judged to be a mistake by the Christian side. Even the Pelagians held fast to the idea that people are dependent on God’s grace and were far from consistently expounding human self-determination, as was often said of them later on. The idea that actions and attitudes (virtues) deserving of praise are not gifts from the gods acquired without any effort on our part, but to the contrary are the result of our own personal endeavours was a basic, but 26. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 194: “durch unverwerfliche heydnische Augenzeugen glaubwürdig machen”. 27. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 202: “bey hellem Tage, vor aller Augen, zu einer gesetzten Stunde, nach vorgängiger Einladung aller Ungläubigen, besonders des hohen Rahts und der Eltesten der Juden”. 28. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 202: “[Jesus ist] incognito zum Himmel [ge]fahren […], damit die gantze Nachwelt ewiglich in Ungewißheit von seiner Auferstehung bliebe”.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

193

not trivial, truth for ancient moral philosophers. Long before the Christian perspective made clarification necessary, we find it expressed by Cicero: No one has ever attributed virtue to God’s beneficence. This attitude is surely justified, for we ourselves rightly gain praise for virtue, and we rightly take pride in it [recte gloriamur]. This would not be the case if we obtained it as a gift from God [donum a deo], and if it did not emanate from ourselves (De natura deorum 3.86-87).

In the view of many pre-Christian philosophers, the gods certainly have a role to play in the success of human life. Prayers imploring the gods to bestow their gifts upon us are therefore by no means senseless. However, it is a case of requesting divine assistance for the acquisition and preservation of the external goods of happiness. Whether we live and whether we are equipped with the desired external goods is not in our hands alone: “Life is the gift of the immortal gods [deorum inmortalium munus], but living well is the gift of philosophy” (Seneca, Epistulae morales 90.1). Living our lives in a praiseworthy manner, acting according to a “moral attitude [bona mens]”, is completely on us (Epistulae morales 41.1-2). Cicero’s declaration “No one has ever attributed virtue to God’s beneficence” was to be turned upside down in the Epistles of Paul which came to form the heart of the Christian understanding of the proper, praiseworthy, “righteous” way to live and behave. Whether or not we are deemed “righteous” in the eyes of God, who will cast the final judgement on how we have lived, will not depend on our own personal efforts: “it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy” (Rom 9,16). By “the deeds of the law”, which partly coincide with universally recognized moral requirements – think of certain norms of the Decalogue – no “flesh shall be justified in his sight” (Rom 3,20). It is a fundamental error to believe that we become “righteous [δίκαιος]” through our moral behaviour. While in ancient philosophy, dikaios was a morally evaluative term attributed to agents who do their duty, the Christian “righteousness [δικαιοσύνη]” is a quality granted by God to human beings and on which the latter have no influence. The devaluation of autonomous moral activity as constitutive of the Christian dikaiosyne can only be adequately understood in the context of the Christian doctrine of justification, of which Celsus, Porphyry and Julian with their knowledge of the Pauline epistles could not have been ignorant. Due to the contingencies of historical transmission, however, no explicit discussion on the doctrine of vicarious satisfaction through the sacrificial death of Jesus has survived in the remaining fragments. However,

194

W. SCHRÖDER

Porphyry’s question, “What is the purpose of the cross?”29, seems to echo the perplexity that this doctrine provoked among pagans. A central element of the doctrine is addressed nonetheless: the idea that a believer can be absolved from guilt through morally indifferent actions. In 1 Corinthians, the sinners – “fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves” – are assured that they are “justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” (Celsus 6.11). Without embarking on an argumentative course, Porphyry has the scripture quotation alone demonstrate the aberrance of the notion that a sinner “will be freed from innumerable disgusting things quite easily only by being baptized and by calling upon Christ’s name” (frg. 88 Harnack). Apparently, he is convinced that the Pauline doctrine of justification speaks for itself: we are surprised and really perplexed at such things, if a man, when once washed from such defilements and pollutions, will be pure. If by wiping off stains from fornication, adultery, drunkenness, theft, homosexuality [ἀρσενοκοιτία], poisoning, and innumerable disgusting things means you will be freed from them quite easily only being baptized and calling Christ’s name. This is like peeling off his whole guilt just as a snake pulls off his old slough (Porphyry frg. 88 Harnack).

Paul’s teachings (1 Cor 6,11), taken literally, lead to morally destructive consequences “encouraging the man who hears them to sin”30. Julian, who refers to the same passage in 1 Corinthians31, also sees the core of Christianity summarized in the Pauline doctrine of justification: Jesus cried aloud to all comers: “He that is a seducer, he that is a murderer, he that is sacrilegious and infamous, let him approach without fear! For with this water will I wash him and will straightaway make him clean” (Caesares 336AB).

The caricature-like exaggeration32 does not diminish, but rather emphasizes, the documentary value of this passage. The idea that through 29. PORPHYRY, frg. 84 HARNACK: τί τὸ χρήσιμον τοῦ σταυροῦ; See also CELSUS 7.2. The textual context in which Porphyry asks the question has been lost to time. 30. PORPHYRY, frg. 88 HARNACK; see ibid.: These words (1 Cor 6,11) “have the power to place aside the training of the law and cause righteousness itself to be impotent against the unrighteous. They introduce a kind of lawless society into the world. And he teaches one should have no fear at all when a man places aside a pile of innumerable injustices, simply by being baptized”. 31. See JULIAN, frg. 59, 245CD: “Paul wrote concerning water being able to cleanse and winning power to purify when it shall go down into the soul? And baptism does not take away his leprosy from the leper, or scabs, or pimples, or warts, or gout, or dysentery, or dropsy, or a whitlow, in fact, no disorder of the body, great or small, then shall it do away with adultery and theft and in short all the transgressions of the soul?”. 32. This makes sense in the context of the quote, which is from the chapter dedicated to Constantine in JULIAN’s Lives of the Emperors. JULIAN summarizes Jesus’ message in

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

195

sacramental activities (and also through the divine election of grace, though this is not addressed here by Julian) sinners and criminals are received into the circle of the “righteous” who are pleasing to God and are redeemed was ridiculous and anathema to ancient common sense; and all the more so in light of the “chronique scandaleuse of the heroes of faith”33 of the Judeo-Christian religion – from the mass murderer Moses to the “faithful and at the same time godless and vicious Emperor Constantine”34. If one seriously considers the idea that the salvation of sinners is independent of their moral accomplishments, a “preference for sinners”35 emerges which is incompatible with basic moral standards: God “relieves bad men, while he casts out good men who have done nothing of that kind, which is very unfair” (Celsus 3.7; 3.62c). The assurance that one who is depraved can be morally exonerated and become “righteous” before God means that moral behaviour is not a condition of salvation – and this, from the perspective of the pagan philosophers, is the new and the truly scandalous in the Christian concept of morality: it is not obedience to moral rules (the “law”), it is “not virtue that brings man into heaven” (Porphyry, frg. 58 Harnack). The doctrine that man’s moral endeavours are worthless in their own right and the concept of righteousness as a gift conferred gratuitously through God’s mercy is also the first priority for Reimarus and other early modern opponents of Christianity. For the attainment of salvation, moral virtue is neither a necessary condition (for heaven is open to criminals too36) nor a sufficient one (for it is worthless without faith). Reimarus, referencing Julian37, counters this with examples of many men of great virtue and the above mentioned words to explain why Christianity might be attractive to a man with a criminal record such as Constantine’s: To a religion with such a comprehensive offer of amnesty “Constantine came gladly”; Caesares 336B. 33. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 264: “Chronique scandaleuse [der] GlaubensHelden”. 34. “Gläubigen und gleich gottlosen bösartigen Kayser Constantino M.”; REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 153, who also (p. 157) quotes Julian’s comment on Constantine in the Caesares. 35. CELSUS 3.64a. See also 3.59: “whosoever is a wretch, the kingdom of God will receive him. […] What others would a robber invite and call?”. 36. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 156: “Denn das Christenthum hat schon von Alters her darin einen Vorzug vor allen andern Religionen gesucht, daß es auch den ruchlosesten Sündern Vergebung, und Trost für ihre Gewissens-Bisse verkündigte; welches seine Feinde nicht gantz unrecht zu einem bittern Vorwurf gebraucht haben”; see JULIAN, frg. 59, 245C. 37. See JULIAN, frg. 39, 184BC: While the Christians denigrate the conduct of noble men such as “Plato, Socrates, Aristides, Kimon, Thales”, they consider Moses to be a man of God. But “even the most wicked and most brutal of the generals behaved more mildly to the greatest offenders than Moses did to those who had done no wrong”.

196

W. SCHRÖDER

integrity: Since “all deeds which are good and agreeable to God are born from faith” and therefore “natural virtues are nothing but illusory virtues and splendid vices”38, self-evident examples of moral action are disqualified – no one, “not even Socrates”, is safe39. In the first place this is an appeal to our moral intuitions: if a person who fulfils moral requirements through appropriate actions is to be judged “good” and “fair”, it cannot be that actions conforming to this norm are worthless from the perspective of the divine judge. And it offends moral sensibility that such goodness does not safeguard the pagan or unbeliever from loss of salvation. But that is not all: the qualification of norm-compliant action as “sin” and the corresponding dispositions as “vice”, as well as the refusal to rate them as “morally good” or “just”, are based on a radical revision – indeed a confusion – of central concepts of value. “Theological language”40, as Reimarus sees it, leads to a complete semantic erosion of concepts such as “justice” or “virtue”, in which their core meaning is attacked. Acting in accordance with moral demands, no matter how much disagreement there may be in matters of morality, is in general called “righteous” and “virtuous”. Apart from the authority of Paul, according to whom “whatsoever is not of faith is sin” (Rom 14,23), there seems to be no reason to dispute these concepts. But if these concepts are the measuring standard, it not only means that the morally conducted lives of virtuous pagans deserve full recognition, but also that the Christian doctrine that man’s virtuous conduct is dependent on God’s supernatural assistance is fundamentally wrong. Enlightenment thinkers such as Anthony Collins41 or Reimarus in their confrontation with Christian morality repeatedly checked their judgement 38. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 155. “die natürlichen [...] Tugenden [...] sind nichts als Schein-Tugenden, und splendida scelera [...]”. See AUGUSTINE, De civitate Dei 19.25: “although some suppose that virtues are true and honourable when they are made subject to themselves and are sought for no further end, […] they must be reckoned as vices rather than as virtues [ideo non virtutes, sed vitia iudicanda sunt]”. For they do not spring up from the faith in the Son of God, and “whatsoever is not from faith is sin” (Rom 14,23). The wording usually quoted – but not found in Augustine – is “the virtues of the pagans are splendid vices [splendida vitia]”; see e.g. Johann August EBERHARD, Neue Apologie des Sokrates, oder Untersuchung der Lehre von der Seligkeit der Heiden, Berlin – Stettin, Nicolai, 1776, p. 300; I. KANT, Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft, in ID., Gesammelte Schriften, ed. Königlich Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, Reimer, 1902ff., vol. 6, p. 58. 39. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 155: “da bleibt kein Socrates, kein Antonin verschont”. 40. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 155: “theologische Sprache”. 41. Collins refers to JULIAN, Caesares 336AB: “[The] Conversion of the Emperor Constantine gave occasion to Julian to satyrize thus our Holy Religion: Whoever, says he, is guilty of Rapes, Murders, Sacrilege, or any other abominable Crime; let him be wash’d with Water, and he will become pure and holy: and if he relapses into the same Impiety,

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

197

against that of the ancient addressees of the biblical message. After all, the Christianity these latter referred to was close to the original and had not yet been glossed over by the modifications and mitigations that were to follow in the course of dogma history. Celsus, Porphyry and Julian’s fresh impressions of Christian teaching were focussed primarily on the “new doctrines” introduced by the Christians (Celsus 7.53). This perspective is illuminating for Reimarus: The Christian doctrine of an “easy atonement”42 by grace is in fact, as Celsus43 and Julian44 in particular point out, a novelty in the history of moral concepts. It contradicts the consensus of all philosophers and of common sense, and it has fatal moral and psychological consequences. By offering the prospect of “illusory security in spite of a heinous life and excessive vices”45, the doctrine of a vicarious atonement undermines the motivation for moral action and for the pursuit of “perfection and virtue”46. Regardless of their own actions, through “another’s merit [ein fremdes Verdienst]” – the merit of Christ – and through grace, “the gateway to eternal happiness” is always open to mankind47. It is not through our own efforts, but through the “satisfaction”48 achieved by the crucifixion of Jesus, and the grace which God grants or withholds by virtue of his “sovereign will”49 that we become “righteous” before God. Reimarus comments on the relevant passage, Rom 9,22-23, he will again become pure and holy, by thumping his Breast and beating his Head”; A Discourse of Free-Thinking, London, n.pr., 1713, ed. G. GAWLICK, Stuttgart – Bad Cannstatt, Frommann-Holzboog, 1965, p. 118. 42. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 156: “leichte Entsündigung”. 43. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 157: “Des Celsus Worte bey dem Origene lib. III. p. 147 [CELSUS 3.59] sind vorzüglich merkwürdig, da er sagt: bey ihren Geheimnissen riefe der Herold vorher aus: Heran! wer unschuldige Hände hat, sich nichts Arges bewußt ist, und gerecht gelebt hat, dem verspräche man die Entsündigung; bey den Christen aber würden alle Sünder, Ungerechte, Diebe, Mörder, zu der Reinigung und zu den Geheimnissen eingeladen”. 44. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, pp. 156-157: “Der Kayser Julianus zielt auf diese so gar leichte Entsündigung im Christenthum, wenn er am Ende seiner Satyre auf die Kayser, den Constantinum M. mit seinem Sohn, als Christen, und doch höchst lasterhafte, so redend eingeführt: Wer Weibsleute geschändet, wer sich mit Mordthaten befleckt hat, der komme nur getrost hierher; ich will ihn alsobald rein machen, wenn er mit diesem Wasser wird gewaschen seyn. Und wofern er sich von neuem mit eben diesen Verbrechen verschuldet hat: so will ich ihn dennoch wieder reinschaffen, wenn er sich nur vor den Kopf und die Brust schlägt”. 45. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 153: “falsche Sicherheit bey dem ruchlosen Leben und allen ausschweifenden Lastern”. 46. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 157. 47. Ibid., vol. 1, pp. 156-157: “Wenn nun die Menschen […] durch den Glauben an ein fremdes Verdienst eine allemal offene Thür zu ihrer Seligkeit finden: wie können sie in sich einen Bewegungsgrund, Reitz und Trieb haben, die Tugend um ihrer eigenen Vollkommenheit willen zu lieben und zu üben?”. 48. Ibid., vol. 2, pp. 488 and 494. 49. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 557: “absoluten Willens”.

198

W. SCHRÖDER

as follows: “Woe to the poor lump of clay, from which God, through pure caprice, has created not a chamber pot, a receptacle for excretions, but a vessel of temporal and eternal ruin”50. People who let themselves be guided by these ideas will have little impetus, according to Reimarus, “to love virtue for the sake of their own perfection”51. One who believes that we can “always be reconciled with God through the application of an external justice”52 will hardly be in a position to recognize the “intrinsic value of virtue”53. IV A last – and in particular from a philosophical point of view most important – contentious point debated in the struggles between the pagan philosophers and the Christians was the Christian conception of belief. Greekspeaking writers – the authors of the New Testament, Christian theologians, as well as their pagan adversaries – used the word πίστις. Generally speaking, the word πίστις may be translated with either “faith” or “belief”. The discussions in late antiquity were not about πίστις in the sense of “faith” that is “relying upon someone”. They were about belief as a “propositional attitude”. To put it in Greek: they were about πιστεύειν ὅτι, that is “believing that a certain statement or a certain doctrine is true”, for example the belief that Jesus is the Messiah promised in the so-called Old Testament or the belief that he was born of a virgin. Or that he was resurrected three days after his crucifixion. It is the Christians’ belief in doctrines like these which their pagan critics called ἄλογος … πίστις: “irrational”, “blind belief”54. At first glance, this accusation seems to be hardly more than crude polemical rhetoric. On closer inspection, however, these harsh words turn out to be an abbreviation of a substantial epistemological objection against the Christian conception under attack.

50. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 556: “Wehe dem armen Erdenkloß, welchen Gott nach bloßer Willkühr, nicht etwa zum Nachtscherben und Unflahts-Behältniß, sondern zum Gefäße des zeitlichen und ewigen Verderbens gemacht hat”. 51. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 157. 52. Ibid.: “durch die Zueignung einer fremden Gerechtigkeit […] stets zu versöhnen”; see also the formula “Glaube an eine fremde Gerechtigkeit”, pp. 121 and 155. 53. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 157: “inneren Werth der Tugend”. 54. PORPHYRY, frg. 1 HARNACK: The Christians have “chosen their teachings with irrational and uncritical belief [ἀλόγῳ καὶ ἀνεξετάστῳ πίστει]”. See also frg. 73 HARNACK: The Christians are ready to “boldly follow whatever [the Christian preachers] say, without any examination at all [ἀνεξετάστως]”, and frg. 73 HARNACK: the Christians demand “irrational faith [ἄλογος … πίστις]”.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

199

Celsus observed that according to the Christians πίστις is something that can be demanded. It is an action which we are required to perform, and which we are free to perform or to omit. Christians typically use the imperative: πίστευσον – “just believe!”, and they forbid the examination of the proposed doctrine before accepting it. As Celsus puts it, the Christians “use such expressions as ‘Do not examine, just believe [μὴ ἐξέταζε ἀλλὰ πίστευσον]!’”. That means: What Christians require is “assent [συγκατάθεσις]” (Celsus 3.39) to their “doctrines [δόγματα]” (Celsus 1.2) before evaluating the relevant evidence. Of course, there may be (and there are, as some Stoics thought) some cases, e.g. when sense perception is involved, in which we can voluntarily give or withhold our assent to a certain belief. But in general ancient philosophers acknowledged that it is simply impossible to decide to believe a doctrine or a theory to be true. Belief is a mental state which necessarily follows from the given evidence. Believing a statement or doctrine to be true depends on the available evidence. We need to examine the reasons which tell in favour of it, that is, as Celsus says with a quotation from Plato: “to give or receive a reason [διδόναι ἢ λαμβάνειν λόγον]’” (1.9). On the basis of this standard epistemological view the three pagan critics charge the Christians with misconceiving the process of acquiring a belief. They reverse, Celsus says, the right order which has to be complied with when we form a belief. For they demand to “believe before anything else [πρῶτον πίστευσον]” (Celsus 6.10), i.e., before evaluating the respective evidence. Again in Celsus’ words: “[Christian] faith takes possession of our minds from the outset [προκαταλαβοῦσα], and makes us yield the assent [συγκατάθεσις] which we give to the doctrine of Jesus” (Celsus 3.39). The term πίστις … προκαταλαβοῦσα can also be translated as “rendering an affirmative judgment before proper examination of the relevant evidence”, or, in short: “prejudiced belief”. The pagan philosophers also emphasize that Christian πίστις necessarily presupposes the view that we can voluntarily decide to believe a statement or a doctrine to be true. The reason is as follows: according to Christ belief is a merit. As a meritorious action it will be rewarded with eternal salvation, whereas unbelief will be punished with eternal damnation. See, for example, Christ’s word in the gospel of Mark (16,16) which Porphyry refers to: “Whoever believes … will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned”55. It goes without saying that only 55. PORPHYRY, frg. 91 HARNACK: “Christ [Marc. 16,16] threatens eternal punishment to those who do not believe in Him [Minatur, inquit, Christus sibi non credentibus aeterna supplicia]”. See also CELSUS 6.11: “the common and ready cry of all [Christian] parties is, ‘Believe, if thou wilt be saved, or else begone!’”.

200

W. SCHRÖDER

voluntary actions can be meritorious. That means: The Christian idea that salvation is the reward for having the true belief implies that belief is the result of a voluntary decision. This comes up to a really fatal conclusion: Christian πίστις is based on an absurd epistemological view which we nowadays call doxastic voluntarism, i.e., the thesis that voluntary decisions play a crucial role in the process of acquiring a belief or conviction. There are various kinds of doxastic voluntarism. Philosophers have never ignored what in fact can hardly be denied: human will does play a role in the realm of cognition. For we are capable of willingly directing our attention to certain propositions; we are free to examine or neglect arguments; we can gather relevant information or suppress it; in some cases of sense perception we can voluntarily give or withhold our assent to a certain belief (that the ice is thick enough to cross a frozen river). These are uncontroversial observations. By contrast, the Christian conception of belief goes far beyond this. The Christian view is a strong doxastic voluntarism. It implies that we are capable of exercising a direct control of our epistemic activities. In other words: we can directly decide what to believe. It is important to underline that this is by no means a distorted account of the Christian conception of πίστις. On the contrary: it is the standard view which Christian philosophers and theologians explicitly stated and emphatically affirmed – precisely in the sense in which the pagan philosophers depicted and attacked it. In fact, Clement of Alexandria defines πίστις as “the assent prior to proof [ἀφανοῦς πράγματος … συγκατάθεσις … πρὸ ἀποδείξεως]”. Cyril of Jerusalem refers to faith / belief as an action, when he speaks of πίστις as a voluntary “seizing / gripping faith [πίστιν κτῆσαι]”56. By contrast, if we withhold our assent, we are guilty of “the callousness of wilful error [callositas voluntarii erroris]”, as we read in Tertullian (Ad nationes 2.1.5). A person who embraces false beliefs undoubtedly “commits adultery against the truth”, is an “adulter veritatis” (De idololatria 1.2). As the quotations just given show, this conception introduces a moral dimension into the domain of cognition. Having a wrong opinion cannot be understood in the way we usually understand it: as just a mistake, a misperformance. In the Christian perspective it is a reprehensible offence, a moral “crime [crimen]” (De idololatria 1.2). Even those who 56. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, Stromata 2.27.4; CYRIL OF JERUSALEM, Catechesis 5.12. See also CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, Stromata 2.9.2: “Belief stems from the power of choosing [προαίρεσις]” and is “voluntary [ἐθελοντήν]”; Stromata 2.11.1: “faith/belief [πίστις] is a morally praiseworthy achievement of the power of choosing [προαιρέσεως κατόρθωμα]”; GREGORY OF NYSSA, Catechesis magna 31: “accepting the Gospel message is a matter of the free will [τὸ αὐτεξούσιον]”, of the “power of choosing [προαίρεσις]” and possesses “virtuous merit [ἀρετή]”.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

201

have doubts and insist on examining the available evidence must be blamed and will be punished in the afterlife. For they contumaciously refuse to give their assent, although they could and should give it. In other words: scepticism, error, unbelief, and even the insistence on being persuaded by argument are offences according to the standards of Christian religious morality, whose cardinal virtue is obedience which is realized by the believer’s submission to divine authority. – To sum up, according to the pagan philosophers a strong doxastic voluntarism is (firstly) an indispensable element of the Christian conception of belief. It is (secondly) an absurd epistemological view, which (thirdly) has the fatal consequence of proscribing and ostracising doubt and critical thinking. We shall immediately perceive the echoes of these objections, when we turn to what Reimarus has to say about the Christian conception of belief in his Apologie. Quoting Celsus and Porphyry, Reimarus, too, charges the Christians of requiring “a blind belief which stifles rational insight”57. At the core of the Christian conception of belief / faith Reimarus discloses the absurd idea that “belief / faith is an action which is under the control of rational men” and that men can accept any doctrine as true, “if they want to believe it or if they are called for to believe it”58. Reimarus admits that the “investigation of truth is within our power, and it is an action”59. But “belief / faith” itself is not. It is not an action, “it is not voluntary”60. Furthermore, Reimarus addresses a fatal consequence of this conception of belief / faith. This conception is not only unfounded from an epistemological point of view. It also has fatal effects in societies dominated by the Christian religion. For, if belief is something we can voluntarily acquire, it can be enforced. In other words, doxastic voluntarism provides a justification of the compulsion to believe. And in fact, Christian intolerance, the suppression and persecution of people of different faith were legitimised by referring to this notion. The capability of voluntarily deciding to believe is crucial. If – and only if – we possess this capability, we can 57. REIMARUS, Apologie (n. 9), vol. 1, p. 67: “ein blinder Glaube, mit Erstickung aller vernünftigen Einsicht”. From a theological point of view “belief / faith is […] a good work and virtue of a man which deserves the greatest reward” (“das Glauben an und für sich ein […] gutes Werk, und Tugend des Menschen sey, welches die gröste Belohnung verdienet”; vol. 1, p. 122). See also vol. 1, p. 120: “Wer nur glaubt, und für wahr hält was die Kirche glaubt, der verdient schon dadurch […] das ewige Leben; wer dasselbe nicht glaubt, verdient Gottes Zorn und die ewige Verdammniß”. 58. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 122: “[…] dass das Glauben eine Handlung sey, die vernünftige Menschen in ihrer Macht und Vermögen haben, daß sie glauben können wenn sie nur wollen, und daß sie glauben können, was sie nur wollen oder sollen”. 59. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 123: “[Die] Untersuchung der Wahrheit […] haben wir in unserer Macht und Willkühr, und es ist eine Handlung”. 60. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 482: “Glaube ist keine willkührliche Sache”.

202

W. SCHRÖDER

be forced to adopt the right faith. Only on this condition religious coercion, i.e. intolerance, is a feasible project61. But, as doxastic voluntarism is false, it is “foolish and futile to compel mankind with violence and coercive means to the right faith”62. * Reimarus’ extensive utilisation of the fragments of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian is illuminating. It illustrates that the apologetic writings of the theologians and philosophers who were dedicated to the task of fighting paganism had a most undesirable side effect by making available several arguments of late antique critics of Christianity which proved to be fatal blows to pivotal elements of Christian theology. At first glance, if one looks at Reimarus’ chef-d’oeuvre superficially, one might feel reminded of the common practise of 18th-century scholars who used to boast of their erudition by abundantly adding quotations from ancient authors. In Reimarus’ case, however, things are fundamentally different. By taking into account the arguments of the ancient philosophers, who attacked early Christianity as contemporaries, Reimarus achieved most important benefits. First of all: some of the arguments were original and forceful objections against crucial elements of Christian theology. What is more, Reimarus obtained the reassurance that he was not criticizing Christianity from an anachronistic perspective. For it was already the ancient readers of the Bible who perfectly understood that the miracles stories were crude concoctions, that the book of Daniel was an obvious falsification, or that the typological interpretation of the Torah (e.g. of Isaiah’s words about the virgin) was untenable. The Christian ideas about morality and faith/belief were not only unacceptable from a modern – 18th-century – point of view; they were absurdities also from a synchronic perspective. Christian doctrines were not only false, but an aberration, a false path in the history of the Western culture. Already in antiquity common sense was against Christianity. This was an important lesson freethinkers like Reimarus learned from the pagans. And it was, 61. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 118: “Man erhebt [...] das Glauben als ein verdienstlich seligmachend Werk; so wie man alle, die ohne Glauben sind, verdammet, hasset und verfolgt”. 62. Ibid., vol. 1, pp. 177-178: “Die Menschen können ja nicht alle einerley Einsicht haben, und wir müssen zufrieden seyn, wenn sie nur in den allgemeinen ersten Wahrheiten übereinstimmen. Gott selbst duldet auf dem Erdboden so manche thörigte und lästerliche Meynungen und Gebräuche, womit ihn die Menschen zu verehren glauben […]. Da sich nun die Menschen einmal in ihren Gedanken von der Gottheit getheilt […], so ist es thöricht und vergeblich, daß einer das gantz menschliche Geschlecht zwingen will, seiner Vorstellung beyzutreten, oder alle, die anders denken, mit Gewalt und Zwangsmittel […] zum Glauben zu nöthigen”.

REIMARUS’ DEBT TO CELSUS, PORPHYRY, AND JULIAN

203

among others, the Christian apologists’ fight against paganism, that drew his attention to the argumentative armoury available in the fragments of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian. Philipps-Universität Marburg Wilhelm-Röpke-Straße 6 DE-35032 Marburg Germany [email protected]

Winfried SCHRÖDER

IMAGINING THE PAGAN THE ROMANTIC ROOTS OF A PRESENT-DAY RELIGIOUS IDENTITY

I. INTRODUCTION The pagan has captured the imagination of individuals, cultures and nations, and it has inspired many to look back on the past in order to construct a meaningful present and future. Scholars of religion have often stated that the contemporary Pagan religion has Romantic roots1. Therefore, from a Religious Studies perspective, the central thesis here is that the positive image of the Germanic pagan that arose when German Romantics were searching for a shared national identity led to the discovery and revaluation of the ancient pagan religion, and the gradual invention2 of the contemporary religious Pagan identity. We will therefore shed light on the transformation of the perception of the pagan from an attributed German Romantic concept to an appropriated religious self-definition. By means of a literature study, we will first dig for the German Romantic roots by examining the Germanenmythos, the revaluation of folk culture as the longed for dwelling place of the Volksgeist, nature as the environment that can rekindle the Volksgeist of the emerging German nation and the experience of the Weltseele, and the relationship between Christianity and paganism during Romanticism. In the second part, we will shed light on the Romantic aftermath, and the birth of contemporary Paganism. Lastly, we will look more closely at the tension between two very diverse ontological influences of German Romanticism on the contemporary image of the pagan, namely the pagan as expressing the particular Volksgeist, and the pagan as honouring the universal Weltseele. Next to the Germanenmythos we will point to the invention of a new myth: the Paganmythos. 1. C.M. CUSACK, Richard Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen: Medieval, Pagan, Modern, in Relegere: Studies in Religion and Reception 3 (2013) 329-352, p. 336; R. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. viii, 21; C. PARTRIDGE, The Re-Enchantment of the West: Alternative Spiritualities, Sacralization, Popular Culture and Occulture, London, T&T Clark International, 2004, p. 87; M.F. STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives, in ID. (ed.), Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives, Santa Barbara, CA, ABC-CLIO, 2005, 1-54, pp. 42-45. 2. E. HOBSBAWM – T. RANGER, The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2012; J.R. LEWIS – O. HAMMER (eds.), The Invention of Sacred Tradition, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007.

206

Y. SCHATTEVOET

Therewith, we can trace the changing image of the pagan from German Romanticism to the present in the form of contemporary Paganism with the focus on the German context. II. GERMAN ROMANTICISM Contemporary Paganism has many roots; some reaching back deep into the earth, while others seem freshly sprouted. Two major influences on Paganism that are often mentioned by those studying religion are the nineteenth century occult revival in the context of Western Esotericism, and the Romantic Movement3. The latter root in the context of Germanic paganism is our focus here. Many years after the conversion to Christianity in Europe, a renewed sympathy for paganism arose during the Enlightenment in the form of interest in the Greek and Roman philosophers4. The idea of the Classical world as the cradle of European civilisation was something that appealed to the Romantics, and so a longing for a bygone past arose. Nationalism also grew strong during Romanticism, whereby the universal model of Classical culture made room for the own particular culture. For German Romantics, this was German culture, whereby it was attempted to create a strong German unity. This was already initiated by the Jena Romantics of the Frühromantik who tried to transform the aftershocks of disenchanting Enlightenment, the French Revolution, and the reign of Napoleon into a meaningful new mythology for Germany. When it comes to religion, Christendom had showed cracks due to the serious threat of Protestantism, and so the German Romantics hoped to unify Germany in a religious sense as well. With the lack of a common religious identity, a national identity was constructed as the particular model for the emerging German nation as a whole5. 3. For instance, see: H. BOGDAN, The Influence of Aleister Crowley on Gerald Gardner and the Early Witchcraft Movement, in J.R. LEWIS – M. PIZZA (eds.), Handbook of Contemporary Paganism (Brill Handbooks on Contemporary Religion, 2), Leiden – Boston, MA, Brill, 2009, 81-107; CUSACK, Richard Wagner (n. 1), p. 336; W.J. HANEGRAAFF, New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought, New York, State University of New York Press, 1998, pp. 77-79, 85-89; HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), pp. viii, 21; PARTRIDGE, The Re-Enchantment of the West (n. 1), pp. 79, 87; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 42-25; K. VON STUCKRAD, Was Ist Esoterik? Kleine Geschichte des geheimen Wissens, München, Beck, 2004, pp. 192196. 4. P. GAY, The Enlightenment: An Interpretation (The Rise of Modern Paganism, 1), New York, Norton, 1977. 5. CUSACK, Richard Wagner (n. 1), p. 335; HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), pp. 11, 12, 21; B. MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen: Götter, Mythen, Weltbild, München,

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

207

The German Romantics started to look into their own pagan past, which was imagined as the great golden age when the German people were one. To bring back these good old times, the German national identity was constructed by means of attributing and appropriating what the Romantics believed was the pre-Christian Germanic ancestor. This perceived continuation of the ancient Germanics and the contemporary Germans is the Germanenmythos6. This myth became of utmost importance for the German Romantics as it enabled them to search for the true expression of German culture based on one language, a common history, and a shared culture, including religion7. To illustrate this myth in the works of German Romantic intellectuals, Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller (17591805) wrote about the ancient Germanics in his Antrittsrede über das Studium der Universalgeschichte: “So waren wir”, and one of the Brothers Grimm, Jacob Ludwig Karl (1785-1863), refers to his Deutschen Mythologie as “unserer Mythologie” belonging to “unseren Vorfahren”8. With the German Romantics, a “romanticised” image of the ancient Germanics arose to construct the national identity of the German folk, which we will examine in this first part. It is therefore not our aim here to give insight into the ancient pagan wie er gewesen ist, but into the perception of the pagan through the eyes of the German Romantics and their Zeitgeist9. The Religious Studies scholar Bernhard Maier articulates this as follows: Beck, 2003, p. 143; A. IVAKHIV, The Revival of Ukrainian Native Faith, in STRMISKA (ed.), Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), 209-239, p. 215; E. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos: Eine Analyse österreichischer Geschichtslehrbücher zwischen 1891 und 1945 (Anthropologie des Mittelalters, 1), Berlin, LIT Verlag, 2006, p. 22; PARTRIDGE, The Re-Enchantment of the West (n. 1), pp. 8, 9, 87; P. RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen: Geschiedenis van een illusie, Amsterdam, Wereldbibliotheek, 2011, pp. 55, 77, 124, 129, 130, 131, 135, 148, 149, 246, 345; P. RIETBERGEN, Europe: A Cultural History, London, Routledge, 2006, pp. 290, 297, 332; Y. SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots! The Romantic Perception of Germanic Pagans and Its Impact on Contemporary Paganism, in Brilliant Assistants, Nijmegen, Radboud University, 2014, 1-14, p. 5; M. TATAR, Grimms Märchen, in E. FRANÇOIS – H. SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte I, München, Beck, 2009, 275-289, pp. 575-577; G.S. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany: Religion and Aesthetic Culture from Romanticism to Nietzsche, Chicago, IL, The University of Chicago Press, 2004, pp. 2, 23, 24. 6. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), pp. 22-27; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 55, 124, 130, 131, 134, 146, 163, 345; RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. 58, 59; SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), pp. 5, 7. 7. RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. 367, 368. 8. MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 144. 9. W.T.M. FRIJHOFF, Religie en de mist van de geschiedenis: Hoe behoefte aan herinnering onze cultuur transformeert, Nijmegen, Van Eck & Oosterink, 2010, pp. 12, 22; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), pp. 142, 143; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), p. 355.

208

Y. SCHATTEVOET

Angesichts des weitgehenden Schweigens der Quellen erweist sich eine Kultur so gut wie die andere als ideale leere Leinwand, auf die jede Generation aufs neue ihre individuellen und kollektiven Wunschbilder projizieren kann10.

1. The Noble Pagan Ancestor of Times Gone By The search for a common ancestor and a shared heritage as origin myth for cultural, religious or political legitimation is nothing new, as various cultures throughout history imagined themselves having, for instance, Classical roots, or believed themselves to be descendants of the patriarch Abraham11. The Germanenmythos implies that the roots of German culture can be traced back to the Germanic pagans. Perhaps ironically, the writings of the Greeks and Romans had already introduced German intellectuals to their own ancient culture. For instance, the German Humanist Ulrich von Hutten (1488-1523) read Publius Cornelius Tacitus’ (±56117) Annals, which narrates how chieftain Arminius (known in German as Hermann der Cherusker) led the Germanic tribes to fight the Roman invaders in 9 CE12. Another German Humanist, Beatus Rhenanus (14851547), even considers Tacitus’ Germania the “goldene Büchlein” of the Germans13. Due to the interpretation of the Classical writings from a German point of view, the ancient Germanic pagans began to be positively perceived as the warrior ancestors of the contemporary Germans who loved their land and worshipped nature. Moreover, these pagans fought for their freedom against the Romans, which appealed to Germans as they had the memory of being ruled themselves, this time by the French14. Inspired by the Aristotelian climate theory, Montesquieu (1689-1755) added the qualities of proudness and honesty to these pagans of the north15. This not only breathed new life 10. “In the light of the silence of the sources, a culture as good as any other is shown as a blank canvas, on which every generation can project its individual and collective ideals time and time again” (my translation); MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 167. 11. IVAKHIV, The Revival of Ukrainian Native Faith (n. 5), p. 215; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 143. 12. W.M. DOYÉ, Arminius, in E. FRANÇOIS – H. SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte III, München, Beck, 2009, 587-602, p. 587. 13. M. WERNER, Die “Germania”, in FRANÇOIS – SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte III (n. 12), 569-586, p. 569. 14. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), pp. 26, 27; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), p. 163; S. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival: Transformations of Germanic Neopaganism (Studies in Critical Research on Religion, 5), Leiden – Boston, MA, Brill, 2016, p. 18; WERNER, Die “Germania” (n. 13), p. 577. 15. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 20, 21.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

209

into the positive image of the particular pagan, a discovery of what was believed to be the remnants of the past in contemporary folk culture, an appreciation of the vernacular, and love for nature, but it also made Classical culture seem foreign, dull and out-dated16. With the Germanic pagan revalued, these imagined forebears of great German culture could be the ideal common ancestor of the German people of the emerging nation state17. Here we can see the characteristic Romantic emotion of Sehnsucht to bring an imagined great past of a folk that was truly German to the present as the building block for one strong and mighty German nation18. The German Romantics then wondered how they could revive this magnificent bygone past for the nation of the proud and free German. 2. The Spirit of Folk Culture As the pre-Christian past was “romanticised” in the sense that it was seen as the glory days of a time when the German people were a happy unity, the German Romantics became very interested in reviving this state of wellbeing. They wanted to learn as much about the Germanic ancestors as possible. By turning to folk culture as the treasure chest for a glimpse of the pagan past, the historical notion of the “Germanic” people became more and more interchangeable with the contemporary “German” folk. The German Romantics therewith created the Germanenmythos19. However, when searching for primary sources about ancient Germanic culture and religion, it was soon realised that data were very scarse. Written sources were often authored by Classical writers offering a stereotypical image of the Germanic pagan as barbaric, and archaeological findings were mainly classified as Roman or Celtic. Many German Romantic intellectuals – most notably those of the emerging academic fields of Folklore Studies and Linguistics, among them the theologian and philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803), the poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), and the Brothers Grimm (Jacob Ludwig Karl, 1785-1863, and Wilhelm Karl, 1786-1859) – felt obligated to gather everything they could get their hands on that would only hint about the ancient Germanics. 16. IVAKHIV, The Revival of Ukrainian Native Faith (n. 5), p. 215; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 143; MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), p. 22; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 55, 124, 130, 131, 246, 345; RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. xxxii, 332; SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), p. 5; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 2. 17. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), pp. 11, 12. 18. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 2. 19. S. BEHRENBECK, “Heil”, in FRANÇOIS – SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte III (n. 12), 310-327, p. 320.

210

Y. SCHATTEVOET

They believed that remnants of the ancient pagans had survived the ravages of time, and that it was preserved in the German folk culture in remote places. The Romantics were drawn to the countryside and eagerly collected so-called “folk poetry” or Naturpoesie – folk songs, folklore, myths, legends, fairy tales, and other material – as they thought it could very well be that this heritage would be lost forever due to modernisation if not written down any time soon. These diverse sources were used to construct a German identity as the folk culture had to be the golden ticket to a renewed national unity, with a shared religion, culture and language20. Coined by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831), Herder called the “golden ticket” that granted access to what it meant to be German the Volksgeist, and developed the concept further21. In the light of particularism, Herder believed that a Volk – meaning both a people and nation – was an organic totality with a unifying collective personality, and that the Volksgeist is the one-of-a-kind expression of a particular people. This makes every culture unique but equal22. A characteristic expression of the Volksgeist is the native language of a people, being “the language of childhood and of the happy savages, monotone, honest, and the language of nature”23. This is contrary to the “universal” Latin language – the intellectual lingua franca of Christendom – which removes a folk from its true roots. In this sense, Herder argues that the Old Testament is the morgenländisch poetry of the Jewish people, which is distinct from the German abendländisch poetry24. Remarkably in this context is that the word Deutsch can be traced back etymologically to the Proto-Germanic word þeuðō meaning “folk”, and, most significantly, to the Gothic adjective þiudiskō which literally meant “pagan”. The Latin name for one particular Germanic tribe was later derived from this word: the Teutoni, which is directly related to “Teutonic”, 20. BEHRENBECK, “Heil” (n. 19), pp. 319, 320; HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), p. 113; IVAKHIV, The Revival of Ukrainian Native Faith (n. 5), p. 215; MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), pp. 22, 23, 26, 27; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 77, 89-93, 124, 129-138, 141, 142, 146-166, 345; RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. 173, 174; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 147; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 42, 45; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 1, 2, 14, 33, 34, 73. 21. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), p. 22; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 33, 75. 22. IVAKHIV, The Revival of Ukrainian Native Faith (n. 5), pp. 215, 244; MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), p. 23; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 77, 89-92, 135, 147-151, 161, 165, 346, 347; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 21; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 33, 34. 23. RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), p. 148 (my translation). 24. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 33, 34; IVAKHIV, The Revival of Ukrainian Native Faith (n. 5), p. 215.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

211

and is still used today as a synonym for “Germanic”. Moreover, the Latin word theodiscus was first used in 786 for “in the language of the folk”. During the Middle Ages, the derived word diet stood for “people” or “folk”, and diets came to mean “the vernacular” (referring to both German and Dutch), as opposed to the “universal languages” Latin and French. German, then, can be linguistically seen as the language spoken by the German folk25. As a human being moves through various stages in life, so Herder believed that a folk is most vital during its early stages, before moving away from nature, and therewith becoming civilised and growing old. It was therefore obvious for Romantics that the purest expression of the Volksgeist could be found in the oldest folk poetry, art, customs and religion of a culture. For this reason, the philologist Christian Gottlob Heyne (1729-1812) states that the folk poetry was not composed by individuals, but developed naturally during the “childhood of the human race”. However, when a people moves away from the roots, and folk poetry is lost, it is very difficult – if not impossible – for a folk and nation to ever become a happy unity again. The idea that happiness can be found only in the youthfulness of the folk comes from the concept of the “noble savage” as developed earlier by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778). He states that the primitive Native Americans are happier and purer, because they live closer to nature. In this manner, by knowing the original expression of the German Volksgeist of the happy, wild and free pagan ancestors, German culture could be revived and the flourishing nation would be a fact. For Herder, the German nation could therefore only find happiness within itself26. Peasants, who were generally perceived as the backward folk of the hinterland, were now understood in the old pagani sense as the people of the heath, the heathens, who were the keepers of the ancient pagan wisdom. They were the key to the rediscovery of the Germanic Volksgeist for the good of the nation. The Romantics saw the old pagan religions in a new light and it was therewith positively revalued as being meaningful for the development of the national identity27. In the words of August Wilhelm 25. See: http://www.etymologiebank.nl/trefwoord/duits. 26. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), pp. 22-27; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 77, 89-92, 124, 125, 129-139, 141, 146-152, 157, 159, 345-347; RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. 173, 174; D. SPEICH, Die politische Philosophie der Nation bei Kant, Herder, Fichte und Hegel, Zürich, Universität Zürich, 1997, p. 14; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 42; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 1, 2, 14, 32-34, 73. 27. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), p. 113; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 138-142; SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), pp. 4, 6.

212

Y. SCHATTEVOET

von Schlegel (1767-1845) in his Vorlesungen über dramatische Kunst und Literatur: The poetry of the ancients was that of possession; ours is that of longing. The former stands firmly on the soil of the present; the latter sways between memory and anticipation28.

The Brothers Grimm – best known for their collection of Märchen collected Naturpoesie with the goal of creating an archive to store what they believed to be the cultural heritage of the Germans. They encountered the difficulty that these sources were often not explicit descriptions of ancient Germanic culture, so they developed a philological method which they thought would bring to the surface “the concealed origins, the problem of detecting pure, native culture hidden beneath the layers of Christian teaching”29. These, they thought, were the timeless religious pagan truths of the ancients, which could form the base for German culture and religion30. Inspired by the Brothers, the folklorist Wilhelm Mannhardt (1831-1880) wrote two volumes of Wald- und Feldkulte, in which he describes his perception of pre-Christian Germanic pagan religion – including the belief in giants, dwarves, elves, and trolls – based on the folk religion of his own day31. The academic field of Comparative Philology opened another door for an increase in available sources of knowledge about the perceived ancestors. Due to linguistic similarities, German culture became embedded in northern European culture at large, based on the idea that there must be more correspondences between Germanic and Scandinavian culture than language alone. Romantics – including Herder – looked up north, and found a rich Nordic heritage, not only of folk stories, but also the Icelandic Edda, and an abundance of archaeological findings. These sources proved to be of unprecedented value for the construction of a Germanic mythology that could be part of an overarching cultural context32. One of the most evident examples of the use of various northern European sources is the thirteenth century Nibelungenlied, which has clear commonalities with the Icelandic Völsunga Saga, and demonstrates therefore to be sharing the same Volksgeist. The Lied became the national German epic during Romanticism, whereby the protagonist Siegfried is celebrated as the Germanic hero. Moreover, the epic has been an inspiration for later artistic adaptions, for 28. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 1. 29. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 25. 30. Ibid., p. 23; TATAR, Grimms Märchen (n. 5), p. 278. 31. MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 53. 32. BEHRENBECK, “Heil” (n. 19), p. 320; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 21, 24, 26.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

213

instance Richard Wagner’s (1813-1883) Der Ring des Nibelungen, and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973)33. Later, an even greater framework for German culture was found. Scholars of Comparative Philology and Comparative Religious Studies were digging deeper for roots, and similarities between Germanic languages and the Sanskrit language were found, for instance by the linguist Franz Bopp (1791-1867). It implied that the cradle of Germanic culture could be found in Indo-European civilisation. This idea of an Indo-European descent from India eventually led to the development of an Aryan mythology34. Having developed academic disciplines to study what was believed to be the ancient Germanic heritage with the aim of reviving the Volksgeist, it became clear only later that the Naturpoesie and other fragments of folk culture were not accurate sources from a bygone golden age, but rather the Romantic perceptions of the pagan past – an invention of tradition to construct a national identity built on the revalued image of the pagan ancestor as the youthful, strong and free Ur-German35. From then, however, the image of the Germanic pagan ancestor was installed deep into the German consciousness to lead a life of its own36. 3. Enchanted Nature and the Nation With the Romantic emphasis on nationalism, there was a growing interest in the geographical area that we now know as the Federal Republic of Germany, both when it comes to the characteristic German landscape – such as the Wald, and nature as the wild environment where spiritual experiences can occur – and the memory of specific places and historical events in the form of a Denkmal. Nature as wild and free, and the nation as civilised culture are often seen as contrary. With the enthusiasm for 33. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), pp. 23, 26; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 146, 152-156; P. WAPNEWSKI, Das Nibelungenlied, in FRANÇOIS – SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte I (n. 5), 159169, p. 162. 34. J. COLLIS, The Celts: Origins, Myths & Inventions, Gloucestershire, The History Press, 2010, p. 53; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 52; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 14, 33. 35. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), pp. 22-27; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 77, 89-92, 124, 125, 129-137, 141, 146-152, 157-159, 162, 163, 346; RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. 173, 174; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 42; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 1, 2, 14, 33, 34, 73; FRIJHOFF, Religie en de Mist van de Geschiedenis (n. 9), pp. 12, 22. 36. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 24; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 1, 45.

214

Y. SCHATTEVOET

nature and going into the German wilderness as a way to escape the modern world, this is certainly true and can be understood as an aversion to modernity. However, nature and the nation are connected in the sense that the typical German natural world could rekindle the Volksgeist, which was the golden ticket to returning to the German roots. Nature also provoked the experience of a pantheistic Weltseele. Moreover, it was thought that remnants of the ancient Germanics could be found among the people of the countryside, that is, far away from modern civilisation. Returning to the natural world and the natural state of the happy ancient Germanic pagan was therefore a necessity for the development of the modern nation state and the construction of the German national identity – therewith connecting the old and the new, nature and culture, and also, again, the ancient Germanic pagan and the contemporary German. Only then, the German state and its German people could thrive again. Contrary to the older Christian idea of nature as the potentially dangerous place, and home to the pagan “demons”, the early Romantics cultivated a predilection for nature and the wilderness. For the first time in history, nature became a favoured place to spend leisure time in37. The Romantic emotion of Sehnsucht is even specified in a longing for nature in particular: Natursehnsucht. This concept emerged in a time when people had become more distant from the natural world due to the swiftly industrialising and urbanising environment. German Romantics were mesmerised by those typical German forests and mountain views, which they believed were once the sacred spaces of the pagan ancestors and the dwelling places of the gods and local spirits. The idea arose that this ancientness could still be felt in the forests as the Germanic “Waldbewußtsein von der Vorzeit”38. Wandering through the forest and being in nature in general sometimes led to profound spiritual experiences39. This can be better understood in the context of the religious Pantheism Controversy of the 1780s which was instigated by the philosopher Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677). The idea of Christian Pantheism was appealing to Herder, who, inspired by Spinoza, believed that God was the immanent living force of the universe. Whereas the Volksgeist was expressed in the poetry of the ancients, God could be known through history, art, and nature itself40. The German 37. U. LINSE, Der Wandervogel, in FRANÇOIS – SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte III (n. 12), 531-548, p. 535. 38. A. LEHMANN, Der deutsche Wald, in FRANÇOIS – SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte III (n. 12), 187-200, pp. 188, 189. 39. RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 133, 134; RIETBERGEN, Europe (n. 5), pp. 333, 384. 40. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 35.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

215

Romantic Naturphilosophie that emerged between the 1790s and 1820s spread the idea of nature being alive and revealing higher spiritual truths when deciphered by means of multidisciplinary scientific methods – although some of these methods are now considered pseudo-science. The German natural philosophy included mesmerism or animal magnetism, and inspired esoteric Christian theosophy. Being interested in both the latter and a pantheistic Naturphilosophie, the philosopher Friedrich Joseph Wilhelm von Schelling (1775-1854) developed the concept of a unifying Weltseele, which could overcome the duality of the material world and the ideal spiritual world41. With the Romantic interest in creating a national identity that could unite the German people, the memory of a meaningful common history – real or imagined – was captured in Denkmale. One of the most explicit ones considering the pagan past, is the image of the German people united under one visionary leader42. Hermann der Cherusker was perceived to be such a strong Germanic chieftain, leading the pagan tribes during the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 CE to fight the invading Romans. This battle is known as the Hermannsschlacht or Varusschlacht (depending if one chooses sides with respectively the “native, freedom-loving” Germanic tribes, or the “invading power” of Rome). Tacitus wrote in his Annals about the incredible victory of Hermann and his tribes, who utterly beat Varus and three legions of Roman soldiers. This historical narrative played an important role for German nationalism, as similarities were perceived between the intruding Roman legions and both the contemporary dominating French political power and the hand of the Roman Catholic Church. This gave the emerging nation state the hope that the German people could again fight off foreign rule43. For this reason, Hermann is celebrated as the first known German hero to be commemorated with a plaque at the Walhalla Monument. This impressive neo-Classical hall, inaugurated in 1842, can be seen as a place of collective national memory to honour all great Germans44. Hermann’s Battle appealed to the Romantic imagination, and not long after, in 1875, the Hermannsdenkmal or Hermann’s Memorial was established in that very Teutoburg Forest. Again, the German Wald was imagined as being connected with the natural place and the historical event of ancient Germanic 41. A. FAIVRE, Western Esotericism: A Concise History, Albany, NY, State University of New York Press, 2010, pp. 69, 70; N. GOODRICK-CLARKE, The Western Esoteric Traditions: A Historical Introduction, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2008, pp. 180, 181; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 46. 42. FRIJHOFF, Religie en de Mist van de Geschiedenis (n. 9), pp. 15, 21. 43. SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), pp. 11, 12. 44. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 2.

216

Y. SCHATTEVOET

pagans celebrating victory over the intruding “other”, therewith creating a shared national history for one Germany. The Hermannsdenkmal consists of a more than 53 meter high statue of the hero Hermann, raising a 7 meter sword to the sky with the inscription: Deutsche Einigkeit Meine Stärke; Meine Stärke Deutschlands Macht, and on his shield is written: Treufest45. Not far from the Hermannsdenkmal are the Externsteine, a natural rock formation that holds yet another memory of the pagan past, about which Goethe wrote his article Die Externsteine46. Either historically accurate or imagined, the natural spot came to be seen as an ancient Germanic religious site where once the mighty irminsul was erected. The irminsul was the sacred pillar or tree trunk of the pagans that was destroyed by the Christian monarch Charlemagne in 772, and symbolises therewith the defeat of paganism47. 4. The Christian and the Pagan The Christian image of the pagan has been negative from the very beginnings of Early Christianity as paganism was perceived as an error, opposed to the one true Christian religion or vera religio48. For the Christian, the pagan has always been perceived in a negative light as the religious “other”49. According to Peter Gay, it was only during the Renaissance that “pagans and Christians (…) began to walk comfortably together for the first time” – be it the Classical pagan philosophers50. The era of Romanticism can be seen as a turning point when it comes to a revaluation of the particular Germanic pagans. However, when it comes to religion, most Romantics never ceased to be Christian at heart. Herder, being Lutheran, thought universal Christianity to be perfectly compatible with the ancient Germanic wisdom as supposedly discovered in the collected folk poetry and other sources, as the Germans also were in need of salvation51. This offered an opening up, however. Herder 45. SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), p. 11. 46. J.W. VON GOETHE, Die Externsteine, in ID. (ed.), Über Kunst und Alterthum in den Rhein- und Mayn-Gegenden, vol. 5, Stuttgart, 1816-1832, 130-139. 47. SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), p. 12; R. SIMEK, Dictionary of Northern Mythology, Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2007, pp. 175, 176. 48. See D.A.T. MÜLLER, Pagans: An Early Christian Concept in the Middle Ages, in this volume, 1-12, for an extensive examination of the Christian image of the pagan. 49. BEHRENBECK, “Heil” (n. 19), p. 320. 50. P. GAY, Paganism, in A. GRAFTON – G.W. MOST – S. SETTIS (eds.), The Classical Tradition, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2010, 675-679, p. 676. 51. MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), p. 23; RAEDTS, De ontdekking van de Middeleeuwen (n. 5), pp. 77, 89-92, 129, 147, 345-347; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 22.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

217

emphasises that every folk has their own poetry, which implies that the Bible was not typically German as it was written elsewhere. For this reason, it was not the religious poetry of the German folk, but of the Hebrews. What, then, was the ancient religious poetry of the Germanics which bears the Volksgeist? What were pagan myths? Who were the pagan gods? In his 1796 Iduna oder der Apfel der Verjüngung, Herder lets the Germanic god Frey discuss with Alfred about the advantages and disadvantages of the Icelandic Edda as German national mythology52. A few more leaps had to be taken before Herder’s idea of the Volksgeist would be extended to also imply that present-day people would be happiest having rediscovered their ancient particular religion in the form of paganism53. One first step was taken in the direction of creating a completely new religion that was not aimed at developing a reborn paganism and a revival of the worship of the old gods. Creating new Germanic “poetry” now that the Volksgeist was believed to have been brought back to the German people, the Romantic idea of modern religion is one concerned with aesthetics, whereby art and science are seen as the “national gods of the Germans”54, as explicitly stated by Schlegel. Due to the academic influence of the Brothers Grimm, the idea of a Germanic pagan Götterlehre became widespread, and led to the creation of artistic and scholarly works using the Romantic image of the Germanic gods, such as Wotan. The most well-known artistic imagination is Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, whereas an influential scholarly work is Geschichte des Heidenthums im nördlichen Europa by Franz Josef Mone (1796-1871) in which it is argued that a sun cult from the Orient brought the gods to northern Europe55. Later, Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) offered his “God is dead” philosophy, which cleared the road for an alternative to non-monotheistic religion, and eventually contemporary Paganism56. It was a remaining negative Christian attitude towards the own Germanic pagans, that the Brothers Grimm believed the institution of Christianity to be the suppressors of particular Germanic paganism, which was why it was now so hard to find explicit remnants of the pagan past. Even as this can be understood in the light of the tension between Roman Catholic Germany and Protestant Germany, an anti-Christian tendency was adopted later by some contemporary Pagans, who equally hold a grudge against 52. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), p. 55; Herder’s full text can be read on the website of the Friedrich Schiller Archiv: https://www.friedrich-schillerarchiv.de/die-horen/die-horen-1796-stueck-1/i-iduna-oder-apfel-verjuengung/ 53. SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), p. 13. 54. WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 15, 55, 67. 55. Ibid., p. 188. 56. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 306.

218

Y. SCHATTEVOET

Christianity for destroying pagan wisdom, which is still current today. Moreover, for many Pagans, religiously identifying as such is seen as a deliberate break with Christianity in order to rediscover the pagan roots and revive ancient paganism for the present day57. III. FROM A NATIONAL IDENTITY TO A RELIGIOUS IDENTITY How did the Romantic longing for the idealised past to construct a national identity transform into a contemporary religious identity? It obviously did not happen overnight. The theory of the invention of tradition is of importance to understand this transformation. We will here specifically look at the branches growing out of German Romanticism with a focus on Germany. According to Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, invented traditions are a contemporary set of practices that seem archaic at first, but are actually recent constructions or inventions when looking deeper into them. The aim of these traditions is to suggest continuity with a bygone past to historically legitimise “certain values and norms of behaviour by repetition” in the present. They therewith function as the glue for a strong group cohesion. Hobsbawm and Ranger argue that this has been important within the context of both nationalism and religion. James R. Lewis and Olav Hammer have developed the theory further in the context of religion58. The invention of religion, then, is used to better understand how the Romantic image of the pagan contributed to the emergence of contemporary Paganism. At this point, the focus is shifting from the construction of a national identity to a religious one. For this we refer to the difference between history wie es gewesen ist, and the memory of history as imagined. In this religious context, Willem Frijhoff argues that new religious identities are constructed by means of appropriating and attributing the collective memory of history59. According to Frijhoff, this memory of history, which changes throughout time, “is the form in which the twenty-first century moulds its religious longing”60. In this sense, the Germanenmythos is an invention of tradition, as the imagined past of the ancient Germanics is appropriated by both the 57. GAY, Paganism (n. 50), p. 678; MONYK, Zwischen Barbarenklischee und Germanenmythos (n. 5), p. 23; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 2, 7, 8, 29, 42; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 14, 110, 297. 58. LEWIS – HAMMER (eds.), The Invention of Sacred Tradition (n. 2), pp. 1, 4-6; HOBSBAWM – RANGER, The Invention of Tradition (n. 2), pp. 1, 2, 6-8, 12, 14. 59. FRIJHOFF, Religie en de Mist van de Geschiedenis (n. 9), pp. 8, 12, 17, 22. 60. Ibid., p. 21 (my translation).

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

219

German Romantics and contemporary Pagans in order to construct an identity in the present. Herder’s idea of the Volksgeist can be seen as the bridge between the national and religious identity, as it is the image of the Germanic ancestor that sparks the longing for an imagined heroic past, whereas the Weltseele turns out to be useful for the general understanding of paganism as a universal phenomenon and the deification of nature61. 1. The Romantic Aftermath and the Emergence of the Pagan Religious Identity As the aim of this article is to shed light on the Romantic roots of contemporary Paganism, it is out of the scope to dive deeply into the Romantic aftermath. However, a brief overview – and by no means complete – of influential key movements after Romanticism is given, so we can see it slowly transforming into contemporary Paganism. During the Wilhelmine Period – starting around 1890 – the nationalistic Völkische Bewegung or Völkisch Movement arose out of Romanticism as a quest for the renewal of the German people as a unity, especially regarding nationalism and spirituality. Nature, folklore, and anti-modern ideas were important for the movement, which generally consisted of small groups. A division between Christian and pagan groups can be made, whereby the former attempted to develop a typical German Christianity – sometimes based on racial ideas of a “purified” Christianity, and an Aryan Christ – and the latter was more concerned with reviving Germanic religion, leading to the emergence of Ariosophy. Influenced by Herder’s concept of the Volksgeist, the pagan branch worshipped the Germanic folk spirit rather than pagan deities62. The publishing house of Eugen Diederich (1867-1930) played a key role when it comes to spreading Völkisch ideas in both directions. For instance, by publishing the 24 volume series Thule – Altnordische Dichtung und Prose or Sammlung Thule, which was a translation of the Icelandic sagas, skaldic poetry, and the Edda63. In Norse Revival: Transformations of Germanic Neopaganism, Stefanie von Schnurbein dates the very first religious Pagan movements to around 1900 as part of the Völkisch Movement, life reform movement, youth movement, and occultism, which all influenced each other to a greater or lesser extent64. The life reform movement is significant in this context, 61. SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5), pp. 12, 13. 62. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 3, 4, 28, 35-37; WILLIAMSON, The Longing for Myth in Germany (n. 5), pp. 2, 286, 287. 63. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 29. 64. Ibid., pp. 30-34.

220

Y. SCHATTEVOET

as many of its ideas were adopted by the emerging religious Pagan movement. This included the longing for an imagined pagan past when people lived in harmony with nature. Central to the life reform movement was the idea of going back-to-basics, having a natural lifestyle, and a corporeal spirituality with reverence for the light and the sun. Among their practices were natural hygiene, growing organic food, vegetarianism, nudism, natural physical exercise such as walking, and living in a community close to nature65. Many of those part of the life reform movement later joined Helena Blavatsky’s (1831-1891) Theosophical Society, whose spiritual ideas have been of major importance to many alternative spiritualties and new religious movements to come66. In 1901 the Wandervogel was found, which consisted of groups of young people who enjoyed being physically active in nature to experience a sense of freedom from society. On a quest to search for an authentic, natural lifestyle and mirroring their perceived Germanic ancestors, these youngsters “wandered” through the German wilderness which they admired for its natural beauty, where they danced and sang folk songs67. The artist Fidus (Hugo Höppener, 1868-1948) artistically translated the ideas of the Wandervogel to pieces of art68. A similar trend occurred in Great Britain with the woodcraft movement – for instance, the Order of Woodcraft Chivalry and the Kibbo Kift – which equally influenced the emergence of contemporary Paganism both on the isles and on the continent69. Like the life reform movement, the Turnerbewegung of Friedrich Ludwig “Turnvater” Jahn (1778-1852) also aimed for a healthy body. As a nationalist, Jahn saw this directly in the light of the German Volksgeist, as he believed it to be a sacred duty to develop a strong body by means of physical exercise to be as strong as Hermann der Cherusker. The idea of strong men being able to bring victory to the nation reoccurred later in the Männerbünde and Burschenschaften. The latter are known for their heroic Mensur, which often led to facial scars called a Schmiss. These scars were worn with pride as a sign of bravery. Needless to say, these fencing competitions were not for the fainthearted70. Out of the Völkisch Movement and Theosophy arose the Ariosophy, which connected both occult and racial ideas. Guido von List (1848-1919) 65. BEHRENBECK, “Heil” (n. 19), p. 321; WERNER, Die “Germania” (n. 13), p. 581. 66. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 34. 67. Ibid., pp. 30-32; LINSE, Der Wandervogel (n. 37), p. 531. 68. WERNER, Die “Germania” (n. 13), p. 581. 69. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), pp. 162-165. 70. G. PFISTER, “Frisch, Fromm, Fröhlich, Frei”, in E. FRANÇOIS – H. SCHULZE (eds.), Deutsche Erinnerungsorte II, München, Beck, 2009, 202-219, p. 202; WERNER, Die “Germania” (n. 13), p. 578.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

221

has been key to the Ariosophy, and developed the image of the Germanic pagan further. He believed that ancient Ario-Germanic culture was a sophisticated pre-Christian pagan culture, which, in a Herderian manner, had a particular Volksgeist. All people had their own Volksgeist, but according to Von List, the Ario-Germanic race was the noblest and therefore superior to all other races. His Wuotanist religion had to ensure the preservation and development of this perfected race. At the same time, Von List was a pantheist who believed in the Weltseele. In Das Geheimnis der Runen, published in 1908, he wrote about the runes as mystical Ario-Germanic symbols shedding light on the sacred ancient language, and his correspondences would become of importance to contemporary Pagans. The Guido von List Gesellschaft was established in 1908, and Von List himself founded the Hoher Armanen Orden three years later71. In the course of the twentieth century, many other Pagan groups arose, oftentimes inspired by art and scholarship. For instance, playwright and painter Ludwig Fahrenkrog (1867-1952) wrote Germanentempel in 1907, which included his idea of a Germanic religion. He then founded the Deutscher Bund für Persönlichkeitskultur in 191172. Fahrenkrog, together with Wilhelm Schwaner and Karl Weißleder, also founded the Germanisch-deutsche Religionsgemeinschaft in 1912 by consecrating an altar in Hermannstein. A year later, the members of this group merged with the Gesellschaft Wodan, which would become the Germanische GlaubensGemeinschaft. Then there was the Deutscher Orden which was founded in 1911 by Otto Sigfrid Reuter (1876-1945), which subsequently joined the Deutschreligiöse Gemeinschaft to eventually become the Deutschgläubige Gemeinschaft in 1914. Reuter wrote Sigfrid oder Christus in 1910, in which he portrayed the protagonist of the Nibelungen as a victorious warrior of light. Later, in 1934, the scholar Otto Höfler (1901-1987) was inspired by the idea of contemporary Männerbünde, and came to believe that the cornerstone of Germanic religion was having secret societies, which included initiation rituals, a death cult, and ecstatic experiences. These ideas reformulated the image of the pagan73. As Von Schnurbein mentions, these new Pagan groups did not have many members, but their ideas were influential nevertheless due to the fact that many of these members were artists and intellectuals who

71. MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 156; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 41, 42. 72. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 38, 39. 73. MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), pp. 151, 157; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 39, 40.

222

Y. SCHATTEVOET

proved to be active and effective disseminators of Neopagan ideas. Their imaginations of lost and regained national and cultural greatness fell on fertile ground, especially in the urban middle classes, who were driven by similar fears and hopes in connection to rapid modernization, industrialization and urbanization of their country. Due to their activities and ideas about the nature of a pre-Christian Germanic faith and its renewal, concepts related to Germanic Neopagan religion were able to take hold in other alternative movements such as the environmental movement, as well as in the academy and, most notably, in the aesthetic imagination: in literature, theater, and music74.

During the Second World War, however, various Germanic pagan, occult, and racial ideas were adopted by the leaders of the NSDAP – most notably Ariosophy75. Due to the devastating effects of the war, many ideas were discredited, and it was therefore the end of many Pagan fellowships, societies and orders. It was only during the 1950s and 1960s that groups were reinvented or new groups were established. For instance, the Guido von List Gesellschaft re-emerged right after the war in 194576. The racially-inspired and anti-Christian Bund für Gotteserkenntnis was founded in 1951, forbidden by law ten years later, and arose again in 1971. The Nordische Glaubensgemeinschaft split-off from of the Deutschgläubige Gemeinschaft, and out of this group arose the Artgemeinschaft Germanische Glaubens-Gemeinschaft, founded in 1951 by Wilhelm Kusserow, and later renamed Treuekreis Artglaube Irminsul. The Deutschgläubige Gemeinschaft re-emerged in 1957, and in the same year the Ariosophic GodenOrden was founded by Hermann Musfeldt. Guido von List’s own society was revived as the Armanen Orden in 1976, which started to combine Germanic and Celtic paganism, and was later influenced by the Goddess Movement. The Order also adopted esoteric and New Age ideas, mainly due to the efforts of Adolf and Sigrun Schleipfer (Schlichting), including an initiation structure of nine grades. A few years later, in 1989, the Arbeitsgemeinschaft naturreligiöser Stammesverbände Europas (ANSE) was founded by Schlichting77. Meanwhile on the British Isles, another major influence of contemporary Paganism in general found its genesis. Wicca was founded by Gerald Brosseau Gardner (1884-1964), and this Modern Pagan Witchcraft is “the only religion which England has ever given the world”, according to Ronald Hutton78. Whereas Germanic Paganism’s emphasis is on the pagan, 74. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 46, 47. 75. See, for instance: N. GOODRICK-CLARKE, The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence of Nazi Ideology, New York, New York University Press, 1992. 76. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 49. 77. MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), pp. 161, 162; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 49, 55, 57. 78. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 1), p. vii.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

223

Wicca is concerned with the witch, and the religion is based on the belief that Wicca is the revival of the ancient witchcraft religion which has survived underground to the present day. However, it turned out later that this, too, was an invention of religious tradition. Wicca and its various traditions – such as Gardnerian Wicca, Alexandrian Wicca, and later in the United States, Dianic Wicca, among other branches – grew rapidly during subsequent years. This also had to do with the fact that Modern Witchcraft was appealing to the counterculture of the 1960s, which included a fascination for both indigenous religions and the occult. In the 1970s, it instigated a renewed interest in Germanic Paganism as well, and many older groups attracted members of the new generation. Some Völkisch groups, which had ceased to exist during the war, had returned. However, as Ariosophy and other racial ideologies were negatively perceived after the War due to the grave consequences for those not considered strong, pure Aryans, groups emerged that dissociated themselves from fascism and racism. One of these groups is the Heidnische Gemeinschaft e.V., founded in 1985, which puts emphasis on reconstructing not only ancient Germanic paganism, but also Celtic paganism79. Arguably the most influential Germanic Pagan branch is Ásatrú. One of the first groups was the Viking Brotherhood, which was founded by Stephen McNallen (1948) in 1972, and became the Asatru Free Assembly in 1974 – and among its members is the scholar and author Stephen Edred Flowers (also known as Edred Thorsson or Darban-i-Den, 1953). However, Ásatrú did not emerge on German soil, but in the United States, and various groups were formed during the initial years in Iceland, Sweden, Norway, and Great Britain. Influenced by Völkisch ideas, a gradual shift took place within Ásatrú in general in the 1990s and 2000s from a focus on racial ideology towards an emphasis on ethnicity – not least because of criticism and controversies80. Also, the tension between Ethnic Germanic Paganism and the universalist branch has remained within Ásatrú, and for this reason, the Asatru Free Assembly split in two with the in 1987 established folkish-oriented Ásatrú Alliance, and the more universalist Ring of Troth, or Troth, founded by Flowers. The latter organisation includes the initiative Heathens against Hate in favour of inclusivism and as a stance against racism and discrimination within religion81. It was only in the 1980s that the first German Ásatrú groups emerged out 79. CUSACK, Richard Wagner (n. 1), pp. 335-338; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 162; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 54-57. 80. VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), p. 54. 81. CUSACK, Richard Wagner (n. 1), pp. 330, 336-338; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 5, 7. The website of Heathens against Hate can be accessed here: https://www. heathensagainst.org/

224

Y. SCHATTEVOET

of the Artgemeinschaft and the Armanen Orden. Groups that distance themselves from völkisch racial ideas are the in 1991 re-emerged Germanische Glaubensgemeinschaft, and the earlier mentioned Heidnische Gemeinschaft e.V, among other groups82. 2. Contemporary Paganism: Volksgeist and Weltseele To better understand the influence of the German Romantic image of the pagan on contemporary Paganism, creating a division between two branches of Paganism is useful, namely Reconstructionist Paganism and Eclectic Paganism. Michael F. Strmiska states that, generally, the former “romanticize[s] the past (…) as a source of spiritual strength and wisdom”, whereas “Eclectic Pagans idealize the future” hoping that “a spirituality of nature can be gleaned from ancient sources and shared with all humanity”83. The Romantics were concerned with finding the particular ancient culture of the people, and this line of thought is followed by the later Pagan movements who aim to reconstruct pre-Christian paganism as a meaningful religious identity for the present day. Both use the memory of the perceived past and the appropriation of the Germanic identity in a positive, revalued manner for different means. Particularist Pagan movements can be categorised under Reconstructionism, as these Pagans aim to revive authentic ancient paganism based on the sources still available. They are therefore often very interested in scholarly research that can shed more light on paganism, and some Pagans are academics themselves. Their image of the pagan is believed to be an accurate representation of “wie er gewesen ist”. However, what should not be lost sight of, is the fact that Reconstructionist Pagans interpret and adapt the findings of academic research based on their own positive image of the pagan as their ancestor with the aim of reviving the perceived indigenous pagan religion as being meaningful for them in today’s modern world. Examples of Reconstructionist Paganism in the Nordic context are Heathenry and Ásatrú84. 82. CUSACK, Richard Wagner (n. 1), pp. 335-338; MAIER, Die Religion der Germanen (n. 5), p. 162; VON SCHNURBEIN, Norse Revival (n. 14), pp. 54-57. 83. STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 22. 84. G. HARVEY, Inventing Paganism: Making Nature, in LEWIS – HAMMER (eds.), The Invention of Sacred Tradition (n. 2), 277-290, pp. 278, 279. 283, 284, 286, 287; Y. SCHATTEVOET, Can You Feel Alive Today? Omnia’s Stenny as a Case Study on Contemporary Paganism, in A. ANCZYK – H. GRZYMAŁA-MOSZCZYŃSKA (eds.), Walking the Old Ways: Studies in Contemporary European Paganism, Katowice, Sacrum Publishing House, 2012, 131-184, pp. 139, 152-154; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 1922; M.F. STRMISKA – B.A. SIGURVINSSON, Asatru: Nordic Paganism in Iceland and America, in STRMISKA (ed.), Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), 127-179, p. 135.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

225

Ethnic Paganism or Native Faith is a branch of Reconstructionist Paganism that connects Paganism directly with the ethnos, meaning both the people and the nation. Ethnic Paganism is concerned with the revival of local pagan folk religion under the umbrella of the greater “folk”, that is, the Nordic, Celtic, Slavic, Baltic, Hellenistic, or other larger ethnic category. This often goes hand-in-hand with a strong sense of nationalism, and some groups are politically active. Ethnic Paganism is a European-wide movement, but it is most popular in the Slavic and Baltic countries, with movements such as Rodnovery or Slavic Native Faith85. Moreover, the song Na Moey Zemle (“In My Land”) by the Russian metal band Arkona is a clear example of the Ethnic branch of Paganism in contemporary culture. The song is a collaboration of pagan metal bands from all four corners of greater Europe – Sweden, Lithuania, Latvia, Germany, and the Netherlands – who all sing about the beauty of their own native land and their mighty pagan gods to a Russian traveller who is seeking happiness elsewhere. Having travelled far and wide, the traveller eventually realises that one can only find true happiness in the home land of the own people, following the particular indigenous pagan religious tradition of their ancestors, and so he returns to his native Russian roots86. As an alternative to Ethnic Paganism based on race or ethnicity, Marion Bowman has developed the concept of “cardiac Celts”, meaning those people who feel connected to a specific particular form of Paganism – be it Celtic paganism, Germanic paganism, or any other particular expression – regardless of their ancestry87. Moreover, Adam Anczyk distinguishes Reconstructionist Paganism from Revivalism, which he defines as the postulate of “reviving” traditional polytheistic religions (…) not in this case meant as complete, accurate and faithful reconstruction of pre-Christian beliefs, but rather as recalling and renewing a specific Pagan spirit88.

This Revivalist category can be seen as a bridge between particular forms of Paganism and, in a universal sense, Eclectic Paganism89. According to Strmiska, Eclectic Paganism is 85. A. ANCZYK, The Golden Sickle: An Introduction to Contemporary Druidry, Katowice, Sacrum Publishing House, 2014, pp. 129, 132; HARVEY, Inventing Paganism (n. 84), p. 286; SCHATTEVOET, Can You Feel Alive Today? (n. 84), pp. 139, 152-154; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 19-22. 86. See: SCHATTEVOET, Back to the Roots (n. 5). 87. GAY, Paganism (n. 50), p. 679; HARVEY, Inventing Paganism (n. 84), pp. 279, 283, 284; M. BOWMAN, Cardiac Celts: Images of the Celts in Paganism, in G. HARVEY – C. HARDMAN (eds.), Pagan Pathways: A Complete Guide to the Ancient Earth Traditions, London, Thorsons, 2000, 242-251; EAD., Contemporary Celtic Spirituality, in J. PEARSON (ed.), Belief Beyond Boundaries: Wicca, Celtic Spirituality and the New Age, Milton Keynes, Ashgate, 2002, 55-101; STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 18. 88. ANCZYK, The Golden Sickle (n. 85), p. 133. 89. Ibid.

226

Y. SCHATTEVOET

connected not so much with any particular region of the earth as with the earth itself, affiliated not with any particular group of humans speaking any particular language or practicing any particular traditions but with a larger and also vaguer sense of universal humanity90.

The Eclectic branch is interested and inspired by the pagan religions of the past, but these Pagans adopt and adept it according to their own interpretations and needs, whereby they feel free to mix and match elements of paganism with other forms of religiosity. They are therefore not attempting to reconstruct a specific ancient religion like the Reconstructionist branch, but they are more concerned with inventing a new, personalised Pagan religion based on their own preferences and predilections91. It therewith broadens the image of the pagan as all those pre-Christian ancestors of the world who experience the earth as being alive and divine. This universalist category of Paganism is therefore not only in line with the Christian idea of paganism as a global phenomenon whereby all those who are not following the vera religio can be considered pagan, but also influenced by the Romantic concept of the Weltseele, and, for some Eclectic Pagans, pantheism92. Eclectic Paganism – which can be understood as being closely related to New Age religion – is reflected in the biggest Pagan branches, modern Pagan Witchcraft and Wicca, among other Pagan religions93. Whereas Reconstructionist Paganism can be considered “orthodox” in the sense that only authentic ancient paganism is considered legitimate, the universal branch of Paganism seems to be preferred as the “orthodox” view of scholars of Pagan Studies, like Graham Harvey and Michael York. The diversity of Paganism is recognised by referring to the religious category as a whole with the umbrella term “Paganisms”94. Scholars of Pagan Studies generally use a broad definition of Paganism, which would suggest a “Paganism for universal humanity”. For instance, according to Harvey, Paganism is a religion at home on Earth (…) in which respectful relationships between humans and all others with whom we share life on earth are significant. (…) Pagans are people who consider the world to be alive: they are listening to a speaking Earth (a community of life)95. 90. STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 22. 91. Ibid., pp. 19, 20. 92. MÜLLER, Pagans (n. 48). 93. STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), pp. 19-22; HANEGRAAFF, New Age Religion (n. 3), pp. 77-79. 94. G. HARVEY, Contemporary Paganism: Religions of the Earth from Druids and Witches to Heathens and Ecofeminists, New York, New York University Press, 2011, p. 223. 95. Ibid., pp. xv, xvi.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

227

According to York, the term “paganism” should apply to all polytheistic nature religions as a world religion, including indigenous religions, Hinduism and Shintoism96. Here, a universalist approach and the suggestion of a Weltseele come to the surface, which reflects the Romantic pantheistic views of the Spinozist Naturphilosophie. Moreover, a middle way between Paganism and other religions has been developed, which includes combining Paganism with Christianity. The Pagan intellectual Isaac Bonewits has coined this as “Meso-Paganism”. Anczyk writes that: Meso-Pagan movements arise from the Romantic fascination with ancient beliefs and mythology (especially with the idea of the “noble Pagan”); they also refer to the doctrine of pre-revelation (of the Christian God, who revealed himself to heathens before the coming of Christ), and are linked strongly to historiosophical theories propagated by the nineteenth- and twentieth century esoteric societies97.

Generally, the differing images of the pagan being the particular ancestor bearing the Volksgeist and which is imperative for a people to rediscover in order to become a happy unity again, and the pagan being the universal earthling honouring the Weltseele, have both led to two diverse branches of contemporary Paganism. For both the Reconstructionist Pagans and the Eclectic Pagans, the Germanenmythos is key to the historical legitimation of the contemporary Pagan identity. However, looking more closely, it can be argued that the Germanenmythos is of greater importance to the former branch due to the idea that both the perceived particular pagan ancestors and the present-day descendants share the same Volksgeist. By studying and interpreting the primary sources of the ancient pagans as a way to better understand their imagined forebears – especially when it comes to religion – they believe they are reconstructing the ancient religion for the modern world as accurately as possible. When reconstruction is not possible due to a lack of sources, Pagans often point at monotheistic religion – most notably Christianity, and to a lesser extent Islam – as the imperialistic force that destroyed indigenous pagan religions. According to Strmiska, appropriating the religious Pagan identity makes therewith clear their break and rejection of the very religion that provided a word for their self-definition: Christianity98: By accepting for themselves a name taken from a word that had for so long functioned as a term of condemnation and abuse, today’s Pagans hope to honor long-ago Pagans they see as their forebears. In studying, reinterpreting, and 96. STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 11; M. YORK, Pagan Theology: Paganism as a World Religion, New York, New York University Press, 2005. 97. ANCZYK, The Golden Sickle (n. 85), p. 130. 98. STRMISKA, Modern Paganism in World Cultures (n. 1), p. 7.

228

Y. SCHATTEVOET

reviving past Pagan religious beliefs and practices, contemporary Pagans dedicate themselves to defying historical and contemporary forces of religious intolerance by proclaiming and practicing openly what was once prohibited and punished99.

Eclectic Pagans often feel this aversion to monotheistic religions as well, but some are also open to adopting elements of these religions. The Germanenmythos for those Eclectic Pagans, then, is perhaps too narrow, as these Pagans perceive paganism to be a universal phenomenon, and are therewith inspired by paganism in general. Like the Reconstructionists, they see ancient pagans as the ancestors of the contemporary Pagans, however, in a sense that all forms of paganism are related and can be used as inspiration for the construction of the contemporary Pagan religion. One could therefore speak of the Paganmythos or Pagan Myth, as it is believed that there is a continuation between the ancient pagans as the imagined religious ancestors of the contemporary Pagans. The Romantic image of the pagan as the wild and free, nature-worshiping noble savage is part of this present-day religious identity. However, the Germanenmythos and the Paganmythos, both imagining a continuation of the past in the present, are exactly that: myths. They can be seen as the ever-repeating popular Romantic myths that have contributed to the emergence of the contemporary Pagan, which offers a meaningful religious identity for the world we live in today. In this light, contemporary Paganism can be understood as an invention of religious tradition, legitimised by the Romantic memory of the pre-Christian past, and inspired by the Romantic image of the pagan. IV. CONCLUSION We have seen that in the context of German Romanticism, the longing for a shared national identity for the German people of the emerging nation state led to the idea of the Germanenmythos. German Romantic intellectuals positively revalued pre-Christian history, and appropriated the ancient Germanic pagans as the ancestors of the contemporary Germans. This resulted in the image of the pagan as the noble savage being directly connected to the roots of German culture. The pagan was perceived as proud and honest, wild and free, worshipping nature and loving the native land, and, significant for the day, a brave warrior fighting against foreign invaders. The earliest pre-Christian times were seen as the most vital stage of the culture, in which the people were truly happy. Their native tongue was 99. Ibid., p. 8.

IMAGINING THE PAGAN

229

thought to be the speech of nature, and the Volksgeist was expressed in its purest form in folk poetry. Due to the Church’s efforts to suppress paganism, the ancient Germanic wisdom was believed to have been transmitted in the Naturpoesie of the people of the countryside. Romantic intellectuals felt obligated to collect and subsequently decode these pagan remnants to rediscover the Volksgeist of the German people. The German Romantic program to construct the German national identity led to the rediscovery of a pagan heritage that served as the fundament of what would gradually transform into a religious identity. The Romantic idea of a unifying religion was initially a Germanic Christianity, or – with a certain openness towards paganism – a new aesthetic-scientific religion, but pantheism and the concept of an all-encompassing Weltseele were also appealing. Inspired by the Romantic image of the pagan, the actual emergence of contemporary Paganism, however, can be traced back to the Völkisch Movement. Moreover, the life reform movement, the youth movement, later the Burschenschaften, and, in general, occultism enabled the exchange of alternative ideas, such as anti-modern sentiments, an emphasis on the corporeal, and a religion and lifestyle in harmony with nature. This was fertile ground for the emerging Germanic Pagan groups, of which the majority disappeared during the Second World War. Later, also influenced by Wicca, there was a renewed interest in the imagined pagan ancestor. With the romanticised memory of a shared pre-Christian past, the Pagan religious identity was constructed by means of appropriating the ancient pagan as the ancestor of the folk, which can be seen as a revival of the Germanenmythos. The German Romantics had built the fundament for this invented religion as their image of the pagan served as an ideal for the national identity. The actual shift from nationalism to religion could take place once the need for a new meaningful religious identity arose. Two different ontological German Romantic concepts affected the religious Pagan identity, and resulted in a tension that is still present today. Inspired by the Germanenmythos, one branch of contemporary Paganism, Reconstructionism, aims to reconstruct the perceived indigenous pagan religion of the particular ancestors. In a Romantic manner, it can be argued that these Pagans are in line with the idea of the Volksgeist being most vital among the ancient pagans of the same (ethnic or national) group they belong to, and that it is crucial to rediscover the religion of their people as it gewesen ist. By trying to reconstruct this pre-Christian religion, they invent a new present-day religious tradition. On the other hand, the Romantic concept of the Weltseele, which includes the pantheistic idea of nature being divine, leads to the Eclectic branch

230

Y. SCHATTEVOET

of contemporary Paganism. The emphasis here is not on the nationalistic concept of the religion of the folk, but on the idea of paganism as the original universal religion of humanity – a global nature religion with local expressions. Eclectic Pagans therefore feel free to adopt and adept pagan religiosity that inspires them personally to invent their religious identity. Remarkably, like the German Romantic intellectuals being inspired by the Germanenmythos, some contemporary scholars of Paganism have left their mark on the image of the pagan by inventing a universal earth-worshipping ancestor that has never existed. Therewith, a new myth, that is, the Paganmythos, was born, which is the conception that the ancient pagans are the religious ancestors of the contemporary Pagans – all sharing and honouring the unifying Weltseele. Both the Germanenmythos and the Paganmythos suggest continuity between ancient pagans and contemporary Pagans in respectively a particular and universal way. As German Romantics attributed positive characteristics to the image of the Germanic pagan in the light of the Germanenmythos, so it could function as a historical legitimation for a national identity. The myth could eventually contribute to the appropriation of the pagan Volksgeist. The Paganmythos enabled the attribution of paganism as a universal religion, which at the same time could be appropriated by contemporary Pagans with a legitimation not based on a particular shared history, but on the shared Weltseele. In conclusion, it is therefore argued that contemporary Paganism has German Romantic roots, as the Romantic memory of the past and the image of the pagan is appropriated to construct a meaningful religious identity for the present-day. Postbus 9103 NL-6500 HD Nijmegen The Netherlands [email protected]

Yentl SCHATTEVOET

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES? THE QUESTION OF “PAGAN SURVIVALS” RECONSIDERED

I During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many scholars expressed a belief that “paganism”, by some definition and in some form, had survived through the European Middle Ages and far into the early modern period. This belief took many different forms. To Geoffrey Coulton, the great historian of the medieval English Church, Christianity had merely been a veneer brushed on top of a world of rural commoners who still secretly honoured ancient divinities: “in church, the women crowded around Mary; yet they paid homage to the old deities by their nightly fireside, or at the time-honoured sacred haunts, grove or stone or spring”1. Folklorists classified whole categories of modern popular custom as relics of ancient pagan belief and ritual, persisting into recent times, and archeologists and experts in English literature accepted this idea with enthusiasm2. Medieval church carvings such as foliate heads and women displaying their vulva were interpreted as representations of old gods and goddesses, still venerated within a Christian setting3. Experts in Anglo-Saxon healing and protective charms eagerly drew attention to the names of heathen gods and spirits preserved in a few of them, as indicators of continuing devotion4. Popular magic, of the sort provided for clients by folk healers and diviners, known most commonly in English as cunning folk or wise folk, had always been denounced as “pagan” by orthodox and educated Christians; partly because such magic had certainly been practised since pre-Christian times, and partly because anything which fell neither into the categories of Christian orthodoxy or Christian heresy could be consigned to that of paganism5. 1. G.C. COULTON, Five Centuries of Religion, vol. 1, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1925, pp. 182-183. 2. This movement is summarized in R. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 112-131. 3. LADY RAGLAN, The Green Man in Church Architecture, in Folklore 50 (1939) 4577; M. MURRAY, Female Fertility Figures, in Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 64 (1934) 93-100. 4. G. STORMS, Anglo-Saxon Magic, Den Haag, Nijhoff, 1948; J.H.G. GRATTAN – C. SINGER, Anglo-Saxon Magic and Medicine, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1952. 5. For early examples of this, see V.I.J. FLINT, The Rise of Magic in Early Medieval Europe, Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 1993, passim; for late, J. OBELKEVITCH,

232

R. HUTTON

Some authors, of whom Margaret Murray was the last and most celebrated, even argued that a full-blown pagan cult had persisted beyond the end of the Middle Ages, and was persecuted by early modern Churches and states under the name of witchcraft6. Murray convinced such giants of their respective historical fields as Sir Stephen Runciman, Sir George Clark, Christopher Hill and Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie7. Two different forces united to create this tradition. One was almost as old as established Christianity itself: a desire to police the boundaries of true religion and condemn anything that did not conform with strict orthodoxy – especially elements of popular belief – as “pagan”. The second was distinctively modern: a desire to undermine Christianity itself, and break its cultural dominance, by suggesting that even in its apparent medieval and early modern heyday, its hold had never been as complete – especially among ordinary people – as had been claimed. Perhaps because of the increasing transition to post-Christian cultures in the West, both forces weakened during the late twentieth century. By the 1990s historians tended to make a distinction between “surviving paganism” and “pagan survivals”. Unanimous agreement had apparently been reached among them by then that there was no surviving paganism in any area of Europe for more than a short period after its official conversion to Christianity. In other words, no coherent and self-conscious pagan resistance movement persisted anywhere in the continent, with a retention of allegiance to pagan deities in preference to Christianity. By contrast, there was equal unanimity that large numbers of ideas, figures, stories, spells, customs and motifs had been taken into medieval and early modern culture from ancient paganism, and some proved remarkably enduring. These spanned the fields of architecture, art, literature, magic, medicine and folk tradition. Scholars were not unanimous regarding the extent of this importation, or the spirit in which it was conducted, or whether specific phenomena should be assigned to it or not. None the less, the general principle was accepted. It united authors as different in their interests as Norman Cohn, Carlo Religion and Rural Society: South Lindsey1825-1875, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1976, pp. 280, 299-301; for my own commentary on the effect, R. HUTTON, Witches, Pagans and Historians, in The Pomegranate 18 (2016) 205-234. 6. For a history of this school of thought, see HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 2), pp. 132-50, 194-201. 7. S. RUNCIMAN, Preface to M. MURRAY, The Witch-Cult in Western Europe, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1964; G.N. CLARK, The Seventeenth Century, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1945, pp. 245-248; C. HILL, Reformation to Industrial Revolution, London, Weidenfeld, 1967, pp. 115-118; E. LE ROY LADURIE, Paysans de Languedoc, Paris, École Pratique des Hautes Études, 1966, pp. 407-414.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

233

Ginzburg, Éva Pócs and myself, and inspired the collection entitled The Pagan Middle Ages, edited by Ludo Milis in 19918. During the 1990s, however, some British and American historians began to reject the term “pagan” altogether for these borrowings, proposing instead that expressions such as “lay Christianity” or “religious folklore” should be employed instead9. During the present century this reaction has gone still further. Chris Wickham has stated that the churchmen who denounced paganism in early medieval Europe were facing “the fact that traditional rituals of varying origins survived everywhere routinized into local Christian practice”, so that “preaching against such customs was unlikely to get rigorists very far, precisely because they were seen as Christian already”10. Steven Marrone has proposed that “much that has been pointed to among the religious practices of the populace as evidence for a persistence of paganism or a pagan residue should be regarded as not substantially different from the broad spirituality promoted by the official Church”11. Carl Watkins has gone furthest, attacking Carlo Ginzburg, Norman Cohn, Jean Delumeau and myself together, for speaking of “pagan survivals” at all, calling the term completely unhelpful when it merely reflects the ruses of language employed by some medieval churchmen to condemn forms of Christianity of which they disapproved12. My essay here is intended as a response to these views, not with the intention of refuting them, but of recasting the basic terms of the discussion. I am going to look at a set of figures found in the medieval and early modern imagination, which do not seem to me to fit very well into the categories of pagan or Christian. They cannot straightforwardly be called pagan because they do not seem to be demonstrable survivals from pre-Christian cults. On the other hand they have absolutely no derivation from Christian theology 8. N. COHN, Europe’s Inner Demons: The Demonization of Christians in Medieval Christendom, London, Pimlico, 21993; C. GINZBURG, Ecstasies: Deciphering the Witches’ Sabbath, London, Penguin, 1992; É. PÓCS, Between the Living and the Dead, Budapest, Central European University Press, 1999; R. HUTTON, The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles, Oxford, Blackwell, 1991, pp. 284-341; L. MILIS (ed.), The Pagan Middle Ages, Woodbridge, Boydell, 1998. 9. E. DUFFY, The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, c. 1400 – c. 1580, New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1992, p. 283; K. JOLLY, Popular Religion in Late Anglo-Saxon England, Chapel Hill, NC, University of North Carolina Press, 1996, p. 140. 10. C. WICKHAM, The Inheritance of Rome: Illuminating the Dark Ages 400 to 1000, New York, Penguin, 2009, pp. 176-177. 11. S.P. MARRONE, A History of Science, Magic and Belief from Medieval to Early Modern Europe, London, Palgrave, 2015, p. 35. 12. C. WATKINS, History and the Supernatural in Medieval England, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 76-106.

234

R. HUTTON

or cosmology, so simply to term them a form of Christianity seems to beg an awful lot of questions. One of them is found in learned and elite culture, and three in popular culture. The latter seem to me to be the more interesting and significant, but the former also has its place in this discussion, and I shall deal with it first.

II This first figure consists of a mighty female thought to represent the natural world, the terrestrial realm or the cosmos below the level of heaven. Certainly the Greeks and Romans had conceived of such beings, the Greek Gaia and the Roman Terra Mater (a literal Mother Earth). In that sense the presence of such a one in medieval and early modern texts could be called an inheritance from the ancient world, and she might even be termed a pagan survival. In another, however, such terminology is questionable. This is because such figures featured in ancient culture mostly as literary representations, having little actual worship attached to them and no major cult centres. The Greeks wrote about Gaia, as a goddess representing the world, or the earth, but she was venerated only at statues or places for offerings set up in a few temples of other deities, and given an annual sacrifice in two local religious calendars13. Terra Mater is mentioned only near the end of a long list of deities to receive sacrifices at one cycle of games instituted by the emperor Augustus14. The ancient European peoples who have left records could seemingly conceive of such mighty figures, as symbols and allegories, but did not have a lot of use for them in worship, for which they preferred deities who were more localized and more specific in functions and attributes. This may have made it easier for Christian culture to find a place for a generalized embodying being to represent the earth, as one had not been an important pagan focus of worship. Such a being plays a part in two well-known early medieval charms. One is the Latin poem Praecatio terrae matris, found in several Continental manuscripts dating from the sixth century onward, and an English one from the eleventh or twelfth century. It is almost certainly a pagan work in origin, being a very polished literary piece produced by a sophisticated writer towards the end of the Roman 13. J. LARSON, A Land Full of Gods, in D. OGDEN (ed.), A Companion to Greek Religion, Chichester, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010, p. 67. 14. M. BEARD – J. NORTH – S.R.F. PRICE (eds.), Religions of Rome, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1, p. 203; vol. 2, p. 142.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

235

Empire, and matching the way in which the Greek Gaia tended to feature in Greek creative literature rather than in religious observance15. It was incorporated into early medieval Christian compilations of herbal medicine, as a charm to increase the potency of the herbs being collected, glossed as a spell once used by pagans, and Christianized by the addition of a prayer directed immediately after it to the Christian heavenly powers16. The second work is the “Field Blessing Ceremony” or Aecerbot, known from a single English manuscript of the late tenth or early eleventh century. It is a Christian composition, quoting passages of Church liturgy and invoking the powers the Trinity, the Virgin Mary and Evangelists, but also on “earth’s mother”, as the indwelling spirit of the soil that is to be fertilized. It does so as part of a clear theology whereby the Christian God, who is the main object of its devotion, grants fertility to the soil as part of his general remit as creator of all things, and makes its “mother” his agent17. Such a theology, of finding a place for this sort of female entity within Christianity, was continued by some of the savants of the twelfth-century Renaissance. They pitched on the figure of Natura, “Nature”, which had been developed by pagan poets during the late imperial Roman period. She first appears (under her Greek name of “all-parent Physis”) in an Orphic hymn, and appears as a mighty cosmic power, standing between Zeus and the rest of the Olympian deities, in the verses of Claudian, who was serving a Christian imperial court and may have been a Christian himself. The overtly Christian authors Lactantius, Prudentius and Augustine all appropriated her for their religion as the servant of their God who sustained the material world: Augustine called her a teacher and guide of truth appointed to carry out the divine will. Moreover, he regarded her as possibly an animate being18. That made it the easier for medieval scholars to accept her. She was represented as a divine female in Christian texts between the fifth and eleventh centuries19, but it was the school at twelfth-century Chartres which really took her up. 15. J.W. DUFF – A.M. DUFF (eds.), Minor Latin Poets, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1934, pp. 339-350. 16. GRATTAN – SINGER (eds.), Anglo-Saxon Magic and Medicine (n. 4), pp. 45-46; A.D. NOCK, Some Latin Spells, in Folklore 36 (1925) 93-96. 17. British Library, Cotton MS Caligula A7, fos. 176a-178a. 18. E.R. CURTIUS, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, London, Routledge, 1953, pp. 106-127; C.S. LEWIS, The Allegory of Love, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1936, pp. 54-74; G.D. ECONOMOU, The Goddess Natura in Medieval Literature, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, pp. 4-57. 19. CURTIUS, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages (n. 18), p. 107; ECONOMOU, The Goddess Natura (n. 18), pp. 28-52.

236

R. HUTTON

There Bernard Silvester made her into a divinity sprung from the Christian God and given the task of calling matter into being at the creation of the universe. Thereafter she personified the latter, acting as the engendering force of fertility and procreation20. This concept was then developed further by Alan of Lille (Alanus de Insulis), who made Natura the agent of God in earthly affairs and the fashioner of humans, obeyed by the whole cosmos. As such, he represented her as a being of utter goodness, a virgin crowned with stars, travelling in a glass coach drawn by peacocks and attended by a train of virtues21. Their works were poetic romances, not expositions of theology, and they did not advocate any actual worship of Natura. None the less, they had invested the Christian imagination with the concept of a divine female presence immediately responsible for the world and quite detached from Biblical tradition. As such she was sufficiently appealing to take her place in the vernacular poetry which flourished through the second half of the Middle Ages. In a section of the major French work, the Roman de la Rose, she is presented as a being of inexpressible beauty, created by God to rule the universe on his behalf, with a particular interest in love and procreation22. The English subsequently took her up, in the person of Geoffrey Chaucer, who explicitly used the ideas of Alan of Lille to make her God’s deputy, ruling both the world in general and its particular creatures. Her most important responsibility remained that for love and conception, but she had regained Alan’s view of her as sovereign of reason as well23. In the early modern period this concept of a great female agent and intermediary for the Christian God was transmuted through Platonic cosmology, to provide the image of a world soul, standing between the deity, and the earth and humanity, and functioning both as an agent for his will and as the fount of life and inspiration. She was depicted visually as a beautiful nude woman associated with the moon and crowned with stars24. Once again, literary tradition had retained a sense of the divine feminine, distinct from and greater than female saints, even including the Virgin Mary, as the immediate power responsible for earthly existence. This chain of images, stretching from the end of the ancient world to the beginning of the modern, prepared the way for the burgeoning of that preoccupation 20. BERNARD SILVESTER, De mundi universitate. 21. ALAN OF LILLE, De planctu naturae, and Anticlaudianus. 22. JEAN DE MEUN, Roman de la Rose, Books 4-5. 23. GEOFFREY CHAUCER, The Parlement of Foules, lines 302-385. 24. See, for example, the frontispieces to books by two authors from opposite sides of the post-Reformation religious division, R. FLUDD, Utriusque cosmi historia, Oppenheim, 1617; and A. KIRCHER, Ars magica lucis et umbrae, Rome, 1646.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

237

with a mighty goddess figure, associated with the natural world and with the moon, which was to be a hallmark of the nineteenth- and twentiethcentury imagination from the Romantic Movement onwards. The link between this being and the Christian God was broken in this later period, enabling her to become the main deity of contemporary feminist spirituality and Paganism25. III In my introduction, however, I laid more stress on popular images of supernatural females than those in high literary culture, and it is time now to turn to the three of these which I would regard as especially significant. One is British, one Western European and one Gaelic. The British one is the fairy queen, who seems to have been a distinctively late medieval creation. The Anglo-Saxons certainly believed in fairy-like beings, which they called elves, but we know very little of certainty about them: there are ambiguous hints in the texts that they could have been seen as beautiful and alluring, but overwhelmingly the surviving sources credit them with blighting people with physical maladies26. We may presume that the Anglo-Saxon elves were prehistoric, because they appear near the beginning of English history and are linguistically cognate with similar Scandinavian beings. We may also presume that the native British had likewise believed in land spirits of various kinds, because traditional peoples always do. The likelihood that no coherent view of elves was held in AngloSaxon England is increased by reference to English scholarly writings of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. They contain a lot of information about fairy-like beings which was to pass into later canonical fairy lore and which was reported at all levels of society. It included the concept of a parallel realm of human-like beings, superior to humans in some abilities and in longevity, with its own ruler. This was however not a consistent motif when speaking of such beings, and was indeed only occasionally encountered. There seems to have been no overall convention or general system of belief to contain and explain the stories about them, which treated them as rarely encountered and dimly understood aspects of reality. The intellectuals who recorded them struggled to provide one, and failed. 25. HUTTON, The Triumph of the Moon (n. 2), pp. 32-43, 151-241, 272-369. 26. The evidence has been comprehensively reviewed by A. HALL, Elves in AngloSaxon England, Woodbridge, Brewer, 2007.

238

R. HUTTON

Neither the range of terms nor the theological concepts available to them were quite adequate to the phenomena concerned27. Instead a general category for such beings was to be created, ultimately, by a different genre of the same high medieval period, that of literary chivalric romance, which was composed for and consumed by ruling elites and was suited to the tastes and values of the new knightly class. These works were represented overtly as pure fantasy, which means that they were required to conform neither to theological orthodoxy nor to the laws of nature. They featured beings, usually called “fays”, who had sumptuous lifestyles resembling those of the elite audiences for which they were composed, and wielded superhuman powers in addition. As such, they functioned as patrons, lovers or predators with respect to the human knights and ladies who were the protagonists of the stories28. The French word “fay” or “faie” was to supply the genesis of the English term “fairy” itself, as it entered Britain via the medium of these romances, which had been first produced in the French-speaking world29. By the end of the twelfth century an English writer could speak of the realm of Avalon, to which the wounded King Arthur was taken, as populated by fays, to whom he gave the English term of “elves” (alven), ruled by a queen30. By the middle of the next century, therefore, the surviving English sources contain in aggregate a native tradition of elves, mostly as bringers of pain and disease; an international literary one of beautiful, wealthy and magical fays; and a third category of creatures who overlapped with the first two types but did not really fit either. By the year 1300, the three were apparently starting to blend, as English churchmen had begun to condemn people who believed in beautiful female spirits led by a queen, who danced at night in wild natural places31. The position of a queen or king among such beings also emerged more prominently in French and English literature at this time. The classical figures of Proserpine and Pluto had some influence on this development, as the best-known existing model for a divine queen and king of an Otherworld, 27. GERALD OF WALES, Itinerarium Kambriae, Book 1, c. 8; RALPH OF COGGLESHALL, Chronicon Anglicanum, fols. 88-90; Sir E. CRASTER, The Miracles of Farne, in Archaeologia Aeliana, 4th series, 29 (1951) 101-103; WILLIAM OF NEWBURGH, Historia rerum Anglicarum, Book 1, cc. 27-28; GERVASE OF TILBURY, Otia imperialia, Book 3, c. 45; WALTER MAP, De nugis curialium, Disti. 2, c. 11. 28. See especially, with reference to later images of fairies, Claris et Laris, Battaile Loquifer, Tydorel, Bel Inconnu and Huon de Bordeaux. 29. N. WILLIAMS, The Semantics of the Word “Fairy”, in P. NARVAEZ (ed.), The Good People, Lexington, KY, University of Kentucky Press, 1997, 457-478. 30. LAYAMON, Brut, lines 9608-9609, 14277-14282. 31. Fasciculus morum, Part 5, lines 61-72.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

239

or indeed an Underworld, as fairy domains were henceforth sometimes considered to be entered through doors in hills. Proserpine features as a fairy monarch in the French romance Arthur of Little Britain, while Sir Orfeo, an English equivalent of the same period, has a well-rounded picture of a fairyland with Pluto as its ruler. At the other end of the fourteenth century a being known, with ease and familiarity as the fairy queen, or elf queen, had become fully established in English letters, featuring repeatedly in the work of Chaucer (once appearing in it under the name of Proserpina)32. Some existing romances were reworked to accommodate her. A French one from the twelfth century features a lovely female fay who aids a knight, wearing royal purple but with her nature left undefined; and these features were carried over into an English translation from around 1300. By the later fourteenth century, however, when Thomas Chestre reworked the story as Sir Launfal, she had explicitly become the daughter of the “King of Faërie” and dressed in green, which was becoming the classic colour worn by fairies33. By the early fifteenth century the literary construct of the fairy kingdom was fully established, and had spread across most of Britain. The famous Scottish romance Thomas of Erceldoune, prominently featuring a queen of the “wild fee”, dates from the first quarter of that century, and King Berdok, which has the first known usage in Scots of the word “fairy”, and gives the fairy realm a king, derives from the middle decades34. Thereafter both monarchs feature regularly in Scottish Renaissance poetry, sometimes under the names of Proserpine and Pluto, and the queen becomes much more prominent than the king35. Likewise, the Welsh saint’s life Buchedd Collen, written in the form of a romance and dating from the late fifteenth or early sixteenth century, has a “King of the Fairies” as the main opponent of its hero36. By the mid-fifteenth century, moreover, the concept of a fairy realm had become part of the mental world of English commoners. In 1450, “one calling himself Queen of the Fayre” operated in Kent 32. GEOFFREY CHAUCER, The Wife of Bath’s Tale, lines, 857-861; Sir Thopas, lines 784803; The Merchant’s Tale, lines 2225-2318. 33. All three versions were helpfully edited in a single volume by A.J. BLISS at London in 1960. 34. Whereas the other medieval texts cited above are in well-known editions, and most in more than one, King Berdok is hidden within the various editions of the Bannatyne Manuscript, sometimes catalogued under the first line, “Syn of Lyntoun”. 35. See, for example, R. HENRYSON, Orpheus and Eurydice, lines 110-126; W. DUNBAR, The Golden Targe, lines 125-126, and Schir Thomas Norny, lines 5-6; Sir D. LYNDSAY, The Testament, and Complaynt, of Our Soverane Lord’s Papyngo, lines 1132-1135, and Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaits, lines 732, 1245-1245, 1536-1537, 4188-4189. 36. Most recently published in E.R. HENKEN, Traditions of the Welsh Saints, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1987, pp. 221-226.

240

R. HUTTON

and Essex, either as a maniac or a confidence trickster37. The next year a gang of disguised poachers raiding an aristocratic deer park in Kent called themselves “servants of the queen of the fairies”38. In the same period women operating as cunning folk, offering healing and other services in return for payment, began to claim to have learned their skills from the feyry or ffayry39. The use by ordinary English people of what had been a French word shows how much this burgeoning belief system had been imported from the romance literature. Thereafter it remained a major theme of both popular culture and literature, all over England, Wales and Scotland, for the remainder of the early modern period40. Poets and playwrights regularly portrayed the fairy queen in their work, Shakespeare most famously and in two completely different guises, the stately Titania in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the diminutive Mab in Romeo and Juliet. Sometimes, like Titania, she had a royal consort, and more often, like Mab, she had not41. She was also, however, just as prominent in the beliefs of ordinary people. Across most of Britain, but especially in Scotland, cunning folk continued to claim to have been taught their craft by her or her minions, and some of those individuals accused of witchcraft in the period also reported that they had enjoyed her favour42. English confidence tricksters quite frequently defrauded victims by promising to obtain that favour for them, and sometimes that of her royal husband as well43. One of the most interesting aspects of all this 37. R. FLENLEY (ed.), Six Town Chronicles, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1961, p. 127. 38. F.R.H. DU BOULAY (ed.), Documents Illustrative of Medieval Kentish Society, Maidstone, Kent Archaeological Society, 1964, pp. 254-255. 39. T.S. HOLMES (ed.), The Register of John Stafford, Bishop of Bath and Wells 14251443 (Somerset Record Society, 1915-16), pp. 25-27; C. JENKINS, Cardinal Morton’s Register, in R.W. SETON-WATSON (ed.), Tudor Studies, London, Longmans, 1924, 72-74. 40. For surveys, see M.W. LATHAM, The Elizabethan Fairies, New York, Columbia University Press, 1930; K.M. BRIGGS, The Anatomy of Puck, London, Routledge, 1959; D. PURKISS, Troublesome Things, London, Allen Lane, 2000; L. HENDERSON – E.J. COWAN, Scottish Fairy Belief, East Linton, Tuckwell, 2001. 41. For the references, see the works cited above. 42. Again see the sources in n. 40, but also especially Bessie Dunlop’s confession published in E. WILBY, Cunning Folk and Familiar Spirits, Brighton, Sussex Academic Press, 2005; pp. VIII-XV; Andro Man’s in J. STUART (ed.), The Miscellany of the Spalding Club: Volume One, Aberdeen, Spalding Club, 1841, pp. 119-125; and Isobel Gowdie’s, most recently and fully in E. WILBY, The Visions of Isobel Gowdie, Brighton, Sussex Academic Press, 2010, pp. 37-52. 43. E.g. The Brideling, Saddling and Riding of a Rich Churle in Hampshire, London, 1595; The Several Notorious and Lewd Cousnages of John West and Alice West, Falsely Called the King and Queene of the Fayries, London, 1613; Historical Manuscripts Commission, Hatfield House MSS, vol. 5 (1894), pp. 81-83; C.J. SISSON, A Topical Reference in “The Alchemist”, in J.G. MCMANAWAY et al. (eds.), Joseph Quincy Adams: Memorial

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

241

is that fairies in general still retained in this period the character of AngloSaxon elves, of blighting humans, stealing their children or causing more harmless mischief. Their queen, however, was almost invariably viewed in positive terms, as a benevolent and capable protectress and benefactress. IV The second significant supernatural female whom I would identify in medieval and early modern popular tradition appeared much earlier than the fairy queen, in more mysterious circumstances, and belief in her covered a much larger geographical area. She travelled the night with a retinue of spirits, and sometimes with especially favoured human beings. She was known variously as Diana, Herodias, Holle or Holda, Percht or Bertha, Bensozia, Sacria, Abundia, Sybilla, and by a host of local names44. Quite commonly, and especially in Italy, she was simply “the Lady” and her retinue the “blessed” or “good” ladies, or “the ladies of the night” or “the ladies from outside”. What she and her followers generally did was to visit the houses of favoured humans, usually the better-behaved and cleaner in a community, and bless them with good fortune. They often feasted there, but what they consumed was miraculously restored as they departed. Sometimes they held a revel of their own in some rural place, which is why in Italy the Lady’s court was often known as “the good game”. Three aspects of this tradition seem consistent. First, it was a belief of commoners, and especially of poor women and sometimes of men of the same class. Their claim to travel with the Lady or ladies gave them a status which they would not normally have possessed. Furthermore, the activities in which they took part represented a classic piece of wish fulfilment for an underclass: to become favoured members of a supernatural royal court and visit the houses of the wealthier to feast to their heart’s content. Second, the women who claimed to rove with the Lady were often or mostly the cunning folk of their communities. Like those in Britain who Studies, Washington, DC, Folger Shakespeare Library, 1948, 739-741; F. TIMBERS, The Magical Adventures of Mary Parish, Kirksville, MO, Truman State University Press, 2016. 44. For this and what follows, see COHN, Europe’s Inner Demons (n. 8), pp. 162-180; GINZBURG, Ecstasies (n. 8), pp. 89-206; G. HENNINGSEN, The Ladies from Outside, in B. ANKARLOO – G. HENNINGSEN (eds.), Early Modern Witchcraft, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1990, 191-218; C. LECOUTEUX, Phantom Armies of the Night: The Wild Hunt and the Ghostly Processions of the Undead, Rochester, VT, Inner Traditions, 2011, pp. 8-23; R. HUTTON, The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present, London, Yale University Press, 2017, pp. 120-146.

242

R. HUTTON

attributed their skills to the tuition of fairies, they frequently said that they had learned their magic from her and her companions. Third, the tradition seems nowhere to have involved any actual group activity. The travels of humans who claimed to join these female phantasms were experienced in their minds – in dream or in trance states – while their bodies remained static. The first reference to these beliefs comes from the ninth century, in the famous canon “Episcopi”, which regarded them as shared already by a large number of people45. For the next three hundred years they are recorded in texts which, like the canon, derive from the Frankish lands, with their epicentre in the Rhine Valley. During the remainder of the Middle Ages they spread out over the whole of the French- and Germanspeaking areas, and across Italy into Sicily, and into Spain. By the early modern period they were contracting again, vanishing from most Frenchspeaking regions. There is no solid evidence that they ever reached Britain, though British scholars did know about them from reading Continental texts. They may possibly have helped to reinforce the developing British figure of the fairy queen, but look in essentials rather different from images of British fairies, whom humans did not claim to contact in dream or trance, with whom they rarely rode at night, and who were led by a queen who was commonly paired with a king. Moreover British fairies operated by both day and night. As the beliefs concerning the Lady shrank into a midContinental heartland, from Germany to Sicily, they also broke into more clearly defined regional traditions, which were in place by the early modern period: a German one of nocturnal spirits who followed a leading female figure, but were not joined by humans; one from the German-speaking Alpine areas in which the spirits had no leading figure, but could be joined by favoured humans; and an Italian and Sicilian one which retained both a leading figure and the belief that people could join her and her spirits in their journeys and revels. So, from where did these ideas come? The obvious answer, which is indeed the one which has always been made, is that they derived entirely from ancient paganism, and from the cult of a pre-Christian goddess. This remains possible, but it seems very hard to prove. The names given to the superhuman leader by churchmen, from the ninth to the sixteenth century, were Diana and Herodias. Diana was indeed an ancient goddess of the night and wild nature, but she was a Roman one, with no widespread 45. F.W.H. WASSERSCHLEBEN (ed.), Regionis abbati Prumiensis libris duo, Leipzig, 1840, p. 355. Translations are now in COHN, Europe’s Inner Demons (n. 8), p. 167; GINZBURG, Ecstasies (n. 8), pp. 89-90; and LECOUTEUX, Phantom Armies (n. 44), p. 9.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

243

popular cult north of the Alps. Nor did myth portray her as sweeping up human followers. Moreover, when those who claimed to rove with the Lady were interrogated by the authorities, it was churchmen who named her Diana, while her followers gave her other names associated with abundance, generosity, wisdom and stateliness (none of which were, or were derived from, those of other pre-Christian goddesses). It may be, as Carlo Ginzburg thought, that the churchmen concerned were influenced by classical learning46; or it could be simply that Diana is the only pagan goddess found in the New Testament, as the divine patroness of Ephesus, and indeed the only European one in the whole Bible. Likewise, Herodias is the wickedest woman found in the New Testament, being responsible for the execution of John the Baptist; and a twelfth-century legend actually explained how she came to develop from her Biblical persona to being the leader of the night rides, in penance for her offence47. Ginzburg suggested that she derived from an ancient goddess called Hera-Diana, but no such deity, who twins a Greek with a Roman deity of a very different sort, is found anywhere in the ancient world48. Claude Lecouteux proposed the Greek Hecate as the ancestor of the medieval Lady49. She was certainly associated with the night, witchcraft and ghosts, and known to the Romans. However, she was never portrayed as the leader of a retinue of earthbound spirits, or indeed of any retinue at all, other than of dogs, or (possibly) of human souls she was leading towards the realm of the dead, or from it to be reborn on earth as babies50. Recognizing this, Carlo Ginzburg proposed two other contenders, both of which had enjoyed huge popularity in the Roman Empire, with an epicentre in just the right place, the Rhineland, for the birth of the medieval myth51. One was Epona, goddess of horses and of their welfare and fertility, and so worshipped by riders. However, she was never shown with a retinue of any kind, while the medieval spirits, when they did ride, rather than fly, used wild beasts as their steeds and not horses52. The other cult 46. GINZBURG, Ecstasies (n. 8), p. 91. 47. Reinardus Vulpes, Book 1, lines 1143-1164. 48. GINZBURG, Ecstasies (n. 8), pp. 91-93. 49. LECOUTEUX, Phantom Armies (n. 44), pp. 25, 33. 50. S. RONAN (ed.), The Goddess Hecate, Hastings, Chthonios, 1992. For possible references to her as leader of a retinue of ghosts, see the Orphic Hymn to Hecate, line 13; and B. SNELL (ed.), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck, 1971, vol. 1, p. 115. 51. GINZBURG, Ecstasies (n. 8), pp. 104-105. 52. The classic study of material relating to her is R. MAGNEN – É. THENEVOT, Épona, Bordeaux, Delmas, 1956, updated by C. STERCHX, Éléments de cosmogonie celtique, Brussels, Brussels University Press, 1986, pp. 9-54; and K.M. LINDUFF, Epona: A Celt among the Romans, in Latomus 38 (1979) 817-837.

244

R. HUTTON

was of the Matres or Matronae, the Mothers or Ladies. They were portrayed in iconography as three stately women, standing or (more usually) seated in a row, and holding symbols of prosperity such as bread, fruit and flowers. As such, they could indeed make plausible originals for benevolent female superhumans who visited and blessed houses at night, and it is just possible that they were the root of this tradition: though it must be said that we do not know what they were reputed to do in Roman times, at all. Once more, however, there are discrepancies with the medieval Lady or ladies. The Matres or Matronae were never shown with a retinue or in motion, and never associated with animals: conversely, the medieval ladies of the night rides did not travel in trios53. There is therefore no goddess or set of goddesses attested in the whole of the archaeological record which makes a good fit with the medieval tradition. There remains a possibility that a pagan Germanic cult, from outside of the Roman Empire and so outside of iconographic or epigraphic evidence, lay behind that tradition. On the face of things, however, a Germanic origin for the medieval myth seems a little unlikely, given that the most thoroughly Germanic lands, of the north and east, did not contain that myth. Its recorded range was mostly within the former Roman Empire. It remains possible that ancient goddesses lie behind the Lady’s German names, Holle and Percht (or variants of those), but the linguistic evidence is dubious. Percht is not recorded before the fourteenth century, and it has recently been plausibly suggested that the name derives from the medieval German one for the Christian feast of the Epiphany, a time at which she was reputed to be most active: this would fit a common medieval pattern of personifying feasts as (mostly female) figures54. Holle or Holda is recorded earlier, from the eleventh century, but her name is used then generally to describe not the leader of the night rides but the rides themselves; in which case she may have been made, again, the personification of them55. 53. The basic study of them remains F. HAVERFIELD, The Mother Goddesses, in Archaeologia Aeliana 15 (1892) 314-336. See also M. GREEN, The Gods of the Celts, London, Batsford, 1986, chapter 3; and Celtic Goddesses, London, British Museum, 1995, pp. 106111. 54. J.B. SMITH, Perchta the Belly-Slitter and Her Kin, in Foklore 115 (2004) 167-186. 55. This is how she features in all but one recension of the text in which she first features under this name, BURCHARD OF WORMS, Decretum, Book 10, c. 29, and see also Book 19, cc. 70, 90, 170-171. A character called Holda does appear much earlier, in a praise-poem by Walahfrid Strabo from the early ninth century, most accessibly edited in Patrologia Latina, vol. 114, col. 1094. This is, however, very likely to be the godly Old Testament prophetess Huldah, called Olda in the Vulgate, who features in 2 Kgs 22,14-20 and 2 Chron 34,22-33.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

245

Scholars of ancient German mythology have often used medieval Norse literature to try to plug the gap left by the absence of evidence from pagan Germany itself. This does indeed contain revels by non-human beings, to which human magicians could fly in spirit. These revels are not, however, mainly female, and have no identifiable leader56. There are also superhuman females called Valkyries and Disir in the Old Norse literature. The former gather slain warriors to serve the god Odin in the next life, and are sometimes described as travelling through the air, on wings or by riding supernatural horses. The latter are warriors who ride in troops, to aid or destroy human fighters. Neither of them, however, ride behind a leader or invite living humans to join them57. Modern Scandinavian folklore came to associate the god Odin with these rides, but in the medieval texts he is a solitary traveller, and in his one recorded encounter with the night revels of spirits and their human magician friends, he deliberately disrupts them maliciously, making it impossible for the humans to get home again58. There is therefore no clear pagan progenitor at all for the Lady of medieval myth. It is entirely possible that the latter was developed from aspects of a variety of ancient cults, but that would still make her a medieval creation. There is even a slight possibility that the original inspiration was actually Christian, and that it was adapted from legends of female saints who visited houses to bless them. There is, however, no evidence for this at all, and the medieval Lady was neither saintly nor had any Christian associations. It is interesting in this context to note that the churchmen who condemned the belief in her all through the Middle Ages from the ninth century onward knew what both paganism and heresy looked like, and didn’t think that it belonged to either category59. They treated it instead as a rather silly popular superstition, carried on by people who were otherwise orthodox Christians, and this remained the dominant attitude among them into the early modern period, although in a few places, from the 1390s onward, it got mixed up with the developing stereotype of the satanic witch. What we seem to have in it, therefore, is a long-lived, widespread and tenacious popular and counter-cultural motif, of wish-fulfilment, 56. For which see HUTTON, The Witch (n. 44), pp. 86-95. 57. For Valkyries, see Volundark vida, verse 1; Helgakvida Hundingsbana II, in the Poetic Edda, verse 4, prose opening fit 2, and prose opening fit 4. LECOUTEUX prints the relevant passage concerning the Disir, from the Flateyarbók, in Phantom Armies (n. 44), pp. 20-21. 58. Hávamál, line 155. 59. This is certainly true of the canon “Episcopi” and Burchard, above, and also of the texts collected in J. GRIMM, Teutonic Mythology, trans. J.S. STALLYBRASS, London, Bell, 1882, vol. 1, pp. 282-288; COHN, Europe’s Inner Demons (n. 8), pp. 162-180; and LECOUTEUX, Phantom Armies (n. 44), pp. 15-17.

246

R. HUTTON

personal space and the acquisition of personal prestige. It appeared well into the Middle Ages, burgeoned for half a millennium and then atrophied again, existing for the whole period alongside Christianity. V My third example of a popular figure of this sort is the Cailleach, recorded in nineteenth- and twentieth-century folklore across the Gaelic world, of native Ireland, the Highlands and Western Isles of Scotland, and the Isle of Man60. She features in that as a mighty female figure, of immense age and huge size, associated with specific mountains, hills, lakes, rivers, cairns and caves. In Scotland she is specifically the spirit of winter, bringing the cold, and is also linked to animals, wild and tame, and can take animal shape. Some stories make her the builder of hills and mountains. This stature, and her wide range, naturally led those folklorists who considered the question of her origins to assume that she had been a major pagan goddess. The difficulty here is that she does not feature, in her modern form, in the older literatures of her regions. Medieval and early modern Scottish poetry certainly has supernatural or semi-human hags, often called “carlins” or “carlings” in the poetry, of a sort found across the Celtic cultural zone; but nothing really like the Cailleach61. Even more striking, she is missing from the very rich literature of medieval Ireland, which abounds with non-human beings. In particular it includes a genre called the Dindshenchas (meaning “the lore of notable places”) which is devoted to explaining place-names, by telling the stories behind them62. The name of the Cailleach is associated (as said) with many natural features in modern Ireland, but none of the medieval texts attach her to any. This cannot really be because she was a deity of the common people and the texts were produced by elites, because medieval Ireland was divided into so many tiny polities that a cultural gap between 60. The Scottish lore is collected in D.A. MACKENZIE, Scottish Folk-Lore and Folk Life, Glasgow, Blackie, 1935, pp. 136-170; the Irish in G. Ó CRUALAOICH, The Book of the Cailleach: Stories of the Wise-Woman Healer, Cork, Cork University Press, 2013. Both view her as an ancient goddess, in a tradition established in the nineteenth century, and both include a good bibliography of earlier studies of her. 61. For a recent treatment of the Celtic concept of the superhuman hag, see HUTTON, The Witch (n. 44), pp. 252-261. The early modern Scottish poetry features one called “the Gyre Carling” (Gay Old Woman), who appears in the Bannatyne Manuscript and Sir David Lyndsay’s The Dreme as a cannibal witch with an iron club, a figure nothing like the Cailleach. 62. E. GWYNN (ed.), The Metrical Dindshenchas, 5 vols., Dublin, Institute for Advanced Studies, 1903-1935; W. STOKES (ed.), The Prose Tales in the Rennes “Dindshenchas”, in Revue celtique 15 (1894) 272-336, 418-484.

CHRISTIAN GODDESSES?

247

rich and poor had hardly room to develop. Nor is it really plausible to suggest that the medieval authors avoided her out of distaste or fear, as their writings deal with several other kinds or personalities of superhuman females, which should have been even more abhorrent to medieval Christian mores. These include malevolent spirits translated most commonly into English as “the witches (or hags) of the glen” who emerge from wild places to incite armies to battle and enjoy the resulting carnage. In this they are human-like equivalents of the scavenging animals who devoured the corpses on battlefields, and the same roles are also fulfilled by a still more imposing class of being known collectively as the morrigna, who are usually interpreted by scholars as having been pagan Irish war goddesses63. Three in particular feature in the texts, the Badb, the Nemain and the Morrígan, who are all credited with provoking conflict or spreading panic among warriors, and revelling in the outpouring of emotion and bloodshed which results. The Morrígan also manifests a vigorous sexual appetite, with respect to both gods and heroes. Characters like these, so prominent in the actual medieval literature of Ireland, make the Cailleach of the later folklore look almost demure. There is, however, one direct link between the medieval and the modern in the case of the Cailleach, because in both Ireland and Scotland in recent centuries, the great land spirit was sometimes known as the Cailleach Bheare, the Old Woman of the Beare district; the last word being given several variant spellings and in Scotland commonly transmuted into Bheur. This character is found in medieval texts. She is not, however, the same personality in the two periods, because in the medieval literature, which seems to depend ultimately on one (probably) ninth-century poem, she is a royal woman, once powerful and beautiful, who is reduced to poverty and obscurity in extreme old age64. The name Cailleach ultimately derives from the Old Irish word for a nun, originally having the literal meaning of “the veiled one”, from caille, a veil, being the Irish translation of the Latin pallium65. A nun is what the original Cailleach Bheare is said to have become in the poem, eventually finding her only hope in Jesus. 63. The “witches (or hags) of the glen”, and related hag-figures, are considered in HUTTON, The Witch (n. 44), pp. 252-261. The best (relatively) recent study of the morrigna, which cites all the relevant primary texts, is probably A.G. EPSTEIN, War Goddess, University of California unpublished Ph.D. thesis, 1998. 64. For the dating of the poem, and the text, see G. MURPHY, The Lament of the Old Woman of Beare, in Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 55 (1952-3) 83-109. The same character is referred to in apparently later medieval Irish literature such as Aislinge Mheic Conglinne and The Expulsion of the Déssi. O CRUALAIOCH, The Book of the Cailleach, treats her as a sovereignty goddess, a type of being which undoubtedly occurs in medieval Irish literature, but the woman of the poem only partly matches that type. 65. M. NI DHONNCHADHA, Caillech and Other Terms for Veiled Women in Medieval Irish Texts, in Éigse 28 (1994-1995) 71-96.

248

R. HUTTON

The text concerned is a meditation on the transitory and ultimately worthless nature of worldly success. The scholars who had assumed that the modern Cailleach was an ancient goddess have assumed likewise that the same goddess must lie behind the lamenting woman in the poem; but there is no evidence for this. The evidence as we have it suggests the reverse: that the folk-figure of the great land-spirit developed since the Middle Ages, out of the character of the lamenting woman. It may well be that in the process she swept up the personae of local hag-spirits associated with particular wild places, to produce a pan-Gaelic character. None the less, that would still make her a post-medieval creation. VI It is time to conclude. What is being suggested here, as should be obvious, is that the Christian Middle Ages, across Western Europe and at all levels of society, were capable of developing traditions of new superhuman figures, which operated outside of Christian cosmology. They did not do so in opposition to Christianity and were not associated with a particular sect or faction; though they were often thought to favour and teach folk magicians. They were part of the thought-world of people who were otherwise orthodox Christians for their place and time. It seems wrong to refer to such figures as “pagan survivals”. Though they may have drawn on ancient ideas and motifs, they appear to have been creations of the Christian period, and to have gone on being created – if my characterization of the Cailleach is correct – into early modern times. On the other hand, to describe them as Christian, unproblematically and straightforwardly, is to miss the point of how completely they functioned outside of, and alongside, the Christian world picture. What all have in common is that they were expressions of a superhuman feminine, which interacted with humans and which was completely different in kind from the female saints integrated into Christian theology. It may be that we need to find a new labelling system for such entities, to fit an increasingly post-Christian society, for which the old polarizing terminology of pagan and Christian is no longer suitable. University of Bristol Senate House Tyndall Ave Bristol BS8 1TH United Kingdom [email protected]

Ronald HUTTON

EPILOGUE 1

GENTES, PAGANI, AND THE “NIJMEGEN SCHOOL”

Christian authors used various terms to refer to adherents of the old Greco-Roman religious tradition1. In this little note, meant as a kind of epilogue to the preceding essays, I would like to draw attention to a question that is probably not unknown to most readers, but the details of which are perhaps worth recalling. It is the debate about the status of Christian Latin that went on for several decades of the last century and in which the two terms listed in the title played a not unimportant role. The controversy about what status to give to early Christian Latin is well documented and has been studied in some detail, most recently in two interesting essays by a Leuven alumnus2. As these essays were published in journals that are primarily addressed at linguists and/or classical philologists, it might be of some interest briefly to recall what the issue was about. I am not an historian of linguistics, but I would like to use Denecker’s essays, especially his second one, to say a word about how vocabulary referring to “pagans” played its role in it. 1. Just note the titles of various works, which run from πρὸς ῞Ελληνας (TATIAN, the lost works by MILTIADES and APOLLINARIS OF HIERAPOLIS mentioned by EUSEBIUS in HE 5.17.5 and 4.26.1, 27.1; CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA’s Προτρεπτικὸς πρὸς ῞Ελληνας; THEODORET’s Graecorum affectionum curatio) over ad (TERTULLIAN) or adversus Nationes (ARNOBIUS) to Oratio contra gentes (Latin title commonly given to a work of ATHANASIUS) and adversus (OROSIUS’ Historiae) or contra Paganos (the Carmen contra paganos), to mention only such titles that have a word connoting “pagan” in their title. Besides these, there are of course many other works critically engaging with “paganism” that take the form of apologies (JUSTIN MARTYR’s Apologies and (parts of) the lost ones by QUADRATUS, ARISTIDES and ARISTO OF PELLA; THEOPHILUS OF ANTIOCH’s ad Autolycum; TERTULLIAN’s Apologeticum, resulting from his ad Nationes, but also his de Spectaculis; MINUCIUS FELIX’ Octavius; LACTANCE’s Divinae institutiones and his de Mortibus persecutorum; the better part of AUGUSTINE’s De civitate Dei), heresiography (the opening chapters of EPIPHANIUS OF SALAMIS’ Panarion, and other such catalogues), a letter (ad Diognetum), satire (HERMIAS’ Διασυρμὸς τῶν ἔξω φιλοσόφων), poems (COMMODIANUS), sermons (see MAXIMUS OF TURIN, CAESARIUS OF ARLES), or general surveys (EUSEBIUS’ Praeparatio evangelica). As is well known, THOMAS AQUINAS’ Summa contra gentiles addresses more recent “pagans”, though some of the ideas he wishes to counter had a history that went back to ancient times. 2. T. DENECKER, The Nijmegen School and Its “Sociological” Approach to the So-called ‘Sondersprache’ of Early Christians: A Preliminary Historiographical Study, in Latomus 77 (2018) 335-357; ID., Among Latinists: Alfred Ernout and Einar Löfstedt’s Responses to the “Nijmegen School” and Its Christian ‘Sondersprache’ Hypothesis, in Historiographia Linguistica 45 (2018) 325-361; both with extensive bibliography.

250

J. VERHEYDEN

In 1912 the Dutch Latinist Jos Schrijnen, later on professor of Latin at the Catholic University of Nijmegen in the Netherlands, published a monograph (in Dutch) entitled Sociale klassieke taalkunde in which he promoted a sociological approach to studying languages that was becoming increasingly more popular at that time and that led him to argue that early Christians in the Latin speaking part of the empire developed their own version of Latin in such a way that it could be regarded as a special language (“Sondersprache”) that characterised a particular social group3. Twenty years later Schrijnen published an essay in which he tried to define the particularities of that language in more detail4. The hypothesis was further promoted by Schrijnen himself and by his students, most forcefully by his successor in the chair of Latin at Nijmegen, Christine Mohrmann, who over a period of more than forty years published an impressive series of books and articles in defence of it – hence the label “Nijmegen School”5. The aim was to look for Christian neologisms and, more broadly and interestingly, specifically Christian usages and meanings of existing words and phrases6. As Denecker indicates, Schrijnen and Mohrmann developed their hypothesis along two axes, each of them with a twofold aspect. The first one has to do with the use of a particular term, the second with its meaning. The first can be further divided into “absolute” Christian words, attested in principle only in Christian authors, and “relative” ones, originating in Christian milieu but then also being used by non-Christian authors. On the second axis, one can distinguish between “direct” Christian words denoting 3. Sociale klassieke taalkunde, Amsterdam, Van Langenhuysen, 1912. 4. Charakteristik des altchristlichen Latein, Nijmegen, Dekker en Van de Vegt & Van Leeuwen; repr. in C. MOHRMANN (ed.), Études sur le latin des chrétiens, 4 vols., Roma, Storia e letteratura, 1958-1977, IV, 367-404. 5. See, a.o., Die altchristliche Sondersprache in den Sermones des hl. Augustin. Erster Teil: Einführung, Lexikologie, Wortbildung, Nijmegen, Dekker en Van de Vegt & Van Leeuwen, 1932 (the first part of her PhD, the second was never published); Le latin commun et le latin des chrétiens, in Vigiliae Christianae 1 (1947) 1-12; repr. in MOHRMANN (ed.), Études (n. 4), III, 13-24; Le latin, langue de la chrétienté occidentale, in Aevum 24 (1950) 133-161; repr. in Études, I, 51-81; L’étude de la latinité chrétienne: État de la question, méthodes, résultats, in Conférences de l’Institut de linguistique de l’Université de Paris 10 (1951) 125-141; repr. in Études, I, 83-102; Nach vierzig Jahren, in Études, IV, 111-140. On the “school”, see esp. two essays, published together, by Dutch colleagues who were well familiar with it: G.J.M. BARTELINK, L’œuvre scientifique de Christine Mohrmann (l’École de Nimègue), in Sacris Erudiri 32 (1991) 23-37 and A.A.R. BASTIAENSEN, Schrijnen – Mohrmann: Collaboration et succession retardée, ibid., 39-59. Cf. also C. VIRCILLO FRANKLIN, Christine Mohrmann (1903-1988) and the Study of Christian Latin, in J. CHANCE (ed.), Women Medievalists and the Academy, Madison, WI, University of Wisconsin Press, 2005, ²2018, 599-612. In her later years Mohrmann published several essays on Medieval Latin, which in a sense can perhaps have a bigger claim on being given this label of “Sondersprache”. 6. On neologisms, see, e.g., J. BASTUJI, Aspects de la néologie sémantique, in Langages 8/36 (1974) 6-19.

GENTES, PAGANI, AND THE “NIJMEGEN SCHOOL”

251

exclusively Christian concepts like the incarnation, and “indirect” ones, which received a specific meaning in Christian discourse that distinguished them from their “pagan” use. The latter is the more important one for the hypothesis, for as Denecker notes, “if the spread of Christianity could be shown to have given rise to linguistic innovations outside of the characteristically Christian lexicon, the ‘Sondersprache’ hypothesis would prove [to be] correct”7. The hypothesis is further strengthened if one can produce evidence for Christian usage and novelty on all four levels of vocabulary, morphology, phonetics, and syntax. Denecker surveys the reactions to the Nijmegen hypothesis by a number of Latinists, primarily Alfred Ernout, a student of Antoine Meillet who would become professor at the Collège de France, and Einar Löfstedt, professor at Lund University, with also more oblique references to others, most importantly among them Jules Marouzeau. Denecker demonstrates how a then relatively young Ernout was rather cautious in engaging with the established scholar Schrijnen and in his review of the latter’s 1932 work remains uncommitted or, at best, tepidly enthusiastic, without ever really taking up the hypothesis in his later work, which proves the great hesitations he had about the thesis, further proof, if needed, being a letter he wrote to Mohrmann in 1947 and his review of Mohrmann’s state of the question some years later, in which he speaks out against her8. The great Marouzeau could speak freely right from the beginning, and did so. His “j’ai peine à admettre” in his review of the same work of Schrijnen is later on interpreted, quite correctly, by J. de Ghellinck as utter scepticism9. Others were less negative and endorsed Schrijnen’s “Christian Latin” 7. DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), p. 327. 8. Cf. ibid., pp. 327-339. A. ERNOUT had previously published on historical morphology (Morphologie historique du latin, Paris, Klincksieck, 1914) and would publish two books on Latin vocabulary after the second World War (Le vocabulaire latin, Paris, Collège de France, 1946, and Aspects du vocabulaire latin, Paris, Klincksieck, 1954). His review of Schrijnen, followed by one of Mohrmann’s dissertation, appeared in Bulletin de la société linguistique de Paris 33 (1932) 66-67 and 67-68. The review of Mohrmann’s essay of 1951 was published in the Revue de philologie 26 (1952) 137-138. Part of the letter is cited in DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), pp. 337-338. If in the letter he is still more indirect, veiling his criticism in a nice comparison when saying that contemporary Church Latin (of the “Catholic Church”) is not intelligible to many and that no one would think to speak of the particular syntax of Bossuet or Lacordaire, he is much more direct in the review: “c’est donc surtout dans le lexique que le latin chrétien s’est montré créateur; la syntaxe n’a guère été touché par lui” and “quant à la phonétique et à la morphologie, elles n’ont rien non plus de particulièrement chrétien” (p. 137). The criticism is devastating. One cannot speak of a “Sondersprache” on the sole basis of innovations in the vocabulary; all aspects of a language have to be affected to make the hypothesis work. 9. J. MAROUZEAU, review of Schrijnen, in Revue des études latines 10 (1932) 241-242, here p. 241. And see J. DE GHELLINCK, Latin chrétien ou langue latin des chrétiens, in Les études classiques 8 (1939) 449-478, p. 475. Cf. DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), p. 330.

252

J. VERHEYDEN

without any reservation, but also without much reflection, it would seem. Denecker cites reviews by Albert Debrunner (the “Sondersprache” thesis is “unproblematically [sic] accepted”, Martin McGuire (“simply taken for granted”), and Alexander Souter (“blatantly uncritical”)10. It might be useful to note that the first and third of these were more at home in “Biblical Greek”, Debrunner being responsible for the updated edition of Friedrich Blass’ grammar of NT Greek and Souter for an edition of the New Testament11. This may in part perhaps explain their enthusiasm, as both were of course familiar with the whole discussion on whether the Greek of the New Testament could possibly be defined as a language of its own (or if not exclusively Christian, at least Jewish-Christian or “biblical”) and not principally adverse to such a conclusion. This is in any case true for Debrunner who concludes the introductory section on the position of NT language in the context of Hellenistic Greek as follows: “Das Griechisch des NT weist charakteristische Unterschiede zur Koine auf”12. Löfstedt, a specialist of “late Latin”, as he liked to call it, and author of monographs on the language of the Peregrinatio Egeriae, Tertullian and Arnobius13, changed from initial sympathy to more outspoken criticism 10. See his qualifications in DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), p. 334. The reviews were published in Indogermanische Forschungen 54 (1936) 306-307; The American Journal of Philology 58 (1937) 502-504; and The Classical Review 52/4 (1938) 149. 11. A. Debrunner took over from Blass, who had passed away in 1907, for the fourth edition: F. BLASS – A. DEBRUNNER, Grammatik des neutestamentlichen Griechisch, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 41913, 141975 (bearbeitet von F. REHKOPF), 161984. A. SOUTER, Nouum Testamentum Graece, Oxford, Clarendon, 1910, ²1947. 12. Grammatik (n. 11), p. 9. Blass had called in pragmatic reasons for writing a grammar of NT Greek, noting that general grammars of the Greek language could not be expected to give any special attention to the peculiarities of such a relatively small corpus of writings as the New Testament. Cf. F. BLASS, Grammatik des neutestamentlichen Griechisch, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1896, ²1902, p. 1: “die allgemeine Grammatik der griechischen Sprache kann auf die in ihnen [i.e., the NT writings] hervortretenden Eigenthümlichkeiten nur in beschränktester Weise Bezug nehmen”; he proposes to offer “eine möglichst genaue Erforschung auch ihrer grammatischen Besonderheiten” (ibid.). Blass seems to be more open for linking NT Greek to the more vulgar part of Hellenistic Greek, but he then also emphasises again the differences there are between the former and the latter when concluding, “wer eine Grammatik der damaligen Volkssprache schreibt, auf Grund aller dieser verschiedenen Zeugnisse und Denkmäler, verfährt vom Standpunkte des Grammatikers richtiger, als wer sich auf die Sprache des NT. beschränkt. Indessen die praktischen Erwägungen, von denen wir ausgingen, werden fort und fort eine solche Beschränkung auferlegen; denn es ist nicht gleichwertig, was ein beliebiger Aegypter in einem Briefe oder einer Verkaufsurkunde schreibt, und was die Männer des NT. geschrieben haben, mochten sie auch zu ihrer Zeit noch so sehr als gleichartig und gleich verächtlich mit dem niederen Haufen der Aegypter und Syrer von der ganzen gebildeten Welt angesehen werden” (pp. 2-3). 13. Cf. from an impressive production, Beiträge zur Kenntnis der späteren Latinität, Stockholm, Svanbäcks, 1907; Philologischer Kommentar zur Peregrinatio Aetheriae: Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der lateinischen Sprache, Uppsala, Almqvist och Wiksell; Leipzig,

GENTES, PAGANI, AND THE “NIJMEGEN SCHOOL”

253

when reviewing or discussing the publications of his Nijmegen colleagues14. In 1933 he uses the term “christliche Sondersprache” without any comment15 and praises Tertullian’s “sprachschöpferische Genialität”16. In the same work he also briefly deals with the development in meaning of the terms gentes and pagani. The first one “naturally” developed from referring to foreign peoples to denoting non-Christians, hence a move from a secular to a religious connotation. In his own words, Die gentes sind also im Gegensatz zum populus Romanus die fremden Völker, die Ausländer, die Barbaren, ein Begriff, an dem naturgemäss eine ungünstige Vorstellung haftete. Das christliche gentes = “die Heiden” ist nur die natürliche, ganz naheliegende Übertragung dieser Auffassung auf das religiöse Gebiet17.

The same happened to the word pagani which lost its secular meaning to become a synonym for gentes in Christian authors. Löfstedt qualified only this second case as a transformation and not an innovation, but it most probably is true also for the first instance, as Denecker rightly notes18. Haupt, 1911; Tertullians Apologeticum textkritisch untersucht, Lund, Gleerup; Leipzig, Harrassowitz, 1915; Arnobiana: Textkritische und sprachliche Studien zu Arnobius, Lund, Gleerup; Leipzig, Harrassowitz, 1917; Kritische Bemerkungen zu Tertullians Apologeticum, Lund, Gleerup; Leipzig, Harrassowitz, 1918; Zur Sprache Tertullians, Lund, Gleerup; Leipzig, Harrassowitz, 1920; Syntactica: Studien und Beiträge zur historischen Syntax des Lateins. Erster Teil: Über einige Grundfragen der lateinischen Nominalsyntax, Lund, Gleerup, 1929, ²1942; Zweiter Teil: Syntaktisch-stilistische Gesichtspunkte und Probleme, Lund, Gleerup, 1933; Vermischte Studien zur lateinischen Sprachkunde und Syntax, Lund, Gleerup, 1936; Coniectanea: Untersuchungen auf dem Gebiete der antike und mittelalterliche Latinität, Uppsala – Stockholm, Almqvist och Wiksell, 1950; and posthumously edited, Late Latin, Oslo, Aschehoug, 1959. See the collection of studies on Löfstedt edited by P. POCCETTI, Einar Löfstedt nei percorsi della linguistica e della filologia Latina: Atti del convegno internazionale, Roma, 6-7 maggio 2004, Pisa – Roma, F. Serra, 2007. 14. On this development, see DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), pp. 339-352. 15. Talking about Graecisms, he notes, “Lehrreiche Fälle bieten namentlich diejenigen Sprach- und Sachgebiete, die ganz besonders unter griechischen Einfluss gestanden haben: grammatische, medizinische und überhaupt wissenschaftliche Terminologie, christliche Sondersprache etc.” (LÖFSTEDT, Syntactica [n. 13], II, pp. 433-434); cf. DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), p. 340. The term is used positively, but it should be noted it is used to refer to one particular phenomenon (semantic calques from Greek) and without specifying if these words, even if introduced in Latin through a particular channel, were meant to be exclusively Christian words. Grammatical, medical and scientific language in general were not the exclusive property of scientists, even if they were the first and most enthusiastic users and the ones who probably best knew the etymology and the connotations of such terms. 16. Syntactica (n. 13), II, p. 458; and cf. DENECKER’s conclusion: “Löfstedt seems to accept the Sondersprache hypothesis without any reservations” (Responses [n. 2], p. 341). 17. Syntactica (n. 13), II, p. 467. The “naturally” negative connotation is sometimes (artificially) given up, as I will show below. 18. “Das war der Hintergrund bei der Entwicklung des christlichen Sprachgebrauchs; es handelt sich also hier, wie so oft sonst, nicht um Neuprägung, sondern um Umprägung eines alten, jedem Römer geläufigen Begriffes” (ibid., p. 468). “Although this statement

254

J. VERHEYDEN

Even if Löfstedt did not wish to use these two examples as proof against the “Sondersprache” thesis, for they occur in the same work in which he had embraced that thesis, the label “Umprägung” raised the ire of the Nijmegen colleagues. Schrijnen reacted first the next year and in “quite a patronizing and self-congratulatory way”, as Denecker observes19. The passage in which he reacts to Löfstedt speaks for itself: M. Löfstedt croit que dans ce changement sémasiologique, comme cela apparaît clairement dans le changement du sens de gentes “peuples étrangers”, qui finit par signifier “païens”, de même pagani “villageois” puis “païens”, orare “demander solennellement” puis “prier”, etc., il s’agit plutôt d’une “Umprägung” que d’une “Neuprägung” de sens, et que ce renouvellement de sens se fait par l’intermédiaire d’une acception qui s’était déjà développée secondairement. N’est-ce pas une question de mots? Et la dénomination ne dépend-elle pas du point de vue auquel on se place? Personnellement, j’ai la prétention d’y voir une “Neuprägung”. Quoi qu’il en soit, il est clair que, pour aboutir au sens chrétien, il a fallu qu’il y ait des points de contact, et ces points de contact ont été fournis par une des significations secondaires et affectives que presque chaque mot se crée à la longue nécessairement. … Observons cependant deux choses: 1° sans l’action puissante du christianisme toutes ces nuances de sens seraient restées forcément stériles et sans lendemain; 2° quand on veut retrouver la nuance préchrétienne qui a servi de trait d’union il faut user d’une extrême prudence. Et tout d’abord il faut partir de la signification chrétienne juste20.

Two things are worth mentioning. First, Schrijnen apparently admits that it may just be a matter of a choice of words, but it is evident from what follows that this is not how he sees it (“j’ai la prétention…”). Second, he rightly points out the affective aspects that may have played a role in pushing towards a particular direction, but he remains most hesitant in doing anything with it and prefers to stay on seemingly safe ground with his final phrase about “la signification chrétienne juste”. Mohrmann took over from Schrijnen and repeatedly came back to Löfstedt’s position, reading it, in line with Schrijnen, as an open critique of the Nijmegen position21. She especially also took issue with the gentes/ primarily relates to the case of pagani, it seems reasonable to assume that for Löfstedt it also applied to that of gentes” (DENECKER, Responses [n. 2], p. 342). One should note the phrase “wie so oft sonst” which actually makes Schrijnen’s position the exception, in this and in other cases. 19. DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), p. 342. 20. Le latin chrétien devenu langue commune, in Revue des études latines 12 (1934) 96-116, here pp. 111-112; repr. in C. MOHRMANN – P.J. MEERTENS – W. ROUKENS (eds.), Collectanea Schrijnen: Verspreide opstellen van Dr. Jos. Schrijnen, Nijmegen – Utrecht, Dekker en Van de Vegt, 1939, 335-356. 21. DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), pp. 343-347.

GENTES, PAGANI, AND THE “NIJMEGEN SCHOOL”

255

pagani example. In redrawing the development the words went through, she starts from the commonly accepted negative connotation the word gentes (and pagani) has, which the Christians picked up on to give it a completely new meaning: La valeur intellectuelle du mot dans la langue des chrétiens est complètement nouvelle…, mais elle repose sur la nuance affective du mot dans la langue commune. Sans l’action puissante de l’idéologie chrétienne cette nuance serait restée forcément stérile et jamais elle n’aurait abouti au sens que le mot a obtenu dans la langue chrétienne. Et, ce qui est plus, le sens du mot gentes a subi un changement essentiel qui, à mon avis, nous permet de parler d’un néologisme sémantique22.

It is as if one reads Schrijnen himself (italics are mine to compare with the quotation from Schrijnen above). Only the word “Neuprägung” is lacking, probably because it cannot be rendered that easily in French, for which she then uses the term “neologism”. The strong wording and the strong conviction that speaks from it notwithstanding, it is interesting (and perhaps symptomatic for the thesis as a whole) to see that even Mohrmann occasionally seems to falter23. Without going into further details of the Mohrmann vs. Löfstedt debate, I wish to conclude with two comments based on the observations on Schrijnen’s reaction mentioned above. Non-linguists may have the impression that this is indeed only a matter of wording, and one has the impression that even Mohrmann, at one point, seems to admit this24. But actually, the dispute about whether the new or additional meaning a word receives is a “Neu-” or an “Umprägung” is symptomatic for a broader problem underlying the whole discussion. There are four aspects to it. First, as Denecker notes, Schrijnen, nor Mohrmann, ever made an effort to offer a clear definition of what is a “Sondersprache”25. Defining such 22. Quelques traits caractéristiques du latin des chrétiens, in Miscellanea Giovanni Mercati. Vol. 1: Bibbia – Letteratura cristiana antica, Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca apostolica vaticana, 1946, 437-466, here pp. 442-443; repr. in Études (n. 4), I, 21-50. Mohrmann would return to the problem six years later in an article entitled Encore une fois: ‘paganus’, in Vigiliae Christianae 6 (1952) 109-121; repr. in Études, III, 277-289. 23. See DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), pp. 344-345; he also notes that sometimes she is “vague” in her use of the term “Latin”, by which she actually means “Christian Latin”. 24. “Il n’est pas douteux qu’il s’agit ici plutôt d’une question de mots, comme Mgr. Schrijnen l’a déjà observé” (Quelques traits [n. 22], p. 441). Repeated almost verbatim in Étude de la latinité chrétienne (n. 5), p. 131. 25. DENECKER, Responses (n. 2), p. 326: “It should be emphasized that Schrijnen and Mohrmann never really managed to make it clear what exactly they meant by Sondersprache (a ‘special language’, ‘dialect’, ‘sociolect’, ‘jargon’, …), and that this vagueness constituted a major and lasting source of criticism from contemporary scholars”.

256

J. VERHEYDEN

a concept is easier said than done, but without a clear idea of what it refers to and some agreement on this basic principle the debate risks to become a matter of words and labels, impressions, and appreciations. Second, it looks as if Schrijnen and Mohrmann have pushed their intuition too far when arguing that the peculiarities of Christian Latin are detectable not only in the vocabulary, but also in other aspects of a language. This was the major problem Ernout had with their thesis (see above n. 8), and one they never were able to solve in an acceptable way. Third, there may be something inherently circular in Schrijnen’s reasoning on how new meanings come about. As he sees it, this “new” meaning is, to some degree, already enclosed in the old one. The change is gradual or transitional rather than disruptive (“significations secondaires et affectives”), and it is in a sense natural. All that is needed is an instance that pushes this new meaning forward, which is the role Schrijnen attributes to Christianity in this context. But it entails that Christianity is perhaps not the creative force Schrijnen and Mohrmann want it to be, but rather the transmitter of a potential that was always present; moreover, to assess this development, it might be risky to “start from the Christian meaning” (“il faut partir de la signification chrétienne juste”), for how to distinguish on that basis between a word that truly receives a new meaning “from scratch” and one for which an always existing meaning is promoted to become the more common or the “completely new” one? Fourth, one cannot deny that Christian authors introduced some new vocabulary, but that is not the problem, and also, and more importantly, that some words received another connotation and maybe even another meaning in Christian literature, whether or not they came to be used by pagan authors as well. How “new” this was is a relative concept, both from the perspective of the author and his/her readers and from a purely linguistic point of view. The first of these has, again, to do with perceptions; the second may give the impression one is on safer ground, only to find that there is no generally accepted linguistic definition of what is a “new” word in such a context. Also, it is good to keep in mind that giving a word a “truly” new meaning, if that can somehow be established, may be less innovative than producing an “Umprägung”. It all depends on context, the type of meaning, and the author/readership being able to digest it. On a more pragmatic level, one might decide to proceed along the following line: in cases where a word completely loses its old meaning, so that no one continues to use it in this way or that the old meaning becomes “archaic” or “rare” after the new meaning started to catch on and to circulate, one can speak of “Neuprägung”; in the other cases, where the two meanings exist side by side, “Umprägung”

GENTES, PAGANI, AND THE “NIJMEGEN SCHOOL”

257

is perhaps the better label. It would mean that the borderlines between “Neu-” and “Umprägung” are flexible and should be treated as such; all “new” words of this type start as “Umprägungen”, some make it into “Neuprägung”26. This brings me to my second comment on the basis of what is said above. Schrijnen alludes to the affective aspect of the meaning and use of a term, but he does not further develop this and it remains a marginal element in the discussion. Yet, it is precisely this affective aspect that may have played a role, if perhaps not in creating then at least in promoting the “new” meaning of gentes and pagani, because of the irony that is involved in the way they are used in a good deal of Christian literature. Gentes, denoting foreign peoples, can be looked upon in despise, and there is ample evidence for this in ancient sources, both Greco-Roman and others, as far as the latter are preserved, for it is not an exclusive privilege of Greeks and Romans to consider others as “barbaric”, though our best evidence comes from that corner; or they can be praised, for whatever reasons. Among the latter may be the purpose to warn, reprimand, or educate the reader (as is in part the case in Tacitus’ Germania and in a good number of biblical passages “honouring” the peoples to turn around disobedient Israel), or there may be an element of sincere respect sounding through. The same is also true, in some way at least, for the singular. Gens is a term that can receive various affective connotations depending on who is using it, on the purpose, and on the object it is referring to. The word could refer, most positively, to someone’s high birth, or to the opposite. It could be a reason for pride and for contempt. In any case, it expressed a sense of belonging, for the better or the worse. The situation is different for paganus that always had a negative connotation, in some cases more mildly than in others. A basic aspect is that a paganus does not belong, or is considered not to belong, to the civilised world of urban society. “Pagan” religion survived much longer on the countryside than in the cities, but most of the Christian controversy literature using the terms gentes and pagani (and related ones) is thinking of or addressing urbanised “pagans”. The irony in the “Umprägung” cannot have escaped the readers, be they Christian or not. Pride is taken away and insult given in return. Prominent members of a prominent gens are scolded as pagani, even while living in the metropolis. It also works on the more general level of exposing as gentes members of such families. It must have 26. Cf. DENECKER’s assessment of the “Mohrmann / Löfstedt divide”: “not necessarily incompatible …: by its very nature, a transformation likewise involves an element of innovation” (Responses [n. 2], p. 344).

258

J. VERHEYDEN

been hard to swallow as an insult for the targets and an easy prank from the side of the Christian author and reader. In order to make the trick work most perfectly, it is better that the old meaning continues to exist and that the targets are very much aware of the turn; so maybe “Um-” rather than “Neuprägung” after all27? Joseph VERHEYDEN

27. The discussion on the notion of “Christian Latin” continued after the “Nijmegen School” had dissolved; see, e.g., Ph.H. BURTON, On Revisiting the Christian Latin ‘Sondersprache’ Hypothesis, in D.C. PARKER – H.H. HOUGHTON (eds.), Textual Variation: Theological and Social Tendencies? Papers from the Fifth Birmingham Colloquium on the Textual Criticism of the New Testament, Piscataway, NJ, Gorgias, 2008, 149-171; ID., Christian Latin, in J. CLACKSON (ed.), A Companion to the Latin Language, Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, 485-501.

EPILOGUE 2

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE A SELECTIVE SURVEY OF RELEVANT VOCABULARY WITH A FEW COMMENTS

The Bible uses several different words for referring to pagans, i.e., non-Jewish peoples and their representatives. In general, one can distinguish four groups or four ways to mention pagan peoples. The first and most important, because the most frequently used, is to pick one of several words denoting “(foreign) people/s”. In the Hebrew Bible ‫ גוים‬is the standard term. It by far surpasses in use any other word from whatever group. As a rule, though not exclusively, it is rendered in LXX by ἔϑνη and in Vg by gentes (less frequently in both also the singular is used); the latter is also the normal equivalent for ἔϑνη in the New Testament. “Thoroughly” negative in meaning, it is worth noting that even this term occasionally can be used with a positive connotation in a more universalistic eschatological perspective or, more pragmatically and rhetorically, as a sort of counterexample, when calling upon Israel (or followers of Jesus) to repent or stay loyal to the Lord, lest it (or they) be replaced or surpassed by “the gentiles”. This goes even more for any other of the terms listed here. Far less frequent are the adjective of the same root, gentilis, and the substantivised adjectives ethnicus and barbarus, clearly modelled on the Greek. Other words that belong to this group and occur in the Vg are populi (as a rule, ‫עמים‬, ‫אמים‬, λαοί)1, nationes and cognationes, and tribus (‫אמים‬, λαοί)2. There are also a few instances of the metaphorical use of lingua in combination with one or more of the previous terms. The second group consists of words denoting the idea of being strangers and foreigners (in the land of Israel). To this group belong such words as alienigena (adj. and noun), alienus (adj. and noun), peregrinus (adj. and noun), and advena (adj. and noun). The first two render ‫ נכר‬or ‫( זר‬LXX ἀλλοφύλος, ἀλλογενής, ἀλλότριος). The same connotation of being a stranger can also be paraphrased otherwise (see Gen 17,12 non de stirpe 1. In the singular it can also refer, negatively, to a foreign people, but it is more often used positively to denote God’s people, though the latter also can have a negative connotation if “God’s people” sins against His commandments and behaves as a pagan one. 2. The latter term is used only selectively in this way, as there are of course many instances where it refers to “the (twelve) tribes of Israel”.

260

J. VERHEYDEN

vestra). For this group, even more than for the first one, it is important to note that the terms listed are not by definition always negative or connoted to “paganism”. The first stranger in the land of Israel was Abraham (see, e.g., Gen 23,4 where he is called both advena and peregrinus). Only part of the occurrences of these terms denote (an aspect of) pagan lifestyle. The third group are words or phrases denoting “pagan” religious practices, most prominently committing idolatry, but also more generally, adopting a Greek lifestyle. I have not systematically looked at such cases. As the Vg does not use any specific term but only circumscriptions, I have left out this group from the survey3. The fourth group consists of the name of a people as such (the Philistines, Ammonites, etc.) or as a paraphrase (cf. PsH 82,8 habitatores Tyri)4. Such references are mostly used in a specific historical context, but they are not necessarily bound to it and can take a kind of exemplary function for any foreign people5. I will not dwell on such cases in the survey below (except for the word Ἕλληνες, see pp. 306-307). Finally, it may be good to remember, though it is probably well known, that the term pagani/-us does not occur in the Latin Bible6. 3. See, e.g., two instances with peregrinus: peregrina usus … participans (2 Macc 5,10) and qui induti sunt veste peregrina (Zeph 1,8). The “famous” ἑλληνισμός in 2 Macc 4,13 ἦν δὲ ἀκμή τις Ἑλληνισμοῦ καὶ πρόσβασις ἀλλοφυλισμοῦ is rendered erat autem hoc non initium sed incrementum quoddam et profectus gentilis et alienigenae conversationis. The word idolatria occurs only three times in the Vg (1 Sam 15,23; Acts 17,16; Rev 21,8); idolatres, used abundantly by Jerome and Bede, does not occur. 4. Note in this respect the unique occurrence of the term allophili in PsG 55,1 cum tenuerunt eum Allophili in Geth par. PsH Palestini = MT ‫ ;פלשׁתים‬LXX οἱ ἀλλόφυλοι. PsH refers to the version of Psalms translated from the Hebrew, PsG the one translated from the LXX. 5. This is probably the case in the woe sayings against the cities in Matt 11,21-23 par. Luke 10,13-15, where Tyre and Sidon represent any pagan city and population. The same may be true of the demand for a sign in Matt 12,38-32 par. Luke 11,29-32, where Nineveh is called forth by the analogy Jesus makes between the way his and Jonah’s message is received, but Nineveh stands for any pagan city that would respond positively to Jesus. 6. The word paganus enters only rather late in Christian literature. It is found in an anonymous tractate against pagan philosophers and another one against the Jews of which excerpts are preserved in Augustine (CPL 0360 and 0360°). Dionysius Exiguus uses it a couple of times in his translation of the Vita Pachomii. Johannes Maxentius, in his Dialogus contra Nestorianos, has one Nestorian reply: qui hoc non credit, prorsus paganus est, by which he probably means more than just “a simpleton”. It then becomes the common term for “pagans” in Fulgentius of Ruspe, Facundus of Hermiane, Verecundus, Cassiodorus, who uses it dozens of times in his translation of Socrates’ Historia Ecclesiastica and in other works, Caesarius of Arles, Gregory of Turin, Isidore of Sevilla, Julian of Toledo, and Bede. It is also used twice in the Latin version of letters of Ignatius of Antioch, a possibly

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

261

What follows is not conceived as a contribution to the study of the social, legal, or theological meaning of the word or concept of “gentile” in the Jewish and Christian Bible. There is no lack of secondary literature on this topic, but that is not my interest here. It is also not my intention to offer a systematic analysis of Vg translation technique. My purpose is a far more modest one. I merely wish to present a number of lists that may help to illustrate how these various words denoting “paganism” are used in Vg, briefly to evaluate the equivalences there are between a particular word and the Hebrew or Greek one it renders, and if possible also to explain some at least of the “inconsistencies” or “anomalies” the lists reveal. As it is just not possible, and perhaps also not really necessary for my purpose, to survey all instances of the use of the keywords listed above in the whole of Vg, I have decided to cover the NT evidence in full (though perhaps in somewhat less detail because the situation is slightly less complex – the differences between the original and the translation being fewer in number – and also because the ways the keywords are used are not completely different from what the OT evidence shows us), but to limit the evidence for the OT to three randomly chosen books, from the three sections of the Hebrew Bible, which have been checked systematically – Genesis, Isaiah, and the Psalms (both versions). The surveys and lists below are arranged per book or corpus (first OT: Genesis – Psalms – Isaiah, than NT) and per word and word form. Instances of the keywords in the lists below (with prepositions or certain adjectives) are marked in bold and with the Hebrew or Greek original in parenthesis (more selectively for the NT, because there is less variation); cases in which another word is used than the “normal” equivalent, if applicable (e.g., ‫ = גוים‬gentes, ‫עמים‬, ‫ = אמים‬populi), are in bold italics if another of the keywords is used, or plain italics if not; occasionally, the latter is also used to highlight other aspects (use of a special word, etc.). I also indicate interesting parallels or combinations of keywords. With regard to the former of these, I follow a slightly different pattern for the NT evidence, in that I have systematically checked OT and NT parallels for a particular verse as these can be found in the margins of the Vg and NA28 editions and have also paid attention to OT citations; for the OT part, parallel material is cited more selectively, in order not to overburden the lists. The reading of the LXX is added when deemed relevant or of interest; if no mention is given, Vg and LXX agree on the use of the “normal” equivalent (e.g., ‫ = גוים‬ἔϑνη = gentes). authentic (Phil. 4.3) and a spurious one (Antioch. 1.2), but this translation dates from long after Ignatius.

262

J. VERHEYDEN

The numbers of instances for the various keywords are as follows7: gens 1005 (OT 846, NT 159), the vast majority of these in the plural (736/269)8. 7. For gens, natio, and cognatio I count and list all instances; comments and modifications are added below when presenting the evidence. For the other keywords I only list relevant evidence, as for those terms there are too many instances that do not bear the connotation of “pagan”. Numbers of totals include doubles in the same verse. PsH and PsG are counted as separate works, also when they are identical. References are according to Vg numbering and may occasionally slightly differ from MT or LXX. Only for gens, the most important term, and for populi (pl.), I have distinguished instances according to the various word forms. 8. gentes, nom., voc. and acc. 352 (NT 53): Gen (6) nom. (4) 10,32; 22,18; 25,23; 26,4; acc. (2) 35,11; 48,19; PsH (30) nom. (14) 2,1; 9,16.18.20.21.37; 45,7; 66,5; 71,17; 78,1.10; 85,9; 101,16; 113,10; voc. (1) 116,1; acc. (15) 2,8; 9,6; 43,3; 46,9; 58,6.9; 65,7; 77,54; 78,6; 79,9; 81,8; 93,10; 112,4; 117,10; 134,10; PsG (42) all of the above, except 78,10 and 81,8, + nom. (13+2: 15) 64,8; 71,11; voc. (1+3: 4) 46,2; 48,2; 65,8; acc. (14+9: 23) 9,12; 46,4; 66,5; 67,31; 95,3; 104,1; 105,34.35; 125,2; Isa (25) nom. (12) 2,2; 11,10; 33,3; 40,15.17; 41,1; 43,9; 55,5; 60,3.12; 62,2; 64,2; voc. (1) 34,1; acc. (12) 2,4; 14,6.12.26; 30,28; 34,2; 41,2; 45,1; 49,22; 52,15; 54,3; 66,19; NT (53): (25) nom. Matt 6,32; 12,21; 25,32; Luke 12,30; Acts 4,25; 11,1; 13,48; 15,17; Rom 2,14; 9,30; 15,12; 1 Cor 10,20; 12,2; Gal 2,14; Eph 2,11; 3,6; 4,17; 1 Thess 4,5; 2 Tim 4,17; Rev 11,18; 15,4; 17,15; 18,3.23; 21,24; voc. (2) Rom 15,10.11; acc. (26) Matt 28,19; Mark 13,10; Luke 21,24; 24,47; John 7,35; Acts 13,19.46; 14,15; 15,7; 18,6; 21,21; Rom 2,24; 15,9.12; 1 Cor 5,1; Gal 2,8.9; 3,8bis; 1 Peter 2,12; Rev 2,26; 12,5; 14,8; 19,15; 20,3.7. gentium 180 (NT 27): Gen (6) 10,5; 14,1.9; 17,4.5; 49,10; PsH (11) 17,44; 21,28; 32,10; 64,8; 66,5; 97,2; 104,44; 105,41; 110,7; 113,12; 134,15; PsG (13) all of PsH, except 64,8 and 66,5, + (4) 21,29; 88,51; 95,5.7; Isa (19) 9,1; 10,7; 13,4; 14,18; 16,8; 23,3; 25,3; 29,7.8; 36,18; 37,12; 42,6; 49,6; 52,10; 60,5.11.16; 61,6; 66,12; NT (27): Matt 4,15; 10,5; 20,25; Luke 2,32; 21,25; 22,25; John 7,35; Acts 7,45; 14,2; 15,3; 21,11; Rom 3,29bis; 4,17.18; 11,12.13.25; 15,16.18; 16,4; 1 Tim 2,7; 2 Tim 1,11; 1 Peter 4,3; Rev 16,19; 21,26; 22,2. gentibus 202 (NT 50): Gen (3) 10,20.31; 17,6; PsH (16) 17,50; 21,29; 43,12.15; 45,11; 56,10; 66,3; 78,10; 95,3.10; 105,27.35.47; 109,6; 125,2; 149,7; PsG (9) 43,12.15; 45,11; 56,10; 66,3; 78,10; 95,10 as in PsH, + (2) 17,48; 81,8; Isa (9) 42,1; 45,20; 55,4; 61,9.11; 63,3; 66,18.19.20; NT (50): Matt 10,18; 12,18; 20,19; 24,9.14; Mark 10,33.42; 11,17; Luke 18,32; 21,24; Acts 4,27; 9,15; 11,18; 13,47; 14,26; 15,12.14.19.23; 21,19.25; 26,17.20.23; 28,28; Rom 1,5.13; 9,24; 11,11.13; 15,9.16; 16,26; 1 Cor 1,23; 2 Cor 11,26; Gal 1,16; 2,2.12.15; 3,14; Eph 3,1.8; Col 1,27; 1 Thess 2,16; 1 Tim 3,16; 3 John 7; Rev 7,9; 10,11; 11,2.9. gens 62 (NT 6): PsH = G (1): 32,12; Isa (5) 2,4; 26,2; 58,2; 60,12; 66,8; NT (6): Matt 24,7; Mark 13,8; Luke 21,10; John 11,50; 18,35; 1 Peter 2,9. gentis 36 (NT 1): Gen (1) 34,22; PsH = G (1) 105,5; Isa (1) 14,32; NT (1): 2 Cor 11,32. genti 26 (NT 2): PsH (1) 147,20; Isa (3) 1,4; 26,15bis; NT (2) Matt 21,43; Acts 24,10.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

263

gentilis 22, mostly in the NT (6/16); 2 Macc (4); once the noun gentilitas (Judith 14,6), once the adverb gentiliter9. ethnicus 3, transliterating ἐϑνικός, only in Matthew and 3 John (see below p. 308). barbarus 11, also formed after the Greek10. populus, most instances in the singular refer to Israel as the people of God (ca. 60% with possessive or indicative pronoun)11; but quite a number of cases in the plural refer to other peoples, often, though not always, in an explicitly universalistic perspective that does not take away, however, from the fact that these are “gentiles”12. natio 108 (OT 101, NT 7), only 17 of these in the singular13. cognatio 163 (OT 159, NT 4), 67 in the singular14. tribus, as one can expect, most instances refer to the tribes of Israel, but there are a few cases that apply, in combination with gentes or populi15. gentem 106 (NT 14): Gen (8) 12,2; 15,14; 17,20; 18,18; 20,4; 21,13.18; 46,3; PsH = G (1) 104,13; Isa (9) 2,4; 9,3; 10,6; 18,2bis; 49,7; 55,5; 60,22; 65,1; NT (14): Matt 24,7; Mark 13,8; Luke 7,5; 21,10; 23,2; John 11,48; Acts 7,7; 8,9; 24,17; 28,19; Rom 10,19bis; Rev 13,7; 14,6. gente 39 (NT 5): PsH = G (3) 42,1; 82,5; 104,13; Isa (1) 18,7; NT (5): John 11,51.52; Acts 10,22.35; 26,4. 9. Plural: NT (11): John 12,20; Acts 14,5; 17,4.12; 19,10.17; 20,21; 21,28; Rom 15,27; 1 Cor 10,32; 12,13. Singular: NT (5): Mark 7,26; Acts 16,1.3; Gal 2,3; Col 3,11; adv. Gal 2,14. 10. OT (5): PsH = G 113,1; 2 Macc 2,22 barbaram multitudinem (Greek pl.); 10,4 barbaris hominibus for βαρβάροις ἔϑνεσιν; 15,1 adv. barbare for βαρβάρως; NT (6): Acts 28,1.4; Rom 1,14; 1 Cor 14,11bis; Col 3,11. 11. Though occasionally it can refer to a “pagan” people (see Gen 19,38 et vocavit nomen eius Ammon id est filius populi mei; Ps 113,1 G = H de populo barbaro); other such labels can also be used to disqualify Israel as falling back in pagan belief and practice (e.g., “idolatrous”), but they will not be taken into account here. 12. Relevant cases from the corpus (plural): populi 48 (NT 4): Gen (4) 10,18; 25,23; 27,29; 35,11; PsH (15) 44,6.18; 46,2; 48,2; 61,9; 65,8; 66,4bis; 66,6bis; 96,6; 98,1; 101,23; 116,1; 148,11; PsG (13) all of PsH, except 46,2; 48,2; 65,8, + (1) 2,1; Isa (9) 2,3; 8,9; 14,2; 17,13; 26,11; 33,3.12; 34,1; 49,1; NT (4): Matt 21,11; Acts 4,25; Rom 15,11; Rev 17,15. populorum 28 (NT 1): Gen (3) 17,16; 28,3; 48,4; PsH (8) 32,10; 46,10; 67,31; 88,51; 95,5.7; 104,20; 108,30; PsG (7) 32,10; 46,10; 67,31; 104,20 = PsH, + (3) 7,8; 86,6; 104,44; Isa (10) 10,13.14; 11,10; 13,4; 17,12; 19,13; 24,13; 30,28; 51,4; 61,9; NT (1): Luke 2,31. populos 42 (NT 0): Gen (5) 10,32; 47,21.23; 48,19; 50,20; PsH (15) 7,9; 9,9; 17,48; 43,3; 46,4; 55,8; 66,5; 67,31; 86,6; 95,10.13; 97,9; 98,2; 105,34; 143,2; PsG (12) all of PsH, except 67,31; 86,6; 105,34; 143,2, + (1) 101,23; Isa (10) 2,4; 3,13; 14,6; 25,7; 43,4; 49,22; 51,5; 60,2; 62,10; 63,6. populis 24 (NT 5): Gen (1) 42,6; PsH (7) 9,12; 56,10; 76,15; 95,3; 104,1; 107,4; 149,7; PsG (7) all of PsH, except 9,12; 104,1, + (2) 43,15; 73,14; Isa (4) 12,4; 25,6; 55,4; 56,7; NT (5): Acts 4,27; 14,12; Rev 7,9; 10,11; 11,9. 13. Plural (21): Gen (5) 10,5.32; 17,16; 18,18; 35,11; PsH (2) 71,11; 107,4; PsG (7) 107,4, + 17,50; 78,10; 105,27.47; 109,6; 149,7; Isa (4) 5,26; 11,12; 14,9; 25,7; NT (3): Luke 21,24; Acts 10,45; 22,21. Singular (6): PsG (2) 72,15; 147,20; NT (4): Acts 2,5; 18,24; Phil 2,15; Rev 5,9. 14. Plural (5): Gen (4) 10,20.31; 12,3; 36,40; PsH (1) 21,28. Singular (10): Gen (5) 12,1; 24,4.38.40; 45,18; PsG (1) 73,8; NT (4): Mark 6,4; Luke 1,61; Acts 7,3.14. 15. Relevant cases (16): Gen (2) 27,29; 28,14; PsH (5) 2,1; 7,8; 43,15; 46,4; 104,44; PsG (1) 71,17; Isa (1) 43,9; NT (7): Matt 24,30; Rev 1,7; 5,9; 7,9; 11,9; 13,7; 14,6.

264

J. VERHEYDEN

lingua 233, in the plural or with omnis, not including the motif of speaking in tongues (Mark 16,17?; Acts 2,4; 10,46; 19,6; 1 Cor 12 and 14)16. alienigena 66 (OT 64, NT 2), 15 in the singular; remarkably frequent in 1-2 Macc (17, all pl.)17. alienus 214 (OT 200, NT 14), the large majority of cases without the connotation of being gentile; with the connotation, often in the phrase dii alieni (sometimes also sg.)18; cf. also alienatus 819. peregrinus 51 (also peregrinatio 20 and peregrinare 38), but not always with a clear connotation of being a gentile20. advena 93, but only a couple of instances apply, and then with the connotation of (gentile) proselytes to Judaism21.

I. THE OLD TESTAMENT As is well known the Vulgate was translated by several people and in different formats. Jerome took the lion’s share, but the other translators remain unknown. Some books can truly be said to be translations, while others are rather the result of more or less systematic and thorough revisions of the Old Latin version. This has obviously its effect on how to assess the evidence, refraining scholars from making too easily too general conclusions; what goes for one book, or one particular instance in a book, does not automatically also apply to other books or passages. Few have formulated this situation and the problems it causes better than the great specialist Robert Weber when noting in his Preface, The term “Vulgate” normally means the Latin Bible that has been in common use in the Western Church since the seventh century. This Bible is not the work of one author; nor is it the product of any one age. It is a collection of translations which differ both in origin and in character. In the Old Testament, most books are Jerome’s translations made from the Hebrew; but the Psalter is an Old-Latin text which was corrected by Jerome to agree with the Greek text of Origen’s Hexapla, while some books (Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, and Maccabees) are pure Old-Latin and untouched by Jerome. In the 16. Relevant cases (12): Gen (1) 10,31; Isa (2) 45,23; 54,17; NT (9): Rom 14,11; Phil 2,11; Rev 5,9; 7,9; 10,11; 11,9; 13,7; 14,6; 17,15. 17. Plural (7): Gen (1) 17,27; PsG (5) 59,10; 82,8; 86,4; 107,10; 143,11; Ps 151 (1) 151,6. Singular: NT (2): Luke 17,18; Acts 10,28. 18. Relevant cases (34): Gen (3) 35,2; 42,7; 45,1; PsH (11) 17,46bis; 43,21; 48,11; 53,5; 68,9; 80,10; 108,11; 136,4; 143,7.11; PsG (10) all of PsH, except 68,9 and 143,11, + (1) 18,14; Isa (8) 1,7; 2,6; 17,10; 25,2.5; 43,12; 61,5; 62,8; NT (2): 1 Tim 5,22; Heb 11,9. 19. Relevant cases (5): PsH (1) = G (1) 57,4; NT (3): Eph 2,12; 4,18; Col 1,21. 20. Relevant cases (8): PsH (2) 68,9; 80,10; PsG (1) 68,9; Isa (2) 60,10; 61,5. NT (3): Matt 27,7; Heb 13,9; 3 John 5; cf. also the verb in 1 Peter 4,4. 21. Relevant cases (7): Isa (2) 56,3.6; NT (5) Acts 2,10; 6,5; 13,43; 17,21; Eph 2,19.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

265

New Testament, all books have an Old-Latin base; but this base has been revised in the light of the Greek with varying degrees of thoroughness – in the Gospels rather hurriedly, in most other books more carefully. The reviser of the Gospels was certainly Jerome; the reviser(s) of the other books, or groups of books, are altogether unknown. The Vulgate, therefore, is far from being a unity, and the only justification for calling it “Jerome’s Vulgate” (as we often do) is that there is more of his work in it than there is of anyone else’s22.

1. Genesis – gentes 10,32 hae familiae Noe iuxta populos (‫ )בגויהם‬et nationes suas (‫ )ומאלה‬ab his divisae sunt gentes (‫ )הגוים‬in terra post diluvium LXX κατὰ γενέσεις αὐτῶν κατὰ τὰ ἔϑνη αὐτῶν ... νῆσοι τῶν ἐϑνῶν (cf. v. 31) 22,18 et benedicentur in semine tuo omnes gentes (‫ )כל גויי‬terrae (cf. 26,4) 25,23 duae gentes (‫ )גיים‬in utero tuo sunt et duo populi (‫ )לאמים‬ex ventre tuo dividentur populusque populum (‫ )ולאמ מלאם‬superabit (LXX 3× λαός, -οί) 26,4 et multiplicabo semen tuum … et benedicentur in semine tuo omnes gentes (‫ )כל גויי‬terrae (cf. 22,18) 35,11 cresce et multiplicare gentes (‫ )גוי‬et populi nationum (‫ )וקהל גוים‬erunt ex te LXX ἔϑνη καὶ συναγωγαὶ ἐϑνῶν 48,19 erit in populos (‫ )לעם‬et multiplicabitur … et semen illius crescet in gentes (‫ )הגוים‬20 benedixitque eis …

All six cases of gentes in Genesis render ‫גוים‬. All are in a sense related as they have to do with the blessing and/or multiplication of the peoples on earth, hence bear a universalistic connotation. This is also reflected in the formulations. In three cases gentes is coupled to a synonym that renders one more instance of ‫ גוים‬or a related word; in 10,32 and 35,11 the translator obviously wished to avoid mere repetition of the same word in the same verse. Note the triple instance (with slight variation) of gentes “of the earth” (in terra, terrae) and the combinations with benedicere, multiplicare, and crescere; two instances of omnes gentes. The situation is largely identical for the other plural forms of gentes. Here are the instances of plural genitive: 10,5

ab his divisae sunt insulae gentium (‫ )איי הגוים‬in regionibus suis unusquisque secundum linguam et familias in nationibus suis (‫)בגויהם‬

22. Biblia Sacra iuxta Vulgatam versionem adiuvantibus Bonifatio Fischer OSB, Iohanne Gribomont OSB, H.F.D. Sparks, W. Thiele recensuit et brevi apparatu instruxit ROBERTUS WEBER OSB, Stuttgart, Württembergischen Bibelanstalt, 1969, ²1975, p. xx.

266

J. VERHEYDEN

νῆσοι τῶν ἐϑνῶν ... αἱ ἐν τοῖς ἐϑνῶν αὐτῶν Thadal rex Gentium (‫)גוים‬ et Thadal regem Gentium (‫)גוים‬ erisque pater multarum gentium (‫)המון גוים‬ quia patrem multarum gentium constitui te (as in v. 4; LXX changes the adjective from πλήϑους in v. 4 to πολλῶν) 49,10 et ipse erit expectatio gentium (‫)ולו יקהת עמים‬ LXX καὶ αὐτὸς προσδοκία ἐϑνῶν LXX

14,1 14,9 17,4 17,5

Gen 49,10 is a rare exception to the rule of using gentes for ‫גוים‬. Is there influence of the LXX, a different Vorlage, or a conscious choice for the more pointed gentes instead of the “neutral” original? 10,5 is to be compared with 10,32 (well seen by LXX with its double νῆσοι) as part of the “Table of Nations” and shows the same universalistic perspective that is also continued in 17,4.5 and 40,10, but 14,1.9 offer a different, more exclusive use of the term. There are three instances of gentibus: 10,20 hii filii Ham in cognationibus et linguis et generationibus terrisque et gentibus suis (‫למשׁפחתם ללשׁנתם בארצתם בגויהם‬-‫)גם‬ 10,31 isti filii Sem secundum cognationes et linguas et regiones in gentibus suis (‫)למשׁפחתם ללשׁנתם באטצתם לגויהם‬ 17,6 et ponam in gentibus (‫ )לגוים‬regesque ex te egredientur

10,20.31 are part of the “Table of Nations” and comparable in using an elaborate fourfold phrase for referring to the descendants of Ham and Sem, as is the case also, in variant forms, in 10,5.32. In both instances the LXX equivalent for the composite cognationes is ἐν ταῖς φυλαῖς, which elsewhere occurs as an equivalent for familiae. The universalistic perspective is maintained all through the “Table of Nations”, all while indicating the common origin of all these peoples in a person that is reclaimed by the Jewish “nation”. The same perspective and the same combination of universalism and a unique origin in one person speaks even more prominently from 17,6, as the key figure is now said to be one of the patriarchs of that same “nation”. There are nine occurrences of singular gens in Genesis: faciamque te in gentem magnam (‫ )לגוי גדיל‬et benedicam tibi et magnificabo nomen tuum erisque benedictus 15,14 verumtamen gentem (‫הגוי‬-‫ )את‬cui servituri sunt ego iudicabo 17,20 duodecim duces generabit et faciam illum in gentem magnam (‫)לגוי גדול‬ 18,18 cum futurus sit in gentem magnam (‫ )לגוי גדול ועצום‬ac robustissimam et benedicendae sint in illo omnes nationes terrae (‫)כל גויי הארץ‬ 20,4 et ait Dominus num gentem (‫ )הגוי‬ignorantem et iustam interficies 12,2

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

267

21,13 sed et filium ancillae faciam in gentem magnam (‫ )לגוי אשׂימנו‬quia semen tuum est 21,18 quia in gentem magnam (‫ )לגוי גדול‬faciam eum 34,22 unum est quod differtur tantum bonum si circumcidamus masculos nostros ritum gentis imitantes (infra) 46,3 quia in gentem magnam (‫ )לגוי גדול‬faciam te ibi

Six instances refer to a non-Jewish people (Egyptians 15,14; Ishmaelites 17,20; 21,13.18; Shechemites 34,22; and the people of Gerar under Abimelech 20,4). Only in 15,14 it is explicitly used with a negative connotation. 12,2 and 18,18 repeat the motif of Abraham’s blessing, in the first with an exclusive focus on “his people”, in the singular, which introduces an element of exclusiveness, in the second through a combination of this and the more universalistic perspective that is met in other passages. 46,3 repeats and applies the former of these two views to Jacob with the additional element that this will happen in Egypt, hence in “gentile territory”. The rare bird in this list is 34,22, where Vg clearly has paraphrased the Vorlage, or read another text, though the Hebrew has the synonym ‫ עם‬at another place in the verse (“Only on this condition will they agree to live among us, to become one people: that every male among us be circumcised as they are circumcised” = LXX, with λαόν). The phrase gentem magnam always renders ‫גוי גדול‬. It is a fine illustration of the taste of Vg Gen for rendering identical passages in the Vorlage in the same way; the same in LXX (ἔϑνος μέγα). The second half of the double qualification in 20,4 is lacking in the Hebrew (LXX has δίκαιον). LXX reads for the second qualification in 18,18 a mere πολύ (MT ‫)ועצום‬. 18,18 deviates from the common way to render “all peoples” (omnes gentes) and offers another example of the translator’s tendency to avoid using the same word twice in the immediate context (cf. 10,32a and 35,11b above; ctr. 17,20 LXX which renders MT ‫ נשׂיאם‬with another ἔϑνη). There is no reason to suspect any theological motivation behind it. On the basis of 18,18 and 35,11 one might be tempted to detect here a pattern of rendering the first occurrence of ‫ גוים‬by gentes and then turning to an alternative for the second occurrence, but in 10,32 the translator proceeds differently, maybe because he felt the combination of populi and nationes works better than that of gentes and nationes. In the one instance where the latter are used in juxtaposition they are separated by other elements (10,20); in other instances direct juxtaposition is avoided (10,5.31). Besides the two instances in 34,22 and 49,10, where gentes stands for MT ‫עם‬, and the four cases where ‫ גוים‬is rendered by either populos (10,32a) or nationes (10,5; 18,18; 35,11b), there is one more instance of the latter. MT 17,16 ‫לגוים מלכי עמים‬ is translated as in nationes et reges populorum (LXX εἰς ἔϑνη, καὶ βασιλεῖς

268

J. VERHEYDEN

ἐϑνῶν) for no apparent reason, except perhaps that the translator again wishes to avoid too close a repetition of the comparable combination of “peoples and kings” in v. 6 (see above), though that is up for discussion. – Other Terms Four of the thirteen relevant instances of populi have been mentioned above in combinations with gentes (10,32; 25,23; 35,11; 48,19). The others are: 10,18 et post haec disseminati sunt populi (‫ )משׁפחות‬Chananeorum 17,16 eritque in nationes (‫לגוים‬, εἰς ἔϑνη) et reges populorum (‫מלכי עמים‬, βασιλεῖς ἐϑνῶν) orientur ex eo 27,29 et serviant tibi populi (‫עמים‬, ἔϑνη) et adorent te tribus (‫לאמים‬, ἄρχοντες) 28,3 benedicat tibi et crescere te faciat atque multiplicet ut sis in turbas populorum (‫לקהל עמים‬, εἰς συναγωγὰς ἐϑνῶν) 42,6 ad illius nutum frumenta populis (‫עם‬-‫לכל‬, παντὶ τῷ λαῷ τῆς γῆς) vendebantur 47,21 subiecitque eam Pharaoni 21 et cunctos populos eius (‫העם העביר‬-‫ואת‬, τὸν λαόν) 47,23 dixit ergo Ioseph ad populos (‫העם‬-‫אל‬, πᾶσι τοῖς Αἰγυπτίοις) 48,4 ego te augebo et multiplicabo et faciam in turbas populorum (‫לקהל‬ ‫עמים‬, εἰς συναγωγὰς ἐϑνῶν) daboque tibi terram hanc 50,20 et salvos faceret multos populos (‫רב‬-‫עם‬, λαὸς πολύς)

10,18 is again from the “Table of Nations”, but with a rather uncommon rendering of the keyword (LXX has the usual φυλαί). It does not yet have an ominous sound, but the Canaanites will of course prove to be fierce enemies later on. The next two in the list are about the blessing of Jacob by Isaac. If the second repeats the motif of being fruitful in turbas (the same phrase in 48,4), as with Abraham, the first strikes a different tone and has Jacob being honoured by other, obviously gentile, nations. Maybe the switch to ‫ עםים‬and ‫ אמםים‬instead of ‫( גוים‬prominent in the passages about Abraham’s and Isaac’s blessing in 22,18 and 26,4, though see 12,3, but there without the multiplication component) was somehow meant to distinguish between the blessing of Abraham and of Isaac – by God – and that of Jacob – by his father; Vg is true to the model. 42,6 refers to all those who live in Egypt or had come to buy its grain, including the Hebrews (42,5), but the next two passages speak of the local inhabitants, in contrast to Israel (see 47,20 and 27), and their priests who are exempt of the taxes that are imposed upon them, and of the profitable purchases Pharao is able to make thanks to Joseph. With 48,4 we meet another instance of the blessing motif, now of Joseph by Jacob, that focuses on the multiplication of the Jewish nation, as in 28,3. The last instance has Joseph assure his brothers about their future. The original singular is

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

269

somewhat unfortunate, because it weakens the focus on Israel, and for no apparent reason is turned into a plural, as is the case also in 42,4 (here perhaps inspired by ‫ )לכל‬and 47,21.23. All five instances of a form of nationes in Genesis are mentioned in the lists or the comments above (10,32 and 35,11 under gentes, 10,5 gentium, 18,18 gentem, 17,16 populi). In four of these it renders MT ‫גוים‬, the exception being 10,32a. Two of the four instances of cognationes occur in the “Table of Nations” and are mentioned above under gentibus (10,20.31). The two others are: 12,3 atque in te benedicentur universae cognationes terrae (‫)כל משׁפחת האדמה‬ 36,40 haec ergo nomina Esau in cognationibus (‫ )למשׁפחתם‬et locis et vocabulis suis

12,3 is the first mention of the motif of the blessing of Abraham, that will be taken up in variant forms in the story (see above). The singular cognatio occurs in 12,1 in the command to leave his hometown (here as ‫)וממולדתך‬. Vg harmonises and renders both in the same way, once for the more common form (12,3) and once for the alternative. LXX distinguished between the two (ἐκ τῆς συγγενείας σου, πᾶσαι αἱ φυλαὶ τῆς γῆς). 36,40 comes at the end of the long section on the clans, chieftains, and descendants of Esau, hence of the Edomites, with whom Israel later will have to fight for the land. The four other instances of singular cognatio pick up on Abraham’s native country in 12,1 (24,4.38.40) or refer to Joseph’s when in Egypt (45,18) and variate between ‫( מולדת‬24,4) and ‫( משׁפחת‬24,38.40, LXX all three φυλή) and (‫בתיכם‬, LXX τὰ ὑπάρχοντα). The second occurrence of tribus (the other is 27,29, above at populi) is one more instance of a blessing of Jacob, but now by God: 28,14 et benedicentur in te et in semine tuo cunctae tribus terrae (‫משׁפות‬-‫כל‬ ‫)האדמה‬

variates on the ones in 27,29 and 28,14, and Vg sticks to its usual way of rendering this term, as did LXX (for the adjective, see 47,21 and compare the phrase in 12,3). MT

The one instance of linguae is mentioned above (10,31 at gentibus). The one instance of alienigena and the three of alienus are as follows: 17,27 omnes viri domus illius tam vernaculi quam empticii et alienigenae (‫נכר‬-‫כסף מאת בן‬-‫ )ומקנת‬pariter circumcisi sunt 35,2 42,7 45,1

abicite deos alienos (‫אלהי הנכר‬-‫ )את‬qui in medio vestri sunt et agnovisset eos quasi ad alienos (‫ )ויתנכר אליהם‬durius loquebatur nullus interesset alienus (‫עמד אישׁ‬-‫ולא‬, οὐδείς) agnitioni mutuae

270

J. VERHEYDEN

In the first three cases the keyword renders ‫נכר‬. In 17,27 Vg paraphrases the Vorlage (LXX καὶ οἱ ἀργυρώνητοι ἐξ ἀλλογενῶν ἐϑνῶν is closer to the original) and seems to split up the second half into two, but actually empticii et alienigenae hold together as is clear from the structure with tam … quam. 35,2 is a clear case (LXX τοὺς ϑεοὺς τοὺς ἀλλοτρίους). 42,7 does not say that Joseph considers his brothers as “pagans”, because he has recognised them, but there is some irony, and so maybe also an echo of this, in the fact that they say they come from Canaan (LXX translates with a verb: ἠλλοτριοῦτο). In 45,1 the word has no equivalent in the Hebrew and is added somewhat redundantly. 2. Psalms23 – gentes There are thirty instances of gentes in PsH and forty-two in PsG. PsH and G agree on twenty-eight of these; in the other two (78,10; 81,8) PsG reads gentibus. The extras in PsG are listed separately; in five instances PsH has a different case of the keyword. Differences between PsH and PsG are given in the list or in the comments; such differences that do not affect the use or meaning of the keyword are not indicated. References follow the numbering of Vg. PsH = G: 2,1 quare turbabuntur gentes et tribus (‫ )גוים ולאמים‬meditabuntur inania 2 consurgent reges terrae et principes tractabunt G … gentes et populi (ἔϑνη καὶ λαοί) meditati … 9,16 demersae sunt gentes (‫)גוים‬ 9,18 convertantur impii in infernum omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬quae oblitae sunt Deum 9,20 iudicentur gentes (‫ )גוים‬ante faciem tuam 9,21 sciant gentes (‫ )גוים‬homines se esse 9,37 perierunt gentes (‫ )גוים‬de terra eius (MT 10,16) 45,7 conturbatae sunt gentes (‫ )גוים‬concussa sunt regna 66,5 laetantur et laudent gentes (‫ )לאמים‬quoniam iudicas populos (‫ …)עמים‬et gentium (‫ )ולאמים‬... ductor es 71,17 et benedicentur in eo omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬et beatificabunt eum G et benedicentur in ipso omnes tribus terrae omnes gentes (πᾶσαι αἱ φυλαὶ τῆς γῆς πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) beatificabunt eum 78,1 venerunt gentes (‫ )גוים‬in hereditatem tuam 85,9 omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬quas fecisti venient et adorabunt coram te Domine 101,16 et timebunt gentes (‫ )גוים‬nomen Domini et universi reges terrae gloriam tuam 23. As a rule, I first list the PsH = G instances, then those where PsH = G, but with the keyword in a different case, and then those peculiar to PsH and PsG.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

271

113,10 ne dicant gentes (‫ )הגוים‬ubi est Deum eorum (MT 115,2) 116,1 G

laudate Dominum omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬conlaudate eum universi populi (‫האמים‬-‫)כל‬ omnes gentes … omnes populi

et dabo tibi gentes (‫ )גוים‬hereditatem tuam et possessionem tuam terminos terrae 9,6 increpuisti gentes (‫)גוים‬ tu manu tua gentes (‫ )גוים‬delisti et plantasti eos adflixisti populos (‫)לאמים‬ 43,3 et emisisti eos 46,9 regnavit Deus super gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ … )על‬10 principes populorum (‫)עמים‬ congregati sunt 58,6 evigila ut visites omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ )כל‬non miseraris universis 58,9 subsannabis omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫)לכל‬ 65,7 oculi eius gentes (‫ )בגוים‬aspiciunt G super gentes 77,54 et eiecit a facie eorum gentes (‫( )גוים‬MT 55) 78,6 effunde furorem tum super gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ … )אל‬et super regna … G in gentes 79,9 eiecisti gentes (‫)גוים‬ 93,10 qui erudit gentes (‫)גוים‬ 112,4 excelsus super omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫כל‬-‫ )על‬Dominus 117,10 omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬circumdederunt me 134,10 qui percussit gentes multas (‫ )גוים רבים‬et occidit reges fortes 2,8

PsH = G (different case): 78,10 quare dicunt gentes (‫ )הגוים‬ubi est Deus eorum nota fiat in gentibus (‫ )בגיים‬ante oculos nostros ne forte dicant in gentibus … et innotescat in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) G coram oculis nostris 81,8 iudica terram quoniam hereditabis omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫)בכל‬ G iudica terram quoniam tu hereditabis in omnibus gentibus PsG = H (different case): 64,8 turbabuntur gentes (τὰ ἔϑνη) H conpescens … multitudinem gentium (‫)והמונ לאמים‬ 66,5 et gentes (ἔϑνη) in terra diriges (cf. supra) H et gentium (‫ )ולאמים‬quae in terra sunt ductor es sempiternus 95,3 adnuntiate inter gentes ( ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) gloriam eius in omnibus populis mirabilia eius narrate in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬gloriam eius in universis populis (‫העמים‬-‫)בכל‬ H mirabilia eius 105,35 et commixti sunt inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) (cf. v. 34 above) H gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ 125,2 tunc dicent inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) H in gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ The PsG only cases are: 71,11 et adorabunt eum omnes reges omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) servient ei H universae nationes (‫גוים‬-‫)כל‬

272 46,2 H 48,2 H 65,8 H

J. VERHEYDEN

omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) plaudite manibus omnes populi (‫העמים‬-‫)כל‬ audite haec omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) omnes populi (‫העמים‬-‫)כל‬ benedicite gentes (ἔϑνη) Deum nostrum populi (‫)עמים‬

adnuntiate inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) studia eius in populis (‫)בעמים‬ subiecit populos (λαούς) nobis et gentes (ἔϑνη) sub pedibus nostris congregavit populos (‫ )עמים‬subter nos et tribus (‫ )ולאמים‬sub pedibus nostris 67,31 dissipa gentes (ἔϑνη) quae bella volunt H disperge populos (‫עמים‬, cf. v. 31a) 104,1 adnuntiate inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) opera eius H notas facite populis (‫ )בעמים‬cogitationes eius 105,34 non disperdiderunt gentes (ἔϑνη) … 35 (below) H non exterminaverunt populos (‫)העמים‬ 9,12 H 46,4 H

The equivalence between ‫ גוים‬and gentes / ἔϑνη is impressive. There are only three exceptions. PsH 66,5 probably reflects a concern for avoiding triple populi, the more common equivalent of ‫עמים‬, ‫אמים‬. It is quite understandable when taking into account the immediate context in 66,3-4.6 (once gentibus and 4× populi). PsG is in line with LXX. In 78,10 PsH kept the double ‫גוים‬, but PsG variates. The differences in the extra of PsG are to be explained from the model (MT ‫עמים‬, LXX ἔϑνη). The second exception is PsH 71,11. If a consequence from avoiding double omnes, there was no absolute need also to change the noun (see universis gentibus in 66,3, with populis in 95,3; universae nationes also in Gen 18,18). Or did PsH feel it was a better fit with reges? The third exception is PsH 64,8, for which I do not see a reason. Maybe Vg read another text here, unless it is again a matter of taste (see the combination with multas in PsH 134,10). There are several instances of the usual omnes gentes (with multas in PsHG 134,10; cf. PsH 64,8), several also where the keyword is used in combination with a synonym: populi (PsHG 43,3; 46,9; 66,5; 95,3; PsG 2,1; 46,4), nationes (PsG 78,10), tribus (PsH 2,1; PsG 71,17). In the latter, the doublet is in line with LXX diff. MT. A number of passages reflect the universalistic perspective we also met in Genesis. However, the purpose is different as they are not part of a blessing, but rather announce the subservience of “all people” to the God of Israel. This can take various forms: praise of God and His justice (66,5; 116,1; 125,2), worship (46,2; 71,11; 85,9), fear (101,16), and may even include them blessing the Lord (65,8 and 71,17). In other instances they are made the object of God’s judgement and punished (9,2.21.37;

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

273

45,7; 58,6.9; 78,6; 79,9; 81,8; 93,10; 105,34; 134,10) or said to be rebuked (9,6) and become the reward and heritage for the faithful (2,8; 46,4; 78,1). God reigns over them (46,9; 65,7; 112,4), silences them (64,8), and protects his people against them (46,9; 65,7; 112,4). More ominous are the passages where they criticise the Lord (78,10; 113,10), pose a threat to the faithful (117,10), or are said to be avoided (105,35). Occasionally they are also made the audience of God’s prophets and missionaries (9,12; 95,3; 104,1). PsH has eleven instances of gentium, nine of which have an identical parallel in PsG and the two others a different case. PsG has four extras. PsH = G: 17,44 salvabis me a contradictionibus populi (‫ )מריבי עם‬pones me in caput gentium (‫)לראשׁ גוים‬ 21,28 et adorabunt coram eo universae cognationes gentium (‫)כל משׁטתות גוים‬ G universae familiae gentium (πᾶσαι αἱ πατραὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) 32,10 Dominus dissolvit consilium gentium (‫גוים‬-‫ )עצת‬irritas fecit cogitationes populorum (‫)מחשׁבות עמים‬ 97,2 in conspectu gentium (‫ )לעיני הגוים‬revelavit iustitiam suam 104,44 et dedit eis terram gentium (‫ )ארצית גוים‬et laborem tribuum (‫)ועמל לאמים‬ possederunt G regiones gentium (χώρας ἐϑνῶν) et labores populorum (πόνους λαῶν) 105,41 et dedit eos in manu gentium (‫גוים‬-‫)ביד‬ 110,7 ut det eis hereditatem gentium (‫)בחלת גוים‬ 113,12 idola gentium (‫ ;עצביהם‬cf. 134,15) … (MT 115,4) G simulacra gentium (τὰ εἴδωλα τῶν ἐϑνῶν) … 134,15 idola gentium … (‫עצבי הגוים‬, cf. 113,12) G simulacra gentium (= 113,12) … PsH = G (different case): 64,8 conpescens … multitudinem gentium (‫)והמונ לאמים‬ G turbabuntur gentes (τὰ ἔϑνη) 66,5 et gentium (‫ )ולאמים‬quae in terra sunt ductor es sempiternus G et gentes (ἔϑνη) in terra diriges PsG = H (different case): 21,29 quoniam Dei est regnum et  ipse: dominabitur gentium (τῶν ἐϑνῶν, as object) H quia Domini est regnum et dominabitur gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ PsG only: 88,51 quod continui in sinu meo multarum gentium (πολλῶν ἐϑνῶν) H quia portavi in sinu meo omnes iniquitates populorum (‫רבים עמים‬-‫)כל‬ 95,5 quoniam omnes dii gentium (πάντες οἱ ϑεοὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) daemonia H omnes enim dii populorum (‫אלהי העמים‬-‫ )כל‬sculptilla 95,7 adferte Domino patriae gentium (αἱ πατριαὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) H adferte Domino familiae populorum (‫)משׁטתות עמים‬

274

J. VERHEYDEN

In all instances of PsH = G, but one, PsH gentes renders ‫גוים‬. PsH 113,12 seems to have been harmonised with its parallel in 134,15. In 88,51; 95,5.7 PsG and PsH follow their Vorlage. In addition to some of the themes mentioned above, note the phrases dii and idola gentium. Of the sixteen instances of the gentibus in PsH, six have an identical parallel in PsG, which has three more, for two of which PsH reads gentes (78,10; 81,8). PsH = G: 43,12 et in gentibus (‫ )ובגוים‬dispersisti nos 43,15 posuisti nos similitudinem in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬commotionem capitis in tribubus (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬ 45,11 exaltabor in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬exaltabor in terra 56,10 confitebor tibi in populis (‫בעמים‬, ἐν λαοῖς) Domine cantabo tibi in gentibus (‫אמים‬-‫בל‬, ἐν ἔϑνεσιν) 66,3 in universis gentibus (‫גוים‬-‫ )בכל‬salus tua G in omnibus gentibus 95,10 dicite in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬Dominus regnavit … iudicabit populos (‫)עמים‬ PsH = G (different case): 21,29 quia Domini est regnum et dominabitur gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ G quoniam Dei est regnum et  ipse: dominabitur gentium (τῶν ἐϑνῶν, as object) 95,3 narrate in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬gloriam eius in universis populis (‫העמים‬-‫)בכל‬ mirabilia eius G adnuntiate inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) … in omnibus populis (ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς λαοῖς) 105,35 et commixti sunt gentibus (‫בגוים‬, cf. v. 34) G inter gentes 125,2 tunc dicent in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬magnificavit Dominus G inter gentes PsH only: 17,50 propterea confitebor tibi in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬Domine G in nationibus (ἐν ἔϑνεσιν) 78,10 quare dicunt gentes (‫ )הגוים‬ubi est Deus eorum nota fiat in gentibus (‫)בגיים‬ ante oculos nostros G ne forte dicant in gentibus (τὰ ἔϑνη) ubi est Deus eorum et innotescat in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) coram oculis nostris 105,27 et ut deiceret semen eorum in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬et disperget eos in terris G in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) … in regionibus 105,47 et congrega nos in gentibus (‫הגוים‬-‫)מנ‬ G de nationibus (ἐκ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) 109,6 iudicabit in gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ G in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) 149,7 ad faciendam vindictam in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬increpationes in populis (‫אמים‬-‫)כל‬ G in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) … in populis (ἐν τοῖς λαοῖς)

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

275

PsG only: 17,48 H 78,10 H 81,8 H

Deus qui dat vindictas mihi et subdidit populos (λαούς) sub me liberator meus de gentibus iracundis (ἐξ ἐχϑρῶν μου ὀργίλων) 49 et ab insurgentibus in me exaltabis me Deus qui das vindictas mihi et congregas populos (‫ )עמים‬sub me qui servas me ab inimicis mei (‫ )מאיבי‬49 et a resistentibus mihi … ne forte dicant in gentibus (τὰ ἔϑνη) ubi est Deus eorum et innotescat in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) coram oculis nostris quare dicunt gentes (‫ )הגוים‬ubi est Deus eorum nota fiat in gentibus (‫ )בגיים‬ante oculos nostros iudica terram quoniam tu hereditabis in omnibus gentibus iudica terram quoniam hereditabis omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫)בכל‬

PsH (in) gentibus everywhere stands for ‫)ב(גוים‬, except in 56,10 where it translates “peoples”, maybe to avoid a too literal translation of ‫אמים‬ after ‫ בעמים‬in the first part of the verse (see also LXX). In 17,48 PsH stays closer to MT than PsG is to LXX. If original, it may explain why PsG reads nationibus for gentibus right after in v. 50. Or is gentibus a scribal error just before et ab insurgentibus? On several occasions PsG reads nationibus, even when LXX has ἔϑνεσιν that as a rule is more commonly rendered by gentibus. In 78,10 it can be explained as alternation with in gentibus in the first half of the verse (see above). As there is no apparent reason for the change in the other instances, these cases may illustrate that the two were considered as very close synonyms, but even then it remains remarkable that this happens more often with the dative/ablative than with any other case. The Psalms contain seven instances of a singular form of gens, all but one both in PsH and in PsG. In all cases it renders singular ‫גוי‬: PsH = G: 32,12 42,1 82,5 104,13 105,5

beata gens (‫ )אשׁרי הגוי‬cuius Dominus Deus eius populus (‫)העם‬ quem elegit in hereditatem sibi a gente non sancta (‫חסיד‬-‫)מגוי לא‬ dixerunt venite et conteramus eos de gente (‫)מגוי‬ et transierunt de gente in gentem (‫גוי‬-‫ )מגוי אל‬de regno ad populum alterum (‫עם אחר‬-‫)אל‬ et laeter in laetitia gentis tuae (‫)בשׂמחת גויך‬

PsH only: 147,20 G

non fecit similiter omni genti (‫גוי‬-‫)לכל‬ taliter omni nationi (LXX 147,9 παντὶ ἔϑνει)

The positive connotation in 32,12 and 105,5 and the reference to Israel in 82,5 in a more ominous context (its destruction intended by its enemies) are alternated with references to other peoples, one of which is very explicit (42,1).

276

J. VERHEYDEN

– Other Terms Plural forms of populus are met often in Psalms. The evidence for the nominative and vocative (46,2; 48,2; 61,9; 65,8; 116,1) plural is as follows: PsH = G: 44,6 sagittae tuae acutae populi (‫ )עמים‬sub te cadent 44,18 propterea populi (‫ )עמים‬confitebuntur tibi 66,4 confiteantur tibi populi (‫ )עמים‬Deus confiteantur tibi populi omnes (‫)עמימ כלם‬ 66,6 confiteantur tibi populi (‫ )עמים‬Deus confiteantur tibi populi omnes (‫)עמימ כלם‬ 96,6 et viderunt omnes populi (‫העמים‬-‫ )כל‬gloriam eius 98,1 Dominus regnavit commoveantur populi (‫)עמים‬ G irascantur 148,11 reges terrae et omnes populi (‫לאמים‬-‫ )וכל‬principes et universi iudices terrae 116,1 G

laudate Dominum omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬conlaudate eum universi populi (‫האמים‬-‫)כל‬ omnes gentes … omnes populi

PsH = G (different case): 101,23 cum congregati fuerint populi (‫ )עמים‬simul et regna ut serviant Domino G in conveniendo populos in unum et reges ut serviant Domino 61,9 G

sperate in eo omni tempore populi (‫)עם‬ omnis congregatio populi (συναγωγὴ λαοῦ)

PsH only: 46,2 omnes populi (‫העמים‬-‫ )כל‬plaudite manibus G omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) 48,2 audite hoc omnes populi (‫העמים‬-‫)כל‬ G omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) 65,8 benedicite populi (‫ )עמים‬Deo nostro G gentes (ἔϑνη) Deum nostrum PsG only: quare fremuerunt gentes et populi (ἔϑνη καὶ λαοί) meditati sunt inania… 2,1 H quare turbabuntur gentes et tribus (‫ )גוים ולאמים‬meditabuntur inania

In a few instances populi renders ‫( אמים‬2,1; 116,1; 148,11), but the more common equivalent is ‫( עמים‬LXX λαοί). In 61,9 MT has the singular. One meets the occasional expression with omnes, and as with gentes the keyword can have a more universalistic (44,18; 61,9; 66,4.6; 96,6; 101,23, 148,11) or, less frequently, a clearly negative connotation, picturing the peoples as subject to the Lord’s reign and wrath (see 44,6; 98,1). The close synonymy between gentes and populi is illustrated by the combinations of these two terms and the cases where PsH and G each pick one of them to render the same word in Hebrew/Greek.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

277

The evidence for populorum is as follows: PsH = G: 32,10 Dominus dissolvit consilium gentium (‫גוים‬-‫ )עצת‬irritas fecit cogitationes populorum (‫)מחשׁבות עמים‬ 46,10 67,31 G 104,20

principes populorum (‫ )נדיבי עמים‬congregati sunt populus Dei Abraham increpa … congregatio fortium in vitulis populorum (‫)בעגלי עמים‬ congregatio taurorum in vaccis populorum princeps populorum (‫ )משׁל עמים‬et dimisit illum

PsH only: 88,51 quia portavi in sinu meo omnes iniquitates populorum (‫רבים עמים‬-‫)כל‬ G quod continui in sinu meo multarum gentium (πολλῶν ἐϑνῶν) 95,5 omnes enim dii populorum (‫אלהי העמים‬-‫ )כל‬sculptilla G quoniam omnes dii gentium (πάντες οἱ ϑεοὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) daemonia 95,7 adferte Domino familiae populorum (‫)משׁטתות עמים‬ G adferte Domino patriae gentium (αἱ πατριαὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) 108,30 et in medio populorum (‫ )ובחוך רבים‬laudabo eum G in medio multorum (ἐν μέσῳ πολλῶν) PsG = H (different case): Dominus narrabit in scriptura populorum (‫בכתוב עמים‬, ἐν γραφῇ λαῶν) 86,6 H scribens populos PsG only: 7,8 et synagoga populorum (‫ידין עמים‬, συναγωγῆ λαῶν) circumdabit te H et congregatio tribuum 104,44 et dedit illis regiones gentium (χώρας ἐϑνῶν) et labores populorum (πόνους λαῶν) possederunt H et dedit eis terras gentium (‫ )ארצית גוים‬et laborem tribuum (‫)ועמל לאמים‬ possederunt

PsH prefers populos to gentes in a couple of instances, but see 104,44. The origin of 108,30 remains unclear: another Vorlage, a redundant clarification of the original, or the translator mistaking ‫ רבים‬for ‫ ?עמים‬It simplifies 86,6 against MT. Two instances of the combination gentes with tribus (7,8; 104,44). Note the motif of God’s sovereignty over the nations in 86,6 and 104,20.44, the threatening 7,8, the courageous 108,30, and the reference to idolatry in 67,31 and to the gentile gods in 95,5. The instances of the accusative read as follows: PsH = G: 7,9 9,9 G 17,48

Dominus iudicabit populos (‫)עמים‬ et ipse iudicat orbem in iustitia iudicat populos (‫ )לאמים‬in aequitatibus orbem terrae … in aequitate … in iustitia Deus qui das vindictas mihi et congregas populos (‫ )עמים‬sub me

278 G 43,3 46,4 G 55,8 66,5 95,10 95,13 G 97,9 G 98,2

J. VERHEYDEN

Deus qui dat … et subdidit … tu manu tua gentes delisti … adflixisti populos (‫ )לאמים‬et emisisti eos congregavit populos (‫ )עמים‬subter nos et tribus (‫ )ולאמים‬sub pedibus nostris subiecit populos nobis et gentes sub pedibus nostris in furore populos (‫ )עמים‬detrahet Deus laetentur et laudent gentes (‫ )לאמים‬quoniam iudicas populos (‫…)עמים‬ et gentium (‫ )ולאמים‬... ductor es sempiternus dicite in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬Dominus regnavit … iudicabit populos (‫)עמים‬ in aequitate iudicabit orbem in iusto et populos (‫ )ועמים‬in fide sua iudicabit orbem terrae in aequitate et populos in veritate sua iudicabit orbem in iustitia et populos (‫ )ועמים‬in aequitatibus iudicabit orbem terrarum in iustitia et populos in aequitate Dominus in Sion magnus et excelsus est super omnes populos (-‫על‬ ‫העמים‬-‫)כל‬

PsH = G (different case): 86,6 G 143,2 G

Dominus numerabit scribens populos (‫)בכתוב עמים‬ in scriptura populorum (ἐν γραφῇ λαῶν) qui subiecit populos (‫ )עמי‬mihi qui subdis populum meum (τὸν λαόν μου) sub me

PsH only: 67,31 G 105,34 G

disperge populos (‫ )עמים‬qui bella volunt dissipa gentes (ἔϑνη) non exterminaverunt populos (‫העמים‬-‫ )את‬quos dixit Dominus eis non disperdiderunt gentes (τὰ ἔϑνη, cf. v. 35) quas

PsG = H (different case): 101,23 in conveniendo populos (λαούς) in unum et reges ut serviant Domino H cum congregati fuerint populi (‫ )עמים‬simul et regna ut serviant Domino

‫ עמים‬is the usual word in the Hebrew (but see the synonym in 43,3). In 143,2 G is closer to the original than H’s plural (followed by modern translations) that is thought to make better sense. As with the other cases of populi, the negative connotation dominates, with 66,5 and 101,23 as notable exceptions. The foreign people will be judged by the God of Israel (7,9; 9,9; 95,10.13; 97,9; 143,2 – all with iudicare), subjected to him (17,48; 46,4), or dispersed (67,31). Note the variation in the strongly parallel 95,13 / 97,9 and 17,48 / 46,4. The instances of populis read as follows: PsH = G: 56,10

confitebor tibi in populis (‫ )בעמים‬Domine cantabo tibi in gentibus (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

76,15 95,3 G 107,4 G 149,7 G

279

ostendens in populis (‫ )בעמים‬potentiam tuam narrate in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬gloriam eius in universis populis (-‫בכל‬ ‫ )העמים‬mirabilia eius inter gentes … in omnibus populis confitebor tibi in populis (‫ )בעמים‬Domine et cantabo te in nationibus (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬ in populis (ἐν λαοῖς) … in nationibus (ἐν ἔϑνεσιν) ad faciendam vindictam in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬increpationes in populis (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬ in nationibus … in populis

PsH only: 9,12 G 104,1 G

adnuntiate in populis (‫ )בעמים‬commutationes eius inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) studia eius confitemini Domino invocate nomen eius notas facite populis (‫)בעמים‬ cogitationes eius adnuntiate inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) opera eius

PsG = H (different case): 73,14 H

dedisti eum escam populis Aethiopum (λαοῖς τοῖς Αἰϑίοψιν) populo Aethiopum (‫)לעם לציים‬

PsG only: 43,15 H

posuisti nos in similitudinem gentibus (εἰς παραβολὴν ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) commotionem capitis in populis (ἐν τοῖς λαοῖς) in gentibus (‫ … )משׁל בגוים‬in tribubus (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬

With one exception (149,7), the keyword renders Hebrew ‫עמים‬. H is true to the model in 73,14, just as G follows LXX. In 43,15 H has the synonymous, but less common tribus. There are several instances of combinations with gentibus. Note the parallels in 56,10 / 107,4 and, less strictly, in 9,12; 95,3; and 104,1 (the latter with another case of “confess”) – all with positive overtone. Several forms of populi occur in the same context in 95,3.5.7.10. The plural in 75,16 is followed by the singular of the keyword in v. 16. There are eleven instances of four different forms of nationes (sg. or pl.) in the Psalms, one PsH only (71,11), eight PsG only, and one identical in both (107,4). All but one (72,15) have been mentioned in different categories in the lists above, but are repeated here for convenience. PsH = G: 107,4 confitebor tibi in populis (‫ )בעמים‬Domine et cantabo te in nationibus (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬ G in populis (ἐν λαοῖς) … in nationibus (ἐν ἔϑνεσιν) PsH only: 71,11 et adorabunt eum omnes reges universae nationes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬servient ei G omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη)

280

J. VERHEYDEN

PsG only: 17,50 propterea confitebor tibi in nationibus (ἐν ἔϑνεσιν) Domine H in gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ 78,10 ne forte dicant in gentibus (τὰ ἔϑνη) ubi est Deus eorum et innotescat in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) coram oculis nostris H quare dicunt gentes (‫ )הגוים‬ubi est Deus eorum nota fiat in gentibus (‫ )בגויים‬ante oculos nostros 105,27 et ut deiceret semen eorum in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) H in gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ 105,47 et congrega nos de nationibus (ἐκ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) H de gentibus (‫הגוים‬-‫)מן‬ 109,6 iudicabit in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) H in gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ 149,7 ad faciendam vindictam in nationibus (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) increpationes in populis (ἐν τοῖς λαοῖς) H in gentibus (‫ … )בגוים‬in populis (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬ 72,15 H 147,20 H

ecce nationem (τῇ γενεᾷ) filiorum tuorum reliqui generationem (‫)דור‬ non fecit taliter omni nationi (147,9 παντὶ ἔϑνει) similiter omni genti (‫גוי‬-‫)לכל‬

If the choice for nationes at PsH 107,4 may be motivated by the Hebrew (though see 56,10, cited above p. 274, where gentes is used as the equivalent), no real explanation can be offered for 71,11, gentes being the usual equivalent for ‫ גוים‬in PsH. PsG uses natio(nes) as a synonym of gens/-tes for rendering ἔϑνη/-ος ((‫)גוי)ם‬. In a few instances the choice for nationes may result from the need for a parallel to populi or gentes (78,10; 149,7; also 107,4), but it does not explain the other cases (for 105,27 one might speculate about the combination with regionibus in the second half of the verse). The exception at 72,15 remains a bit of a puzzle, as PsH’s generationem is the better equivalent. PsH and G have one instance each of cognatio(nes): 21,28 G 73,8 H

et adorabunt coram eo universae cognationes gentium (‫משׁפחות גוים‬-‫)כל‬ et adorabunt in conspectu eius universae familiae gentium (πᾶσαι αἱ πατριαὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) dixerunt in corde suo cognatio eorum (ἡ συγγένεια αὐτῶν) simul dixerunt in cordibus suis posteri eorum (‫ )נינם‬simul

The first was mentioned already above (under gentium). For the second H renders MT and G renders LXX, including the combination of plural verb (εἶπαν) and singular subject. This part of the verse is often not translated and replaced by a phrase that is not found in MT or LXX (see NRSV “We will utterly subdue them”, REB “Let us together oppress them”, NAB “Destroy them all”, NJB “Let us crush them at one stroke”).

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

281

The six relevant cases of tribus have all been mentioned before under gentes and/or populi, but are here repeated for convenience: quare turbabuntur gentes et tribus (‫)גוים ולאמים‬ quare fremuerunt gentes et populi (ἔϑνη καὶ λαοί) et congregatio tribuum (‫ )ועדת לאמים‬circumdet te et synagoga populorum (καὶ συναγωγὴ λαῶν) circumdabit te posuisti nos similitudinem in gentibus (‫ )משׁמ בגוים‬commotionem capitis in tribubus (‫אמים‬-‫)בל‬ G in similitudinem gentibus (εἰς παραβολὴν ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) … in populis (ἐν τοῖς λαοῖς) 46,4 congregavit populos (‫ )עמים‬subter nos et tribus (‫ )ולאמים‬sub pedibus nostris G subiecit populos (λαούς) nobis et gentes (ἔϑνη) sub pedibus nostris 104,44 et dedit eis terras gentium (‫ )ארצות גוים‬et laborem tribuum (‫ועמל‬ ‫ )לאמים‬possederunt G et dedit illis regiones gentium (χώρας ἐϑνῶν) et labores populorum (πόνους λαῶν) possederunt

2,1 G 7,8 G 43,15

71,17 H

et benedicentur in ipso omnes tribus terrae (πᾶσαι αἱ φυλαὶ τῆς γῆς) omnes gentes (πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) beatificabunt eum et benedicentur in eo omnes gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )כל‬et beatificabunt eum

The equivalent in MT is ‫( אמים‬LXX λαοί, which G as a rule renders with populi). In 71,17, H follows MT and G LXX (double subject). In 7,8 H may have wished to alternate with populos in v. 9 (‫ ;)עמים‬G just repeats the same word twice. In 46,4 H may have wished to introduce a third term to differentiate a bit the repeated use of only gentes and populi (see v. 2 H populi / G gentes, 4 H populos et tribus / G populos et gentes, 9 HG gentes, 10 HG principes populorum). The same might apply for 43,15 (v. 13 HG populum tuum) and 104,44 (v. 43 HG populum meum). The word tribus is clearly considered to be perfectly interchangeable with the synonyms with which it is combined. Alienigena is met only in PsG (and once in Ps 151). 59,10 H 82,8

mihi alienigenae (ἀλλόφυλοι) subditi sunt mihi Palestina (‫ )פלשׁת‬foederata est Gebal et Ammon et Amalech alienigenae (ἀλλόφυλοι) cum habitantibus Tyrum H … Palestina (‫ )פלשׁת‬cum habitatoribus Tyri 86,4 ecce alienigenae (ἀλλόφυλοι) et Tyrus et populus Aethiopum (λαὸς Αἰϑιόπων) hii fuerunt illic H ecce Palestina (‫ )פלשׁת‬et Tyrus cum Aethiopia iste natus est ibi 107,10 mihi alienigenae (ἀλλόφυλοι) amici facti sunt (ὑπετάγησαν) H cum Philisthim (‫ )פלשׁת‬foederabor 143,11 eripe me et eripe me de manu filiorum alienigenarum (ἐκ χειρὸς υἱῶν ἀλλοτρίων)

282

J. VERHEYDEN

H

libera me et erue me de manu filiorum alienorum (‫נכר‬-‫)מיד בני‬

151,6

exivi obviam alienigenae (εἰς συνάντησιν τῷ ἀλλοφυλῷ) et maledixit mihi in simulacris suis

G is consistent (ἀλλότριοι being a synonym for ἀλλόφυλοι), as is H in four of the five instances. Note the parallel in 59,10 and 107,10 (G’s rendering of the verb is too positive) and the combination with specific foreign peoples in 82,8 and 86,4. Alienus is met slightly more often than alienigenae. PsH = G: filii alieni (‫נכר‬-‫ )בנׅ‬mentientur mihi filii alieni (‫נכר‬-‫ )בנׅ‬defluent expandimus manus nostras ad deum alienum (‫)לאל זר‬ et derelinquent alienis (‫ )לאהרים‬divitias suas quia alieni (‫ )זרים‬insurrexerunt adversus me non sit in te deus alienus (‫ )אל זר‬et non adores deum peregrinum (‫לאל‬ ‫)נכר‬ G non erit in te deus recens (ϑεὸς πρόσφατος) nec adorabis deum alienum (ϑεῷ ἀλλοτρίῳ) 108,11 et diripiant alieni (‫ )זרים‬laborem eius 136,4 quomodo cantabimus canticum Domini in terra aliena (‫)על אדמת נכר‬ 143,7 libera me et erue me de aquis multis de manu filiorum alienorum (‫נכר‬-‫)מיד בני‬ 17,46 43,21 48,11 53,5 80,10

PsH only: 68,9

alienus factus sum (‫ )מוזר‬fratribus meis et peregrinus (‫ )ונכרי‬filiis matris meae G extraneus (ἀπηλλοτριωμένος) … et peregrinus (ξένος) … 143,11 supra sub alienigena PsG only: 18,14 H

et ab alienis (ἀπὸ ἀλλοτρίων) parce servo tuo a superbis (‫ )מזדים‬quoque libera servum tuum

In G alienus consistently translates ἀλλότριοι, except for the verbal form in 68,9. H uses it for rendering ‫( נכר‬twice also for peregrinus) or ‫זר‬, except in 48,11 where the word seems to have a more neutral or less pronounced negative connotation, though that is perhaps a wrong impression, for in this case too it can well mean “a foreigner” with the same connotations of dangerous and threatening as in the other instances (so clearly in G). Note the combinations with deus and filius and the double doublet with peregrinus, with the change in order in G 80,10. G 18,14 may be the result of LXX misreading the original as ‫מזרים‬. Turning to a foreign God means forgetting about the true one (so 43,21a).

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

283

The variant alienatus is met twice, as is peregrinus (68,9; 80,10). PsH = G: 57,4 alienati sunt (‫זרו‬, LXX ἀπηλλοτριώϑησαν) peccatores a vulva erraverunt ab utero loquentes mendacium PsH = G: 68,9 supra sub alienus PsH only: 80,10 supra sub alienus

As said above, there may be a few other cases in which these words have a stronger connotation with “pagan” practices or attitudes, but it is not always so easy to decide. 3. Isaiah – gentes Isaiah counts twenty-five instances of gentes, evenly divided over nom. and acc. (12/12), and one voc. (34,1): 2,2 11,10 33,3 40,15 40,17 41,1 43,9 55,5 60,3 60,12 62,2 64,2

et fluent ad eum omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ )כל‬3 et ibunt populi multi (‫עמים‬ ‫רבים‬, ἔϑνη πολλά) radix Iesse qui stat in signum populorum (‫ )לנס עמים‬ipsum gentes (‫ )גוים‬deprecabuntur a voce angeli fugerunt populi (‫ )עמים‬ab exaltatione tua dispersae sunt gentes (‫)גוים‬ ecce gentes (‫גוים‬, LXX adds πάντα, cf. v. 17) quasi … reputatae sunt ecce insulae (‫ )איים‬quasi … omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ )כל‬quasi non sint sic sunt coram eo taceant ad me insulae et gentes (‫ )איים ולאמים‬mutent fortitudinem omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ )כל‬congregatae sunt simul et collectae sunt tribus (‫לאמים‬, ἄρχοντες) ecce gentem (‫ )גוי‬quam nesciebas vocabis et gentes (‫וגוי‬, λαοί) quae non cognoverunt te ad te current et ambulabant gentes (‫ )גוים‬in lumine tuo et reges in splendore ortus tui gens enim (‫הגוי‬-‫ )כי‬et regnum quod non servierit tibi peribit et gentes (‫ )והגוים‬solitudine vastabantur et videbunt gentes (‫ )גוים‬iustum tuum et cuncti reges inclitum tuum a facie tua gentes (‫ )גוים‬turbarentur

34,1

accedite gentes (‫ )גוים‬et audite et populi (‫לאמים‬, ἄρχοντες) adtendite audiat terra et plenitudo eius orbis et omne germen eius (ἡ γῆ καὶ οἱ ἐν αὐτῇ, ἡ οἰκουμένη καὶ ὁ λαὸς ὁ ἐν αὐτῇ)ͅ

2,4

et iudicabit gentes (‫ )בין הגוים‬et arguet populos multos (‫… )לעמים רבים‬ non levabit gens contra gentem (‫גוי‬-‫ )גוי אל‬gladium

284 14,6 14,12 14,26 30,28 34,2 41,2 45,1 49,22 52,15 54,3 66,19

J. VERHEYDEN

caedentem populos (‫עמים‬, ἔϑνος) in indignatione plaga insanabili subicientem in furore gentes (‫)גוים‬ corruisti in terram qui vulnerabas gentes (‫גוים‬-‫על‬, diff. LXX ὁ ἀποστέλλων πρὸς πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη) hoc consilium quod cogitavi super omnem terram et haec est manus extenta super universas gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫כל‬-‫)על‬ ad perdendas gentes (‫ )גוים‬in nihilum et frenum erroris quod erat in maxillis populorum (‫)עמים‬ quia indignatio Domini super omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫כל‬-‫ )על‬et furor super universam militiam eorum dabit in conspectu eius gentes (‫ )גוים‬et reges obtinebit ut subiciam ante faciem eius gentes (‫ )גוים‬et dorsa regum vertam ecce levo ad gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )אל‬manum meam et ad populos (‫עמים‬-‫)ואל‬ exaltabo signum meum iste asperget gentes multas (‫ )גוים רבים‬super ipsum continebunt reges os suum et semen tuum gentes (‫ )גוים‬hereditabit et civitates desertas inhabitabit et ponam in eis signum et mittam ex eis qui salvati fuerint ad gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ … )לא‬ad insulas (‫ )האיים‬longe …

With one exception (41,1), gentes always translates ‫( גוים‬LXX ἔϑνη). LXX paraphrases the opening words of 2,4 as ἀνὰ μέσον ἐϑνῶν. It has only νῆσοι at 41,1; maybe Vg was influenced by v. 2. The plural at 55,5b after the singular in 5a coordinates with verb in Hebrew (cf. also LXX). At 11,10 LXX reads a quite different text, but with double ἔϑνη (ἡ ῥίζα τοῦ Ιεσσαι καὶ ὁ ἀνιστάμενος αὐτοῦ ἐϑνῶν, ἐπ ̓ αὐτῷ ἔϑνη ἐλπιοῦσιν). Note the relatively numerous combinations with populos, occasionally also with tribus (43,9), reges (41,2; 60,3; 62,2), and insulae (40,15; 41,1; 66,19), and further also the phrase omnes gentes and the negative and (less frequently) positive connotations of the word. There are nineteen instances of the genitive plural: 9,1 10,7 13,4 14,18 16,8 23,3 25,3 29,7 29,8

Galileae gentium (‫)גליל הגוים‬ et ad internicionem gentium non paucarum (‫)ולהברית גוים לא מעס‬ vox multitudinis (‫ )המון‬in montibus quasi populorum frequentium (‫רב‬-‫ )עמ‬vox sonitus regum gentium congragatarum (‫ממלכות גוים‬ ‫)נאסטים‬ omnes reges gentium universi (‫מלכי גוים כלם‬-‫)כל‬ domini gentium (‫ )בעלי גוים‬exciderunt flagella eius et facta est negotiatio gentium (‫)סחר גוים‬ super hoc laudabit te populus fortis (‫עז‬-‫ )עמ‬civitas gentium robustarum (‫ )קרית גוים עריצים‬timebit te multitudo omnium gentium (‫הגוים‬-‫ )המון כל‬quae dimicaverunt contra Arihel et omnes qui … sic erit multitudo omnium gentium (cf. v. 7) quae dimicaverunt contra montem Sion

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

36,18 37,12 42,6 49,6 52,10 60,5 60,11 60,16 61,6 66,12

285

Dominus liberabit nos numquid liberaverunt dii gentium (‫)אלהי הגוים‬ numquid eruerunt eos dii gentium (cf. 36,18) quos subverterunt patres mei et dedi te in foedus populi (‫ )עמ‬in lucem gentium (‫)לאיר גוים‬ dedi te in lucem gentium (cf. 42,6) ut sis salus mea usque ad extremum terrae paravit Dominus brachium sanctum suum in oculis omnium gentium (‫הגוים‬-‫)לעיני כל‬ quando conversa fuerit ad te multitudo maris (‫ )המון ים‬fortitudo gentium (‫ )חיל גוים‬venerit tibi ut adferatur ad te fortitudo gentium (cf. v. 11) et reges earum adducantur … (cf. v. 12 supra) et suges lac gentium (‫ )חלב גוים‬et mamilla regum lactaberis fortitudinem gentium (cf. v. 60,5) comedetis et in gloria earum superbietis et quasi torrentem inundantem gloriam gentium (‫ )כבוד גוים‬quam sugetis …

There are no exceptions in the translation of ‫גוים‬. One will note a number of fixed combinations and the various repetitions of identical formulas (29,7.8; 60,5.11 and 61,6; 36,18 and 37,12; 42,6 and 49,6); note also the variant on the motif of omnes gentes in 10,7. The dative/ablative plural is represented with nine cases: 42,1 45,20 55,4 61,9 61,11 63,3 66,18 66,19 66,20

dedi spiritum meum super eum iudicium gentibus (‫ )לגוים‬proferet congregamini et venite et accedite simul qui salvati estis ex gentibus (‫)הגוים‬ ecce testem populis (‫לאומים‬, ἐν ἔϑνεσιν) dedi eum ducem ac praeceptorem gentibus (‫)לאמים‬ et scietur in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬semen eorum et germen eorum in medio populorum (‫בתוך העמים‬, καὶ τὰ ἔκγονα αὐτῶν) sic Dominus Deus germinabit iustitiam et laudem coram universis gentibus (‫הגוים‬-‫)נגד כל‬ torcular calcavi solus et de gentibus (‫ )ומעמים‬non est vir mecum ut congregem cum omnibus gentibus et linguis (‫הגוים והלשׁנות‬-‫כל‬, πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη καὶ τὰς γλώσσας) et adnuntiabunt gloriam meam gentibus (‫)בגוים‬ et adducent omnes fratres vestros de cunctis gentibus (‫הגוים‬-‫)מכל‬ donum Domino

With two exceptions (55,4 and 63,3), gentes always renders ‫גוים‬. In 55,4 the choice may have been inspired by the combination with populis (see 61,9); in 63,3 the reason may be the reference in v. 1 to Edom and Bozrah, specific “gentile” peoples. LXX always renders with a form of ἔϑνη (not necessarily a dative/ablative), also in the first half of 55,4. The critical view on gentiles lasts until chapter 63, but is then reversed in the

286

J. VERHEYDEN

final chapter that abounds with references to the keyword (see gentes in v. 19), but all of these in a positive, eschatological perspective. One meets the usual combinations with omnes/cunctae and with other keywords. Isaiah contains five instances of singular gens, one of the genitive, three of the dative, nine of the accusative, and one ablative: 2,4 26,2 58,2 60,12 66,8

et iudicabit gentes et arguet populos multos … non levabit gens contra gentem (‫גוי‬-‫ )גוי אל‬gladium aperite portas et ingrediatur gens iusta (‫צדיק‬-‫ )גוי‬custodiens veritatem quasi gens quae iustitiam fecerit (‫צדקה עשׂה‬-‫ )כגוי אשׁר‬et quae iudicium Dei sui non reliquet gens (‫הגוי‬-‫ )כי‬enim et regnum quod non servierit tibi peribit numquid parturiet terra in die una aut parietur gens (‫ )גוי‬simul

14,32

et quid respondebitur nuntiis gentis (‫גוי‬-‫ )מלאכי‬quia Dominus fundavit Sion et in ipsa sperabunt pauperes populi eius (‫)עניי עמו‬

1,4

Israel non cognovit populus meus (‫ )עמי‬non intellexit 4 vae genti peccatrici populo gravi iniquitate (‫)הוי גוי חטא עם כבד עון‬ indulsisti genti (‫ )לגוי‬Domine indulsisti genti (‫)לגוי‬

26,15 2,4 9,3 10,6 18,2 49,7 55,5 60,22 65,1 18,7

supra sub gens multiplicasti gentem (‫ )הגוי‬non magnificasti laetitiam (MT 2) ad gentem fallacem (‫ )בגוי חנפ‬mittam eum et contra populum (‫עם‬-‫)ועל‬ furoris mei mandabo illi ite angeli veloces ad gentem convulsam et deliceratam (‫גוי םםשׁך‬-‫אל‬ ‫ )וםורט‬ad populum terribilem (‫עם נורא‬-‫ )אל‬post quem non est alius gentem (‫ )גוי‬expectantem expectantem et conculcatam ad contemptibilem animam ad abominatum gentem (‫ )למתעב גוי‬ad servum dominorum ecce gentem (‫ )גוי‬quam nesciebas vocabis et gentes (‫ )וגוי‬quae non cognoverunt te ad te current minimus erit in mille et parvulus in gentem fortissimam (‫)לגוי עצום‬ dixi ecce ego ecce ego ad gentem (‫גוי‬-‫ )אל‬quae non vocabat nomen meum a populo divulso et dilacerato (‫ )עם םםשׁך וםורט‬a populo terribili (‫ומעם‬ ‫ )נורא‬post quem non fuit alius a gente (‫ )גוי‬expectante expectante et conculcata

All instances of gens render ‫גוי‬. The alternation of singular and plural in 55,5 is not in the original (see also v. 4 above). LXX usually translates with ἔϑνος (1,4; 2,4; 10,6; 18,2.7; 60,22; 65,1; 66,8), in a few instances using the plural (49,7 τὸν βδελυσσόμενον ὑπὸ τῶν ἐϑνῶν, which gives a slightly different meaning from Vg; 55,5 probably in line with the second mention of the keyword, which is here rendered as λαοί, probably for the sake of differentiating; 60,12 τὰ ἔϑνη καὶ οἱ βασιλεῖς). In a couple of instances it switches to λαός (26,2 simplifying with a mere λαός; 58,2).

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

287

9,2 is paraphrased as τὸ πλεῖστον τοῦ λαοῦ and in 26,15 the keyword is absent and reads instead πρόσϑες κακά. A good number of the instances refer to Israel as a nation, either positively (9,3; 26,15; and 60,22, with populus tuus in v. 21: God praised for what he does for His people; 26,2 Judah; 66,8 Zion) or negatively (1,4 a lament; 10,6 Assur comes down on Israel; 58,2 Israel fakes its loyalty to the Lord, with the dramatic populus meus in v. 1; 65,1 Israel’s disobedience). But also foreign nations can be singled out, negatively (usually with a hint or reference in the context about who is meant: 14,32 the Philistines; 49,7 foreign nations despise Israel; 60,12 Lebanon) but also positively (see the eschatological perspective in 2,4 where the singular has a global meaning after the negatively connoted double plural in the first half of the verse; 18,2.7 a people beyond Ethiopia; 55,5 all nations will call upon the Lord). Note the parallel theme in 9,3 and 26,15 and the almost verbatim repetition in 18,2.7. I have added a few cases in which singular populus refers to Israel because it is part of the context (see 1,4; 10,6; cf. also 18,2.7 for an unknown people). One will also note the qualifications of the keyword with adjectives or participles or otherwise (65,1; 58,2, and see 26,2). – Other Terms As with Genesis and Psalms, forms of populi are the most commonly used keywords next to gentes. The nine instances of populi are as follows: 2,3 8,9 14,2 17,13 26,11 33,3 33,12 34,1 49,1

et ibunt populi multi (‫ )עמים רבים‬et dicent venite… congregamini populi (‫ )עמים‬et vincimini et audite universae procul terrae (‫ארץ‬-‫)כל מרחקי‬ et tenebunt eos populi (‫ )עמים‬et adducent eos in locum suum sonabunt populi (‫ )לאמים‬sicut sonitus aquarum inundantium videant et confundantur zelantes populi (‫עם‬-‫)קנאת‬ a voce angeli fugerunt populi (‫ )עמים‬ab exaltatione tua dispersae sunt gentes (‫)גוים‬ et erunt populi (‫ )עמים‬quasi de incendio cinis accedite gentes (‫ )גוים‬et audite et populi (‫ )ולאמים‬adtendite audiat terra et plenitudo eius orbis et omne germen eius audite insulae (‫ )איים‬et adtendite populi (‫ )לאמים‬de longe

The word renders ‫ עמים‬or its synonym ‫( אמים‬17,13; 34,1; and 49,1, the last two of these in combination with a synonym). The LXX equivalent in most cases is ἔϑνη. It reads singular λαός in 26,11 (infra) and 34,1 (with a different order of the subjects) and the plural in 33,3 (in combination with ἔϑνη). The word is mostly used for threatening foreign nations, occasionally also in a triumphalistic way (14,2 enslaving the peoples who

288

J. VERHEYDEN

led the Lord’s people into the land) and once positively (2,3). In 26,11 Vg seems to have misunderstood the Vorlage (or read a different one), for in MT the zeal is the Lord’s and is the object, translating as “Let them see your zeal for your people, and be ashamed” (NRSV), or something similar (diff. LXX ζῆλος λήμψεται λαὸν ἀπαίδευτον). Note the presence of other forms of populi, or other keywords, in the immediate context of 2,3 (v. 4 gentes, populos) 17,13 (v. 12 populorum). Two instances of combined gentes/populi (in random order) and one of populi/insulae, characteristic of Isaiah. Note the slightly redundant, or highly rhetorical, use of two or even three synonymous verbs in 8,9; 34,1 (with also several largely synonymous subjects); 49,1, and the comparisons in 17,13 and 33,12. The ten instances of the genitive are: 10,13 10,14 11,10 13,4 17,12 19,13 24,13 30,28 51,4 61,9

et abstuli terminos populorum (‫ )גבולת עמים‬et principes eorum depraedatus sum et invenit quasi nidum manus mea fortitudinem populorum (‫)לחיל העמים‬ radix Iesse qui stat in signum populorum (‫ )לנס עמים‬ipsum gentes (‫ )גוים‬deprecabuntur vox multitudinis in montibus quasi populorum frequentium (‫דמות‬ ‫רב‬-‫ )עם‬vox sonitus regum gentium (‫ )ממלבות גוים‬congregatarum vae multitudo populorum multorum (‫)המון עמים רבים‬ deceperunt Aegyptum angulum populorum eius (‫)פנת שׁבטיה‬ quia haec erunt in medio terrae (‫ )בקרב הארץ‬in medio populorum (‫)בתוך העמים‬ ad perdendas gentes (‫ )גוים‬in nihilum et frenum erroris quod erat in maxillis populorum (‫)לחיי עמים‬ quia lex a me exiet et iudicium meum in lucem populorum (‫)לאור עמים‬ requiescet et scietur in gentibus (‫ )בגוים‬semen eorum et germen eorum in medio populorum (‫)בתוך העמים‬

In all instances populorum renders ‫( עמים‬sg. in 13,4 that is a rather more free rendering of the original). In 19,13 Vg goes its own way. LXX takes more freedom (or worked from another Vorlage). ἔϑνη is the normal equivalent (10,13; 11,10 rather freely rendered; 13,4; 17,12; 24,13; 51,4), but it reads τὴν οἰκουμένην ὅλην in 10,14, κατὰ φυλάς in 19,13 (closer to MT), καὶ τὰ ἔκγονα αὐτῶν in 61,9, and mere αὐτούς in 30,28. In most cases the word is found in a verse with threatening-punitive connotation, in a general or more specific format (10,13.14; 17,12; 19,13 the rulers of Egypt; 24,13; 30,28). An eschatological perspective is met in 11,10 and 51,4, a more triumphalistic one in 61,9. It is not clear who the peoples are in 13,4, but they seem to stand in the service of the Lord – either as heavenly forces, or more plausibly as earthly nations being instrumentalised for the Lord’s purposes. Here again one finds other keywords

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

289

in the immediate context (see 11,10 and v. 12; 17,12 and v. 13). Note the combination with gentes in 13,4 (twice genitive) and 61,9 with the phrase in medio (as in 24,13), and the (slightly redundant) repetitions in 13,4; 17,12; 24,13; and 61,9. Ten instances of the accusative are found: 2,4 3,13 14,6 25,7 43,4 49,22 51,5 60,2 62,10 63,6

et iudicabit gentes (‫ )הגוים‬et arguet populos multos (‫)לעמים רבים‬ stat ad iudicandum Dominus et stat ad iudicandos populos (‫)עמים‬ caedentem populos (‫ )עמים‬in indignatione plaga insanabili subicientem in furore gentes (‫)גוים‬ vinculi conligati super omnes populos (‫העמים‬-‫כל‬-‫ )על‬et telam quam orditus est super universas nationes (‫הגוים‬-‫כל‬-‫)על‬ et dabo homines pro te et populos (‫ )ולאמים‬pro anima tua ecce levo ad gentes (‫גוים‬-‫ )אל‬manum meam et ad populos (‫עמים‬-‫)ואל‬ exaltabo signum meum et brachia mea populos (‫ )עמים‬iudicabunt me insulae (‫ )איים‬expectabunt quia ecce tenebrae operient terram et caligo populos (‫)לאמים‬ elevate signum ad populos (‫העמים‬-‫)נס על‬ et conculcavi populos (‫ )עמים‬in furore meo et inebriavi eos in indignatione mea

With one exception (60,2), as usually, the keyword renders ‫עמים‬. LXX is again more free. Four cases of a form of ἔϑνη (25,7, for both keywords; 51,5, but with a different verb – ἐλπιοῦσιν, as in the second half of the phrase; 60,2; 62,10), once of the singular (14,6, for both keywords), twice singular λαός (2,4; 3,13), once mere αὐτούς (63,6, after ἐϑνῶν in v. 3), and just different words in 43,4 (ἄρχοντες) and 49,22 (εἰς τὰς νήσους). The threatening-punitive tone dominates, evoking fall (14,6) and judgement (2,4; 3,13; 51,5), destruction (63,6) and submission (49,22) or enslavement (43,3), but with a shimmer of hope in other instances (25,7; 51,5; 60,2; 62,10). Note the usual combinations with other keywords, above all gentes, but once also again insulae, the play with signum (49,22 and 62,10; see above at 11,10), and the double instance of iudicare (2,4; 3,13) and divine indignation and furor (14,6; 63,6). Finally, the four instances of populis: 12,4 25,6 55,4 56,7

notas facite in populis (‫ )בעמים‬adinventiones eius et faciet Dominus exercituum omnibus populis (‫העמים‬-‫ )לכל‬in monte hoc ecce testem populis (‫ )לאומים‬dedi eum ducem ac praeceptorem gentibus (‫)לאמים‬ quia domus mea domus orationis vocabitur cunctis populis (‫העמים‬-‫)לכל‬

Three times the usual ‫ עמים‬and once its synonym (55,4). The peoples are informed about the greatness of the Lord (12,4) and hope is granted

290

J. VERHEYDEN

them (25,6; 55,4 David; 56,7 the Lord Himself). The all-inclusive perspective is illustrated from the combination with gentes (55,4) and through adjectives denoting this motif (25,6; 56,7). So far for the plural of populous. As said before, the singular can occasionally have a generalising connotation. This is especially clear in combinations with other words expressing that aspect. A fine example is 24,4: defluxit orbis infirmata est altitudo populi terrae (‫הארץ‬-‫)מרום עם‬, which LXX renders more freely as ἐπένϑησεν ἡ γῆ, καὶ ἐφϑάρη ἡ οἰκουμένη, ἐπένϑησαν οἱ ὑψηλοὶ τῆς γῆς. All four instances of nationes are quite significant for the way Isaiah uses this keyword: 5,26 11,12 14,9 25,7

et levabit signum nationibus (‫ )נס לגוים‬procul et sibilabit ad eum de finibus terrae et levabit signum in nationes (‫ )נס לגוים‬et congregabit profugos Israel et dispersos Iuda colliget a quattuor plagis terrae surrexerunt de soliis suis omnes principes nationum (‫)כל מלכי גוים‬ universi respondebunt vinculi conligati super omnes populos (‫העמים‬-‫כל‬-‫ )על‬et telam quam orditus est super universas nationes (‫הגוים‬-‫כל‬-‫)על‬

The standard equivalent is ‫( גוים‬LXX ἔϑνη all through). Interestingly, the closely similar 5,26 and 11,12 are used in opposite ways, once to threaten Israel and once to appease and comfort it. Threatening again is 14,9, and comforting 25,7. The combination with signum was met also above (populi). One has the impression that, more than with populi or gentes, the universal aspect is brought forward, not only through omnes and universi, but also by references to “the whole earth”, as in 5,26; 11,12 and 14,9. There is one relevant instance of tribus: 43,9

omnes gentes (‫הגוים‬-‫ )כל‬congregatae sunt simul et collectae sunt tribus (‫)לאמים‬

reads ἄρχοντες ἐξ αὐτῶν, which connects this phrase closer to the first half (LXX ἔϑνη). Maybe the word was chosen to alternate after gentes and populum in v. 8. All nations confess and attest the greatness of the Lord. LXX

I list two instances of lingua that are illustrative: 45,23 54,17

quia mihi curvabunt omnia genu et iurabit omnis lingua (‫לשׁון‬-‫)כל‬ et omnem linguam (‫לשׁון‬-‫ )וכל‬resistentem tibi in iudicio iudicabis

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

291

Vg uses the normal equivalent; LXX has γλῶσσα in the first and φωνή in the second instance. The combination with omnis in both instances and the reference to omnes fines terrae in 45,22 and several foreign peoples in 45,14 strengthen the universality of the perspective while indicating that these are outsiders. The combination with omne vas in 54,17a and with judgement offers comfort and encouragement to Israel creates the same impression. The evidence for alienus, peregrinus and advena is as follows: 1,7 2,6 17,10 25,2 25,5 43,12 61,5 62,8 60,10 61,5 56,3 56,6

regionem vestram coram vobis alieni (‫ )זרים‬devorant et desolabitur sicut in vastitate hostili (‫)כמהפכת זרים‬ et augures habuerunt ut Philisthim (‫ )כפלשׁתים‬et pueris alienis (‫ובילדי‬ ‫ )נכרים‬adheserunt plantabis plantationem fidelem et germen alienum (‫ )וזמרת זר‬seminabis domum alienorum (‫ )ארמון זרים‬ut non sit civitas sicut aestum in siti tumultum alienorum (‫ )שׁאון זרים‬humiliabis et non fuit in vobis alienus (‫)זר‬ et stabunt alieni (‫ )זרים‬et pascent pecora vestra et filii peregrinorum (‫ )ובני נכר‬agricolae et vinitores vestri erunt et si biberint filii alieni (‫נכר‬-‫ )בני‬vinum tuum in quo laborasti et aedificabunt filii peregrinorum (‫נכר‬-‫ )בני‬muros tuos et reges eorum ministrabunt tibi sub alieni et non dicat filius advenae (‫הנכר‬-‫ )בן‬qui adheret Domino dicens separatione dividet me Dominus a populo suo et filios advenae (‫ )ובני הנכר‬qui adherent Domino ut colant eum

Alienus renders ‫( זרים‬mostly pl.) or ‫נכר‬, which is also rendered as peregrinus or advena. In 1,7 it paraphrases rather than translates the second mention of ‫זרים‬. In 62,8 Vg stays too close to the Hebrew when rendering ‫ נשׁבע … אם … ואם‬as iuravit Dominus … si … et si …, thereby missing out on the clearly negative connotation that is behind it (cf. LXX ὤμοσε ... εἰ ἔτι .. καὶ εἰ ἔτι); cf. NRSV “The Lord has sworn … I will not again … and foreigners shall not …”; REB “Never again …, never again …”; NAB “No more … . Nor …”; NJB “Never again … . Never again …”. The LXX frequently renders more freely, it seems. The usual equivalents for ‫ זרים‬are ἀλλοφύλος and ἀλλότριος, but other words are used as well. In 1,7 it keeps the double mention of ‫ זרים‬and translates as ἀλλότριοι ... ὑπὸ λαῶν ἀλλοτρίων. For Vg’s Philisthim it has ἡ τῶν ἀλλοφύλων, as elsewhere (see above), and it strengthens the second element as τέκνα πολλὰ ἀλλοφύλα. In 17,10 it reads διὰ τοῦτο φυτεύσεις φύτευμα ἄπιστον καὶ σπέρμα ἄπιστον (cf. Vg’s seminabis for MT ‫)תזרענו‬. In 25,2

292

J. VERHEYDEN

it introduces a variant reading τῶν ἀσεβῶν πόλις and it seems to have had a different Vorlage in 25,5 when translating as [Sεὐλογησουσίν σε] ὡς ἄνϑρωποι ὀλιγόψυχοι διψῶντες ἐν Σιων ἀπὸ ἀνϑρώπων ἀσεβῶν, οἷς ἡμᾶς παρέδωκας. In the other instances one finds ἀλλότριος (43,12), ἀλλογενεῖς ... ἀλλόφυλοι (61,5), υἱοὶ ἀλλότριοι (62,8, the only case where ‫ בני‬is rendered), ἀλλογενεῖς (60,10), ἀλλογενής (56,3), and τοῖς ἀλλογενέσι (56,6). There can be a negative connotation to the word alienus, expressing foreign rule (1,7), lamenting Israel’s disloyalty (2,6; 17,10), or recalling the time when Israel believed in only one god (43,12), but this is balanced, and indeed in a sense overshadowed, by several instances of strongly positive connotations, praising the Lord conquering foreign nations (25,2.5), protecting His people from foreign rule (62,8), evoking foreign people being subdued to Israel (60,10; 61,5), or even joining it in worshiping the one true Lord (56,3.6). In 2,6 the foreigners are (partly) identified as the archenemies from old. The strongly negative tone is strengthened even further by the fourfold repetition of repleti/repleta est terra. In 17,10 and 43,12 some modern translations explain the keyword as referring to “a foreign deity” (17,10 NRSV “and set out slips of an alien god”; REB “Plant then, if you will, your gardens in honour of Adonis, set out your cuttings for a foreign god”; ctr. NAB “though you plant your pagan plants and set out your foreign vine slips”; NJB “you plant pleasure-gardens, you sow exotic seeds”; 43,12 NRSV “when there was no strange god among you”; REB “I and no alien god among you”; NAB “I made it known, not any strange god among you”; ctr. NJB “not some foreigner among you”). An interesting, and indeed quite mysterious, phrase is met in 28,21: sicut enim in monte Divisionum stabit Dominus sicut in valle quae est in Gabao irascetur ut faciat opus suum alienum (‫ )זר‬opus eius ut operetur opus suum peregrinum (‫ )נכריה‬est opus ab eo. Mount Perazim has been translated literally. LXX renders as ὥσπερ ὄρος ἀσεβῶν ἀναστήσεται ... · μετὰ ϑυμοῦ ποιήσει τὰ ἔργα αὐτοῦ, πικρίας ἔργον· ὁ δὲ ϑυμὸς αὐτοῦ ἀλλοτρίως χρήσεται, καὶ ἡ πικρία αὐτοῦ ἀλλοτρία. There is no explicit connection with any foreign gods or peoples, but the two place names recall Joshua’s victory of the Gibeonites (Josh 10,10) and David’s over the Philistines (2 Sam 5,20; 1 Chr 14,11) and so some kind of connection seems to be suggested, only that the qualifying adjectives are now used for God (but see LXX’s ἀσεβῶν). Modern translations vary from “strange and alien” (NRSV, REB) to “singular and strange” (NAB) and “mysterious and extraordinary” (NJB).

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

293

II. THE NEW TESTAMENT This section follows the same pattern as the one on the Old Testament, except that I will not list the Greek original for forms of gentes, which account for the better part of the total of NT keyword cases, unless Vg uses a different case of the standard equivalent (ἔϑνη), a different keyword, or a different phrase altogether. Within or after the excerpt, or in a note, if deemed too long, are added references to three categories of parallels: OT citations, OT parallels with the same or another keyword, or a different phrase, and NT parallels with the same or another keyword, or a different phrase. The information is taken from the references in the margins of NA28 and the Vg edition. It is limited to such parallels that contain one of the keywords or a variant that is deemed to be of interest24. – gentes The form gentes is found 53 times, evenly divided over nominative and accusative, with also two instances of the vocative. Matt 6,32 12,21 25,32

haec enim omnia gentes inquirunt [Luke 12,30] et in nomine eius gentes sperabunt [Isa 11,10 // ipsum gentes deprecabantur; Rom 15,12] et congregabantur ante eum omnes gentes [Rom 14,10 omnes enim stabimus]

24. As a rule, OT citations are such (parts of) verses that are set in italics in NA28; they are marked in bold in the reference at the end. Unless otherwise noted, the LXX is considered to be the Vorlage, hence to contain the keyword in the same form in which it occurs in the excerpt. The OT (for Psalms, only PsG is mentioned) and NT parallels cover a broader field, including phrases that do not contain the keyword but an interesting equivalent. Theoretically, there are five possible types of references: – the LXX/Greek NT and the Vg form of the citation/parallel and the excerpt (Vg reading) all three agree on the keyword: no text is cited: e.g., Acts 4,25 gentes et populi [Ps 2,1], or Matt 6,32 gentes [Luke 12,30]. – the LXX/Greek NT and the Vg form of the citation/parallel agree with one another but differ from the excerpt (Vg): only Vg is cited: Rev 11,18 gentes [Ps 98,1 populi], or Matt 25,32 omnes gentes [Rom 14,10 omnes enim stabimus]. – the LXX/Greek NT form of the citation/parallel agrees with the excerpt (Vg) on the keyword, but the Vg form differs from it: only Vg is cited: Acts 15,17 omnes gentes [Am 9,12 // omnes nationes], or Luke 21,24 in omnes gentes [Deut 28,64 // in omnes populos]. – the LXX/Greek NT and the Vg form of the citation/parallel and the excerpt (Vg) all three differ from one another: both versions of the citation/parallel are cited: Luke 21,24 in omnes gentes (εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη πάντα) [Ezek 32,9 εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη // in gentibus]. – (not attested): the Vg form of the citation/parallel agrees with the excerpt (Vg) on the keyword, but the LXX/Greek NT form differs from it.

294 28,19

J. VERHEYDEN

euntes ergo docete omnes gentes [Mark 13,10; 16,15 euntes in mundum universum; Luke 24,47]

Mark 13,10

et in omnes gentes primum oportet praedicari evangelium25

Luke 12,30

haec enim omnia gentes mundi quaerunt [Matt 6,32]

21,24

et captivi ducentur in omnes gentes (εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη πάντα)26 et Hierusalem calcabitur a gentibus (ὑπὸ ἐϑνῶν) donec impleantur tempora nationum (καιροὶ ἐϑνῶν) et praedicari in nomine eius paenitentiam et remissionem peccatorum in omnes gentes27

24,47 John 7,35

numquid in dispersionem gentium iturus est et docturus gentes (τοὺς Ἕλληνας) [cf. 12,20 Ἕλληνές τινες // gentiles, but 19,20 ἑλληνιστί = graece, for the language]

Acts 4,25 11,1 13,48 15,17

quare fremuerunt gentes et populi (ἔϑνη καὶ λαοί) meditati sunt inania [Ps 2,1] quoniam et gentes receperunt verbum Dei [8,14 Samaria; 10,45 ἐπὶ τὰ ἔϑνη // in nationes] audientes autem gentes gavisae sunt et omnes gentes super quas invocatum est nomen meum [Am 9,12 // omnes nationes]

13,19

et destruens gentes septem in terra Chanaan [Deut 7,1 gentes multas; Ps 77,54] 13,46 ecce convertimur ad gentes [18,6] 14,15 (16) dimisit omnes gentes ingredi in vias suas 15,7 per os meum audire gentes verbum evangelii et credere [10,45 ἐπὶ τὰ ἔϑνη // in nationes] 18,6 mundus ego ex hoc ad gentes vadam [13,46] 21,21 eorum qui per gentes sunt Iudaeorum (πάντας Ἰουδαίους) Rom 2,14 9,30

cum enim gentes quae legem non habent naturaliter quae legis sunt faciunt [Acts 10,35 in omni gente] quod gentes quae non sectabantur iustitiam adprehenderunt iustitiam [Isa 65,1 ad gentem; cf. Rom 10,20]

25. 16,15; Matt 24,14 in universo orbe in testimonium omnibus gentibus; 28,19; Luke 24,47; Col 1,6 pervenit ad vos sicut et in universo mundo; 1,23 praedicatum est in universa creatura quae sub caelo est. 26. Deut 28,64 // in omnes populos; Ezek 32,9 εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη // in gentibus. 27. 3,3 in omnem regionem Iordanis; Mark 13,10; Acts 1,8 usque ad ultimum terrae; 5,31 Israhel; 10,45 ἐπὶ τὰ ἔϑνη // in nationes; Rom 15,19 usque in Illyricum.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

295

15,12

erit radix Iesse et qui exsurget regere gentes (ἄρχειν ἐϑνῶν) in eo gentes sperabunt [Isa 11,10 // ipsum gentes deprecabantur; Matt 12,21]

15,10 15,11

laetamini gentes cum plebe eius (Deut 32,43 // … populum eius) laudate omnes gentes Dominum et magnificate eum omnes populi [Ps 116,1]

2,24 15,9

nomen enim Dei per vos blasphematur inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν)28 gentes autem super misericordiam honorare Deum sicut scriptum est propter hoc confitebor tibi in gentibus et nomini tuo cantabo supra

15,12 1 Cor 10,20 12,2

sed quae immolant gentes daemoniis immolant et non Deo (Greek v.l. τὰ ἔϑνη) 29 scitis quoniam cum gentes essetis [Eph 2,11]

5,1

et talis fornicatio qualis nec inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν)

Gal 2,14

quomodo gentes cogis iudaizare [2,3 Titus …Ἕλλην ὤν // esset gentilis]

2,8

qui enim operatus est Petro in apostolatum circumcisionis operatus est et mihi inter gentes (εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη) ut nos in gentes (εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη) ipsi autem in circumcisionem quia ex fide iustificat gentes Deus [Rom 4,16 omni semini] praenuntiavit Abrahae quia benedicentur in te omnes gentes30

2,9 3,8 Eph 2,11 3,6 4,17

quod aliquando vos gentes in carne [1 Cor 12,2] esse gentes coheredes et concorporales et conparticipes promissionis in Christo Iesu31 ut iam non ambuletis sicut gentes ambulant

1 Thess 4,5

sicut et gentes quae ignorant Deum32

28. Isa 52,5 // om. object; Ezek 36,20 et ingressi sunt ad gentes … et polluerunt nomen sanctum meum. 29. Deut 32,17 and Lev 17,7, said of Israel, but see v. 8 homo de domo Israhel et de advenis qui peregrinantur inter eos (LXX … καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν υἱῶν τῶν προσηλύτων τῶν προσκειμένων ἐν ὑμῖν); Ps 95,5 quoniam omnes dii gentium daemonia. 30. Gen 12,3 πᾶσαι αἱ φυλαὶ τῆς γῆς // universae cognationes terrae; 18,18 πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη τῆς γῆς // omnes nationes terrae; Acts 3,25 πᾶσαι αἱ πατριαὶ τῆς γῆς // omnes familiae terrae. 31. 2,19 … ξένοι καὶ πάροικοι … // non estis hospites et advenae sed estis cives. 32. Ps 78,6; Jer 10,25 ἐπὶ ἔϑνη .. καὶ ἐπὶ γενεάς // super gentes … et super provincias; cf. Gal 4,8 and 2 Thess 1,8 without subject.

296 2 Tim 4,17

J. VERHEYDEN

et audiant omnes gentes [1 Tim 3,16 gentibus]

1 Peter 2,12 conversationem vestram inter gentes (ἐν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν) habentes bonam Rev 11,18 et iratae sunt gentes [Ex 15,14 ἔϑνη // populi; Ps 98,1 populi] 15,4 quoniam omnes gentes venient et adorabunt in conspectu tuo [Ps 85,9; Isa 2,2; Jer 16,19 ad te gentes venient ab extremis terrae] 17,15 aquas quas vidisti ubi meretrix sedet populi sunt et gentes et linguae (λαοὶ καὶ ὄχλοι εἰσὶν καὶ ἔϑνη καὶ γλῶσσαι) [5,9 ex omni tribu et lingua et populo et natione (ἔϑνους)] 18,3 quia de ira fornicationis eius biberunt omnes gentes et reges terrae … et mercatores terrae …33 18,23 mercatores tui erant principes terrae quia in veneficiis tuis erraverunt omnes gentes [Nah 3,4 gentes … et familias] 21,24 et ambulabunt gentes per lumen eius et reges terrae adferent gloriam suam [Isa 60,3] dabo illi potestatem super gentes (ἐπὶ τῶν ἐϑνῶν)34 et peperit filium masculum qui recturus erit omnes gentes in virga ferrea35 cecidit Babylon illa magna quae a vino irae fornicationis suae potionavit omnes gentes36 19,15 et de ore ipsius procedit gladius acutus ut in ipso percutiat gentes [12,5; Isa 11,4 terram] 20,3 et clusit et signavit super illum ut non seducat amplius gentes [7; 13,14 habitantes terram bis] 20,7(8) et exibit et seducet gentes quae sunt super quattuor angulos terrae Gog et Magog [3; 13,14] 2,26 12,5 14,8

Gentes always translates ἔϑνη, except at John 7,35 that reads τοὺς Ἕλληνας in line with v. 35a (see below at gentiles). There is no apparent reason for the exceptional rendering, unless one is allowed to speculate that since the verse presents the thoughts of οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι, the translator (Jerome) was led to opt for the more common gentes as the way Jews generally would have referred to non-Jews (the old ‫)גוים‬. Maybe also the combination with dispersio played a role (see below at gentium). The position of πάντα with ἔϑνη is exceptional in Luke 21,24 and not followed by Vg. 33. 14,8; 17,2 reges terrae et ... qui inhabitant terram; Jer 51,7 Vg inebrians omnem terram … gentes. 34. Dan 7,14 Th καὶ πάντες οἱ λαοί, φυλαί, γλῶσσαι αὐτῷ δουλεύσουσιν = et omnes populi tribus ac linguae ipsi servient // LXX καὶ πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη τῆς γῆς κατὰ γένη καὶ πᾶσα δόξα λατρεύουσα. 35. Ps 2,9 eos, cf. v. 8 gentes; cf. Rev 2,27 and 19,15b = Ps 2,9. 36. 16,19 et civitates gentium; 17,2 qui inhabitant terram; 18,3; Jer 51,7 Vg inebrians omnem terram … gentes.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

297

The keyword is used with the same range of meanings as was the case in the Old Testament. Negative connotations dominate but are occasionally balanced by a more positive, eschatologically inspired perspective (Matt 12,21; Acts 15,17, both citations from Isaiah). Perhaps the one new element is that calling upon the gentiles is not just a way for threatening or warning Israel, as was the case in the Old Testament (especially, though not exclusively, the prophets), but that they are now said to become or to be the object of the mission the Lord has ordered his disciples to initiate (Mark 13,10; Matt 28,19; Luke 24,47; Acts 11,1). The perspective is truly universalistic (omnes gentes), even if in this initial stage the mission is far from being spread already “to the limits of the earth”. The NT contains 27 cases of gentium, many of those in Romans: Matt 4,15 10,5 20,25 Luke 2,32 21,25 22,25 John 7,35 Acts 7,45 14,2

terra Zabulon et terra Nepthalim via maris trans Iordanen Galilaeae gentium [Isa 9,1] in viam gentium ne abieritis et in civitates Samaritanorum ne intraveritis [ctr. Acts 13,46] scitis quia principes gentium dominantur eorum et qui maiores sunt potestatem exercent in eos37 lumen ad revelationem gentium et gloriam plebis tuae Israhel38 et erunt signa in sole et luna et stellis et in terris pressura gentium39 reges gentium dominantur eorum et qui potestatem habent super eos benefici vocantur40 numquid in dispersionem gentium (εἰς τὴν διασπορὰν τῶν Ἑλλήνων)41 iturus est et docturus gentes (τοὺς Ἕλληνας) in possessionem gentium quas expulit Deus a facie partum nostrorum42 Iudaei suscitaverunt et ad iracundiam concitaverunt animas gentium adversus fratres

37. Mark 10,42 ἄρχειν τῶν ἐϑνῶν … καὶ οἱ μεγάλοι αὐτῶν // principari gentibus … et principes eorum; Luke 22,25 reges gentium. 38. Isa 42,6 = 49,6 in lucem gentium; Acts 13,47 εἰς φῶς ἐϑνῶν // in lumen gentibus. 39. Ps 46,4 subiecit populos … et gentes; 64,8 turbabuntur gentes; cf. Matt 24,30 omnes tribus terrae; cf. Rev 6,15 et reges terrae et principes … 40. Matt 20,25 principes gentium; Mark 10,42 ἄρχειν τῶν ἐϑνῶν … καὶ οἱ μεγάλοι αὐτῶν // principari gentibus … et principes eorum. 41. Jas 1,1 duodecim tribubus quae sunt in dispersione; 1 Peter 1,1 παρεπιδήμοις διασπορᾶς // advenis dispersionis. 42. Josh 23,9 gentes magnas et robustissimas; 24,8 et eiecit universas gentes.

298 15,3 21,11

J. VERHEYDEN

pertransiebant Foenicen et Samariam narrantes conversionem gentium sic alligabunt in Hierusalem Iudaei et tradent in manus gentium43

Rom 3,29 4,17 4,18 11,12 11,13 11,25 15,16 15,18 16,4

an Iudaeorum Deus tantum nonne et gentium immo et gentium44 quia patrem multarum gentium posui te45 ut fieret pater multarum gentium et deminutio eorum divitiae gentium quanto magis plenitudo eorum [11,25] vobis enim dico gentibus quamdiu quidem ego sum gentium apostolus [1,5 in omnibus gentibus; 15,16; 16,26 in cunctis gentibus] quia caecitas ex parte contigit in Israhel donec plenitudo gentium intraret46 ut sim minister Christi Iesu in gentibus … ut fiat oblatio gentium accepta [Isa 66,20 de cunctis gentibus donum Domino] quae per me non effecit Christus in oboedientiam gentium verbo et factis47 quibus non solum ego gratias ago sed et cunctae ecclesiae gentium 5 et domesticam eorum ecclesiam [1 Cor 16,19 ecclesiae Asiae … cum domestica sua ecclesia]

1 Tim 2,7

in quo positus sum ego praedicator et apostolus veritatem dico non mentior doctor gentium in fide et veritate48

2 Tim 1,11

in quo positus sum ego praedicator et apostolus et magister gentium (Greek v.l. ἐϑνῶν) [1 Tim 2,7]

1 Peter 4,3

sufficit enim praeteritum tempus ad voluntatem gentium consummandam … 4 in quo peregrinantur

Rev 16,19

et civitates gentium ceciderunt et Babylon magna venit in memoriam ante Deum dare ei calicem vini indignationis irae eius49

43. 28,17 in manus Romanorum; Luke 18,32 tradetur enim gentibus = Matt 20,19; Mark 10,33. 44. 10,12 non enim est distinctio Iudaei et Graeci. 45. Gen 17,5; Sir 44,20 (19) pater multitudinis gentium. 46. 11,12; Luke 21,24 ἄχρι οὗ πληρωϑῶσιν καιποὶ ἐϑνῶν // donec impleantur tempora nationum. 47. 1,5 ad oboediendum fidei in omnibus gentibus; 16,26 … εἰς πάντα τὰ ἔϑνη // ad oboeditionem fidei in cunctibus gentibus. 48. 3,16 praedicatum est gentibus; Rom 1,5 in omnibus gentibus; Gal 2,7 creditum est mihi evangelium praeputii; 2 Tim 1,11. 49. 14,8 cecidit Babylon illa magna quae a vino irae fornicationis suae potionavit omnes gentes.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

21,26 22,2

299

et adferent gloriam et honorem gentium in illam [Isa 60,11 fortitudo gentium] et folia ligni ad sanitatem gentium50

All instances of gentium render ἐϑνῶν. There are two cases of OT citation (Matt 4,15 and Rom 4,17.18) and in both of them NT verbally agrees with the source. As with gentes, there are several interesting parallels in OT or other NT books. Thus, the unusual phrase in Rev 22,2 might perhaps reflect a subsidiary influence from Joel 1,14. The positive connotation of the keyword is especially strong in such cases in which Paul refers to himself (or is presented in this way) as “the apostle of the gentiles” (Rom 11,13 and 1-2 Tim). Very positive are also the last two instances in Revelation. A decidedly more ominous eschatological perspective in Luke 21,25. Several other phrases are likewise quite telling or remarkable. One such phrase is oblatio gentium (Rom 15,16, in combination with v. 18); another is that of the plenitudo gentium (Rom 11,25, ctr. v. 12). Note also the play with the motif of light in Luke 2,32 compared to the parallels in Isaiah and Acts. In a number of cases the gentes are identified: Galilee (Matt 4,15), the Samaritans (Matt 10,5, in strong contrast to Paul’s universalistic take in Acts 13,46 and elsewhere), the Romans (indirectly in Acts 21,11 through 28,17), “Greeks” (the pointed double occurrence in Rom 3,29, in contrast to Jews, and through 10,12), Asia (Rom 16,4, if compared to 1 Cor 16,19, and note the contrast with “the home/local community”, a notion dear to Paul), cities, including Babylon (Rev 16,19). In other instances it is the leaders that are in view (Matt 20,25 parr.). The notion of the diaspora of the gentiles (John 7,35) recalls 1 Peter 1,1 and its “counterparallel” in 1 Jas 1,1. The dative and ablative of gentes occur almost fifty times: Matt 10,18 12,18 20,19

et ad praesides et ad reges ducemini propter me in testimonium illis et gentibus ponam spiritum meum super eum et iudicium gentibus nuntiabit51 et tradent eum gentibus ad deludendum et flagellandum et crucifigendum52

50. Jer 3,17 congregabuntur ad eam omnes gentes; Joel 1,14 vocate coetum (LXX ϑεραπείαν) congregate senes omnes habitatores terrae. 51. Isa 42,1; 2,4 κρινεῖ ἀνὰ μέσον τῶν ἐϑνῶν καὶ ἐλέγξει λαὸν πολύν // iudicabit gentes et arguet populos multos. 52. = Mark 10,33 = Luke 18,32; Matt 27,2 et tradiderunt Pontio Pilato praesidi (Greek Pontius v.l.); John 18,35 mihi (= Pilate), ctr. 30 tibi (= the Jewish authorities).

300 24,9 24,14 Mark 10,33 10,42 11,17 Luke 18,32 21,24

J. VERHEYDEN

tunc tradent vos in tribulationem et occident vos et eritis odio omnibus gentibus (ὑπὸ πάντων τῶν ἐϑνῶν) propter nomen meum53 et praedicabitur hoc evangelium regni in universo orbe in testimonium omnibus gentibus54 et damnabunt eum morti et tradent eum gentibus55 scitis quia hii qui videntur principari gentibus (ἄρχειν τῶν ἐϑνῶν) dominantur eis et principes eorum …56 domus mea domus orationis vocabitur omnibus gentibus [Isa 56,7 πᾶσιν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν // cunctis populis] tradetur enim gentibus et inludetur et flagellabitur et conspuetur57 et captivi ducentur in omnes gentes (εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη πάντα) et Hierusalem calcabitur a gentibus58 donec impleantur tempora nationum (καιροὶ ἐϑνῶν)

Acts 4,27

convenerunt … Herodes et Pontius Pilatus cum gentibus et populis Israhel 9,15 ut portet nomen meum coram gentibus (ἐνώπιον ἐϑνῶν) et regibus et filiis Israhel59 11,18 ergo et gentibus Deus paenitentiam ad vitam dedit60 13,47 posui te in lumen gentibus (εἰς φῶς ἐϑνῶν) ut sis in salutem usque ad extremum terrae61 14,26 (27) quia aperuisset gentibus ostium fidei62 15,12 quanta fecisset Deus signa et prodigia in gentibus per eos [5,12 in plebe; 14,26 gentibus; 21,19]

53. Mark 13,13 = Luke 21,17 ὑπὸ πάντων // omnibus; Matt 10,21 ὑπὸ πάντων // omnibus. 54. Mark 13,10 et in omnes gentes primum oportet praedicari evangelium; 16,15 omni creaturae. 55. = Matt 20,19 = Luke 18,32; Mark 15,1 Pilato; John 18,35 mihi (= Pilate), ctr. 30 tibi (= the Jewish authorities). 56. Matt 20,25 principes gentium; Luke 22,25 reges gentium. 57. = Matt 20,19 = Mark 10,33; Luke 20,20 principatui et potestati praesidis; 23,1 ad Pilatum; John 18,35 mihi (= Pilate), ctr. 30 tibi (= the Jewish authorities); Acts 21,11 et tradent in manus gentium (Paul); 28,17 traditus sum in manus Romanorum (Paul). 58. Ps 78,1 gentes; Isa 63,18 οἱ ὑπεναντίοι ἡμῶν // hostes nostri; Rev 11,2 datum est gentibus. 59. 22,21 εἰς ἔϑνη // in nationes; 26,17 de populo et gentibus; Rom 1,5 in omnibus gentibus pro nomine eius; Gal 1,16 ut evangelizarem illum in gentibus; Eph 3,8 in gentibus evangelizare. 60. 10,45 καὶ ἐπὶ τὰ ἔϑνη // et in nationes; 20,21 Ἰουδαίοις τε καὶ Ἕλλησιν // Iudaeis atque gentilibus in Deum paenitentiam; 26,20 et in omnem regionem Iudaeae et gentibus. 61. Isa 49,6 = 42,6 εἰς φῶς ἐϑνῶν // in lucem gentium; Luke 2,32 lumen ad revelationem gentium. 62. 10,45 et in nationes gratia Spiritus Sancti; 15,12 in gentibus; ctr. 1 Cor 16,9.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

15,14 15,19 15,23 21,19 21,25 26,17 26,20 26,23 28,28 Rom 1,5 1,13 9,24 11,11 11,13 15,9 15,16 16,26

301

primum Deus visitavit sumere ex gentibus (ἐξ ἐϑνῶν) populum nomini suo non inquietari eos qui ex gentibus (τοῖς ἀπὸ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) convertuntur ad Deum [9,35 omnes qui habitabant Lyddae et Saronae] his qui sunt Antiochiae et Syriae et Ciliciae fratribus ex gentibus (ἐξ ἐϑνῶν) salutem quae fecisset Deus in gentibus per ministerium ipsius [15,12] de his autem qui crediderunt ex gentibus (περὶ δὲ τῶν πεπιστευκότων ἐϑνῶν) eripiens te de populo et gentibus (ἐκ τοῦ λαοῦ καὶ ἐκ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) in quas nunc ego mitto te63 his qui sunt Damasci primum et Hierosolymis et in omnem regionem Iudaeae et gentibus adnuntiabam64 lumen adnuntiaturus est populo et gentibus65 quoniam gentibus missum est hoc salutare Dei [13,46 ad gentes; Luke 3,6 omnis caro] per quem accepimus gratiam et apostolatum ad oboediendum fidei in omnibus gentibus pro nomine eius66 ut aliquem fructum habeam et in vobis sicut et in ceteris gentibus 14 Graecis ac barbaris … quos et vocavit nos non solum ex Iudaeis sed etiam ex gentibus (ἐξ ἐϑνῶν) [series of OT citations in vv. 25-29] sed illorum delicto salus gentibus ut illos aemulentur [10,19 in non gentem in gentem insipientem] vobis enim dico gentibus quamdiu quidem ego sum gentium apostolus [15,16] gentes autem super misericordiam honorare Deum sicut scriptum est propter hoc confitebor tibi in gentibus et nomini tuo cantabo67 ut sim minister Christi Iesu in gentibus68… ut fiat oblatio gentium accepta ad oboeditionem fidei in cunctis gentibus69

63. 15,16 in gentibus; 16,26 in cunctis gentibus; Acts 9,15 coram gentibus; 22,21 εἰς ἔϑνη // in nationes; Rom 1,5 in omnibus gentibus pro nomine eius; Gal 1,16 ut evangelizarem illum in gentibus; Eph 3,8 in gentibus evangelizare. 64. 10,45 καὶ ἐπὶ τὰ ἔϑνη // et in nationes; 11,18 et gentibus; 20,21 Ἰουδαίοις τε καὶ Ἕλλησιν // Iudaeis atque gentilibus in Deum paenitentiam. 65. 13,47 in lumen gentibus; Luke 2,32 lumen ad revelationem gentium et gloriam plebis tuae Israhel. 66. 15,16 in gentibus; 16,26 in cunctis gentibus; Acts 9,15 coram gentibus; 22,21 εἰς ἔϑνη // in nationes; 26,17 de populo et gentibus; Gal 1,16 ut evangelizarem illum in gentibus; Eph 3,8 in gentibus evangelizare. 67. 2 Sam 22,50 in gentibus = Ps 17,50 ἐν ἔϑνεσιν // in nationibus, PsH in gentibus. 68. 1,5 in omnibus gentibus; 11,13; 16,26 in cunctis gentibus; Isa 56,7 πᾶσιν τοῖς ἔϑνεσιν // cunctis populis; Gal 2,7 creditum est mihi evangelium praeputii; Eph 3,1 vinctus pro vobis gentibus. 69. 1,5 in omnibus gentibus; 15,16 in gentibus; Acts 9,15 coram gentibus; 22,21 εἰς ἔϑνη // in nationes; 26,17 de populo et gentibus; Gal 1,16 ut evangelizarem illum in gentibus; Eph 3,8 in gentibus evangelizare.

302 1 Cor 1,23 2 Cor 11,26 Gal 1,16 2,2

J. VERHEYDEN

Christum crucifixum Iudaeis quidem scandalum gentibus autem stultitiam [18 pereuntibus] 24 ipsis autem vocatio Iudaeis atque Graecis periculis latronum … periculis ex gentibus (ἐξ ἐϑνῶν) … periculis in falsis fratribus

3,14

ut evangelizarem illum in gentibus70 et contuli cum illis evangelium quod praedico in gentibus [1,16; 1 Tim 3,16 gentibus] prius enim quam venirent quidam ab Iacobo cum gentibus (μετὰ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) edebat [Acts 11,3 ad viros praeputium habentes] 14 quomodo gentes cogis iudaizare 15 nos natura Iudaei et non ex gentibus (ἐξ ἐϑνῶν) peccatores ut in gentibus (εἰς τὰ ἔϑνη) benedictio Abrahae fieret in Christo Iesu

Eph 3,1 3,8

huius rei gratia ego Paulus vinctus Christi Iesu pro vobis gentibus in gentibus evangelizare ininvestigabiles divitias Christi71

2,12 2,15

Col 1,27

quibus voluit Deus notas facere divitias gloriae sacramenti huius in gentibus

1 Thess 2,16 prohibentes nos gentibus loqui ut salvae fiant [1 Cor 10,33 omnibus … multis] 1 Tim 3,16

apparuit angelis praedicatum est gentibus creditum est in mundo72

3 John 7 pro nomine enim profecti sunt nihil accipientes a gentibus (ἀπὸ τῶν ἐϑνικῶν, v.l. ἐϑνῶν) Rev 7,9

turbam magnam … ex omnibus gentibus et tribubus et populis et linguis (ἐκ παντὸς ἔϑνους καὶ φυλῶν καὶ λαῶν καὶ γλωσσῶν)73

70. 2,2; Acts 9,15 coram gentibus; 22,21 εἰς ἔϑνη // in nationes; 26,17 de populo et gentibus; Rom 1,5 in omnibus gentibus; 15,16 in gentibus; 16,26 in cunctis gentibus; Eph 3,8 in gentibus evangelizare. 71. Acts 9,15 coram gentibus; 22,21 εἰς ἔϑνη // in nationes; 26,17 de populo et gentibus; Rom 1,5 in omnibus gentibus; 15,16 in gentibus; 16,26 in cunctis gentibus; Gal in gentibus. 72. 2,7 doctor gentium; Gal 2,2 praedico in gentibus; Col 1,23 in universa creatura; 2 Tim 4,17 omnes gentes. 73. 5,9 ex omni tribu et lingua et populo et natione (ἔϑνους); 10,11; 11,9; 13,7 in omnem tribum et populum et linguam et gentem; 14,6 super omnem gentem et tribum et linguam et populum.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

10,11 11,2 11,9

303

et dicunt mihi oportet te iterum prophetare populis et gentibus et linguis et regibus multis (ἐπί + dat.)74 atrium… quoniam datum est gentibus75 et videbunt de populis et tribubus et linguis et gentibus corpora eorum (ἐκ + gen.)

The keyword systematically translates a form of ἔϑνη (taking into account changes in the case due to prepositions), except in 3 John 7 (but there is a variant reading) and Rev 7,9 (pl. for sg.). 3 John 7 truly is an exception, unless it read ἐϑνῶν, but the difference is of course minimal as both words are closely related. The plural in Rev 7,9 is no doubt an assimilation to the parallels and in any case also makes better sense than the combined phrase in the Greek original. One will note the clusters of passages that contain a form of gentes in Acts 13,45ff. and 15,12ff. and in Rom 11,11ff., and the clusters of parallels from different NT books that can be put together for a number of passages (see, e.g., Acts 9,15). In a couple of instances there are interesting parallels within the same writing (Acts 15,12 and 21,19; Rom 1,5 and 16,26; Rev 7,9 parr., with variations in the order). The three Synoptic gospels are usually in unison, but there are also a few passages where only one of them uses the keyword (Matt 10,18; Luke 21,24). There are a number of instances with the adjective omnibus and with a combined phrase with populis (Acts 4,27), sometimes also with the singular to create a contrast between Israel and the gentiles (Acts 26,17.23; see also Rom 9,24; Gal 2,15). Longer combinations are exceptional and limited to Revelation. The universalistic perspective is strongly emphasised in such passages as Matt 24,14. In a couple of cases the identity of the gentes is again illustrated (Acts 15,19.23; Rom 1,13; the transfer from gentibus to Pilate in Matt 20,19 parr.). Note also again, as above, the references to Paul as the apostle of the gentiles. Forms of singular gens are rather limited in number: Matt 21,43 24,7

et dabitur genti facienti fructus eius [8,11 multi ab oriente et occidente; 28,19 omnes gentes] consurget enim gens in gentem (ἐπί) et regnum in regnum76

74. Dan 3,4 populis tribubus et linguis = Theod. but nom.; LXX ἔϑνη καὶ χῶραι, λαοὶ καὶ γλῶσσαι. 75. Ps 78,1 gentes; Isa 63,18 οἱ ὑπεναντίοι ἡμῶν // hostes nostri; Luke 21,24 a gentibus. 76. = Mark 13,8 = Luke 21,10; 2 Chron 15,6 πρός // gens contra gentem.

304 Mark 13,8

J. VERHEYDEN

exsurget autem gens super gentem (ἐπ̓ ) et regnum super regnum [= Matt 24,7 = Luke 21,10]

Luke 7,5 21,10 23,2 John 11,48 11,50 11,51 11,52 18,35 Acts 7,7 8,9 10,22 10,35 24,10 24,17 26,4 28,19 Rom 10,19

diligit enim gentem nostram surget gens contra gentem (ἐπ̓ ) et regnum adversus regnum [= Matt 24,7 = Mark 13,8] hunc invenimus subvertentem gentem nostram77 et venient Romani et tollent nostrum et locum et gentem [Acts 6,13-14 et legem … traditiones (ἔϑη) quas tradidit nobis Moses] expedit nobis ut unus moriatur homo pro populo et non tota gens pereat78 quia Iesus moriturus erat pro gente (ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἔϑνους) et non tantum pro gente (ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἔϑνους) sed et ut filios Dei qui erant dispersi congregaret in unum [Isa 49,6 in lucem gentium; 1 John 2,2 pro totius mundi] respondit Pilatus numquid ego Iudaeus sum gens tua et pontifices tradiderunt te mihi et gentem cui servierint iudicabo ego dixit Deus Simon … magus seducens gentem Samariae dicens esse se aliquem magnum Cornelius centurio … et testimonium habens ab universa gente Iudaeorum (ὑπὸ ὅλου τοῦ ἔϑνους τῶν Ἰουδαίων)79 sed in omni gente qui timet eum et operator iustitiam acceptus est illi [13,16 viri Israhelitae; 13,26 viri fratres] ex multis annis esse te iudicem genti huic elemosynas facturus in gentem meam veni et oblationes et vota80 et quidem vitam meam a iuventute quae ab initio fuit in gente mea in Hierosolymis contradicentibus autem Iudaeis coactus sum appellare Caesarem non quasi gentem meam habens aliquid accusare ego ad aemulationem vos adducam in non gentem in gentem insipientem (ἐπ ̓ οὐκ ἔϑνει ἐπ ̓ ἔϑνει ἀσυνέτῳ) in iram vos mittam81

77. 1 Ki 18,17 ille qui conturbas Israhel; Acts 24,5 concitantem seditiones omnibus Iudaeis in universo orbe. 78. 2 Sam 17,3 universum populum … omnis populus; 2 Cor 5,14-15 pro omnibus (bis). 79. 1 Macc 10,25 (τῶν Ἰουδ.); 11,30.33 genti Iudaeorum. 80. 11,29 habitantibus in Iudaea fratribus; Rom 15,26 in pauperes sanctorum qui sunt in Hierusalem. 81. Deut 32,21 = Rom 10,19 // in eo qui non est populus et in gente stulta; Rom 11,11 gentibus.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

2 Cor 11,32

305

praepositus gentis (ἐϑνάρχης) Aretae regis custodiebat civitatem Damascenorum

1 Peter 2,9 vos autem genus electum regale sacerdotium gens sancta populus adquisitionis Rev 13,7 14,6

et data est ei potestas in omnem tribum et populum et linguam et gentem (ἐπί + acc.) ut evangelizaret sedentibus super terram et super omnem gentem et tribum et linguam et populum (ἐπί + acc.)82

All instances render a form of ἔϑνος, the paraphrastic formula in 2 Cor 11,32 not really being an exception. One will note the combination, in different order, in Rev 13,7 and 14,6, now in the singular, and the parallels to Matt 24,7 in Mark and Luke, but with variations in the preposition (so also in the two cases in Rev). Several instances refer to the Jewish people. Luke uses it in this way in Acts 10,22 (cf. 8,9 Samaria). The people and its holy place are explicitly linked together in John 11,48. Paul emphatically claims he never ceased to belong to it (mea gens, Acts 24,17; 26,4; 28,19; more distantly in 24,10); also Jewish interlocutors or adversaries of Jesus use the phrase (Luke 7,5 and 23,2 gens nostra; also John 11,4852). Pilate naturally does not wish to be counted among them (John 18,35 gens tua). Jesus speaks positively of a foreign people in Matt 21,43; in 1 Peter 2,19 it refers to the Christians. Decidely more negative are Acts 7,7 and Rom 10,19. The term gentilis occurs in Vg only in the New Testament, both in the plural and in the singular: John 12,20 Acts 14,5 17,4 17,12

erant autem gentiles quidam (Ἕλληνές τινες) [Acts 8,27 vir aethiops eunuchus] cum autem factus esset impetus gentilium (ὁρμὴ τῶν ἐϑνῶν) et Iudaeorum cum principibus suis [14,19 Iudaei] et de colentibus gentilibusque (τῶν τε σεβομένων Ἑλλήνων) multitudo magna [14,1 Iudaeorum et Graecorum copiosa multitudo; 17,12] et multi … ex eis et gentilium mulierum (καὶ τῶν Ἑλληνίδων γυναικῶν) honestarum et viri non pauci [17,4]

82. 5,9 ex omni tribu et lingua et populo et natione (ἔϑνους); 7,9 ex omnibus gentibus et tribubus et populis et linguis 10,11 populis et gentibus et linguis et regibus multis; 11,9 de populis et tribubus et linguis et gentibus.

306 19,10 19,17 20,21 21,28 Rom 15,27 1 Cor 10,32 12,13

Mark 7,26 Acts 16,1 16,3 Gal 2,3 2,14 Col 3,11

J. VERHEYDEN

omnes qui habitabant in Asia … Iudaei atque gentiles (Ἕλληνας) [14,1 Iudaeorum et Graecorum; 19,17; 20,21] hoc autem notum factum est omnibus Iudaeis atque gentilibus (πᾶσιν ... τε καὶ Ἕλλησιν) qui habitabant Ephesi [14,1; 19,10; 20,21] testificans Iudaeis atque gentilibus (Ἕλλησιν) [14,1; 19,10.17] insuper et gentiles (Ἕλληνας) induxit in templum [Ezek 44,7 filios alienos incircumcisos] nam si spiritalium eorum participes facti sunt gentiles (τὰ ἔϑνη) [1 Cor 9,11 vobis] sine offensione estote Iudaeis et gentilibus (Ἕλλησιν) et ecclesiae Dei [2 Cor 6,3 nemini] in uno Spiritu omnes nos in unum corpus baptizati sumus sive Iudaei sive gentiles sive servi sive liberi (Ἕλληνες) [Gal 3,28 non est Iudaeus neque Graecus] mulier gentilis (Ἑλληνίς) Syrophoenissa genere [Matt 15,21-22 in partes Tyri et Sidonis … mulier chananea a finibus illis] Timotheus filius mulieris iudaeae fidelis patre gentili (πατρὸς δὲ Ἕλληνος) [16,3] sciebant enim omnes quod pater eius gentilis esset (Ἕλλην) [16,1] sed neque Titus qui mecum erat cum esset gentilis (Ἕλλην) conpulsus est circumcidi [2,14] si tu cum Iudaeus sis gentiliter (ἐϑνικῶς) et non iudaice vivis quomodo gentes cogis iudaizare ubi non est gentilis (Ἕλλην) et Iudaeus circumcisio et praeputium barbarus et Scytha servus et liber [Gal 3,28 non est Iudaeus neque Graecus]

With three exceptions, gentilis translates a form of Ἕλλην. The adverb in Gal 2,14 was the next best option, as there does not exist no such adverb from the stem ἕλλην- to match Ἰουδαικῶς. Acts 14,5 and Rom 15,27 are probably best explained as assimilations to Iudaei atque gentiles, the standard phrase to render “Jews and Greeks”, though the combination with gentes is also well attested in Vg; the explanation works better for Acts where the phrase occurs quite frequently than for Romans where the word is an hapax. The word is used in a generalising way, but also more specifically to single out an individual (Mark 7,26 and Titus and Timotheus in Galatians and Acts). It can have a negative but not explicitly derogatory

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

307

meaning when used on its own (the Syrophenician who approaches Jesus; Timothy’s gentile father; Titus’ old lifestyle), though there are exceptions of a more positive (John 12,20; Acts 17,4.12) and a mistakenly negative connotation (Acts 21,28), but it definitely has a positive one in the combination with “Jews”, with the notable exception of Acts 14,5. Note also the combination with circumcision as the sign that one is no longer a “gentile” (Gal 2,3, and certainly intended also in 2,14; Col 3,11). In a number of instances Ἕλλην/ες (and Ἑλληνιστής in Acts 6,1; 9,29; 11,20) is rendered as Graecus/-i83. Acts 14,1 18,4

ita ut crederet Iudaeorum et Graecorum copiosa multitudo [17,4 de colentibus gentilibusque multitudo magna; 19,10.17; 20,21 (see gentiles)] suadebatque Iudaeos et Graecos (v.l. in Vg)

Rom 1,14 1,16 2,9 2,10 3,9 10,12

13 ut aliquem fructum habeam et in vobis sicut et in ceteris gentibus 14 Graecis ac barbaris sapientibus et insipientibus virtus enim Dei est in salutem omni credenti Iudaeo primum et Graeco [2,9.10; 3,9; 1 Cor 1,24] tribulatio et angustia in omnem animam hominis operantis malum Iudaei primum et Graeci [1,16; 2,10; 3,9; 1 Cor 1,24] gloria autem et honor et pax omni operanti bonum Iudaeo primum et Graeco [1,16; 2,9; 3,9; 1 Cor 1,24] causati enim sumus Iudaeos et Graecos omnes sub peccato esse [1,16; 2,9; 3,9; 3,23 omnes; 10,12; 1 Cor 1,24] non enim est distinctio Iudaei et Graeci nam idem Dominus omnium dives in omnes [3,9; Acts 15,9 nihil discrevit inter nos et illos; Gal 3,28]

1 Cor 1,22 1,24

quoniam et Iudaei signa petunt et Graeci sapientiam quaerunt [Matt 12,38] 23 Iudaeis quidem scandalum gentibus autem stultitiam 24 ipsis autem vocatis Iudaeis atque Graecis [Rom 1,16; 2,9.10; 3,9]

Gal 3,28

non est Iudaeus neque Graecus non est servus neque liber non est masculus neque femina omnes enim vos unum estis in Christo Iesu [Rom 10,12; 1 Cor 12,13; Col 3,11 at gentiles]

83. In addition, note also the related words Ἑλληνικός (Rev 9,11) and Ἑλληνιστί (John 19,20 and Acts 21,37), referring to the Greek language and consistently translated as graece; Ἑλληνίς (Mark 7,26 and Acts 17,12; see above); and Ἑλληνιστής, each time rendered as Graeci (in explicit contrast to Hebraei in 6,1, or to Iudaei in 11,20; less clearly but intended in 9,29). Once also Ἕλλας for the region/province Graecia (Acts 20,2).

308 Acts 6,1 9,29 11,20

J. VERHEYDEN

factus est murmur Graecorum adversus Hebraeos loquebatur quoque et disputabat cum Graecis (πρός + acc.) illi autem quaerebant occidere eum [21,31] viri cyprii et cyrenei qui … loquebantur at ad Graecos adnuntiantes Dominum Iesum

The combination “Jews and Greeks/Hellenists” basically works in the same way as that with gentiles, but note the emphatic primum in Rom 1,16; 2,9.10. In a couple of instances the couple is accompanied by other such phrases (1 Cor 12,13 and Gal 3,28, and Col 3,11 above). There is no distinction between the peoples, not for the good and not for the bad (Rom 3,9; 10,12 and the passages mentioned in the previous phrase). The tension between Jews and gentiles that is hinted at in Acts 9,29 is met again, more clearly, in 21,31. Note also the helpful missionaries in Acts 11,20 and the combination with barbaris in Rom 1,14 and of the latter with the obviously much more pejorative Scytha in Col 3,11 (NT hapax). John 7,35 is the only exception to the rule that Ἕλλην is translated by either gentilis or Graecus (see above at gentes/gentium, pp. 294 and 297). The two seem to be almost identical and interchangeable. One can understand why the translator decided to keep to the Vorlage in Acts in 11,20 and maybe also in 6,1, as in the first it is inhabitants of Cyprus and the Cyrenaica addressing fellow aspiring Christians speaking their own language, while he may have interpreted the second as referring to Christians of Greek descent or maybe even, as some modern scholars have suggested, as Greek-speaking Jews. One could imagine that in passages such as Acts 19,10.17 the translator opts for gentiles because he does not regard Ephesus as an exclusively “Greek” city. The combination in Rom 1,14 might reveal a sensitivity to distinguish between Greek “gentiles” (gentes) and others who do not even speak Greek. In the same line, one might perhaps also be tempted to speculate that in Col 3,11 gentilis is preferred as the more general and less harsher term in view also of the strong barbarus et Scytha at the end. But in the many other instances where the two combine with Iudaei the rationale is not evident and one has to conclude that they were just regarded as equivalents. Three of the four instances of ἐϑνικός in the NT are in Matthew and they are all translated as ethnici/-us; the fourth one is in 3 John: Matt 5,47 6,7 18,17

nonne et ethnici hoc faciunt [6,32 gentes] orantes autem nolite multum loqui sicut ethnici sit tibi sicut ethnicus et publicanus

3 John 7 pro nomine enim profecti sunt nihil accipientes a gentibus (ἀπὸ τῶν ἐϑνικῶν, v.l. ἐϑνῶν)

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

309

Scribes must have felt insecure about the term, for in two of the three cases in Matthew there is a variant (5,47 v.l. τελῶναι; 6,7 v.l. ὑποκριταί) and the combination in the third instance may perhaps account for the variant in 5,47. One will also note that in Matthew the word is used for making a comparison. On 3 John, see above p. 303. The NT contains six instances of barbarus, all of them translating βάρβαρος: Acts 28,1 28,4 Rom 1,14

barbari vero praestabant non modicam humanitatem nobis ut vero viderunt barbari pendentem bestiam de manu eius 13 in vobis sicut et in ceteris gentibus 14 Graecis ac barbaris sapientibus et insipientibus

1 Cor 14,11 si ergo nesciero virtutem vocis ero ei cui loquor barbarus et qui loquitur mihi barbarus Col 3,11

ubi non est gentilis et Iudaeus circumcisio et praeputium barbarus et Scytha servus et liber [Gal 3,28 non est Iudaeus neque Graecus]

The two instances in Acts refer to the inhabitants of Malta. They reflect a way of looking at less cultivated and somewhat isolated populations that is well attested in Greek and Latin literature – a mixture of paternalism and sincere admiration. It is often translated as “the natives” (NRSV, REB, NAB). Somewhat further in the story the inhabitants are referred to more neutrally as omnes qui in insula habebant and their sick are healed (28,9). The choice for the word is a bit remarkable, especially also when one realises that it is never used for referring to native populations in describing Paul’s and Barnabas’ journey through inner Asia; they always seem to have been able to spread their message in Greek and the locals are never called barbari. In 1 Cor 14,11 Paul uses the word in its general meaning of one with whom no communication is possible because of a language barrier. Note that Col 3,11 had added a conjunction between “barbarian and Scythian”; if in the model the two could be read as part of a list that also contains servus and liber, Vg has put them together in pair with as a result that the Scythians stand out even more as the ultimate foreigners. There are only nine instances of a form of populi (as a rule, λαοί) in the NT: Matt 21,11

populi (οἱ δὲ ὄχλοι) autem dicebant

310 Luke 2,31

J. VERHEYDEN

quod parasti ante faciem omnium populorum

Acts 4,25 4,27 14,12 Rom 15,11 Rev 7,9 10,11 11,9 17,15

quare fremuerunt gentes et populi meditati sunt inania [Ps 2,1] convenerunt … Herodes et Pontius Pilatus cum gentibus et populis Israhel sacerdos … tauros et coronas ante ianuas adferens cum populis (σὺν τοῖς ὄχλοις) volebat sacrificare laudate omnes gentes Dominum et magnificate eum omnes populi [Ps 116,1] turbam magnam … ex omnibus gentibus et tribubus et populis et linguis (ἐκ παντὸς ἔϑνους καὶ φυλῶν καὶ λαῶν καὶ γλωσσῶν) et dicunt mihi oportet te iterum prophetare populis et gentibus et linguis et regibus multis (ἐπὶ + dat.) et videbunt de populis et tribubus et linguis et gentibus corpora eorum (ἐκ + gen.) aquas quas vidisti ubi meretrix sedet populi sunt et gentes et linguae (λαοὶ καὶ ὄχλοι εἰσὶν καὶ ἔϑνη καὶ γλῶσσαι)

With two exceptions (Matt 21,11 and Acts 14,12) populi renders λαοί84. Rev 17,15 may be seen as proof that the translator considered λαοί and ὄχλοι to be close synonyms, but one might then ask why the latter is usually not rendered with populi, and why it is in these two instances. The more common equivalent for ὄχλος (sg. and pl.) in Matthew, and in the NT in general, is turba/-ae, but there are a few exceptions where it is rendered with populus/-i. It is difficult to argue that the translator merely wanted to differentiate after he had used turba/ae in 21,8.9, for there are other instances in which he uses turba/-ae within the same context without making any change (see the plural in 14,13.15.19.22 and the singular in 14,14.19.23; or the plural in 15,30-32.35 with the singular in 15,33.39; note also the use of sg. and pl. together in the same verse in 13,2 and 14,19). Besides 21,11, the exceptions are 14,5; 27,15.24 (sg. / populum/-o), 15,36 (pl. / populo), and 27,20 (pl. / populis). One might argue that the triple populus in 27,15-24 is inspired by the finale to this section in v. 25 which reads λαός = populus. The word has a ominous tone. Maybe the same concern may have played also in 21,11, where the (same) crowd makes a much more positive statement about Jesus, only to give up on it 84. NA28 also reads the plural λαοί in Rev 21,3, but there is a variant with the singular; Vg reads populus.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

311

somewhat later, and in 14,5, where it represents a threat (cf. 21,46, but now turbas), but 15,36 still remains unexplained (see the verbally identical 14,19, with turbis). The situation is a bit different in Acts. Turba/-ae is still by far the more common equivalent, but the number of singular attestations outweighs that of the plural. Moreover, besides populus (14,12 and also 21,27.35, the latter two in the singular), ὄχλος/-οι is also translated twice as plebs (16,22; 17,8) and once as multitudinem (17,13 σαλεύοντες καὶ ταράσσοντες τοὺς ὄχλους = commoventes et turbantes multitudinem). Maybe in the case of Acts 14,12 the translator wished to alternate with turba/-ae that occurs four times in the same context, though it remains unclear why he choose this verse and not one of the others. He also creates some differentiation in 21,27-36, opening and closing with populus (vv. 27 and 35), but translating as turba in v. 34, though in this instance the situation is more complex still, because of the double presence of λαός (= populus) in the same context (21,28.30; note gentiles in v. 28b). The mob is utterly inimical and violent towards Paul; in this respect, this passage could be compared to how it behaves at the trial of Jesus in Matt 27. Also in 16,22 and 17,8.13 the atmosphere is generally threatening and violent. Of course, such interpretation assumes that the translator really wished to play with the terms and that the differences are not merely the result of sloppiness. There are seven instances of natio/-nes and four of cognatio (all sg.): Luke 21,24

et captivi ducentur in omnes gentes et Hierusalem calcabitur a gentibus donec impleantur tempora nationum (καιροὶ ἐϑνῶν) [Rom 11,25 plenitudo gentium]

Acts 2,5 10,45 18,24 22,21

erant autem in Hierusalem habitantes Iudaei viri religiosi ex omni natione (ἀπὸ παντὸς ἔϑνους) quae sub caelo sunt quia et in nationes (ἐπὶ τὰ ἔϑνη) gratia Spiritus Sancti effusa est [2,4 omnes; 9,15; 11,1.18; 13,48; 14,27; 15,7.12; Luke 24,47] Iudaeus autem quidem Apollo nomine Alexandrinus natione (τῷ γένει) vade quoniam ego in nationes (εἰς ἔϑνη) longe mittam te [9,15 coram gentibus; 26,17 de populo et gentibus]

Phil 2,15

ut sitis … filii Dei sine reprehensione in medio nationis pravae et perversae (μέσον γενεᾶς σκολιᾶς καὶ διεστραμμένης) [Acts 2,40 a generatione ista prava]

Rev 5,9

ex omni tribu et lingua et populo et natione (ἐκ πᾶσης φυλῆς καὶ γλώσσης καὶ λαοῦ καὶ ἔϑνους) [sg. in 13,7; 14,6; pl. in 7,9; 10,11; 11,9; 17,15]

312 Mark 6,4 Luke 1,61 Acts 7,3 7,14

J. VERHEYDEN

quia non est propheta sine honore nisi in patria sua et in cognatione sua (ἐν τοῖς συγγενεῦσιν αὐτοῦ) et in domo sua quia nemo est in cognatione tua (ἐκ τῆς συγγενείας σου) qui vocetur hoc nomine exi de terra tua et de cognatione tua ([ἐκ] τῆς συγγενείας σου) [Gen 12,1] Ioseph accersivit Iacob patrem suum et omnem cognationem (πᾶσαν τὴν συγγένειαν) [Gen 46,27, Ex 1,5]

Nationes is an alternative equivalent of ἔϑνη. In Luke 21,24 it is probably chosen to alternate with double gentes (also v. 25) and it bears the same thoroughly negative connotation. It is less clear why it is twice preferred to the more common gentes in Acts. Both instances are puzzling as the motif of going to the gentiles (10,45) is used so often in the book and always expressed with gentes (see the list of parallels), just as that of Paul’s mission (22,21 and parallels). Maybe the double omnes in 10,43.44 was felt to ask for a more general and less pointedly negative equivalent; 22,21 could be seen as a conscious differentiation between three parallels; it is also the only instance of εἰς ἔϑνη without the article, but whether this played a role is difficult to decide. Natio can render ἔϑνος (with the generalising omnis) or function as an exceptional and apparently unmotivated translation of γένος and γενεά85. Both instances of omnis natio have a strongly universalistic tone (Acts 2,5 quae sub caelo sunt; the series of equivalent terms in Rev 5,986), but that is also true of Rev 13,7 and 14,6 and both of these read gens; see also Acts 10,35 (in omni gente), most positively. So there was no absolute need to change to natio, unless it is once more merely a matter of creating differentiation, but why do so with the first instance in Rev 5,9 and then keep to gens all through? In Acts 17,26 πᾶν ἔϑνος ἀνϑρώπων is rendered as omne genus hominum. Maybe the addition of hominum and the generalising super universam faciem terrae in the second half of the verse explains the choice, but it is more probably a 85. Acts 18,24 is the only instance of γένος that is not translated with genus; it is all the more remarkable in light of the parallel in 18,2 (Ponticum genere; see also Phil 3,5 ex genere Israhel; 1 Peter 2,9, in a list with gens and populus; Rev 2,16 genus David), or is it perhaps because v. 24 refers to a city (Alexandria), not a region? Phil 2,15 is the only instance of natio for γενεά; the common equivalent is generatio/-nes. See further Luke 1,50bis (progenies) and Acts 15,21 (a temporibus antiquis); cf. also Acts 14,15: genus in combination with gens and populus. 86. Note that the first two terms are feminine and rule the adjective (πᾶσης), but the latter obviously also goes with the two last elements of the series; the same is true when the first term is masculine, but other ones are feminine.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

313

conscious assimilation to Gen 9,19 (omne hominum genus super universam terram); Vg reads this extra in Gen 9,19 (contra LXX’s mere ἀπὸ τούτων)87. Cognatio renders all three instances of συγγένεια in NT and one of the two of συγγενεύς, the other being Luke 2,44 (Vg cognatos, the standard equivalent of συγγενής). The word does not refer to a foreign origin in Mark and Luke, but does so in Acts 7,3; in Acts 7,14 Jacob’s family become foreigners in Egypt. Tribus is the standard equivalent for φυλή, linguae that for γλώσσαι: Matt 24,30

Rom 14,11 Phil 2,11

Rev 1,7 5,9 7,9 10,11 11,9 13,7 14,6 17,15

et tunc plangent omnes tribus terrae [Zech 12,10.12 terra familiae et familiae seorsum.14 omnes familiae reliquae familiae et familiae seorsum; Rev 1,7] quoniam mihi flectet omne genu et omnis lingua confitebitur Deo [Isa 45,23; Phil 2,10-11; Rev 5,13 omnem creaturam] 10 ut in nomine Iesu omne genu flectat caelestium et terrestrium et infernorum 11 et omnis lingua confiteatur quia Dominus Iesus Christus in gloria est Dei Patris [Isa 45,23; Rom 14,11; Rev 5,13] et plangent se super eum omnes tribus terrae [Zech 12,10.12.14; Matt 24,30] ex omni tribu et lingua et populo et natione ex omnibus gentibus et tribubus et populis et linguis oportet te iterum prophetare populis et gentibus et linguis et regibus multis de populis et tribubus et linguis et gentibus et data est ei potestas in omnem tribum et populum et linguam et gentem ut evangelizaret sedentibus super terram et super omnem gentem et tribum et linguam et populum aquas quas vidisti ubi meretrix sedet populi sunt et gentes et linguae

87. Acts 17,26 is one of three instances in which NA28 reads a form of ἔϑνος that is not rendered with gens/gentes or any of the other keywords. In Acts 24,4 Vg seems to have had a different Vorlage. NA28 24,2 reads καὶ διορϑωμάτων γινομένων τῷ ἔϑνει τούτῳͅ διὰ τῆς σῆς προνοίας. Vg has et multa corrigantur per tuam providentiam. There is a rarely attested variant reading διορϑωμάτων πολλῶν, and an equally rarely attested one that lacks τῷ ἔϑνει τούτῳͅ (04 093 629* 2570). In Rev 15,3, a citation of Jer 10,7 (which reads rex gentium), NA28 reads ὁ βασιλεὺς τῶν ἐϑνῶν, but there is a variant with τῶν αἰώνων (P47 ‫ *א‬²b C 1006 1611 1841 vg sy samss). The evidence from ‫ א‬shows that the reading was disputed. The former is considered in NA28 to be an harmonisation with 1 Tim 1,17 that has the singular for king. Vg reads rex saeculorum.

314

J. VERHEYDEN

Mark and Luke do not have a parallel for that part of Matt 24,30. The verse does not cite the prophet, but is clearly inspired by the passages listed even if it adds tribus. In Zech 12,9 omnes gentes are mentioned and they are the subject of the verbs in the following verses. Phil 2,11 looks like an extended and more emphatic version of Rom 14,11 with a pointed reference to Christ. Lingua/-ae is used solely in combination with another phrase (Rom and Phil omne genu); the variations in Rev read like a refrain. The relevant instances of alienigena, alienus, alienatus, peregrinus and advena are here taken together. This group is a mixed bag, not just because of the variety of terms used and the way they are rendered, but also because it is not always easy to distinguish between passages in which any of these terms is used with the connotation of being a gentile or with a broader or more neutral perspective. In a number of cases the motif of being a foreigner is played out in an interesting way using some of these terms, but one can hardly argue that the intended person(s) is/are considered to be gentiles. Jesus is called a foreigner in Luke 24,18 (παροικεῖς // peregrinus es), but his companions obviously do not think he is a gentile. In Acts 7,6 (πάροικον ἐν γῇ ἀλλοτρίᾳ // accola in terra aliena) and 29 (πάροικος ἐν γῇ Μαδιάμ // advena in terra Madiam) it is Israel and Moses who are called “resident aliens” in a foreign country. In Heb 11,13 prominent figures of Israel’s history are called peregrini et hospites (ξένοι καὶ παρεπίδημοι). In the same line, 1 Peter calls his Christian addressees foreigners (1,1 παρεπιδήμοις // advenis; 2,11 παροίκους καὶ παρεπιδήμους // advenas et peregrinos) and urges for hospitability “between Christians” (4,9 φιλόξενοι εἰς ἀλλήλους // hospitales invicem). The lines are sometimes equally blurred for other terms in this list. Yet I have added some of these perhaps more ambiguous passages in the main list (and will explain below why) and others in the lists of parallels. Luke 17,18 Acts 10,28 1 Tim 5,22 Heb 11,9

non est inventus qui rediret et daret gloriam Deo nisi hic alienigena (ὁ ἀλλογενὴς οὗτος) vos scitis quomodo abominatum sit viro iudaeo coniungi aut accedere ad alienigenam (ἀλλοφύλῳ) neque communicaveris peccatis alienis (ἁμαρτίαις ἀλλοτρίαις) fide moratus est in terra repromissionis tamquam in aliena (ὡς ἀλλοτρίαν) … coheredibus repromissionis eiusdem88

88. Gen 13,12 in oppidis quae errant circa Iordanem; Eph 2,19 hospites et advenae … coheredes.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

Eph 2,12 4,18 Col 1,21 Matt 27,7 Heb 13,9

315

sine Christo alienati (ἀπηλλοτριωμένοι) a conversatione Israhel et hospites (ξένοι) testamentorum promissionis [2,19; 4,18; Col 1,21; Heb 11,9] 17 sicut gentes ambulant … 18 tenebris obscuratum habentes intellectum alienati (ἀπηλλοτριωμένοι) a vita Dei [2,12; Col 1,21; Heb 11,9] et vos cum essetis aliquando alienati (ἀπηλλοτριωμένους) et inimici sensu in operibus malis [2,13 Eph 2,12; 4,18; Heb 11,9] in sepulturam peregrinorum (εἰς ταφὴν τοῖς ξένοις) doctrinis variis et peregrinis (ξέναις) nolite abduci optimum enim est gratia stabiliri cor non escis

3 John 5 carissime fideliter facis quicquid operaris in fratres et hoc in peregrinos (ξένους) 1 Peter 3 ad voluntatem gentium consummandam qui ambulaverunt in … inlici4,4 tis idolorum cultibus 4 in quo peregrinantur (ἐν ᾧ ξενίζονται) Acts 2,10 6,5 13,43 17,21 Eph 2,19

Frygiam et … et advenae romani (οἱ ἐπιδημοῦντες Ῥωμαῖοι) 11 Iudaei quoque et proselyti (προσήλυτοι) Cretes et Arabes [comparable lists of “foreigners” in 6,5.9; 13,1; 11,20 ad Graecos] et Parmenam et Nicolaum advenam (προσήλυτον) Antiochenum [2,10; 13,43] secuti sunt multi Iudaeorum et colentium advenarum (τῶν σεβομένων προσηλύτων) Paulum et Barnaban [2,11 Iudaei quoque et proselyti Cretes et Arabes; 6,5] Athenienses autem omnes et advenae hospites (οἱ ἐπιδημοῦντες ξένοι) [Eph 2,19 hospites et advenae] ergo iam non estis hospites et advenae (ξένοι καὶ πάροικοι) sed estis cives sanctorum et domestici Dei89

The relation between the Greek and the translation varies. Alienigena, attested in NT only in the two passages listed above, renders two different words in Greek, both of them a hapax in NT. The two instances of 89. 3,6 esse gentes coheredes …; Acts 17,21 advenae hospites; Heb 11,9 in aliena … coheredibus; referring to Jews: Gen 23,4 advena sum et peregrinus; 47,9 ad dies patrum meorum quibus peregrinati sunt; 1 Chron 29,15 peregrini enim sumus coram te et advenae sicut omnes patres nostri; Heb 11,13 peregrini et hospites; to Christians: 1 Peter 1,1 electis advenis dispersionis; 2,11 tamquam advenas et peregrinos.

316

J. VERHEYDEN

alienus render ἀλλότριος that occurs a number of times in NT but mostly without the connotation of “gentile”. An exception is Heb 11,34 where it refers to foreign, i.e., clearly gentile armies and is rendered with exterorum90. All three occurrences of alienati in NT render the verb ἀπηλλοτριόομαι, not otherwise attested in NT. The three instances of peregrinus render ξένος and there is also one with the verb of the same root (1 Peter 4,4). In this context one should perhaps also mention 2 Cor 5,6 that evokes the same idea of dwelling off in pagan praxis (now addressing Christians) with a play on ἐν-/ἐκδημόω that is lost in Vg which renders it as dum sumus in corpore peregrinamur a Domino (cf. v. 8). Advena twice renders the substantivized participle of ἐπιδημέω (the only attestations of the verb in NT), twice προσηλύτος, and once πάροικος (the three other instances of this word are Acts 7,6.29 and 1 Peter 2,11 which are mentioned in the introduction to this section). Technically, proselytes are no longer gentiles, but the word obviously indicates something of their origin (so also in the two instances in NT where the word is transliterated in Vg rather than translated – Acts 2,11, in a phrase with advena, and Matt 23,15). In addition to peregrinus, ξένος is also translated as hospis. In combination with one of the other keywords (Acts 17,21; Eph 2,12.19) it carries the connotation of gentile foreigner. An indirect reference to gentiles may be intended also in such passages that argue for extending care or hospitality towards every stranger (Matt 25,35.38.43.44; Rom 12,13; 1 Tim 5,10; Heb 13,2). The two instances of alienigena clearly refer to (people considered to be) gentiles. It is not said in 1 Tim 5,22 of what consist “the sins of others” or who these others are, only that those who commit them should be rebuked in public (v. 20); in all probability fellow Christians are in view who behave in a way that does not suit a Christian; the warning to turn away from following Satan in v. 15 evokes a behaviour that one could perhaps label as “gentile”. Heb 11,9 speaks about Abraham residing in a foreign, hence by definition gentile, country (compare 11,13 where it is the Jewish residents who are referred to as “aliens”). The three instances of alienatus are closely connected. The combination with hospites and the mention of Israel in Eph 2,12 point to gentile behaviour, as does 4,18 after the explicit mention of gentes in v. 17. 90. The strange alienorum appetitor and the equally strange hapax ἀλλοτριεπίσκοπος in 1 Peter 4,15 has nothing to do with pagan praxis, the contrast with si autem ut Christianus in v. 16 notwithstanding; its meaning is not really clear and it is variously translated as “mischief maker” (NRSV), “meddling in other people’s business” (REB), “intriguer” (NAB) or “informer” (NJB) as part of a series of four ways of behaving that a Christian is warned for.

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

317

Matt 27,7 clearly points to a place where non-Jewish, hence “gentile” residents or passers-by were buried. Heb 13,9 is a borderline case. The text speaks of food in general. Some modern translations almost naturally render it as “regulations” (NRSV) or “rules about food” (REB). The author most probably has in view Jewish food laws, but he would certainly be prepared also to condemn with the same vigor gentile practices. The long description in 1 Peter 4,3-4 of what conduct and practices should be avoided which ends with a reference to idolatry and to those who indulge in this speaks for itself. Gentiles are in view also in the various instances of advena in Acts, including those that render προσήλυτος, though in the latter the connotation is of course more positive. Finally, Eph 2,19 evokes a past that the addressees have given up to embrace a new life and enjoy a new citizenship. Readers will have noticed that in the majority of cases, these references are more irenic than those mentioned before. The peregrini, hospites and advenae (certainly in the New Testament) are for the most part harmless and pose no threat, or have recently found or are about to discover the truth.

CONCLUSION There is probably little need to draw many general conclusions. The lists often speak for themselves and the comments after each section offer some clarifications and additional notes. As said at the outset, gentes is the most prominent keyword. It is the natural equivalent for ‫ גוים‬and ἔϑνη. Exceptions have been singled out and when possible explained91. Not infrequently, the change is due to a concern for variation in a context in which the same word is used more than once. This is not a rule and one can easily cite instances where it is not followed, but some translators (or the same translator, at times) occasionally thought they (he) should alternate with another synonym. The relation between original and translation is also stable for populi and tribus, though there are not that many cases of these keywords, somewhat lesser perhaps for nationes92. The other keywords show a greater variety, but are used far less often, usually, as seen, in a more irenic or neutral context. Combinations of keywords occur frequently, take 91. For the NT these are Acts 2,5 (natione), 10,45 (in nationes), 14,5 (gentilium), 17,26 (genus), 22,21 (in nationes), 24,2 (om., see n. 87), Rom 15,27 (gentiles), Rev 5,9 (natione), and 15,3 (saeculorum, see n. 87). Note also gentes/-ium in John 7,35bis (for forms of Ἑλλήνων, Ἓλληνας) and praepositus gentis in 2 Cor 11,32 (ἐϑνάρχης). 92. All instances of λαοί in NT are rendered with a form of populi; in addition the keyword is also used twice for rendering ὄχλοι (Matt 21,11; Acts 14,12).

318

J. VERHEYDEN

different forms, and can go from two to four elements. The connotations these keywords evoke are mostly negative, but there are quite a number of more positive estimations, especially in an eschatological perspective and as a warning. This is in a sense quite remarkable as the same term can shift its connotation, but that was part of the intended rhetoric in the original and was followed by the translators. The OT evidence was limited to three books. The one from the NT is meant to be exhaustive. By adding parallels from the OT and from other NT books to the evidence listed from the latter corpus an opportunity was given also to cite from some other OT books and above all to illustrate how the same or similar motifs are being used and re-used through various books and by various authors. The choice for gentes (or the other keywords) was not innovating, let alone a stroke of genius. In general Vg followed tradition and stayed in line with what could be found in this respect in its predecessor, the various branches of the Vetus Latina, though it certainly did not in each and every instance render the keywords in exactly the same way as a first quick sounding for Isaiah, not included here, has revealed. It might perhaps be worthwhile to check Vg and VL more systematically on this matter. All through the ages the Bible, in its original language and consequently then also in its translations, has offered authors an abundant supply of material in polemicising against “the infidels” (and also against the Jews, of course). It is true that one of the favourite terms for referring to these “enemies” in the West – pagani – did not make it into the version of its Bible that was used for over a millennium; but one could find there other terms, and above all, a whole range of motifs, rhetorical devices, and strategies used to tackle or counter the adversary. Some of the motifs it calls upon may be stereotypical (gentiles indulge in polytheism, idolatry, sexual aberrance, and form a political and social threat for “the elect”), but that makes them all the more useful, as such motifs can easily be applied also in contexts and against people who do not really practice or identify with any of them. Some of its devices, though well known from ancient rhetoric, may appear to lack nuance (generalising phraseology, hyperbole), but they kept demonstrating their usefulness in the eyes of authors relying on them. Some of its strategies may seem farfetched, perhaps even naïve or out of touch with reality (massive condemnations, threats and warnings, appeals to God, but also offering comfort by sketching a future that will be bright again), but they were used time and again, in full confidence that they are effective. Christian polemicists have been inventive in developing new arguments and strategies, but the basic principles can be traced back to the Bible, hence to divinely revealed truth and authority. The Bible can truly

GENTILES AND PAGANS IN THE VULGATE

319

be said to have been a constant source of inspiration for generations of authors in fencing off Christianity from the enemies outside, regardless of whether what was said about them also really applied. Joseph VERHEYDEN

MODERN AUTHORS ABRIL CASTELLÓ, V. 128 ADKIN, N. 91 AHMED, L. 15 25 ALCINA FRANCH, J. 142 ALEXANDER, F.S. 9 ALEXANDER, G. 185-186 ALEXANDRE, R. 84 86 AMMANN, A.M. 152 ANCZYK, A. 224-225 227 ANKARLOO, B. 241 ANTES, P. 13 ARNAUD-LINDET, M.-P. 57-60 63-69 71-73 75-80 ARNOLD, J. 14 ATAMANENKO, V.B. 169 ATHANASSIADI, P. 62 AUGÉ, M. XIV AURAST, A. 1 3 7 BADER, R. 183 BAHLCKE, J. 155 BAR, D. 64 BARCELÓ, P. 64 BARNES, T.D. 51 99 BARTALUCCI, A. 71 83-94 97-98 100101 BARTELINK, G.J.M. 250 BASTIAENSEN, A.A.R. 250 BASTUJI, J. 250 BAUMGARTEN, A.I. 38 BEARD, M. 234 BEAUJEU, J. 19-20 BECHER, M. 109 BECK, A. 14 BECKER, M. 183 BEHRENBECK, S. 209-210 212 216 220 BEIER, H.-J. 106 BELLEN, H. 16 BEREZHNAYA, L. 150 172 BERLEKAMP, H. 122 BERNDT, R. 14 BEUGNOT, A. X

BEUMANN, H. 6 112 114 BIEN, G. 128 135 BIERMANN, F. 122 BILLIG, G. 107 BLAISE, A. 20 BLASS, F. 252 BLEUMER, H. 5 BLISS, A.J. 239 BÖHME, H.W. 109 BOGDAN, H. 206 BONNER, A. 56 BOUVIER, B. 57 BOVON, F. 57 BOWEN, J. 160 BOWMAN, M. 225 BOXUS, A.-M. 83 85-94 96-97 99100 BRADBURY, S. 55-56 BRANDS, G. 64 BRANDT, H. 55 BRESSLAU, H. 115 BRIESKE, V. 105 BRIGGS, K.M. 240 BRODKA, D. 64 BROWN, P. 1 12 17 61 BROWN, T.S. 38 BROX, N. 153 BRÜCKNER, A. 167 BRÜNING, A. XI 149-182 159 175 179 181 BUDELMANN, F. 49 BÜNZ, E. 123 BUJAK, A. 115 BURKE, P. 165 BURTON, PH.H. 258 CAMERON, A. 4 16 61 65 71 83 8586 95 99 CAMPENHAUSEN, A. VON 13 CANCIK, H. 60 CASTAÑEDA, P. 127 CAVERO, P.M. 55 CERESA-GASTALDO, A. 3

322

MODERN AUTHORS

CHANCE, J. 250 CHARIPOVA, L. 178 CHARLAMPOVIČ, K.V. 169 174 CHENU, M.D. 130 CHUMICHEVA, O. 156 CLACKSON, J. 258 CLARK, G.N. 232 CLAUDE, D. 105 CLIFTON, C.S. XIV COHN, N. 232-233 241-242 245 COLLIS, J. 213 COLOT, B. 46 COMBÈS, G. XIII CONSTABLE, G. 116 CORBALÁN, D.B. 55 CORSANO, M. 84 COSKUN, A. 94 COULTON, G.C. 231 COURCELLE, P. 44 COWAN, E.J. 240 CRACCO RUGGINI, L. 95 99 CRASTER, E. 237 CROKE, B. 83 CRUMMEY, R. 179 CSAPO, E. 49 CUNNINGHAM, J.G. 55 CURTIUS, E.R. 235 CUSACK, C.M. 205-206 223-224 DAIM, F. 124 DALLY, O. 64 DE BENOIST, A. XIV DE BLAAUW, S. 64 DEBRUNNER, A. 252 DE GHELLINCK, J. 251 DELGADO, M. XI 127-147 127-128 131 134 142 144 DELUMEAU, J. 233 DEMANDT, A. 64 DENECKER, T. 249-255 257 DENZINGER, H. 163 DILLON, J.M. 44 DMITRIEV, M.V. 171 DOBBELSTEIN, G. 83 DOBIAT, C. 109 DOLBEAU, F. 99 DONNERT, E. 156 DORBATH, B. 17 DOVBYŠČENKO, M. 151 DOWDEN, K. XIV

DOYÉ, W.M. 208 DRALLE, L. 107 DRECOLL, V.H. 56 DREXHAGE, H.J. 16 DRÖSSLER, R. 106 DUBOIS, J.-D. 74 DU BOULAY, F.R.H. 240 DUCH, L. 128 DUFF, A.M. 235 DUFF, J.W. 235 DUFFY, E. 233 DUNN, G.D. 66 ECONOMOU, G.D. 235 EDWARDS, M.J. XI 35-53 35 46 52 62 EHLING, K. 64 EICH, A. 16 EICHLER, E. 106 ELFASSI, J. X ELSNER, J. 31 EMICH, B. 160 EMMEL, S. 64 ENCUENTRA, A. 62 ENGELBERT, P. 6 ENGEMANN, J. 64 EPSTEIN, A.G. 247 ERNOUT, A. 49 251 256 FAIVRE, A. 215 FAJT, J. 105 FEAR, A.T. 55 57-58 62 73 FELDMEIER, R. 83 FELTEN, F.J. 116 FENSKE, L. 108 FERNÁNDEZ, R.G. 55 FESTUGIÈRE, A.-J. 44 FIEDROWICZ, M. 2 12 FISCH, J. 165 FISHER, P. 120 FLAIG, E. 129 FLENLEY, R. 240 FLETCHER, R. X FLINT, V.I.J. 231 FLOROVSKIJ, G. 170-171 FORBES, C.A. 3 FORCELLINI, E. 20 FOX, R.L. 1 FRANÇOIS, E. 207-209 213-214 220 FREDE, M. 62 FREDOUILLE, J.-C. 61

MODERN AUTHORS

FREND, W.H.C. IX 58 FREUND, S. 16 FREYLICHÓWNA, U. 166 FRICK, D.A. 172-174 FRIIS-JENSEN, K. 120-121 FRIJHOFF, W.T.M. 207 213 215 218 FRITZE, W.H. 110 FÜTTERER, P. 106 FUHRMANN, M. 16 GABRIEL, I. 122 GAETHKE, H.-O. 122 GALAND-HALLYN, P. 84 GASTGEBER, C. 158 GAUGE, V. 55 GAUME, J.-J. XIII GAWLICK, G. 197 GAY, P. XIII 206 216 218 225 GENSICHEN, H.-W. 2 GIESE, M. 114 GIGON, O. 9 GINZBURG, C. 232-233 241-243 GLEIXNER, J. 151 GOERDT, W. 153-154 GOETZ, H.-W. 1 3 7 55 58-60 71 77 GOLDBACHER, A. 55 GOLTZ, A. 55 58 GOLUBEV, S.T. 174-175 GOODMAN, M.D. 35 52 GOODRICK-CLARKE, N. 215 222 GOTTER, U. 64 GOTTLIEB, G. 65 GRAFTON, A. 3 216 GRANT, R.M. 49 GRATTAN, J.H.G. 231 235 GREEN, M. 244 GREEN, R. 83 99 103 GRENZMANN, L. 10 GRIGORE, M.-D. 158 GROTHUSEN, K.-D. 107 GRÜNDER, K. 129 GRÜNEWALD, T. 65 GRZYMAŁA-MOSZCZYŃSKA, H. 224 GUDZIAK, B. 152 168 171 GUYOT, P. 77 GWYNN, E. 246 HAARLÄNDER, S. 116 HABERMEHL, P. 55 HAFNER, ST. 159

323

HAHN, J. 4 64 HALECKI, O. 171 HALL, A. 237 HALSALL, G. 66 HAMMER, O. 205 218 224 HANEGRAAFF, W.J. 206 226 HANSON, R.P.C. 64 HARDMAN, C. 225 HARDT, M. XI 105-125 105-106 109 123-124 HARNACK, A. VON 183 HARRIES, J. 83 HARRISON, S. 31 HARTMANN, W. 5 HARVEY, G. XIV 224-226 HAUSES, R. 14 HAVERFIELD, F. 244 HAYE, T. 10 HEATHER, P.J. 65-66 HECK, E. 16-18 26 HECKEL, U. 83 HEIL, U. XI 55-81 56 58 HEISER, A. 74 HELBIG, H. 117 HELM, R. 64 74-77 HELMHOLZ, R. 9 HENDERSON, L. 240 HENKEL, N. 10 HENKEN, E.R. 239 HENNING, E. 110 HENNINGSEN, G. 241 HERFERT, P. 122 HERING, G. 158 HERRMANN, J. 109 120-122 HERZOG, R. 55 HEYDEN, K. 16 HEYLEN, F. 61 HILL, C. 232 HIMKA, J.P. 150 HINZ, H.-M. 107 HOBSBAWM, E. 205 218 HÖFFE, O. 127-129 HÖLZLWIMMER, L. 151 HÖMKE, N. 56 HOFFMANN, A. 14 HOLMES, T.S. 240 HOLTZMANN, R. 107-112 HOUGHTON, H.H. 258 HRUŠEVS’KYJ, M. 159 169-171 HÜBNER, E. 156

324

MODERN AUTHORS

HÜNERMANN, P. 163 HUMMEL, A. 106 HUNT, E.D. 56 HUTTON, R. XI 205-206 209-211 220 222 231-248 231-233 237 241 245247 ISAEVYČ, J.D. 168 ISAIEVYCH, I. 175 IVAKHIV, A. 207-210 JABŁONOWSKI, A. 181 JACOBSEN, A.-C. 56 JAKOVENKO, N. 151 JASPERT, N. 116 JENKINS, C. 240 JENSEN, K.V. 120 JOLLY, K. 233 JONES, C. 61 JONES, P. XIV JONGMAN, W. 16 JÜRGASCH, T. 61 KAHANE, A. 46 KAHL, H.-D. 6 108 114-115 124 KAHLOS, M. 61 92 KAMP, H. 105 109 116 120 KARWASIŃSKA, H. 113-114 KAŠUBA, M. 170 KAUFMAN, T. 10 KELLNER, B. 10 KESSLER, M. 128 KINZIG, W. 183 KLEIN, R. 77 KLIMOV, V. 178 KŁOCZOWSKI, J. 152 KLÖCKENER, M. 57 KLUG, E. 156 KNOCH, P. 118 KOCH, S. 13 KOFSKY, A. XIII KOHNLE, A. 123 KOLODNYJ, A. 178 KOLOKASIS, M. 38 KONEN, H. 16 KOSIV, S. 176 KOVÁCS, P. 76 KRAJCAR, J. 151 164 KRALJUK, P.M. 169

KRAUSE, J. 124 KROKER, M. 105 109 116 120 122 KRÜGER, D. 106 KUDELLA, M. 56 KÜHLER-WIELACH, F. 158 KULIKOWSKI, M. 58 KUNKEL, B. 122 KURZE, F. 107 KUSBER, J. 156 KUTTNER, S. 9 KYTZLER, B. 19 21 LABUDA, A.S. 115 LACHMANN, K. 10 LAIRD, A. 46 LANDFESTER, M. 60 LARSON, J. 234 LATHAM, M.W. 240 LAU, F. 106 LAURENTI, R. 45 LECOUTEUX, C. 241-243 245 LEHMANN, A. 214 LEMBERG, H. 149 LENAZ, L. 95 101 LENSKI, N. 64 LEPPIN, H. 55 58 64 LE ROY LADURIE, E. 232 LEVISON, W. 5 109 LEWIS, C.S. 235 LEWIS, J.R. XIV 205-206 218 224 LIEDTKE, M. 157 LINDUFF, K.M. 243 LINSE, U. 214 220 LIPIŃSKI, E. 50 LIPPOLD, A. 57 LIZZI TESTA, R. 12 61 84-85 LÖFSTEDT, E. 251-255 257 LÖHR, W. 56 LOOS, F. 13 LOPEZ, J.C. 10 LOSADA, Á. 131-132 145 LÜBKE, C. 105 108 113 118 120 122 LUTZ-BACHMANN, M. 127 MACHAT, C. 124 MACKENZIE, D.A. 246 MACMULLEN, R. IX 16 MAGNEN, R. 243 MAIER, B. 206-210 212-213 221-224

325

MODERN AUTHORS

MALAVESI, G. 56 MALVY, A. 179-180 MANGANARO, G. 94 MARCOS CASQUERO, M.A. 5 MARENBON, J. X MARKSCHIES, C. 74 83 85-86 88-90 93-94 98-99 101-102 MAROUZEAU, J. 251 MARRONE, S.P. 233 MARTEL, A. 172 176 MARTINEZ MAZA, C. 83 MASARACCHIA, E. 183 MASTANDREA, P. 44 MATTHEWS, J.F. 84-85 94-96 MAURER, M. 160 MAZZARINO, S. 95 MCCRACKEN, G. 35-36 52 MCGUIRE, M. 252 MCLAREN, J.S. IX MCLYNN, N. 84 91 102 MCMANAWAY, J.G. 240 MEERTENS, P.J. 254 MEIER, M. 58 MEILLET, A. 251 MELLER, H. 124 MENGHIN, W. 122 MENZEL, M. 116 MEYER-BLANCK, M. 58 MILIS, L. 233 MINNS, D. 75 MITCHELL, S. 62 MÖLDERS, D. 105 MOHRMANN, C. 250-251 254-257 MOLTHAGEN, J. 17 MOMIGLIANO, A. IX MOMMSEN, T. 94 MONČAK, I. 152 MONTARESE, F. 48 MONYK, E. 207-211 213 216 218 MORICCA, U. 95 MOST, G.W. 3 216 MÜLLER, D.A.T. IX-XIV 1-12 216 226 MÜLLER, H.-H. 122 MUELLER, J.G. 20 MULDOON, J. 10 MURPHY, G. 247 MURRAY, M. 231-232 MUSSO, L. 95

NAJOCK, D. 21 NARVAEZ, P. 238 NASRALLAH, L. 47 NAUCK, A. 39 NI DHONNCHADHA, M. NIECHWIEJ, M. 151 NOCK, A.D. 50 235 NORTH, J. 234

247

OBELKEVITCH, J. 231 OBIREK, S. 159-161 Ó CRUALAOICH, G. 246-247 O’CONNOR, J.F. 18 O’DALY, G.J.P. 57 O’DONNELL, J.J. 4 12 61 OGDEN, D. 234 OPELT, I. 61 81 OROZ-RETA, J. 5 PADBERG, L.E. VON 4-6 12 107 110 114 118 PAGDEN, A. 130 137 PALLA, R. 84 PALMER, J. X 6 PANNENBERG, W. 128 PARKER, D.C. 258 PARTRIDGE, C. 205-207 PARVIS, P. 75 PATZOLD, S. 5 6 58 PAULY, F. 7 PAUSCH, D. 25 PEARSON, J. 225 PELLEGRINO, M. 19 PENNICK, N. XIV PEREC, V.N. 178 PERELLI, A. 87 90 99 PEREÑA, L. 142 PERL, G. 109 PERTZ, G.H. 115 PETERSOHN, J. 115 PFEIFFER, R. 37 PFISTER, G. 220 PINTUS, G.M. 36 PIZZA, M. XIV 206 PLANCK, D. 122 POCCETTI, P. 253 PÓCS, É. 233 POHLIG, M. 160 POTTMEYER, H.J. 128

326

MODERN AUTHORS

POUCET, J. 83 85-94 96-97 99-100 POWELL, J. 31 PREUSSE, C. 151 PRICE, S.R.F. 35 52 234 PRZEKOP, E. 152 PUHLE, M. 105 PURKISS, D. 240 PYLYPIUK, N. 176 QUÉVAL, M.-H. 183 RÄDLINGER-PRÖMPER, C. 107 RAEDTS, P. 207-211 213-214 216 RAGLAN (LADY) 231 RANGER, T. 205 218 RATTI, S. 83 99 REBILLARD, É. 17 REHKOPF, F. 252 REIMANN, H. 120 REINHARD, W. 157-158 RIETBERGEN, P. 207 209-211 213-214 RISCH, R. 124 RITTER, A.M. 13 RITTER, J. 129 RIZZI, M. 19 ROHDEWALD, S. 172 ROLFES, E. 128 135 RONAN, S. 243 RORDORF, W. 30 ROSENFELD, F. 106 ROSIK, S. 117 ROUKENS, W. 254 RUBENSTEIN, R.E. 8 RUCHHÖFT, F. 120-122 RÜHL, M. 16 RÜPKE, J. 2 12 RUFFING, K. 16 RUHMANN, C. 105 RUNCIMAN, S. 232 SACHY, M. 61 SÁGHY, M. 84 SALLMANN, K. 16 SALZMAN, M.R. 61 84 SAWICKI, J. 152 SCHÄRTL, M. 56 74 SCHATTEVOET, Y. XI 205-230 207 209 211 215-217 219 224-225 SCHEIDEGGER, G. 149-150 155-156 167

SCHILLING, H. 155 158 SCHIMPFF, V. 106 SCHLANGE-SCHÖNINGEN, H. 55 58 SCHLESINGER, W. 106-108 SCHMEIDLER, B. 115-116 119 SCHMID, P. 108 SCHMID-HECKLAU, A. 106 SCHMIDT, P.L. 16 SCHMIDT, R. 112-113 SCHMIDT, V. 111 SCHNEIDER, H. 60 SCHNURBEIN, S. VON 208 210 212213 216-217 219-224 SCHÖLLGEN, G. 13 SCHOLZ, U.W. 60 SCHRAMM, G. 157 161 SCHRIJNEN, J. 250-251 254-257 SCHRÖDER, W. XI 183-203 183 185 SCHRÖTER, J. 74 SCHUBERT, C. XI 13-33 15-19 21 SCHÜTRUMPF, E. 9 SCHULZE, H. 207-209 213-214 220 SCHWEITZER, A. 185 SEEFELDER, K. 93 99 SETON-WATSON, R.W. 240 SETTIS, S. 3 216 ŠEVČENKO, I. 171 SEVERIN, H.-G. 64 SHACKLETON BAILEY, D.R. 83 SHANZER, D. 99 SHEENAN, J. 3 SHORROCK, R. XIV SIGURVINSSON, B.A. 224 SIM, D.C. IX SIMEK, R. 216 SIMMONS, M.B. 35 50 52 SINGER, C. 231 235 SINISCALCO, P. 19 SISSON, C.J. 240 SMITH, A. 44 SMITH, J.B. 244 SMITH, J.H. IX SNELL, B. 243 SOMMER, P. 105 SONNABEND, H. 17 SOUTER, A. 252 SPEICH, D. 211 SPEYER, W. 81 SPIEWOK, W. 10

MODERN AUTHORS

STAMMBERGER, R.F. 14 STARK, R. 9 STEEL, C. X STEMMER, P. 186 STERCHX, C. 243 STIEGEMANN, C. 105 122 STÖKL, G. 154 STOKES, W. 246 STOOB, H. 120 STORMS, G. 231 STRMISKA, M.F. 205-207 210-211 213 218 224-227 STROHMEYER, A. 155 STUART, J. 240 STUCKRAD, K. VON 206 SUNDHAUSSEN, H. 179 SWAIN, S. 31 62 SYDORENKO, A. 176 181 TANDOI, V. 90 TATAR, M. 207 212 TAZBIR, J. 166 THENEVOT, É. 243 THIJSSEN, H. 8 THRAMS, P. 92 TIERNEY, B. 9 TIMBERS, F. 241 TITOV, F.I. 179-180 TOMMASI, C. 35 42 44 48 50-51 TOOM, T. 56 TORKE, H.-J. 182 TRICOIRE, D. 151 TRILLMICH, W. 108-112 116 TRIMPERT, H. 106 TROUT, D.E. 83-86 99 102-103 TRUEB, I. 168 TSCHACHER, W. 5 TUMMUSCHEIT, A. 122 TUREČEK, O. 159 TURIJ, O. 171 UHLE, T. 17 ULRICH, J. 75 VALENZUELA, C. 7 VAN NUFFELEN, P. 55 58-59 62 77 80 VAUCHEZ, A. 153 VENARD, M. 161 VERBEKE, W. X

327

VERHEYDEN, J. IX-XIV 83-103 249258 259-319 VEYNE, P. 2 VILELLA, J. 55 VILLER, M. 179-180 VIRCILLO FRANKLIN, C. 250 VITTON, P. 14 VOGEL, W. 110 VOGT, J. 81 VOIGT, H.G. 114 VOSS, B.R. 16 VULPIUS, R. 179 WAITZ, G. 123 WALLRAFF, M. 64 WALTER, W. 105 122 WALTHER, H. 106 WAPNEWSKI, P. 213 WASSERSCHLEBEN, F.W.H. 242 WASSILOWSKY, G. 160 WATKINS, C. 233 WATSON, A. 78 WEBER, G. 64 WEBER, R. 264-265 WEINRICH, L. 117 WELYKYJ, A.G. 152 WENDEBOURG, D. 158 WERNER, M. 208 220 WHISTON, W. 189 WHITE, J.F. 78 WICKHAM, C. 233 WIECZOREK, A. 107 WIEDERKEHR, S. 172 WILBY, E. 240 WILLIAMS, N. 238 WILLIAMSON, G.S. 207 209-215 217219 WILLICH, C. 120 WILSON, P. 49 WINIARCZYK, M. 38 WINKELMANN, F. 74-75 77 WINZELER, M. 105 WIŚLICZ, T. 151 WITTE, J., JR. 9 WOLFRAM, H. 66-67 108 WOLFRAM, S. 105 WÜNSCH, T. 151-152 WYTRZENS, G. 159 WYTZES, J. 91

328 YORK, M. 226-227 YOUNG, F.M. 35 ZACOUR, N.P. 10 ZANGEMEISTER, K. 3 56-57 ZAPASKO, J. 168

MODERN AUTHORS

ZARINI, V. 84 ZECH, K. 1 ZEMA, V. 169 ZERNACK, K. 107 ŻOŁĄDŹ, D. 166

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Abbadie, Jacques 189 Absalon (archbishop) 122 Acts of Pilate 74 Adalbert of Prague (saint) 115 Adalgoz (archbishop) 116 Adam of Bremen 11 117 Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte II, 44 116 III, 50 115 Agobard of Lyon (archbishop) 4 Alan of Lille Anticlaudianus 236 De planctu naturae 236 58 66-67 Alaric (king) 80 87 Alcuin 109 Alexander of Aphrodisias On Fate 43 Alexander VI (pope) 152 Alexis of Russia (Alexej Michajlovič, 150 tsar) Allaci, Leone 185 Ambrose De fide ad Gratianum 65 Anselm of Canterbury 153 Antoninus Pius (emperor) 75 Antonio Possevino (diplomat, Jesuit) 161 Apollinaris of Hierapolis 249 Apuleius 39 46 Golden Ass 46 On the God of Socrates 39 Arbogastes (general) 65 69-70 16 75 78 Aristides 249 Aristo of Pella 249 8 37 128 Aristotle 131 133 135-138 Metaphysics 1076a 37 Nicomachean Ethics 6 137

7.1 8.12 Politics

135 136 128 130 132-133 1.2 128 135-136 1.4 129 1.5 129-130 1.8 130 133 3 136 3.14 136 3.16 136 3.17 136 5.10 136 5.11 136 7.8 137 Arminius (Hermann der Cherusker) 208 215-216 220 XI 35-53 61 Arnobius of Sicca 252 Against the Nations 249 1 48-50 1.2.6 41 1.3.1 41 1.3.3 48 1.3.4 41 1.5.7 41 1.16 50 1.23.3 42 1.24.1 48 1.24.2 40 1.24.3 41 1.25.4 42 1.26.3 48 50 1.28.1-2 48 1.28.2 48 1.28.6 36 1.31 36 1.34 42 1.34.1 50 1.36 50 1.36.1 40 1.36.4 52

330 1.37.1 1.38.2 1.39.1 1.40.2 1.42.5 1.43.2 1.45.2 1.50.3 1.51-58 1.53.4 1.54.3 1.55.2 1.56.3 1.57.1 1.57.4 1.59.6 1.59.10 1.65.6 1.65.8 1.71.1 2 2.4.4 2.7.7 2.7.10 2.11 2.11.2 2.12.1 2.13 2.13.2–2.14.2 2.13.2 2.13.6 2.13.8 2.14 2.14.4 2.14.6 2.15 2.15.1 2.16.13 2.17.1-2 2.17.5 2.19.2 2.20-23 2.22.3 2.24.1 2.30.5 2.32.2 2.34.2 2.35 2.35.4

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

40 40 50 44 41 42 42 42 40 41 48 41 42 40 40 48 48 48 41 41 43 36 44 48 42 42 48 42-43 43 44 44 44 43 43 43 43 41 43 43 41 43 44 41 44 48 48 50 44 45 42

2.36.1 2.36.2 2.39-43 2.40 2.47 2.52.2 2.53.3 2.54.3 2.61.2 2.62 2.66.2 2.67.1 2.69 2.69.1 2.70.2 2.70.3 2.70.5 2.71.3 2.72.2 2.73.2 2.74.4 2.75.4 2.77.2 3.6.1 3.6.2 3.8.3 3.9.1 3.11.1 3.12.1 3.16.2 3.17 3.26.1 3.27.1 3.29.5 3.30.2 3.32.3 3.33.1-2 3.38ff. 4.6.4 4.7.1 4.9.3 4.11.1 4.12.2 4.14.1 4.15.1 4.17.3 4.20.1 4.22 4.24.3

41 45 45 50 36 44 42 48 42 44 41 41 51 41 51 52 41 51 42 41 42 42 48 52 51 42 42 41 40 48 36 52 52 51 51 51 52 42 40 52 51 41 44 51 52 52 51 51 51-52

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

4.28–5.29.2 40 4.30.3 40 4.32.1 40 5 48 5.1-2 49 5.1.2 48 5.1.6 49 5.2.2 49 5.5-7 49 5.7.1 49 5.8.1 40 5.8.4 40 5.12.7 48 5.14.1 48 5.16.3 51 5.17-19 43 5.18.3 49 5.18.4-5 49 5.19.1 49 5.19.2 49 5.19.4 49 5.20-21 50 5.22.5 50 5.24.1 48 6.5 50 6.10.7 51 6.11.4 41 6.12 51 6.12.2 48 50 6.12.4 48 50 6.15.2 48 6.22 52 6.23 52 6.25 51 7 45 7.20.2 48 7.24 46 7.30.8 52 Arthur of Little Britain 239 Athanasius Contra Gentes 249 40 101 De incarnatione verbi 39,2 190 Athenagoras 16 Embassy 5 37 24–26 39 28 38

30 Augustine

331

38-39 2 55-60 69 235 260 Ad Orosium contra Priscillianistas et Origenistas 56 Contra Academicos 1-2 46 Contra Faustum 61 De civitate Dei 62 249 5.23 61 5.26 66 8.26 61 9.19 61 11 57 18.52 77 19 196 21.6 61 22.3 61 25 196 Ennarationes in Psalmos 61 Epistulae 166.2 55 172.1 56 175 56 Sermones 61 Tractatus in Iohannis Euangelium 61 Augustus (emperor) 63 78-79 234 Aurelian (emperor) 78 Avitus of Braga 57 Baldassare Castiglione (count) 165 Battaile Loquifer 238 Beatus Rhenanus 208 Beda Venerabilis 5 260 Bel Inconnu 238 Bernard Silvester De mundi universitate 236 Blavatsky, Helena 220 Bodin, Jean Colloguium heptaplomeres (1590) 183 Bolesław I Chrobry (king) 113-114 Bonewits, Isaac 227 Boniface (saint) 568 Bopp, Franz 213 Boso (bishop) 107-109 Bossuet, Jacques-Bénigne 251 Bruno of Querfurt 6 113-116

332

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Epistola ad Henricum regem 113-114 Buchedd Collen 239 Burchard of Halberstadt (bishop) 115 Burchard of Worms 245 Decretum Book 10, c. 29 244 Book 19, cc. 70, 90, 170-171 244 Busiris (king of Egypt) 69 Caesarius of Arles 249 260 Cajetan 141 Caligula (emperor) 62 77 Callimachus Hymn 1.4-7 38 Calocaerus (usurper) 64 Canon “Episcopi” 5 242 245 Carmen ad Antonium / Carmen ultimum 84 Carmen ad quendam senatorem 84 95 Carmen contra paganos 71 83-103 249 1-24 85 1-8 85 2-7 87 2, 3, 4, 5 87 6 88 7 87 9-22 85 9-12 88 13 88-89 14-16 88 15 89 17 89 101 18 89 100 19-22 89 22 86 93 23-24 85 87 89 25-33 85 89 28 89 29 90 30 89 34-56 85 90 34-37 85 34, 35 90 36-37 90

38-45 38-40 41-42 43-45 43-44 45 46-56 46 47 48-49 50 51-53 53-54 54-55 54 57-77 57-66 62 63-64 64 65-66 66 67-77 68 73 76-77 78-86 78 79-83 79, 80 83 84 85-86 87-109 87-97 91, 95 96 98-102 98 99-100 100 103-109 103 106-107 110-114 112-114 112 114

85 90 90 90 100 90 100 85 91 90 90 90 92 90 96 90 98 100 91 85 91 91 91 91 97 88 98 85 89 98 91 85 91 100 92 98 100 92 100 92-93 100 92 92 92 85 92 92 100 85 92 92 92 92 85 93 97 98 85 93 94 93

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

115-120 85 93 115 88 93 120 100 121-122 85 93 Cassiodorus 260 Celsus 47 183-203 Ἀληθὴς λόγος 183 1.2 199 1.9 199 1.49 189 1.54 189 2.15 189 2.28 189 2.29 189 2.42c 189 2.55 191 2.63 191 2.70b 191 3.7 195 3.39 199 3.59 195 197 3.62c 195 3.64a 195 6.10 199 6.11 194 199 7.2 194 7.53 197 Chantecler, Charles de 185 Charlemagne (monarch) 216 Charles V (emperor) 132 Chaucer, Geoffrey Sir Thopas 239 The Merchant’s Tale 239 The Parlement of Foules 236 The Wife of Bath’s Tale 239 Chubb, Thomas (deist) 184 Cicero 17 18 36 53 139 153 On the Laws 46 On the Nature of the Gods 3.5-9 36 3.43 36 3.86-87 193 Claris et Laris 238 Claudian (poet) 66 235 Panegyric on Emperor Honorius 65

333

Claudius (emperor) 74 79 Clement of Alexandria 38 47 Protreptikos 249 Exhortation 2.37.4 38 Stromata 2.9.2 200 2.11.1 200 2.27.4 200 6.42 35 Codex Theodosianus 16.10.6 64 16.10.15 64 Collins, Anthony (deist) 184 196 Collins, Samuel (physician) 150 Commodianus 95 249 Carmen apologeticum 86 Conrad II (emperor) 115 Constantine (emperor) 52 63-64 69-70 73 79 195 Constantius II (emperor) 64 69 Cornelius Labeo 44 Cronius (philosopher) 42 Cudworth, Ralph (philosopher) 184-185 Cyprian 14 41 50 To Demetrianus 12 41 Cyril Lucaris (patriarch) 158 Cyril of Alexandria Contra Julianum 185 Cyril of Jerusalem Catechesis 5.12 200 Dalmatius (caesar) 64 Damasus (pope) 99 de Acosta, José 142 de Boyer, Jean-Baptiste (marquis d’Argens) 185 Decius (emperor) 17 78 de La Bletterie, Jean-Philippe-René 185 de las Casas, Bartolomé XI 127-147 Delarue, Carolus 185 de Mirabaud, Jean-Baptiste 184 de Sepúlveda, Juan Ginés 131-136 138 de Vitoria, Francisco 145

334

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Diederich, Eugen (publisher) 219 Dietrich of Haldensleben (margrave) 110 Diocletian (emperor) 17 43 69 78 Diodorus Siculus Histories 6.1 38 Dionysius Exiguus Vita Pachomii 260 Domitian (emperor) 77 Dunbar, William 239 Duplessis-Mornay, Philippe 184-185 189 Eberhard, Johann August 196 Edda 212 217 219 245 Edward Herbert of Cherbury 184 Eigil of Fulda 7-8 Vita Sturmi 6 Ennius (Quintus) 38 40 Enoch (Book of) 39 42 Epiphanius of Salamis Panarion 249 Epistle to Diognetus 47 249 Erasmus, Desiderius 185 Eucherius (general) 68-69 Eugenius (emperor/usurper) 65 69-70 94 96 Euhemerus of Messene 38-41 Reliquiae 38 Eusebius of Caesarea 70 74 Church History 75 2.2 74 2.25 77 3.33 78 4.26.1 249 4.27.1 249 5.5.3 75 5.17.5 249 6.21.3-4 76 6.34 76 9.5.1 74 9.7.1 74 11.30 65 Preparation for the Gospel 38 249 Eutropius Breviarium 58

XIV Evola, Julius Fabricius, Johann Albert 184-185 Facundus of Hermiane 260 Fahrenkrog, Ludwig (playwright/ 221 painter) Fasciculus morum, Part 5, lines 61-72 238 Fedorov, Ivan (printer) 168 XIII Fibus, Bartholomaeus Fidus (Hugo Höppener, artist) 220 Firmicus Maternus The Error of the Pagan Religions 3 4.2 101 Flavianus (Virius Nicomachus, senator/ prefect/consul) 94-95 97 Florus Epitome of Roman History 58 Flowers, Stephen Edred (Edred Thorsson or Darban-i-Den) 223 Fludd, Robert 236 Fulgentius of Ruspe 260 Gardner, Gerald Brosseau (Wiccan) 222 Gerald of Wales Itinerarium Kambriae, Book 1, c. 8 238 Gerold of Oldenburg (bishop) 119 Gervase of Tilbury Otia imperialia, Book 3, c. 45 238 XII Glisson, Paul Goethe, J.W. von 209 216 Górnicki, Łukasz (chancellor) 166 Gottschalk (Obotrite prince) 115 Gratian (emperor) 65 Gregory of Nyssa Catechesis magna 31 200 Gregory of Turin 260 Grimm, Jacob Ludwig Karl 206 209 212 217 245 Grimm, Wilhelm Karl 209 212 217 Hadrian (emperor) 75 78

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Hadrian VI (pope) 132 Hávamál l. 155 245 Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 210 Helmold of Bosau 117 Cronica Slavorum I, 22 115 I, 23 115 I, 106 119 Henry I (king) 105-106 Henry II (king) 113-114 123 Henryson, Robert 239 Herbest, Benedykt (Jesuit) 164 169 Herder, Johann Gottfried 209-212 214 216-217 219 Heriger Vita S. Ursmari 99 Hermes Trismegistus 44 Hermias Διασυρμὸς τῶν ἔξω φιλοσόφων 249 Herodotus 45 Histories 2.2 44 Hesiod 37 Theogony 27–28 37 Heyne, Christian Gottlob 211 Hilary of Poitiers In Matthaeum 6.1 98 Hobbes, Thomas 140 Höfler, Otto 221 Holstenius, Lucas 185 Homer Iliad 2.204 37 2.480 37 Horace 49 Epistles 2.1.156 49 Satires 2.3.208 92 Hosius, Stanislaus (cardinal) 158-159 161 Hostiensis (Henry of Segusio) 9 Huet, Pierre-Daniel 184-185 Huon de Bordeaux 238 Hutten, Ulrich von 208 Iamblichus 45-46 On the Mysteries 1.5 44

335

3.31 44 5.23 46 On the Pythagorean Life 35 44 Ignatius of Antioch Antioch. 1.2 260 Phil. 4.3 260 Innocent IV (pope) 8-9 Isidore of Seville 5 260 Etymologies 8.2.3-5 5 Ivan IV (tsar) 155-156 161 Jahn, Friedrich Ludwig 220 Jean de Meun Roman de la Rose 236 Jerome 50 52 5556 70 264265 Chronicle 75 ad anno 35 74 ad anno 68 77 ad anno 175 75 ad anno 236 76 ad anno 331 64 ad annos 332-335 64 De viris illustribus 3 58 18 In Danielem prologus 190 Johannes Maxentius Dialogus contra Nestorianos 260 Johannes Scotus (bishop) 115 John of Damascus 153 Joseph Volotsky (saint) 154-155 165 63 70 79 Julian (emperor) 183-203 Contra Galilaeos 183 185 Caesares 185 194 336AB 194-196 frg. 23, 135A 191 frg. 39, 184BC 195 frg. 59, 245CD 194-195 frg. 64, 262CD 187 Julian of Toledo 260 Julius Caesar 25 Julius Medici (Clement VII, pope) 131-132

336

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Justin Epitome of Pompeius Trogus 58 16 35 75 187 Justin Martyr 249 First Apology 5 35 47 14 39 30.1 187 35.9 74 44 35 39 46 35 48.3 74 51.9 190 54 39 Second Apology 5 39 8 35 Juvenal Satire 3.62 49 Kant, Immanuel 196 XII Kellet, Joseph King Berdok 239 Kircher, Athanasius 236 Kniahynyc’kyj, Iov (Ioann) (monk) 170 Kopyns’kyj, Isaja (monk) 170 175 Kortholt, Christian (theologian) 184-185 Kosiv, Silvestr (metropolitan) 176 Kusserow, Wilhelm 222 Lacordaire, Henri 251 36 38 48 95 Lactance 235 De mortibus persecutorum 1.2 77 249 Divine Institutes 46 53 249 1.11 38 1.13-14 38 1.17 38 1.22 38 4 36 6.9.4 47 Layamon Brut, ll. 9608-9609, 14277-14282 238 Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim 186 191 List, Guido von 220-222 Livy 39 49

History of Rome 58 1.16 39 39.8-18 49 XIII Loddington, William López de Gómara, Francisco 134 Lucian of Samosata 47 57 Dialogues of the Gods 102 The Parliament of the Gods 102 Zeus Rants 102 Lucretius 2.611-612 97 2.628 97 Lyndsay, David 239 246 Maciejowski, Samuel (bishop) 166 Major, Johannes 130-131 Mannhardt, Wilhelm 212 Marcus Aurelius (emperor) 28 75 Marcus Eugenius (bishop) 162 Marius Victorinus 46 Martial 87 Maximinus Daja (emperor) 74 Maximinus Thrax (emperor) 76 Maximus of Turin 249 ap. Murat., Anecdota Latina 4 101 McNallen, Stephen 223 Meletij Smotryc’kyj (archbishop) 172-173 Mellini, Domenico 184 Michael the Brave (prince) 177-178 Miltiades 249 XI 36 46 Minucius Felix 13-33 249 Octavius 2–4 17 2.3 18 24 30 3.1 18 3.5 23 4.4-6 31 5.1-2 31 5.1 23 5.4 21 5.5 22 5.8 23 5.13 21 6–8 36 7.6 20 9 46-47 9.4 19

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

10.5 11.1 11.5 11.6 14.1-2 14.5 15.1-2 15.1 16.1 16.3 17.9 18.4 18.11 19.10 20.1 21.3 22.1 24.9 25 25.1-5 25.1 25.5 25.10 25.11 25.12 27.7 28 28.1-6 28.1-5 28.1 28.2 28.4 28.5 28.10-11 29.1 31.1-5 31.3 31.5 31.8 32.3 33.3 34.9-12 34.12 35.5 35.6 36.1 36.3-7 36.3 36.7 37.1-6

24 21 23 23 17 23 31 23 23 23 22 22 24 21 24 20 20 23 25 25 22 20 20 20 20 24 27 27 18 23 30 24 24 24 20 29 19 22 24 29 19 29 19 22-23 21 24 23 24 24 24 29 29 29 19

337

37.1 24 37.3 24 37.5 19 37.11 29 38.1 29 38.2 24 38.3-4 29 38.4 19 29 39.3 31 40.3 24 Miracula Sancti Heinrici 10 123-124 Mithridates (king of Pontus) 72 Mohyla, Peter (metropolitan) 175-179 Mone, Franz Josef 217 Montesquieu 208 Musfeldt, Hermann 222 Napoleon Bonaparte 206 Nero (emperor) 77 Nietzsche, Friedrich 217 Numenius of Apamea (philosopher) 42 44 Oldratus of Ponte consilium 72 10 Origen 45 56 76 264 Against Celsus 35 185 8.31 39 Exhortation to Martyrdom 41 39 First Principles 2.3.3 39 XI 5 Orosius (Paulus) Historiae adversus paganos 3 55-81 249 1 prol. 71 1 prol. 9-10 58 1 prol. 11 57 1 prol. 13-14 59 1 prol. 16 70 1.1.6 78 1.3.5-6 58 1.3.6 62 1.10.15 70 1.11.2 71 1.12.5 72 1.20.6 71 1.21.17-19 71 2.3.4 59

338 2.3.5 2.3.9-10 2.6.13-14 2.18.5 2.19.4 2.19.12ff. 3 prol. 1 3.4.4-5 3.4.4 3.5 3.8 3.8.2 3.8.4 3.14.6 3.16.13 3.20.6-7 4.1.14 4.6.3-6 4.6.4 4.6.6 4.11.9 4.12.4 4.12.6-7 4.17.10 4.21.5-6 5.2.1-2 5.2.4 5.4.8 5.4.10 5.4.11 5.10.16 6 6.1 6.1.3 6.1.5 6.1.7 6.1.8 6.1.16 6.5 6.20.1 6.20.8 6.21.1 6.21.11 6.22.1 7 7.1.1 7.1.7 7.2 7.2.16 7.3.4

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

59 71 71 71 71 71 58 72 72 72 71 78 78 72 72 56 72 72 71 70 72 78 78 62 72 56 72 70 59 72 70 69 63 73 62-63 63 71 63 63 72 78 78 78 78 78 63 69 73 80 59 73 71 78 78

7.3.7 7.3.8 7.3.19 7.4.5-7 7.4.14 7.5.3 7.5.4 7.5.7 7.5.11 7.6.1-2 7.6.8 7.6.9-10 7.6.11 7.7 7.7.10 7.7.13 7.8.5 7.9.10 7.10 7.10.5 7.12 7.12.3 7.13.2 7.14 7.14.2 7.14.4 7.15.7-11 7.15.10-11 7.17.5 7.18.7 7.19.2 7.19.4 7.20.2 7.21.2 7.22.1 7.22.3 7.22.5 7.23.3-5 7.25.13 7.26.10 7.27.13-14 7.27.13 7.27.14 7.27.15 7.28.1 7.28.2 7.28.3 7.28.26 7.28.28 7.28.29

80 80 80 73 70 70 77 62 77 77 75-76 75 78 75 77 70 77 77 78 78 77 77 77 77-78 78 75 75 75 78 75 75 78 76 76 80 76 78 70 69 78 70 78 78 70 63 69 69 62 69 76 70 63 70 63 64

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

7.28.30 64 7.29.2 69 7.29.3 69 7.30.2 78 7.30.4 78 7.30.6 70 78 7.32.2 78 7.33.16 62 7.33.17 64 7.33.18 62 7.35.11-12 70 7.35.21 65 7.35.22 65 70 7.36.3 62 7.37 66 7.37.2 66 7.37.5 66 7.37.6 67 7.37.8 70 7.37.9 67 7.37.10-11 68 7.37.10 70 7.37.15 70 7.37.17 70 7.38.6 68 7.39.10 68 7.39.14 69 7.40.1 60 7.41 68 7.41.8-9 69 7.41.8 68 7.43.7 80 7.43.10 57 7.43.15 60 7.43.19 69 Liber apologeticus contra Pelagium 56 Orphic Hymn to Hecate 243 Ostrogski, Konstanty Wasyl (magnate) 168 Otto I (emperor) 6 105 Ovid 49 86 96 Fasti 2.69-70 87 4.181 98 4.185-186 97 4.187 98 4.205-248 38 4.341-342 97 4.355 98

339

6.49 100 Metamorphoses 1.147 97 11.8 101 15.626-744 38 Tristia 5.7.16 97 Paul III (pope) 131 Paulus Festus 101 Pelagius 55-56 Peregrinatio Egeriae 252 Peter Damian De sanctae simplicitate scientiae 153 Peter the Great (tsar) 181 Petronius Satyricon 124.1 v. 257 97 Philastrius of Brescia Diversarum hereseon liber 61 Philip the Macedonian 72 Philippus Arabs (emperor) 76 80 Philo of Byblos 38 Phosphorius (Lucius Aurelius Avianus Symmachus, prefect/consul) 94 Pilate (governor) 74 Plato 42 44-45 149 199 First Apology 60 35 Meno 45 82b-86a 44 Phaedo 113b 44 113d 43 Phaedrus 44 Protagoras 339a-347a 37 Republic 606e-607a 37 Statesman 270b 44 Theaetetus 158b 44 Timaeus 45 28c 42 40c 37 41d 44 Pliny the Elder 50

340

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Pliny the Younger 28 77 Plotinus Enneads 2.9.13 43 Plutarch 39-40 On Superstition 169f-170a 41 On the Sign of Socrates 39 Romulus 27 39 Pompeianus (Gabinius Barbarus, pre94 fect) Pomponazzi, Pietro (philosopher) 131 XII Pomroy, John Porphyry 38 44-45 183-203 Contra Christianos 183 frg. 1 198 frg. 43A 190 frg. 43L 190 frg. 58 195 frg. 73 198 frg. 84 194 frg. 88 194 frg. 91 199 Letter to Anebo 44 On Abstinence 45-46 2.38-43 39 3 44 On Statues 50 Praetextatus (Vettius Agorius, prefect) 95 99 Proba 99 Prudence 83-84 95 235 Cathemerinon 3.56 98 8.80 98 Contra Symmachum 2.1002 98 Hamartigenia 711 97 Peristephanon 3.72 98 Ps.-Tertullian Carmen adv. Marcionistas 86 Pythagoras 42 44 75 78 249 Quadratus Radagaisus (general) 66-69 80 Ralph of Coggleshall

Chronicon Anglicanum, fols. 88-90 238 Reimarus, Hermann Samuel XI 183-203 186188 190 195197 201 Reinardus Vulpes 243 Reuter, Otto Sigfrid 221 Rokyta, Jan (pastor) 155-156 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 211 Rufinus of Aquileia 65 70 74-78 XIII Russel, William Sacranus, Johannes 151-152 155 162 164-165 Sakowicz, Cassian (activist) 173-174 176 Sallust 25 Salvian De gubernatione Dei VIII 7 Saul (general) 66 Saxo Grammaticus 122 Gesta Danorum 14, 39, 2, 1274-1275 120 14, 39, 3, 1276-1277 121 Schelling, Friedrich Joseph Wilhelm von 215 Schetelig, Johann Andreas 185 Schiller, Johann Christoph Friedrich von 206 Schlegel, August Wilhelm von 211-212 217 Schleipfer (Schlichting), Adolf and Sigrun 222 Schwaner, Wilhelm 221 Sejanus (prefect) 73 Seneca 29 53 Epistulae morales 41.1-2 193 90 43 90.1 193 Septimius Severus (emperor) 78 Serenus Granius (governor) 78 Severus Alexander (emperor) 76 Shakespeare, William 240

341

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

Sigismund II Augustus (king) 166 Sigismund von Herberstein (diplomat) 165 167 Silius Italicus 13.560 97 Simon, Richard 189 Sir Orfeo 239 Skarga, Piotr (Jesuit) 161-164 166 169-172 Smotryc’kyj, Herasym (rector) 169 172 175 Socrates 35 127 Sossianus Hierocles Philalethes logos 183-184 Spanheim, Ezechiel 185 Spencer, William 185 Spinoza, Baruch 214 Stephen of Perm (saint) 154 Stephen Tempier (bishop) 8 Stesichorus 37 Stilicho (general) 66 69 Strabo (Walahfrid) 244 Suetonius 2 77 Sulpicius Severus 61 Chronicle 2.33 77 Symmachus (Quintus Aurelius) 94-95 Tacitus (Publius Cornelius) 2 25 Annals 208 215 Germania 208 257 9 109 Tatian 16 38 47 Oration 249 1 37 31 39 Tertullian 14-16 28 36 46 48 50-51 74 85 95 252253 Against the Jews 14 8,10 190 8,18 190 Against Marcion 14 Against Praxeas 1.5 47

Apology

15 27 30 36 249 77 39 74 39 39 37 39 187 74 37 43 101 37 37 30 200-201

5 5.1 5.2 6.7 13.3 14.4 19 20.3 21.24 23.2 23.13 25.8 47.2 47.11 On Idolatry 1.2 On Modesty 1.6 47 On the Pallium 46-47 1.3 47 On the Soldier’s Garland 30 To the Nations 249 1.13-14 101 2.1.5 200 The Shows 249 XII Thankfull, Owen Theagenes of Rhegium 37 Theodoret Graecorum affectionum curatio 249 Theodosius (emperor) 4 65 83 Theodosius II (emperor) 4 Theophilius of Antioch To Autolycus 249 3.7 38 3.20 39 9 37 Thietmar von Merseburg 116 Chronicon 107 I, 3 110 II, 36 109 II, 37 108 III, 17 110-111 VI, 23-24 112 VI, 25 112

342

HISTORICAL NAMES AND WORKS

VI, 37 109 Thomas a Kempis 178 8 139 141-143 Thomas Aquinas Summa contra Gentiles XII 7 249 Summa Theologica II-II q. 66, a. 8 141 Thomas Chestre Sir Launfal 239 Thomas of Erceldoune 239 Tiberius (emperor) 74 Tolkien, John R.R. 213 Traité des trois imposteurs 184 Trajan (emperor) 77-78 Tydorel 238 Valens (emperor) 64-65 69 Valerian (emperor) 17 69-70 78 Valerius Maximus 52 58 2.6.15 52 Verecundus 260 Virgil 7 70 96 Aeneid 51 86 5.84 97 5.108 97 5.483-484 91 6.784 98 7.338 91 8.400 97 9.82 98

Georgics 1.205 97 1.346 98 Vyšens’kyj, Ivan (monk) 169-170 178 Wagner, Richard 213 217 Waldemar (king) 120 122 Walter Map De nugis curialium Disti. 2, c. 11 238 Weißleder, Karl 221 Wigbert (bishop) 107 109 William of Newburgh Historia rerum Anglicarum 1, 27-28 238 Willibald of Mainz The Life of Saint Boniface 5 109 Wipo of Burgundy Gesta Chuonradi II imperatoris 115 Wiprecht of Groitzsch (margrave) 124 Wolfram von Eschenbach Parzival 10 Woolston, Thomas (deist) 184 Xenophanes 37 Zahorovs’kyj, Vasyl (castellan) 159

BIBLICAL REFERENCES*

Exodus 7–11 2 Kings 22,14-20 2 Chronicles 34,22-33 Tobit 13,10 Psalms 26,12 64,4 96,5 Wisdom 13,1-9 Isaiah 7,14 52 Jeremiah 10,25 Daniel Hosea 11,1 Matthew 2,14-5 10,16 13,24-30 24,6-9

*

77 244 244 117 117 117 143 143 202 187 188 2 189-190 202 187 187 141 146 80

Mark 16,16 Luke 10,3 14,23 John 19,30 Romans 1,14 1,18-23 1,18-21 1,19-20 2,12 3,20 9,16 9,22-23 12,3 14,23 1 Corinthians 6,11 2 Corinthians 6,15 Philippians 3,20 Titus 1,12

199 141 114 44 2 143 145 142 142 142 193 193 197 154 196 194 194 113 47 38

The many references in the second Epilogue are not included.

BIBLIOTHECA EPHEMERIDUM THEOLOGICARUM LOVANIENSIUM

SERIES III 131. C.M. TUCKETT (ed.), The Scriptures in the Gospels, 1997. 132. 133. 134. 135. 136. 137. 138. 139. 140. 141. 142. 143. 144. 145. 146. 147. 148. 149.

XXIV-721

p. 60 € J. VAN RUITEN & M. VERVENNE (eds.), Studies in the Book of Isaiah. 75 € Festschrift Willem A.M. Beuken, 1997. XX-540 p. M. VERVENNE & J. LUST (eds.), Deuteronomy and Deuteronomic Literature. 75 € Festschrift C.H.W. Brekelmans, 1997. XI-637 p. G. VAN BELLE (ed.), Index Generalis ETL / BETL 1982-1997, 1999. IX337 p. 40 € G. DE SCHRIJVER, Liberation Theologies on Shifting Grounds. A Clash of 53 € Socio-Economic and Cultural Paradigms, 1998. XI-453 p. A. SCHOORS (ed.), Qohelet in the Context of Wisdom, 1998. XI-528 p. 60 € W.A. BIENERT & U. KÜHNEWEG (eds.), Origeniana Septima. Origenes in 95 € den Auseinandersetzungen des 4. Jahrhunderts, 1999. XXV-848 p. É. GAZIAUX, L’autonomie en morale: au croisement de la philosophie et 75 € de la théologie, 1998. XVI-760 p. 75 € J. GROOTAERS, Actes et acteurs à Vatican II, 1998. XXIV-602 p. F. NEIRYNCK, J. VERHEYDEN & R. CORSTJENS, The Gospel of Matthew and the Sayings Source Q: A Cumulative Bibliography 1950-1995, 1998. 2 vols., VII-1000-420* p. 95 € 90 € E. BRITO, Heidegger et l’hymne du sacré, 1999. XV-800 p. 60 € J. VERHEYDEN (ed.), The Unity of Luke-Acts, 1999. XXV-828 p. N. CALDUCH-BENAGES & J. VERMEYLEN (eds.), Treasures of Wisdom. Studies in Ben Sira and the Book of Wisdom. Festschrift M. Gilbert, 1999. XXVII-463 p. 75 € J.-M. AUWERS & A. WÉNIN (eds.), Lectures et relectures de la Bible. Festschrift P.-M. Bogaert, 1999. XLII-482 p. 75 € C. BEGG, Josephus’ Story of the Later Monarchy (AJ 9,1–10,185), 2000. X-650 p. 75 € J.M. ASGEIRSSON, K. DE TROYER & M.W. MEYER (eds.), From Quest to Q. Festschrift James M. Robinson, 2000. XLIV-346 p. 60 € T. ROMER (ed.), The Future of the Deuteronomistic History, 2000. XII265 p. 75 € F.D. VANSINA, Paul Ricœur: Bibliographie primaire et secondaire - Primary 75 € and Secondary Bibliography 1935-2000, 2000. XXVI-544 p. G.J. BROOKE & J.-D. KAESTLI (eds.), Narrativity in Biblical and Related 75 € Texts, 2000. XXI-307 p.

[2]

BETL

150. F. NEIRYNCK, Evangelica III: 1992-2000. Collected Essays, 2001. XVII666 p. 60 € 151. B. DOYLE, The Apocalypse of Isaiah Metaphorically Speaking. A Study of the Use, Function and Significance of Metaphors in Isaiah 24-27, 2000. XII-453 p. 75 € 152. T. MERRIGAN & J. HAERS (eds.), The Myriad Christ. Plurality and the Quest 75 € for Unity in Contemporary Christology, 2000. XIV-593 p. 153. M. SIMON, Le catéchisme de Jean-Paul II. Genèse et évaluation de son 75 € commentaire du Symbole des apôtres, 2000. XVI-688 p. 154. J. VERMEYLEN, La loi du plus fort. Histoire de la rédaction des récits 80 € davidiques de 1 Samuel 8 à 1 Rois 2, 2000. XIII-746 p. 155. A. WÉNIN (ed.), Studies in the Book of Genesis. Literature, Redaction and 60 € History, 2001. XXX-643 p. 156. F. LEDEGANG, Mysterium Ecclesiae. Images of the Church and its Members 84 € in Origen, 2001. XVII-848 p. 157. J.S. BOSWELL, F.P. MCHUGH & J. VERSTRAETEN (eds.), Catholic Social 60 € Thought: Twilight of Renaissance, 2000. XXII-307 p. 158. A. LINDEMANN (ed.), The Sayings Source Q and the Historical Jesus, 2001. XXII-776 p. 60 € 159. C. HEMPEL, A. LANGE & H. LICHTENBERGER (eds.), The Wisdom Texts from Qumran and the Development of Sapiential Thought, 2002. XII-502 p. 80 € 160. L. BOEVE & L. LEIJSSEN (eds.), Sacramental Presence in a Postmodern 60 € Context, 2001. XVI-382 p. 161. A. DENAUX (ed.), New Testament Textual Criticism and Exegesis. Festschrift 60 € J. Delobel, 2002. XVIII-391 p. 162. U. BUSSE, Das Johannesevangelium. Bildlichkeit, Diskurs und Ritual. Mit einer Bibliographie über den Zeitraum 1986-1998, 2002. XIII-572 p. 70 € 163. J.-M. AUWERS & H.J. DE JONGE (eds.), The Biblical Canons, 2003. LXXXVIII-718 p. 60 € 164. L. PERRONE (ed.), Origeniana Octava. Origen and the Alexandrian Tradition, 180 € 2003. XXV-X-1406 p. 165. R. BIERINGER, V. KOPERSKI & B. LATAIRE (eds.), Resurrection in the New 70 € Testament. Festschrift J. Lambrecht, 2002. XXXI-551 p. 166. M. LAMBERIGTS & L. KENIS (eds.), Vatican II and Its Legacy, 2002. XII-512 p. 65 € 167. P. DIEUDONNÉ, La Paix clémentine. Défaite et victoire du premier jansénisme français sous le pontificat de Clément IX (1667-1669), 2003. XXXIX302 p. 70 € 168. F. GARCIA MARTINEZ, Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls 60 € and in the Biblical Tradition, 2003. XXXIV-491 p. 169. D. OGLIARI, Gratia et Certamen: The Relationship between Grace and Free Will in the Discussion of Augustine with the So-Called Semipelagians, 75 € 2003. LVII-468 p. 170. G. COOMAN, M. VAN STIPHOUT & B. WAUTERS (eds.), Zeger-Bernard Van Espen at the Crossroads of Canon Law, History, Theology and Church80 € State Relations, 2003. XX-530 p. 171. B. BOURGINE, L’herméneutique théologique de Karl Barth. Exégèse et dogmatique dans le quatrième volume de la Kirchliche Dogmatik, 2003. XXII-548 p. 75 €

BETL

[3]

172. J. HAERS & P. DE MEY (eds.), Theology and Conversation: Towards a 90 € Relational Theology, 2003. XIII-923 p. 173. M.J.J. MENKEN, Matthew’s Bible: The Old Testament Text of the Evangelist, 60 € 2004. XII-336 p. 174. J.-P. DELVILLE, L’Europe de l’exégèse au XVIe siècle. Interprétations de la parabole des ouvriers à la vigne (Matthieu 20,1-16), 2004. XLII-775 p. 70 € 175. E. BRITO, J.G. Fichte et la transformation du christianisme, 2004. XVI808 p. 90 € 176. J. SCHLOSSER (ed.), The Catholic Epistles and the Tradition, 2004. XXIV569 p. 60 € 177. R. FAESEN (ed.), Albert Deblaere, S.J. (1916-1994): Essays on Mystical Literature – Essais sur la littérature mystique – Saggi sulla letteratura 70 € mistica, 2004. XX-473 p. 178. J. LUST, Messianism and the Septuagint: Collected Essays. Edited by 60 € K. HAUSPIE, 2004. XIV-247 p. 179. H. GIESEN, Jesu Heilsbotschaft und die Kirche. Studien zur Eschatologie und Ekklesiologie bei den Synoptikern und im ersten Petrusbrief, 2004. XX578 p. 70 € 180. H. LOMBAERTS & D. POLLEFEYT (eds.), Hermeneutics and Religious 70 € Education, 2004. XIII-427 p. 181. D. DONNELLY, A. DENAUX & J. FAMERÉE (eds.), The Holy Spirit, the Church, and Christian Unity. Proceedings of the Consultation Held at the Monastery 70 € of Bose, Italy (14-20 October 2002), 2005. XII-417 p. 182. R. BIERINGER, G. VAN BELLE & J. VERHEYDEN (eds.), Luke and His Readers. 65 € Festschrift A. Denaux, 2005. XXVIII-470 p. 183. D.F. PILARIO, Back to the Rough Grounds of Praxis: Exploring Theological 80 € Method with Pierre Bourdieu, 2005. XXXII-584 p. 184. G. VAN BELLE, J.G. VAN DER WATT & P. MARITZ (eds.), Theology and Christology in the Fourth Gospel: Essays by the Members of the SNTS 70 € Johannine Writings Seminar, 2005. XII-561 p. 185. D. LUCIANI, Sainteté et pardon. Vol. 1: Structure littéraire du Lévitique. 120 € Vol. 2: Guide technique, 2005. XIV-VII-656 p. 186. R.A. DERRENBACKER, JR., Ancient Compositional Practices and the Synoptic 80 € Problem, 2005. XXVIII-290 p. 187. P. VAN HECKE (ed.), Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible, 2005. X-308 p. 65 € 188. L. BOEVE, Y. DEMAESENEER & S. VAN DEN BOSSCHE (eds.), Religious Experience and Contemporary Theological Epistemology, 2005. X-335 p. 50 € 189. J.M. ROBINSON, The Sayings Gospel Q. Collected Essays, 2005. XVIII888 p. 90 € 190. C.W. STRUDER, Paulus und die Gesinnung Christi. Identität und Entschei80 € dungsfindung aus der Mitte von 1Kor 1-4, 2005. LII-522 p. 191. C. FOCANT & A. WÉNIN (eds.), Analyse narrative et Bible. Deuxième colloque international du RRENAB, Louvain-la-Neuve, avril 2004, 2005. XVI-593 p. 75 € 192. F. GARCIA MARTINEZ & M. VERVENNE (eds.), in collaboration with B. DOYLE, Interpreting Translation: Studies on the LXX and Ezekiel in Honour of 70 € Johan Lust, 2005. XVI-464 p. 87 € 193. F. MIES, L’espérance de Job, 2006. XXIV-653 p.

[4]

BETL

194. C. FOCANT, Marc, un évangile étonnant, 2006. XV-402 p. 60 € 195. M.A. KNIBB (ed.), The Septuagint and Messianism, 2006. XXXI-560 p. 60 € 196. M. SIMON, La célébration du mystère chrétien dans le catéchisme de Jean85 € Paul II, 2006. XIV-638 p. 197. A.Y. THOMASSET, L’ecclésiologie de J.H. Newman Anglican, 2006. XXX748 p. 80 € 198. M. LAMBERIGTS – A.A. DEN HOLLANDER (eds.), Lay Bibles in Europe 145079 € 1800, 2006. XI-360 p. 199. J.Z. SKIRA – M.S. ATTRIDGE, In God’s Hands. Essays on the Church and 90 € Ecumenism in Honour of Michael A. Fahey S.J., 2006. XXX-314 p. 200. G. VAN BELLE (ed.), The Death of Jesus in the Fourth Gospel, 2007. XXXI1003 p. 70 € 80 € 201. D. POLLEFEYT (ed.), Interreligious Learning, 2007. XXV-340 p. 202. M. LAMBERIGTS – L. BOEVE – T. MERRIGAN, in collaboration with D. CLAES (eds.), Theology and the Quest for Truth: Historical- and Systematic55 € Theological Studies, 2007. X-305 p. 203. T. RÖMER – K. SCHMID (eds.), Les dernières rédactions du Pentateuque, 65 € de l’Hexateuque et de l’Ennéateuque, 2007. X-276 p. 204. J.-M. VAN CANGH, Les sources judaïques du Nouveau Testament, 2008. XIV718 p. 84 € 205. B. DEHANDSCHUTTER, Polycarpiana: Studies on Martyrdom and Persecution in Early Christianity. Collected Essays. Edited by J. LEEMANS, 2007. XVI286 p. 74 € 206. É. GAZIAUX, Philosophie et Théologie. Festschrift Emilio Brito, 2007. LVIII-588 p. 84 € 207. G.J. BROOKE – T. RÖMER (eds.), Ancient and Modern Scriptural Historiography. L’historiographie biblique, ancienne et moderne, 2007. XXXVIII372 p. 75 € 208. J. VERSTRAETEN, Scrutinizing the Signs of the Times in the Light of the 74 € Gospel, 2007. X-334 p. 209. H. GEYBELS, Cognitio Dei experimentalis. A Theological Genealogy of 80 € Christian Religious Experience, 2007. LII-457 p. 210. A.A. DEN HOLLANDER, Virtuelle Vergangenheit: Die Textrekonstruktion einer verlorenen mittelniederländischen Evangelienharmonie. Die Hand58 € schrift Utrecht Universitätsbibliothek 1009, 2007. XII-168 p. 211. R. GRYSON, Scientiam Salutis: Quarante années de recherches sur l’Antiquité 88 € Chrétienne. Recueil d’essais, 2008. XLVI-879 p. 212. T. VAN DEN DRIESSCHE, L’altérité, fondement de la personne humaine dans 85 € l’œuvre d’Edith Stein, 2008. XXII-626 p. 213. H. AUSLOOS – J. COOK – F. GARCIA MARTINEZ – B. LEMMELIJN – M. VERVENNE (eds.), Translating a Translation: The LXX and its Modern Translations in 80 € the Context of Early Judaism, 2008. X-317 p. 214. A.C. OSUJI, Where is the Truth? Narrative Exegesis and the Question of 76 € True and False Prophecy in Jer 26–29 (MT), 2010. XX-465 p. 215. T. RÖMER, The Books of Leviticus and Numbers, 2008. XXVII-742 p. 85 € 216. D. DONNELLY – J. FAMERÉE – M. LAMBERIGTS – K. SCHELKENS (eds.), The Belgian Contribution to the Second Vatican Council: International Research Conference at Mechelen, Leuven and Louvain-la-Neuve 85 € (September 12-16, 2005), 2008. XII-716 p.

BETL

[5]

217. J. DE TAVERNIER – J.A. SELLING – J. VERSTRAETEN – P. SCHOTSMANS (eds.), Responsibility, God and Society. Theological Ethics in Dialogue. 75 € Festschrift Roger Burggraeve, 2008. XLVI-413 p. 218. G. VAN BELLE – J.G. VAN DER WATT – J. VERHEYDEN (eds.), Miracles and Imagery in Luke and John. Festschrift Ulrich Busse, 2008. XVIII-287 p. 78 € 219. L. BOEVE – M. LAMBERIGTS – M. WISSE (eds.), Augustine and Postmodern 80 € Thought: A New Alliance against Modernity?, 2009. XVIII-277 p. 220. T. VICTORIA, Un livre de feu dans un siècle de fer: Les lectures de l’Apocalypse 85 € dans la littérature française de la Renaissance, 2009. XXX-609 p. 221. A.A. DEN HOLLANDER – W. FRANÇOIS (eds.), Infant Milk or Hardy Nourishment? The Bible for Lay People and Theologians in the Early Modern 80 € Period, 2009. XVIII-488 p. 222. F.D. VANSINA, Paul Ricœur. Bibliographie primaire et secondaire. Primary and Secundary Bibliography 1935-2008, Compiled and updated in colla80 € boration with P. VANDECASTEELE, 2008. XXX-621 p. 223. G. VAN BELLE – M. LABAHN – P. MARITZ (eds.), Repetitions and Variations 85 € in the Fourth Gospel: Style, Text, Interpretation, 2009. XII-712 p. 224. H. AUSLOOS – B. LEMMELIJN – M. VERVENNE (eds.), Florilegium Lovaniense: Studies in Septuagint and Textual Criticism in Honour of Florentino García 80 € Martínez, 2008. XVI-564 p. 225. E. BRITO, Philosophie moderne et christianisme, 2010. 2 vol., VIII-1514 p. 130 € 85 € 226. U. SCHNELLE (ed.), The Letter to the Romans, 2009. XVIII-894 p. 227. M. LAMBERIGTS – L. BOEVE – T. MERRIGAN in collaboration with D. CLAES – 74 € M. WISSE (eds.), Orthodoxy, Process and Product, 2009. X-416 p. 228. G. HEIDL – R. SOMOS (eds.), Origeniana Nona: Origen and the Religious 95 € Practice of His Time, 2009. XIV-752 p. 229. D. MARGUERAT (ed.), Reception of Paulinism in Acts – Réception du 74 € paulinisme dans les Actes des Apôtres, 2009. VIII-340 p. 230. A. DILLEN – D. POLLEFEYT (eds.), Children’s Voices: Children’s Perspectives in Ethics, Theology and Religious Education, 2010. x-450 p. 72 € 231. P. VAN HECKE – A. LABAHN (eds.), Metaphors in the Psalms, 2010. XXXIV363 p. 76 € 232. G. AULD – E. EYNIKEL (eds.), For and Against David: Story and History in the Books of Samuel, 2010. x-397 p. 76 € 233. C. VIALLE, Une analyse comparée d’Esther TM et LXX: Regard sur deux 76 € récits d’une même histoire, 2010. LVIII-406 p. 234. T. MERRIGAN – F. GLORIEUX (eds.), “Godhead Here in Hiding”: Incarnation and the History of Human Suffering, 2012. x-327 p. 76 € 235. M. SIMON, La vie dans le Christ dans le catéchisme de Jean-Paul II, 2010. xx-651 p. 84 € 236. G. DE SCHRIJVER, The Political Ethics of Jean-François Lyotard and Jacques Derrida, 2010. xxx-422 p. 80 € 237. A. PASQUIER – D. MARGUERAT – A. WÉNIN (eds.), L’intrigue dans le récit biblique. Quatrième colloque international du RRENAB, Université Laval, 68 € Québec, 29 mai – 1er juin 2008, 2010. xxx-479 p. 238. E. ZENGER (ed.), The Composition of the Book of Psalms, 2010. XII-826 p. 90 €

[6]

BETL

239. P. FOSTER – A. GREGORY – J.S. KLOPPENBORG – J. VERHEYDEN (eds.), New Studies in the Synoptic Problem: Oxford Conference, April 2008, 2011. XXIV-828 p. 85 € 240. J. VERHEYDEN – T.L. HETTEMA – P. VANDECASTEELE (eds.), Paul Ricœur: 79 € Poetics and Religion, 2011. XX-534 p. 241. J. LEEMANS (ed.), Martyrdom and Persecution in Late Ancient Christianity. 78 € Festschrift Boudewijn Dehandschutter, 2010. XXXIV-430 p. 242. C. CLIVAZ – J. ZUMSTEIN (eds.), Reading New Testament Papyri in Context – Lire les papyrus du Nouveau Testament dans leur contexte, 2011. XIV-446 p. 80 € 243. D. SENIOR (ed.), The Gospel of Matthew at the Crossroads of Early 88 € Christianity, 2011. XXVIII-781 p. 244. H. PIETRAS – S. KACZMAREK (eds.), Origeniana Decima: Origen as Writer, 105 € 2011. XVIII-1039 p. 245. M. SIMON, La prière chrétienne dans le catéchisme de Jean-Paul II, 2012. XVI-290 p. 70 € 246. H. AUSLOOS – B. LEMMELIJN – J. TREBOLLE-BARRERA (eds.), After Qumran: Old and Modern Editions of the Biblical Texts – The Historical Books, 84 € 2012. XIV-319 p. 247. G. VAN OYEN – A. WÉNIN (eds.), La surprise dans la Bible. Festschrift 80 € Camille Focant, 2012. XLII-474 p. 248. C. CLIVAZ – C. COMBET-GALLAND – J.-D. MACCHI – C. NIHAN (eds.), Écritures et réécritures: la reprise interprétative des traditions fondatrices par la littérature biblique et extra-biblique. Cinquième colloque international du RRENAB, Universités de Genève et Lausanne, 10-12 juin 2010, 2012. XXIV-648 p. 90 € 249. G. VAN OYEN – T. SHEPHERD (eds.), Resurrection of the Dead: Biblical 85 € Traditions in Dialogue, 2012. XVI-632 p. 90 € 250. E. NOORT (ed.), The Book of Joshua, 2012. XIV-698 p. 251. R. FAESEN – L. KENIS (eds.), The Jesuits of the Low Countries: Identity and Impact (1540-1773). Proceedings of the International Congress at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven (3-5 December 2009), 65 € 2012. X-295 p. 252. A. DAMM, Ancient Rhetoric and the Synoptic Problem: Clarifying Markan 85 € Priority, 2013. XXXVIII-396 p. 253. A. DENAUX – P. DE MEY (eds.), The Ecumenical Legacy of Johannes 79 € Cardinal Willebrands (1909-2006), 2012. XIV-376 p. 254. T. KNIEPS-PORT LE ROI – G. MANNION – P. DE MEY (eds.), The Household of God and Local Households: Revisiting the Domestic Church, 2013. XI-407 p. 82 € 255. L. KENIS – E. VAN DER WALL (eds.), Religious Modernism of the Low Coun75 € tries, 2013. X-271 p. 256. P. IDE, Une Théo-logique du Don: Le Don dans la Trilogie de Hans Urs von 98 € Balthasar, 2013. XXX-759 p. 257. W. FRANÇOIS – A. DEN HOLLANDER (eds.), “Wading Lambs and Swimming Elephants”: The Bible for the Laity and Theologians in the Late Medieval 84 € and Early Modern Era, 2012. XVI-406 p. 258. A. LIÉGOIS – R. BURGGRAEVE – M. RIEMSLAGH – J. CORVELEYN (eds.), “After You!”: Dialogical Ethics and the Pastoral Counselling Process, 79 € 2013. XXII-279 p.

BETL

[7]

259. C. KALONJI NKOKESHA, Penser la tradition avec Walter Kasper: Pertinence d’une catholicité historiquement et culturellement ouverte, 2013. XXIV320 p. 79 € 260. J. SCHRÖTER (ed.), The Apocryphal Gospels within the Context of Early 90 € Christian Theology, 2013. XII-804 p. 261. P. DE MEY – P. DE WITTE – G. MANNION (eds.), Believing in Community: 90 € Ecumenical Reflections on the Church, 2013. XIV-608 p. 262. F. DEPOORTERE – J. HAERS (eds.), To Discern Creation in a Scattering 90 € World, 2013. XII-597 p. 263. L. BOEVE – T. MERRIGAN, in collaboration with C. DICKINSON (eds.), Tradi55 € tion and the Normativity of History, 2013. X-215 p. 264. M. GILBERT, Ben Sira. Recueil d’études – Collected Essays, 2014. XIV-402 p. 87 € 265. J. VERHEYDEN – G. VAN OYEN – M. LABAHN – R. BIERINGER (eds.), Studies in the Gospel of John and Its Christology. Festschrift Gilbert Van Belle, 94 € 2014. XXXVI-656 p. 266. W. DE PRIL, Theological Renewal and the Resurgence of Integrism: The 85 € René Draguet Case (1942) in Its Context, 2016. XLIV-333 p. 267. L.O. JIMÉNEZ-RODRÍGUEZ, The Articulation between Natural Sciences and Systematic Theology: A Philosophical Mediation Based on Contributions 94 € of Jean Ladrière and Xavier Zubiri, 2015. XXIV-541 p. 268. E. BIRNBAUM – L. SCHWIENHORST-SCHÖNBERGER (eds.), Hieronymus als Exeget und Theologe: Interdisziplinäre Zugänge zum Koheletkommentar 80 € des Hieronymus, 2014. XVIII-333 p. 269. H. AUSLOOS – B. LEMMELIJN (eds.), A Pillar of Cloud to Guide: Text-critical, Redactional, and Linguistic Perspectives on the Old Testament in Honour 90 € of Marc Vervenne, 2014. XXVIII-636 p. 270. E. TIGCHELAAR (ed.), Old Testament Pseudepigrapha and the Scriptures, 95 € 2014. XXVI-526 p. 271. E. BRITO, Sur l’homme: Une traversée de la question anthropologique, 2015. XVI-2045 p. (2 vol.) 215 € 272. P. WATINE CHRISTORY, Dialogue et Communion: L’itinéraire œcuménique 98 € de Jean-Marie R. Tillard, 2015. XXIV-773 p. 273. R. BURNET – D. LUCIANI – G. VAN OYEN (eds.), Le lecteur: Sixième Colloque International du RRENAB, Université Catholique de Louvain, 85 € 24-26 mai 2012, 2015. XIV-530 p. 274. G.B. BAZZANA, Kingdom of Bureaucracy: The Political Theology of Village 85 € Scribes in the Sayings Gospel Q, 2015. XII-383 p. 275. J.-P. GALLEZ, La théologie comme science herméneutique de la tradition de foi: Une lecture de «Dieu qui vient à l’homme» de Joseph Moingt, 2015. XIX-476 p. 94 € 276. J. VERMEYLEN, Métamorphoses: Les rédactions successives du livre de Job, 84 € 2015. XVI-410 p. 277. C. BREYTENBACH (ed.), Paul’s Graeco-Roman Context, 2015. XXII-751 p. 94 € 278. J. GELDHOF (ed.), Mediating Mysteries, Understanding Liturgies: On Bridging the Gap between Liturgy and Systematic Theology, 2015. X-256 p. 78 € 279. A.-C. JACOBSEN (ed.), Origeniana Undecima: Origen and Origenism in the 125 € History of Western Thought, 2016. XVI-978 p.

[8]

BETL

280. F. WILK – P. GEMEINHARDT (eds.), Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, 2016. XII-490 p. 95 € 281. J.-M. SEVRIN, Le quatrième évangile. Recueil d’études. Édité par G. VAN 86 € BELLE, 2016. XIV-281 p. 282. L. BOEVE – M. LAMBERIGTS – T. MERRIGAN (eds.), The Normativity of History: Theological Truth and Tradition in the Tension between Church 78 € History and Systematic Theology, 2016. XII-273 p. 283. R. BIERINGER – B. BAERT – K. DEMASURE (eds.), Noli me tangere in Interdisciplinary Perspective: Textual, Iconographic and Contemporary Inter89 € pretations, 2016. XXII-508 p. 284. W. DIETRICH (ed.), The Books of Samuel: Stories – History – Reception 96 € History, 2016. XXIV-650 p. 285. W.E. ARNAL – R.S. ASCOUGH – R.A. DERRENBACKER, JR. – P.A. HARLAND (eds.), Scribal Practices and Social Structures among Jesus Adherents: 115 € Essays in Honour of John S. Kloppenborg, 2016. XXIV-630 p. 286. C.E. WOLFTEICH – A. DILLEN (eds.), Catholic Approaches in Practical Theology: International and Interdisciplinary Perspectives, 2016. X-290 p. 85 € 287. W. FRANÇOIS – A.A. DEN HOLLANDER (eds.), Vernacular Bible and Religious Reform in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Era, 2017. VIII-305 p. 94 € 288. P. RODRIGUES, C’est ta face que je cherche … La rationalité de la théologie 92 € selon Jean Ladrière, 2017. XIV-453 p. 289. J. FAMERÉE, Ecclésiologie et œcuménisme. Recueil d’études, 2017. XVIII668 p. 94 € 290. P. COOPER – S. KIKUCHI (eds.), Commitments to Medieval Mysticism within 79 € Contemporary Contexts, 2017. XVI-382 p. 291. A. YARBRO COLLINS (ed.), New Perspectives on the Book of Revelation, 98 € 2017. X-644 p. 292. J. FAMERÉE – P. RODRIGUES (eds.), The Genesis of Concepts and the 78 € Confrontation of Rationalities, 2018. XIV-245 p. 293. E. DI PEDE – O. FLICHY – D. LUCIANI (eds.), Le Récit: Thèmes bibliques et 95 € variations, 2018. XIV-412 p. 294. J. ARBLASTER – R. FAESEN (eds.), Theosis/Deification: Christian Doctrines 84 € of Divinization East and West, 2018. VII-262 p. 295. H.-J. FABRY (ed.), The Books of the Twelve Prophets: Minor Prophets – 105 € Major Theologies, 2018. XXIV-557 p. 296. H. AUSLOOS – D. LUCIANI (eds.), Temporalité et intrigue. Hommage à 95 € André Wénin, 2018. XL-362 p. 297. A.C. MAYER (ed.), The Letter and the Spirit: On the Forgotten Documents 85 € of Vatican II, 2018. X-296 p. 298. A. BEGASSE DE DHAEM – E. GALLI – M. MALAGUTI – C. SALTO SOLÁ (eds.), Deus summe cognoscibilis: The Current Theological Relevance of Saint Bonaventure International Congress, Rome, November 15-17, 2017, 2018. XII-716 p. 85 € 299. M. LAMBERIGTS – W. DE PRIL (eds.), Louvain, Belgium and Beyond: Studies in Religious History in Honour of Leo Kenis, 2018. XVIII-517 p. 95 € 300. E. BRITO, De Dieu. Connaissance et inconnaissance, 2018. LVIII-634 + 635-1255 p. 155 €

BETL

[9]

301. G. VAN OYEN (ed.), Reading the Gospel of Mark in the Twenty-first Century: Method and Meaning, 2019. XXIV-933 p. 105 € 302. B. BITTON-ASHKELONY – O. IRSHAI – A. KOFSKY – H. NEWMAN – L. PERRONE (eds.), Origeniana Duodecima: Origen’s Legacy in the Holy Land – A Tale of Three Cities: Jerusalem, Caesarea and Bethlehem, 2019. XIV-893 p. 125 € 303. D. BOSSCHAERT, The Anthropological Turn, Christian Humanism, and Vatican II: Louvain Theologians Preparing the Path for Gaudium et Spes 89 € (1942-1965), 2019. LXVIII-432 p. 304. I. KOCH – T. RÖMER – O. SERGI (eds.), Writing, Rewriting, and Overwriting in the Books of Deuteronomy and the Former Prophets. Essays in Honour 85 € of Cynthia Edenburg, 2019. XVI-401 p. 305. W.A.M. BEUKEN, From Servant of YHWH to Being Considerate of the Wretched: The Figure David in the Reading Perspective of Psalms 35–41 69 € MT, 2020. XIV-173 p. 306. P. DE MEY – W. FRANÇOIS (eds.), Ecclesia semper reformanda: Renewal 94 € and Reform beyond Polemics, 2020. X-477 p. 307. D. HÉTIER, Éléments d’une théologie fondamentale de la création artistique: Les écrits théologiques sur l’art chez Karl Rahner (1954-1983) forthcoming 308. P.-M. BOGAERT, Le livre de Jérémie en perspective: Les deux rédactions conservées et l’addition du supplément sous le nom de Baruch. Recueil de forthcoming ses travaux réunis par J.-C. HAELEWYCK – S. KINDT 309. D. VERDE – A. LABAHN (eds.), Networks of Metaphors in the Hebrew Bible. X-395 p. 85 € 310. P. VAN HECKE (ed.), The Song of Songs in Its Context: Words for Love, Love for Words forthcoming 311. A. WÉNIN (ed.), La contribution du discours à la caractérisation des personnages bibliques. Neuvième colloque international du RRENAB, Louvain95 € la-Neuve, 31 mai – 2 juin 2018. XX-424 p.

PRINTED ON PERMANENT PAPER

• IMPRIME

SUR PAPIER PERMANENT

N.V. PEETERS S.A., WAROTSTRAAT

• GEDRUKT

OP DUURZAAM PAPIER

50, B-3020 HERENT

- ISO 9706