II.4. The two saints in thirteenth and early-fourteenth century sermons
II.4.2 The sermons on the founder and the martyr in Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Cod
lat. 22363b (“Pécsi Egyetemi Beszédek”)
The collection of sermons referred to as Sermones compilati in studio generali Quinqueecclensiensi in regno Ungarie was composed probably sometime between 1255 and 1275 by a Dominican friar for a Dominican audience but survived only in a copy made in a
364 Vizkelety, Az európai prédikációirodalom recepciója a Leuveni kódexben, 157.
365 Vizkelety, Az európai prédikációirodalom , 158.
366 ―filii et fratres sui [Dominici] effodientes posuerant ea in monumento nouo, in quo nondum quisquam positus fuerat.‖ Vizkelety, Az európai prédikációirodalom, 167.
367 ―Item deuota populi ueneracione, quia hossa eius desiderabilia sunt hominibus super aurum et lapidem preciosum multum non solum ad habendum, uerum eciam ad uidendum et dulciora super mel et fauum.‖
Vizkelety, Az európai prédikációirodalom, 167.
368 ―Item rara miraculorum operacione, qui non solum in Hyspania uel Lombardia, uerum eciam in nostra Hungaria cataueratim ruunt hominess cernere cupientes, que per eum fiunt mirabilia.‖ Vizkelety, Az európai prédikációirodalom, 167.
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German territory at the turn of the fourteenth-fifteenth century.369 Its de sanctis part contains several sermons on the Hungarian royal saints (five on St. Stephen, one on St. Emeric, two on St. Ladislaus and four on St. Elizabeth), thus in all likelihood it was composed in Hungary.370 The composition of the collection of sermons is no longer linked to Pécs; it seems that it was compiled and used at the Dominican studium generale of Buda founded in 1304.371 As it has been shown by Edit Madas, these high-quality scholastic model sermons –abundant in citations from classical authorities–372 were written for the Dominican novices and manifest a great number of reflections on preaching, such as learning the summa veritas, the conditions of preaching and understanding, the suitability and the alertness of the preacher.373 The examples to follow were the apostles, the doctors of the Church and two great saints of the Order, Ss.
Dominic and Peter of Verona who had a privileged position in the Sermones compilati as it is attested by the seven and five sermons dedicated to their feasts, respectively. The sermons on the basis of which the Sermones compilati was made (1255-1275) were early ones, especially in the case of Peter. They are reported in Schneyer‘s catalogue but no textual parallels can be
369 Eduardus Petrovich and Paulus Ladislaus Timkovics, ed., Sermones compilati in studio generali Quinqueecclensiensi in regno Ungarie (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1993). On the collection, see Edit Madas, Edit Madas, ―A Dominican Sermon Collection,‖ Budapest Review of Books 6 (1996): 193-199; eadem, Középkori prédikációirodalmunk történetéből, 132-196. The dating of the composition is based on internal evidence: the latest saint in the collection is Peter of Verona canonized by Pope Innocent IV in 1253 and the latest quoted authority is the pope himself who died in 1254; Thomas Aquinas who died in 1274 is not cited at all. However, there is no scholarly consensus about the date of composition: the fact that the great Dominican theologian is not quoted does not necesseraly mean that the collection was written earlier than his death. The only fix date seems to be that it was ready by the beginning of the fourteenth century since one of the sermons of the collection turns up in an early fourteenth-century collection of sermons. For a re-examination of the dating in the light of Latin translations of Aristotle, see Péter Molnár, ―Az ún. Pécsi egyetemi beszédek egyik forrásáról (Az arisztotelészi inspirációjú politikai elmélet lehetőségei Magyarországon a XIII. század második felében)‖ [On One of the Sources of the so-called University sermons composed in Pécs (The possibilities of the Aristotle-inspired political theory in Hungary in the second half of the thirteenth century)], in Arcana tabularii. Tanulmányok Solymosi László tiszteletére, ed.
Attila Bárány, Gábor Dreska and Kornél Szovák (Budapest-Debrecen: [Debreceni Egyetem], 2014 ) vol. 2, 733-742.
370 Gábor Klaniczay, ―Nemzeti szentek a késő középkori egyetemeken‖ [National saints in late medival universities in Változatok a történelemre. Tanulmányok Székely György tiszteletére, ed. Gyöngyi Erdei and Balázs Nagy (Budapest: Budapest Történeti Múzeum – ELTE BTK Középkori és Kora Újkori Egyetemes Tanszék, 1983), 237-250 at 246-247.
371 Harsányi, A domonkos rend Magyarországon, 145-146.
372 Pál Timkovics, A ―Pécsi egyetemi beszédek szellemi háttere,‖ Irodalomtudományi Közlemények 83 (1979): 1-13; Edit Madas, ―Emlìtett és idézett klasszikus auktorok a középkori magyarországi prédikációirodalomban‖, Magyar Könyvszemle 115 (1999), 277-286, available also in French: ―Les auteurs classiques mentionnés et cites dans les sermonnaires de la Hongroise de Moyen Âge,‖ in: L’eredità classica in Italia e Ungheria fra tardo Medioevo e primo Rinascimento, ed. Sante Graciotti and Amadeo Di Francesco (Rome: Il calamo, 2001), 119-132.
373 Madas, Középkori prédikációirodalmunk, 137-141.
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found to them and it is not known who their author could have been.374 This subsection consists of two parts: in the first I discuss the sermons on St Dominic, and then I proceed with those on Peter of Verona.
In the case of St Dominic, I examine whether the sermons reveal the characteristics of
―mendicant sanctity‖ and explore which the most important virtues of the saint were and to what extent these have remained in the foreground or were substituted by other ones about half a century following his canonization. In the instructive inventory of Dominic‘s virtues based on the Bologna canonization process gathered by Vicaire,375 the most prominent qualities of the founder were his love for the regularitas (in the sense of respecting the norms and the prescriptions on the conventual-canonical life: recital of the offices, fasting, obedience, etc.), steadfastness in prayer, piety, humility, care for the souls, persecution of the heretics, love of poverty, joyfulness in tribulations, steadfastness in preaching, and chastity.376 However, virtues that later became frequently occurring attributes to his saintly image, like his education or erudition, the gift of tears, miracles, yearning for martyrdom, self-discipline, were not mentioned in the process. Since academic training was a prerequisite for the office of preaching in the two great mendicant orders that both had hierarchies of study centres and had the most systematic and efficient networks of education in the thirteenth century, I also consider the formative aspect in these sermons, namely how the Order of Preachers and their main activity are presented by an erudite Dominican to the novices his Order through which they were prepared for their vocation.
The sermons on St Dominic
For the sermons on St. Dominic, the author presumably used Humbert of Romans‘s official legend, and also often took expressions from the rhymed offices composed for the feast of the
374 Johannes Baptis Schneyer, Repertorium der lateinischen Sermones des Mittelalters für die Zeit von 1150-1350 (Münster: Auflage, c. 1999), vol. 6, 578.
375 Marie-Humbert Vicaire, Histoire de Saint Dominique (Paris: Les Editions du Cerf, 1957; 2nd edition Paris: Les editions du Cerf, 1982), 231-233, quoted in Canetti, L’invenzione della memoria, 137.
376 The entire list consists of 25 virtues; here I just referred to the seven most important ones and the five ones which were not include in the testimonies. See the list and its analysis in Canetti, L’invenzione della memoria, 139-151.
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saint and his translatio.377 He used only few biographical references from the life of the founding father, characteristically when he wanted to illustrate a virtue of the saint with examples from his life. For instance, to underscore Dominic‘s abstinence from eating meat, a practice that he extended over his order, he writes that ―[Dominic] once told his hosts to bring them only bread and water, and also that he did not drink wine for ten years, and he introduced in his Order not to eat meat unless the gravity of illness requires it.‖378 The emanation of sweet fragrance from his body turns also up in one of the sermons,379 which was such an indisputable sign of his sanctity that it became an important element in all his vitae as well as in the antiphon of the primus nocturnus of his rhymed office.380 A particularly good example for the application of hagiographic themes in the sermons, when the preacher explains Dominic‘s ascent to heaven through four steps: the gift of continence, the light of intelligence, the feeling of love, and the institution of the order:
For these four [grades] it is proper compare him to salt, light, ardent oil lamp, and to a city built on a high place. So through the gift of continence, since as salt keeps away the worms from the meat, he separated himself from carnal things and was like fat separated from meat living an excellent celibate life [...]. And also, he was light because of the light of intelligence, in whose mouth a burning torch381 and on whose forehead a shining star appeared,382 the splendour of which illuminated the whole world. He was also Elias,383who appeared as fire and whose words were burning as a torch, Eccli.46384. And also he was ardent because of the love of God that came from within [...]. He was a city built on a high place by founding excellently his order [...].385
377 Analecta hymnica medii aevi, Historiae rhythmicae. Liturgische Reimofficien des Mittelalters, vol. XXV, ed.
Clemens Blume and Guido M. Dreves (Leipzig: O. R. Reisland, 1897), 239-243.
378 Sermones compilati, sermo 70, p.154: ―(...) dicebat hospitibus suis: panem nobis et aquam tantum exhibete. Et vinum per decennium non bibebat et instituit in ordine suo, ut carnes non comendantur, nisi in necessitate gravioris infirmitatis (...).‖
379 Sermones compilati, sermo 70, pp. 153; 155.
380 Analecta hymnica medii aevi, XXV, 239.
381 Cf. Jordan of Saxony, Libellus, §5.
382 Cf. Jordan of Saxony, Libellus, §9 and Analecta hymnica medii aevi, XXV, 239: Stella micans / in fronte parvuli.
383 Cf. Jordan of Saxony, Libellus, §23.
384 recte Eccli. 48:1, see Sermones compilati, sermo 73, p. 159.
385 Sermones compilati, sermo 73, p. 159: ―Primus est donum continencie, secundus lumen intelligencie, tercius affeccio amoris, quartus institucio ordinis. Propter ista quattour merito conparatur sali et luci, lucerne ardenti et civitati eminenti. Fuit ergo sal per donum continencie, quia sicut sal arcet vermes a carnibus, sic ipse separavit a se carnalitates et erat quasi adeps separatus a carne tenendo eximie vite celibatum [...]. Fuit eciam lux per lumen intelligencie in cuius signum in ore eius apparuit ardens facula, Eccli. 46. Fuit eciam ardens amando Dominum intime [...]. Fuit eciam civitas eminens exiliendo ordinem suum eximie [...].‖
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Among the merits attributed to Dominic in the seven sermons of the Sermones compilati, one finds the general praise of his manner of life and the integrity of his morals.386In addition, he is presented as the executor of good works, the preacher of truth, whose sanctity manifested in the act of contemplation, in steadfastness in reaching his goals, in charity and humility.387 The preacher praises Dominic also for personal characteristics and deeds that cannot be regarded as virtues in a strict sense, nevertheless they were essential components in his sanctity: his steadfastness in learning,388 his intelligence, affection, and the foundation of the Order of Preachers.389
The chastity of the saint was much emphasized in the Languedoc part of his canonization process (generally referred to as Acts of Toulouse) and became a popular theme also in his hagiography.390 In one of sermons the preservation of his virginity is one of the three gifts of sanctity.391 The salt metaphor is used again in connection to chastity but at this time applied generally to the Order of Preachers whose two outstanding virtues are cleanness (salt) and science (light) which could be both found in Dominic, since serving the flower of chastity by serving intact he gained the excellent life of celibacy.392 Although starting from his canonization process, chastity was certainly among the almost always mentioned virtues of Dominic both in hagiographic and sermon literature, an obviously salient role can be perceived in the sermons composed for Dominican novices whose moral education was one of the goals of the author.
