Beyond Devotion: Religious and Literary Communities in the 16th and 17th Century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Texts and Contexts [1 ed.] 9783666552953, 9783525552957

Citation preview

Łukasz Cybulski / Kristina Rutkovska (eds.)

Beyond Devotion Religious and Literary Communities in the 16th and 17th Century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

Academic Studies

91

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

Refo500 Academic Studies Edited by Herman J. Selderhuis In co-operation with Christopher B. Brown (Boston), Günter Frank (Bretten), Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer (Bern), Tarald Rasmussen (Oslo), Violet Soen (Leuven), Zsombor Tóth (Budapest), Günther Wassilowsky (Frankfurt), Siegrid Westphal (Osnabrück).

Volume 91

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

Łukasz Cybulski / Kristina Rutkovska (eds.)

Beyond Devotion Religious and Literary Communities in the 16th and 17th Century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth Texts and Contexts

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

The volume editors thank the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyn´ski University in Warsaw for a subvention to prepare the manuscript.

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek: The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data available online: https://dnb.de. © 2022 by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Theaterstraße 13, 37073 Göttingen, Germany, an imprint of the Brill-Group (Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands; Brill USA Inc., Boston MA, USA; Brill Asia Pte Ltd, Singapore; Brill Deutschland GmbH, Paderborn, Germany; Brill Österreich GmbH, Vienna, Austria) Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Hotei, Brill Schöningh, Brill Fink, Brill mentis, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Böhlau, V&R unipress.

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission from the publisher.

Cover design: SchwabScantechnik, Göttingen Publishing review: prof. Elwira Buszewicz, Jagiellonian University, Kraków Typesetting: le-tex publishing services, Leipzig

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage | www.vandenhoeck-ruprecht-verlage.com ISSN 2197–0165 ISBN 978–3–666–55295–3

Contents

Introduction .........................................................................................

7

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin) Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry................................................ 9 Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw) “The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry .......................................... 39 Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic) On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century. Cultural Contexts Versus the Authors’ Personalities.......................................................................................... 65 Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin) Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki ....................................................................... 103 Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw) “The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)............................................................. 121 Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University) On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament............................... 141 Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin) The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700) ................................................... 171 Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw) Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575) by Maciej Wirzbięta.......................................... 201

6

Contents

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University) Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries of Medicalization in 16th Century Poland–Lithuania............................................................... 213 Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic) The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania. Konstantinas Sirvydas’ Postil as One of the Main Achievements of the Times ................... 245 Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw) Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety .................................... 265 Notes on the Authors ............................................................................. 281 Index of Names ..................................................................................... 287

Introduction

The collaboration of authors contributing to this volume began centuries after the disintegration of the union of the Polish Kingdom and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL). Just as Res Publica Utriusque Nationis – the Commonwealth of Both Nations – was in its day a unique socio-political and cultural phenomenon, so is, we could say – toutes proportions gardées – this meeting of scholars today from the modern nations to explore together their shared heritage. A bold claim to start with, perhaps, but the uniqueness of such a collaboration exempts us to some extent from the obligation of modesty. What makes this endeavour of ours important is not its scope – quite narrow, if one takes into account the literary culture of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in its vibrant totality – but the will to overcome the frontiers and strains of the modern world that push us towards exploring separateness instead of the realities of deep mutual interdependency. To achieve this end, it was crucial to focus on what is felt to be at the heart of that culture and, most importantly, literature. Religion being one of the sources of aesthetic inspirations, religious writings of that time were thus part of the sphere of private devotion, of expressing personal and communal identity and tastes, but also of public statements. Religious literature therefore served as a bond between the Commonwealth’s diverse inhabitants. But even if described in such terms, it was not a homogeneous monolith. Parallel to the unifying trends there were centrifugal tendencies creating internal tensions between matters private and public, local and global, religious and secular, literary and utilitarian, and so forth. Consequently, in defining the thematic scope of this volume it seemed necessary to broaden our investigations beyond purely religious and devotional matters and include other domains as well. The array of subjects that appear vital to us, and still call for further exploration, is vast: it includes manuscript and textual studies, studies on translations and adaptations of works of various status and origin as well as their contribution to shaping the national languages, and diversity of topics and ways of writing about them. The present volume stems from those interests. It is dedicated to secular and religious writings of secular authors as well as those belonging to the clergy and religious orders. Our main interest lay in exploring the different genres of early modern Polish and Lithuanian sermons and novels, and in tracing this heritage to its social and literary context through the works’ material presence in manuscript form and in print. Other papers in this volume have looked into the origins of vernacular translations of the Holy Scriptures and the controversies surrounding them, as well as into the written testimonies of religious devotion and conversions.

8

Introduction

The aim has been not only to confront different kinds of texts and experiences, but to situate this heritage in its social and confessional context. In face of such diversity, this volume contains detailed research papers on selected issues rather than a detached synthesis of knowledge on religious literature as such. Recently, Jakub Niedźwiedź proposed the term ‘multiscripturality’ for describing the complex textual culture of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, thus stressing the number of complexities that still demand our attention. As editors of this volume, we believe that it brings us closer to achieving this goal in the future. Kristina Rutkovska, Łukasz Cybulski Vilnius – Warsaw, 2021

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

In his widely read work Icon animorum (1614) the famous Scottish writer John Barclay wrote about Poles: They are wedded strangely to their own fancies; nor do they take to themselves a greater licentiousness in manners and uncivil conversation than in opinions of religion and heavenly matters, of which every man without any fear will both think and speak as himself listeth. […] From hence it is that their minds at this day are divided into so many schisms and have among them all the heresies which polluted former times (Barclay: 2003, 187).

This image of citizens of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, engrossed in numerous theological disputations and discussions, although somewhat exaggerated, was not unfounded. The coexistence of religions and denominations was characteristic of the pre-Reformation heritage of the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Both countries, united by a personal union at the end of the fourteenth century (which led to the full political union creating the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569), were inhabited by Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christians, Armenian Monophysites, Jews, Muslims and Karaites. From the beginning of the 1530s, Reformation ideas began to seep into Poland-Lithuania. The nobility mainly leaned towards Calvinism, from which the radical and dynamic Minor Reformed Church of Polish Brethren (the Arians, Antitrinitarians) emerged in the mid-1560s, whereas Lutheranism exerted the strongest impact on burghers in Royal Prussia and Greater Poland, where the Unity of Czech Brethren also appeared in 1548. In Ruthenia, both in the part belonging to the Crown and the other in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Orthodox Christianity traditionally held the dominant position, yet Calvinism also won significant support there in the second half of the sixteenth century. The Union of Brest (1596), by which some of the Ruthenian Orthodox bishops – while maintaining the Byzantine rite – recognized the authority of the Pope and Catholic dogmas, dramatically complicated the religious situation. Although religious pluralism as such was by no means an exception in the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe, it should be emphasized that the PolishLithuanian experience differed from others by long-lasting traditions of peaceful coexistence of religions, as well as by the weakness of any uniformist claims, which

10

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

started gaining some strength in the second half of the seventeenth century. The statute of general toleration, known as the Warsaw Confederation (1573), though frequently violated by competing denominations, became a permanent element of the political order of the Commonwealth of Poland-Lithuania, confirmed by successive rulers (Kłoczowski: 2000, 90–96; Ó hAnnracháin: 2015, 75–78). Relatively liberal attitudes until the end of the sixteenth century and the evenly balanced coexistence of several denominations created a situation in which none of the congregations had to resort to clandestine forms of literary expression. Church censorship – both Catholic and Protestant – was rather a pastoral recommendation, without any significant practical consequences (Buchwald-Pelcowa: 1997, 238). Those writing for their fellow believers usually collaborated with specific printing houses, which benefited from the support of powerful patrons (e.g. the Calvinist press in Brest, patronized by the Radziwiłł family; the Orthodox publishing house in Ostrog, founded by Konstanty Wasyl Ostrogski; publishers working for the Czech Brethren in Leszno and supported by the Leszczyński family; the printing house in Łosk, producing Anti-Trinitarian books and operating under the patronage of Jan Kiszka, etc.). However, it used to happen sometimes that business motives prompted dissident printers to publish Catholic works (Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1974). The inter-confession boundaries were insignificant, especially with regard to poetry; its possible denominational characteristics usually escaped the watchful eye of the censor. Religious poetry, by its very nature, “mediates between public and private expression of belief ” (Cummings: 2002, 286), and vernacular poetry, due to its persuasive and community-building force, was an important tool in shaping religious identities in the times of the great Christian reforms. It served the purpose of religious teaching, though the doctrine was not always articulated directly; a theologically motivated aesthetic ideal was no less important. The purpose of this essay is to examine how and to what extent the features of different confessional identities contributed, in the blossoming Polish vernacular religious poetry of the Renaissance and Baroque, to the diversity of its immanent poetics, and how they determined distinct stylistic characteristics and attitudes towards literary tradition. I will focus exclusively on poetry written in Polish, although of course members of Christian Churches operating in the Commonwealth used many languages in their literary works: Latin, German, Church Slavonic, Lithuanian, and Ruthenian. Nevertheless, the dynamics of a historico-literary process is always a correlate of a given linguistic tradition. In religious poetry written by Polish Protestants, stylistic and formal differences between particular creeds appeared to be irrelevant, therefore I am going to address their poetry as a whole. It should also be remembered that unification tendencies amongst Polish Protestants were very strong (excluding only the Polish Brethren), and were expressed, among others, in the Sandomierz Agreement (1570), during the

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

synod in Leszno (1645), which led to the actual unification of the Czech Brethren and the Calvinists, or in the initiative of Colloquium charitativum (1645). These efforts to unite Protestant creeds established conditions conducive to certain textual community, which is clearly visible in the repertoire of hymns. Therefore, one should certainly speak about Protestant rather than Lutheran or Calvinist literary aesthetics in consideration of the works of Polish writers representing Reformed creeds. The time scope of the analysis presented here will mark, on the one hand, the mid-sixteenth century as a period of differentiation of confessions, stimulated by the impact of Reformation ideas, and on the other, the second half of the seventeenth century, when Polish Protestantism fell deeply into regression. The most important Polish-Ruthenian Orthodox intellectuals left Poland-Lithuania, and “belated Catholic confessionalization” became the most significant cultural characteristic of the Commonwealth (Kriegseisen: 2010, 533–660).

1. When Protestant Reformation ideas began to reach Poland, the tradition of religious poetry in Polish was rather modest and depended mostly on the repertoire of melic chants. Although the oldest vernacular texts, representing various genres of liturgical poetry, date back to the fourteenth century, it was the Franciscan Observants’ missionary activity, initiated around the 1450s, that contributed to a significant increase in the number of religious hymns in Polish in the following decades. The poems combined catechetic functions with lyrical expression, served the purpose of strengthening bonds in the ecclesiastic community and were linked to liturgical and paraliturgical forms of devotion. The use of vernacular languages as a means of religious expression was at the center of controversy between Protestant Reformers and defenders of the existing Church order. The main dispute concerned the use of the vernacular in liturgy and in theological writings, yet it also had consequences for poetry. The Protestant promotion of native languages is, in fact, a correlate of the Gospel idea, according to which the “babes” who had been deprived of their voice and language, were called by Christ himself to possess the truths hidden from “wise and prudent” men full of worldly pride (Matt 11:25). To reject the wisdom of this world, the wisdom of scholars (and theologians), to become unschooled in order to possess true wisdom, to remember that the apostles “were unlearned and ignorant men” (Acts 4:13) – this was an important axiological thread in the Protestant teaching. Pieśń nowa, w której jest dziękowanie Panu Bogu wszechmogącemu, że malućkim a prostakom raczył objawić tajemnice Królestwa swojego [A New Song of Thanks to Almighty God, Who Revealed the Secrets of His Kingdom to Babes and the Unlearned] (1556),

11

12

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

whose author – according to the testimony of Stanisław Lubieniecki – was the first Polish poetess, Zofia Oleśnicka, echoes the words of Mary’s canticle Magnificat (Luke 1:46–55) and praises the Lord who “hid the secrets of the eternal Kingdom” from philosophers and “proud sages”, but “dziatki maluchne nas raczył powołać, / A nieprzebrane skarby łaski swej okazać” [deigned to call us, the little babes / And showed us the treasures of His grace] (Oleśnicka: 1556, Aiij v.). The ideal of simplicity is usually commended, as opposed to what is learned, courtly, or decorative. Jakub Lubelczyk, a Calvinist and the author of the first metrical Psalter in Polish (Psałterz Dawida [David’s Psalter], 1558), the volume expanded with a collection of canticles and “songs”, emphasizes in his preface that readers should not expect any “courtly things” in his work, because everyone is called to praise the Lord “in the simplicity of his spirit” (Lubelczyk: 2010, 69). Erazm Otwinowski, an Anti-Trinitarian poet, while recommending his Przypowieści Pana naszego Jezusa [Parables of Our Lord Jesus] (1599), proposes the opposition of hypocritical “sophists”, unable to understand God’s parables, and common people who have intuitive knowledge of the truth: “Co z tych podobieństw Jego prostak pojmie snadnie, / a chytre sylogizmy sam sofista zgadnie” (Otwinowski: 1999, 113) [While a simple man will understand His [Jesus’s] parables easily, / only a sophist will guess cunning syllogisms]. Aesthetic simplicity reveals moral and theological truth and has clear religious connotations, ornamentation and complexity being attributed to religious opponents and openly disavowed (Meller: 2004, 162–184). Prejudice against rhetorical embellishment is a correlate of the popular Protestant belief that idolatry is the most serious sin of the ‘papists’ and the root of all evil. The aesthetic opposition results from the theological condemnation of Catholic religious culture, presumed to be overburdened with unnecessary and illusive embellishment, which, moreover, masks moral rot (Shell: 1999, 23–56). In the Orthodox Church, the liturgical language was Church Slavonic, which – like Latin in the Western Church – from the mid-sixteenth century was in opposition to the vernacular as a proposed medium for the expression of sacred matters, including religious poetry. However, in this context the vernacular language did not mean Polish. Orthodox Christians living in Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were mostly Ruthenians, and therefore it was the Middle Ruthenian language, or so-called ‘prosta mova’ [simple speech], which stood in opposition to Church Slavonic, commended by its most extreme defenders, such as, for example, Ivan of Vishnia, as a language particularly beloved by God (Chynczewska-Hennel: 2017, 67; Wiemer: 2003, 111; Moser: 2017, 121–122). Amongst the Orthodox, the choice of Middle Ruthenian became an equivalent of the Protestant strategy aimed at entrusting religious discourse to ‘commoners’. In fact, Orthodox religious poetry written in Polish was not to develop until the seventeenth century, after several decades of ardent disputes and religious polemics,

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

in which Ruthenian writers adapted Polish to the needs of their own religious discourse (Romanowski: 2018, 157–192).

2. Protestant hymns, so often created by pastors, were part of the same universe of texts in which printed versions of vernacular Bibles, sermons and pamphlets circulated (Dyrness: 2019, 84–85), and thus they were entangled in the Protestant understanding of the role of preaching and doctrine transmission. In fact, they constituted a part of this process. Philip Melanchthon, in his treatise De officiis concionatoris (1529), which was highly valued and well known in Poland-Lithuania, added and discussed a new kind (genus) of rhetorical presentation, especially designed for effective church teachings, the genus didascalicum. Preparing a sermon required identifying the thesis, its reference to a specific point of the catechism, the use of previously collected loci, and applying the thesis to the listeners’ existential experience. Preaching was meant to combine teaching with admonition (Kolb: 2016, 248). This was due to a certain understanding of Biblical rhetoric, which – as it was assumed – does not rely on pure persuasion, but gives the word a practical dimension, changing the life of the recipient and prompting him to act (Millet: 1992, 195–250). Similarly, Calvin, who applied Cicero’s three offices of the orator (docere – conciliare – movere) to the Bible, indicated that the Divine Word teaches, convinces, and attracts the reader with the power of the Holy Spirit. He believed that the Scripture employs rhetorical figures, such as irony, hyperbole, personification, which do not serve, in his opinion, the purpose of embellishment, but rather remain subordinated to the principle of effectiveness and Biblical energy (Dyrness: 2019, 94–95). Decorative elocution had no place in Calvin’s sacred rhetoric (Millet: 1992, 292–349). Sixteenth-century Polish Protestant hymns seem to follow similar rhetorical principles. They reflect catechetic and didactic intentions, and clearly many of them served as a means to explicate and memorize the basic prayers or principles of religious doctrine. And thus, for example, in Oratio Dominica from the Lutheran hymn book Pieśni duchowne a nabożne [Spiritual and Devotional Hymns] (1547) by Jan Seklucjan, the subsequent petitions of the Lord’s Prayer can be found in seventeen stanzas, with interpretations and applications to the everyday experience of the faithful. An explication of the Lord’s Prayer is also offered in the Calvinist hymns of Andrzej Trzecieski and Michał Hey-Stawicki, as well as in anonymous works from the manuscript Kancjonał zamojski [Zamość Hymn-Book] (1558–1561). In the latter, even the very titles of the hymns inform of the goals of the catechesis, e.g. Decalogus, to jest Dziesięcioro przykazanie Boże [Decalogus, i.e. the Ten Commandments of God] or Przykazanie Boże z tymi błogosławieństwy i przeklęctwy

13

14

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

[God’s Commandment with Blessings and Curses] (Kacprzak: 2015, 189–195). More specific elements of the doctrine of justification by faith are also introduced: Możnie-ć ten Pan swą wielmożność nad nami objawił, Przebaczywszy naszę sprośność, że nas k temu sprawił, Iż kiedy weń uwierzemy, Syny Jego być możemy. (Trzecieski: 1558, Aiij v.) [The Lord revealed His mighty power over us By forgiving our filthiness and making us Believe in Him So we could become His sons]

This is how Andrzej Trzecieski teaches his brothers in Pieśń nowa o krewkości wielkiej każdego człowieka [A New Song on the Great Fragility of Every Man] (1558). Amongst the Protestant hymns of the second half of the sixteenth century only metrical psalms or Biblical canticles introduce truly lyrical tones, and only in these cases a lyrical self becomes individualized. Most often, however, the ecclesiastic ‘we’, the teaching voice of the congregation, resounds in Protestant hymns, while their ostentatious simplicity, renouncing any literary embellishment, is meant to reflect the declared poverty of the Lord’s flock. Against this contrasting background the repertoire of medieval hymns and religious songs in Polish, though not large, seemed quite attractive, as it employed more complex lyrical and narrative forms, subtle images and metaphorical expressions. These old (quite often Franciscan) songs were well rooted in popular piety, and the Protestant Reformers’ attitudes towards them were marked with ambivalence. A significant part of this repertoire was contested for doctrinal reasons, including all Marian and hagiographic lyrics. Yet the gesture of renunciation did not target vernacular forms of devotion as such, but rather the Latin rituals and ‘idolatric’ paraliturgy. The attack was rendered with satire and the grotesque, which can be seen, for example, in the works of the first truly great Calvinist poet, Mikołaj Rej. In his Figliki [Little Pranks] collection (1574) he included poems ruthlessly mocking the liturgy and paraliturgy of the ‘papists’, scornfully laughing at the Catholic mass and celebrations of the Passion (Stępień: 2013, 68–138). The very titles of these epigrams speak for themselves, e.g. Pies u Bożej Męki jajca pogryzł [A dog ate eggs at the Lord’s Passion], Co na krzyżu chłopy posrał [The one who shat on men from the cross]. Nonetheless, not ‘novelty’ but ‘antiquity’ was desired to legitimize the truth in religious culture (Gordon: 1996, 1–23), and thus the Polish adaptations of selected

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

medieval Latin hymns, as well as those of the old vernacular songs that had positively passed doctrinal censorship, made their way into Protestant hymn books. In the extensive work of Piotr Artomiusz, Cantional to jest pieśni krześcijańskie ku chwale Boga w Trójcy jedynego (first edition 1620) [A Hymn Book, that is Christian Songs for the Glory of God in the Trinity], including nearly four hundred hymns, we can also find a number of slightly adapted medieval Polish songs, and even a dozen Latin ones (Fijałkowski: 2000, 138–139). Artomiusz explained this by invoking didactic goals and his respect for the ancient tradition: “łaciński język się tu do końca nie odrzucił, w którym przedniejsze a pospolite (mogę rzec: sanctam antiquitatem redolentes) piosneczki się wsadziły, a to dla żaczków i dziatek w języku tym początki jakiekolwiek mających” [The Latin language is not completely rejected here, while the first and the most common (I can say: sanctam antiquitatem redolentes) songs in this language have been included, and this is meant to serve students and children beginning their studies in this language] (Artomiusz: 1640, ):(iiij r.-v.). However, the intention in Protestant religious culture of promoting national languages encouraged the re-interpretation of this sancta antiquitas. Elements of the medieval Church’s past that had not been of first importance in their time were now emphasised and brought forward, as for example the Slavonic liturgy of Orthodox Christians, the fifteenth-century Benedictine foundation of the Slavonic rite in the St Cross Church in Kraków, and above all – to use Artomiusz’s words – “zwyczaj Kościoła pierwszego chrześcijańskiego, w którym […] każdy w języku swym Pana Boga chwalił” [the custom of the first Christian Church in which (…) everyone praised the Lord in their own language] (Artomiusz: 1640, ):( iij r.)1 . This small mention in Artomiusz’s discourse seems to echo the occasional alliance that for some time brought together Protestants and Orthodox Christians in Poland-Lithuania. It happened despite the dramatic doctrinal differences, which in 1576 were emphasized by the Patriarch of Constantinople, Jeremiah II. In his letter to Lutheran theologians from Tübingen (written as a response to the Greek translation of the Augsburg Confession sent to Constantinople twenty-five years earlier), Jeremiah laid out the points of contention between the two denominations, accusing his adversaries of undervaluing the role of works in the pursuit of salvation, renouncing their reduction of the sacraments, their overly pragmatic approach to the liturgy, and the underestimation of its mystical value. In addition, iconoclastic tendencies amongst the Protestants along with their rejection of the cult of the Virgin Mary and the saints seemed to exclude any possibility of agreement (Michalski: 1993, 99–168).

1 It was founded by Władysław Jagiełło and Queen Jadwiga in 1390. The Slavonic rite in this Benedictine monastery ceased around 1480. The very idea of the foundation probably had to do with mission plans directed at Orthodox Russia. See Kanior: 1994, 23–30.

15

16

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Nevertheless, at the end of the sixteenth century, Orthodox Christians in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth for some time regarded cooperation with Protestants as a chance to reform their education system and to renew religious culture, as well as to protect their own rights. The main supporter of this project was Prince Konstanty Wasyl Ostrogski, a Ruthenian magnate who gathered at his court in Ostroh a group of Protestant writers, encouraging them to put their pens to the service of the Orthodox Church (Kempa: 2008, 321–341). The interpenetration of both Eastern ideas and Western rhetorical styles is clearly visible in the writings of the most outstanding Orthodox writer of the time, Meletij Smotryc’kyi (who converted to the Uniate Church around 1627), educated at Ostroh, at the Jesuit Vilnius Academy and at German Protestant universities (Frick: 1995). His excellent Threnos, to jest Lament jedynej ś[więtej] apostolskiej wschodniej Cerkwie z objaśnieniem Dogmat wiary [Threnos, or the Lament of the Only Holy Apostolic Eastern Church with an Explanation of Dogmas of Faith] (1610), written in lyrical, rhythmic poetic prose in Polish, is a moving complaint of the “ragged and stripped” Mother Church for the wrongfulness of her children who abandoned their mother. The prophetic tone refers to the Byzantine-Ruthenian tradition, yet at the same time seems to have a lot in common with Biblical rhetoric in the interpretation of Melanchthon (Babicz: 2004, 16) and Calvin who made the rhetoric of prophets a model of preaching (Millet: 1992, 293–349). What is more, in the later parts of the work, the sublime tone gives way to the polemical and satirical, with use of anti-Catholic themes of Protestant provenance. Smotryc’kyi also adds a small anthology of his own translations of anti-papal poems, including Petrarch and Battista the Mantuan (Miszalska: 2005, 445–454). However, the Protestant-Orthodox alliance, treated by the Uniate Christians as a betrayal to the Orthodox Church and true faith, had no chance of succeeding, not only due to deep theological differences, but also on account of the Orthodox culture’s ritual forms and the sacred Church Slavonic language. Whereas the intense experience of novelty, despite all reservations, was in fact essential in the Evangelical approach, Orthodoxy relied on the tradition of doctrine and worship, allowing vernacular lowliness only in polemical writings. Adam Hipacy Pociej, defending Greek Catholic positions and one of the main designers of the Brest Union, in the poem Parenetica jednego do swej Rusi [Parenetica of One to His Ruthenia], which was attached to his memorial Poselstwo do papieża rzymskiego Syksta IV w roku 1476 [Deputy to the Roman Pope Sixtus IV in 1476] (1605), urged the Ruthenians to abandon “fraternizing with the Arians” and “overt heretics” against “their own” who had united in an act of brotherly love, which in itself constituted proof of the living presence of God. For Roman Catholics, defending tradition as a warranty of the doctrinal deposit was also an obvious position. The leading Jesuit writer of the post-Tridentine period, Piotr Skarga, listed “ancient constancy” among the most important notae Ecclesiae,

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

commending the Roman Church as a refuge of stability and at the same time a reliable alternative to the voluntaristic proposals of the ‘faddists’ (Skarga: 1577, 17). Catholic antiquity also connoted the liturgy and paraliturgy of the medieval Church, both Latin and vernacular, and therefore the latter became an important issue in interfaith confrontation. Although resolutions of post-Tridentine synods in Poland-Lithuania treated vernacular hymns with some reservation as potential bearers of heterodox and improper content, this caution concerned only performing them in church and during the liturgy. Even then, however, “Catholic and ancient” songs (cantilenae catholicae et antiquae) in Polish were allowed and recommended (Bobowski: 1893, 10–17; Korolko: 1977, 22; Michałowska: 2000, 416–417). The promoter of the Tridentine reforms in the Commonwealth, Cardinal Stanisław Hozjusz (Hosius), indicated in his Confessio fidei catholicae christiana the need to maintain a uniform Latin liturgy for the whole Church, but emphasised the benefits of the fact that lay people can participate by singing songs in their native language, “ut hac quasi novitate mentes hominum magis etiam excitentur ad spiritualem laeticiam” [so this novelty could stimulate spiritual joy in human minds] (Hosius: 1553, 132). A significant paradox. ‘Old’, medieval vernacular songs in a new religious and cultural context appear as a ