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drama: first, under what Vincent Gillespie has called the ‘long shadow’ cast by Archbishop Arundel's Constitutions (1409), which placed strict limits on vernacular translations of scripture; secondly, in response to the various phases of the English Reformation, in the light of the onus that Reformers placed both on the Bible – rather than the Church – as the source of religious authority, and on worship in the vernacular, not (as previously) in Latin. 3 ‘Moralities’ have been selected for this study because they are
, copy and use texts and records for more than liturgical purposes or their own personal study, though these naturally continued to be fundamental incentives. Furthermore, these monastic and clerical writers increasingly privileged the text on account of their role not only as interpreters of scripture, but also as custodians of memory. They preserved the memory not simply of their own institutions, but also of their patrons and increasingly the donations made by these individuals. 4 The growth of historical writing in general no doubt influenced the perceptions of
ecclesiastical affairs had been made earlier in Henry’s reign. For instance, on his election to the archbishopric of Lyons, Abbot Halinard of St Bénigne in Dijon had refused to offer the customary oath of fealty to Henry III. Halinard justified his refusal by appeal to scripture and canon law on the unsuitability of clerics making ‘private’ oaths lest they be foresworn. 32 More relevant perhaps was the condemnation by Bishop of Wazo of Liège of Henry III’s intervention in the case of Archbishop Widiger of Ravenna, who had been deposed for celebrating Mass in archiepiscopal
and their duties, the reception of monks and the three principal monastic activities – divine service ( opus divina ), the study of scripture ( opus lectio ) and manual labour ( opus manum ). It was a detailed yet flexible guide that could be adapted to suit the needs of individual communities, which probably accounts for its widespread dissemination. Given a renewed lease of life with Benedict of Aniane’s imperially inspired reforms in 817, the Rule of St Benedict generally became the standard observance (with local variations) not just in the Carolingian empire
and the two testaments of Christian scripture. As this chapter will demonstrate, the harmonised retelling sharpens contradictions between the two parables, holding up the complex multiplicity of scripture, even as it asserts that such multiplicity belongs to one, Paradox formed into story 179 unified truth. In Cleanness, in other words, we find a poignant example of parable as ‘paradox formed into story’.7 Most analyses of Middle English Wedding Feast narratives, and especially of the Cleanness retelling, regard the parable much more simply, as a negative
Ambrose Autpertus 203 Already in ancient Rome and in early Christianity, criticising the corruption of the rich and powerful was a common theme in critical discourse, and it was especially prominent in the Bible. According to his own account, Ambrose Autpertus recorded in the Sermo over eighty passages from Scripture, confronting his readership with a comprehensive repertoire of such criticism.3 Despite this impressive diversity the author remains sceptical with regard to the success of his efforts. In the very beginning of the Sermo de cupiditate he refers to the
particular sins.7 Reconciliation with God, these materials suggested, was an extended and intricate process. The Gospel parable, in contrast, includes neither the vocabulary typical of penitential literature nor the ecclesiastical 66 The politics of Middle English parables structures through which late medieval Christians sought to atone for their sins. We might expect that for some, such as the Wycliffite writers who insisted that scripture should be the foundation of all Christian living, sacramental rituals may appear extra-scriptural, unnecessary, or even corrupt
Europe it was the cost of manuscripts, degrees of literacy, or social boundaries that determined people’s access to the Christian Scripture. Devoid of close contact with the biblical text, the majority of men and women experienced the Bible through a carefully structured array of rituals and images, sermons and chants. These media are at the core of this book as it follows the ways the Bible was sung and preached, revered and studied in medieval England; as it traces how the Bible was mediated and known across the social and cultural boundaries of literacy and piety
.) These are the words of Adam Tesák Brodský at the beginning of his father Juraj Tesák Mošovský's Comedy from a Book of God's Testament Named Ruth ( Komedie z Kníhy Zákona Božího, jenž slove Ruth ; Ruth 1604), printed in Prague in 1604. What is more, Tesák Brodský admonishes that ‘nadto nesluší těmi, kteréž ex fontibus Israel, to jest, z studnic Písem svatých jsou sebrané, pohrdati’ (‘above all, it is unbeholding to scorn those comedies that are composed ex fontibus Israel , that is, from the springs of the Holy Scriptures’, A2r). 1
, though it might be laudable, was not always essential. Secondly, it works to examine what ‘mercy’ meant when translated into action. One could lump many different types of behaviour under the name of misericordia . But even the mercy recommended by scripture could be broken down into different actions, of varying ‘strengths’ – mercy could be made more potent or more dilute. Moreover, if the divine promise (or divine threat) was that no one who judged without mercy would receive mercy from God, working out exactly what ‘mercy’ entailed in practice was vital to