If one is looking for hints how the new saintly ideal was reflected in the sermons composed on the founding father of one of the two great mendicant orders, (s)he might be disappointed: with the exception of the activity of preaching –which was doubtlessly, as the sermons attest, the distinctive feature of the Dominicans, it is only the first sermon on the saint of the collection
386 Sermones compilati, sermo 74, p. 160.
387 Sermones compilati, sermo 71, pp. 155-157.
388 Sermones compilati, sermo 72, p. 157.
389 Sermones compilati, sermo 73, pp. 158-159.
390 Edited by Angelus Walz in Monumenta historica patris nostri Dominici MOPH 16 (Rome:1935), 173-187.
391Sermones compilati, sermo 70, p. 153: ―Beatus Dominicus habuit donum sanctitatis de celo, et hoc in conservacione virginitatis, et indicium sanctitatis in mundo, et hoc in vapuracione odoris.‖
392 Sermones compilati, sermo 93, p. 199: ―Eminencia dignitatis predicatorum constitit in sciencia et mundicia.
Racione mundicie dicuntur sal, racione sciencie dicuntur lux. Utrumque autem fuit in Sancto Dominico, scilicet donum continencie, quoniam florem pudicicie servans illibatum attigit eximie vite celibatum.‖
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that shed some light on this issue. In the section that treats the three ways Dominic was just: in the custody of his senses, his poverty in things, and his temperance in eating. As the author writes with reference to Luke 24:49,
[t]he custody of senses is shown that he lived in a convent, where he was hiding and kept himself away from his enemies and protected himself from the seducers, similarly to the apostles who settled down in cities while they would be dressed in virtue and would become undefeatable by pleasures. But many flee from the protection of the cloister and they frequently roll themselves in the multitude of people in the manner of a hunting spear, imitating the apostles. About whom Horace writes in the Epistles: ‗You hate the keys and seals that please the modest. You chafe at being shown to just a few and praise a public life.‘393
As to the second, the preacher says about Dominic that ―his poverty in goods was testified by his vow because he professed poverty similar to Christ who was poor by birth‖ and who
―invokes the curse of God and his [i.e. Christ‘s] to the person who would defile with the dust of earthly things his order that the practice of poverty decorates superbly since by this it would move away from the sequela Christi.‖394 That is the only locus in the sermons composed on St.
Dominic where the apostolic poverty of the Order of Preachers is mentioned. It clearly shows what has been pointed out a long time ago by several scholars, namely that for the thirteenth-century Dominicans the practice of poverty was not an aim or a virtue by itself but a necessary means for following the footpath of Christ.395 As to the third reason why Dominic was a just person, namely in his fasting habits and moderation in eating, it should be noted that while
393 Sermones compilati, sermo 70, p. 154: ―Custodia sensum protestatur in eo habitacio claustri, ubi latuit et custodivit semetipsum ab inimicis et tutavit se a seductoribus, ad similitudinem apostolorum, qui sederunt in civitate, donec induerentur virtute et fierent invincibiles a voluptate, Lucas ultimo. Sed multi fugiunt custodiam claustri et frequentant multitudinem populi se volutari in venabulo ad instar apostoli. De quibus Oracius in epistolis: odisti clavis et grata sigilla pudico, paucis ostendi gemis et communia laudas, in conventus publicos.‖
The quotationis from Horatio‘s Epistoles 1.20.3-4; the English translation is from Ancient Literacies: The Culture of Reading in Greece and Rome, ed. William A. Johnson and Holt N. Parker (Oxford. Oxford University Press, 2009), 153.
394 Sermones compilati, sermo 70, p. 154: Paupertatem rerum protestatur in eo condicio voti, quia in profitebatur paupertatem ad similitudinem Christi, qui pauper fuit in ingressu […] et malediccionem Dei et suam inprecatus est illum, qui ordinem suum fedaret pulvere rerum terrenarum, quem maxime decorat professio paupertatis, quia per hoc recederet a sequela Christi.‖
395 Cf. Anthony John Lappin‘s chapter ―From Osma to Bologna, from Canons to Friars, from the Preaching to the Preachers: The Dominican Path Towards Mendicancy‖ and Donald Prudlo‘s chapter ―Mendicancy among the Early Saints of the Begging Orders‖ in The Origin, Development, and Refinement of Medieval Religious Mendicancies, ed. Donald Prudlo (Leiden: Brill, 2011), at 31-58 and 85-116, respectively, as well as Julia Burkhard, ―Poverty in 13th-century Dominican Writing,‖ in Rules and Observance: Devising Forms of Communal Life, ed. Mirko Breitenstein et al. (Berlin: Lit, 2014), 265-279.
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fasting had already been the part of monastic life, it gained a new impetus at the beginning of the thirteenth century, first advocated by the heretical sects, like the Waldensians and especially the Cathars, and subsequently taken over by the mendicant orders.396
Although virtues, like humility and charity, and spiritual activities, like contemplation, which have all become increasingly important in the lives of saints in the thirteenth century, do turn up in one of the sermons,397 much more importance is given by the author to the saint‘s deeds and words who ―was the executor of good works and the preacher of the highest truth because he worked and taught.‖398 The preacher dwells on this thread when he describes the service of the saint in binary terms: preaching and labouring, action and contemplation, living according to the Rule of St Augustine and to the constitutions added to it.399 As the author displays in his first sermon on St. Dominic, the coexistence of the two manners of living a cloistered life, the traditional monastic one and the new, rather different type associated with the mendicant orders show that not even by the second half of the thirteenth century was there a clear-cut division between the two lifestyles and sets of values but they rather complemented each other.
The author of the sermons presents St. Dominic as the par excellence friar preacher who would first learn and only then teach. The Sermones compilati collection was presumably written for the novices of the Order of Preachers who would be prepared for their future tasks in these years, so in the sermons compiled for the feast of the founding father much emphasis is given to these two duties and they also reveal some clues to the self-perception of the author as the member of the Ordo Praedicatorum that he wished to transmit to younger generations. As it has been already mentioned, according to author of the sermons, a crucial step for Dominic‘s glorification was the foundation of the order.400 The author explains how from God all power was passed on to people by Christ, and from him it was passed to the apostles, and then to the
396 On the relation between asceticism and sainthood in the later Middle Ages, see Vauchez, Sainthood in the later Middle Ages, 190-197, on charity and labour 199-207.
397 Sermones compilati, sermo 71, p. 156.
398 Sermones compilati, sermo 71, p. 156: ―Beatus ergo Dominicus fuit executor boni operis et predicator summe veritatis, quia fecit et docuit.‖
399Sermones compilati, sermo 70, p. 155: ―Bis dicit acrescens propter duplicem modum merendi, scilicet predicando et operando, vel propter accionem et contemplacionem, vel propter regulam Augustini et constitucionem superhabitas additas.‖ The additional ―contintuciones‖ refer to constitutions of the Ecclesia Premonstratensis.
400 Sermones compilati, sermo 73, p. 159.
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bishops and the preachers of lower rank.401 In another one, he continues this thread by applying the theme ―The good man leaveth heirs, sons, and grandsons [...]‖ (Proverbs 13:22) to St.
Dominic, ―who was good and brought fruit for the church of God since he left an inheritance and this is why the friars of his order are properly called his sons and all those who were converted to the Christian teachings are called his grandsons.‖402 The connection of the two descents results in something highly similar to the genealogical tree of the Dominicans, which had a great career in visual arts in the following centuries. The author of the sermons, considering the friars as the heirs of the power of the apostles, expresses clearly the identity of the Order of Preachers: ―we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world‖403which words refer, in his interpretation, to the eminence of the office of the preachers which consists of knowledge, that is, the light of the world, and cleanness, that is, the salt of the earth.404
The eminence of the saints of the mendicant orders was owed largely to the fact that their vocation was the propagation of the Gospel. Yet, whereas in the Order of Preachers the activity of preaching was supported by study and intellectual labour, the Order of the Friars Minor was generally praised because of his simplicity,405 at least for some decades after the foundation of the order.406 Two sermons on St. Dominic are centred on the praise of learning and teaching, in which the founder is the model to follow also in studying.407 Dominic, as the father of all the preachers, was excellent in the service of preaching, because –and the due course seems to be important- first he acquired wisdom and [only] then poured out the teachings of the Church.408 Dominic had a double wisdom: created, which he experienced during his scholastic studies (studio scolastico), and uncreated, which he experienced in monastic tranquillity (ocio
401Sermones compilati, sermo 93, p. 199. The whole sermon was analysed by Edit Madas, Középkori prédikációirodalmunk, 137-142.
402 Sermones compilati, sermo 74, p. 160: ―[...]Beato Dominco, qui in se quidem fuit bonus et ecclesie Dei extitit fructuosus, quia reliquid post se heredes etc., ut filii dicantur proprie fratres ordinis sui, nepotes vero omnes converse per doctrinam filiorum suorum.‖
403 Sermones compilati, sermo 93, p. 199: ―[...] sumus sal terre et lux mundi.‖
404 Sermones compilati, sermo 93, p. 199: ―Eminencia dignitatis predicatorum consistit in sciencia et mundicia.
Racione mundicie dicuntur sal, racione sciencie dicuntur lux.‖ Cf. Madas, Középkori prédikációirodalmunk, 137-138.
405 Vauchez, Sainthood in the later Middle Ages, 343.
406 For the re-assessment of Franciscan education, see Bert Roest, A History of Franciscan Education (c. 1210-1517) (Leiden: Brill, 2000).
407 Sermones compilati, sermo 73, p. 158: ―[…] ad imitacionem patris nostri debemus et nos discere […].‖
408 Sermones compilati, sermo 92, p. 197: ―[…] quia primo acquisivit sapienciam et postea profudit doctrinam […].‖
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monastico). Thanks to this double wisdom, Dominic could avoid sin, fight the evil, teach the people and save himself.
Considering the sermons on Peter of Verona written mostly by preacher friars from the thirteenth century and early fourteenth century,409 Donald Prudlo identified three main themes the preachers applied to the promotion of the saint: 1) Dominican self-representation that shifted from his presentation as an ideal preacher friar to a fighter against heresy 2) Christological parallels 3) reasons of his excellence, namely Peter‘s devotion to the Virgin, his entitlement to have the Triple Crown, and his fashioning as a New Martyr or as an Anti-Francis.410 In the five sermons on Peter of Verona surviving in the Sermones compilati that are from the very period that Prudlo analysed but were not included into his sample, two of these themes can be found: the presentation of the saint as the ideal friar of the Order of Preachers and two reasons for his pre-eminence among other saints, the Triple Crown, and closely connected to this, his title of the ―new martyr‖.411 In the following I examine how these strategies and themes were employed by the author of the sermons for the feast of Peter Martyr in the Sermones compilati.
Prudlo argued that in contrast to St. Dominic who lacked the charisma St. Francis of Assisi, Peter of Verona became the saint whom the Dominicans started to portray as the ideal friar preacher, the successor of Dominic, so much so that sometimes the founding father was even pushed into the background. Whereas the author of the sermons on Peter in the Sermones compilati does not explicitly say that Peter Martyr is the successor of the founding father, he indeed attributes a privileged role to him in the first sermon: comparing the sanctos predicatores to light, the preacher considers appropriate to apply it also to St. Peter, who was
―the first among them and special‖.412 He uses the four qualities of light to praise the saint: its extremely harmonious quality in Peter‘s charity and his concurrence (concordancia) with God;
409 For a detailed list of the authors who composed sermons on Peter of Verona based on Schneyer‘s Repertorium, see Carlo Delcorno ―Il racconto agiografico nella predicazione sei secoli XIII-XV‖ in Agiografia nell’occidente cristiano (Rome: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, 1980), 79-114, at 89, note 33.
410 Prudlo, The Martyred Inquisitor, 97-124.
411 Peter of Verona was referred to as novo martyre in the Liber Ordinarius of the diocese of Eger; see Liber Ordinarius Agriensis (1509), edited and introduced by László Dobszay (Budapest: Magyar Tudományos Akadémia Zenetudományi Intézet, 2010 ) (Musicalia Danubiana Subsidia), 102.
412 Sermones compilati, sermo 61, p.132: ―Sanctos predicatores lumen appellat [...] Sanctus Petrus primus fuit inter illos et precipuus [...].
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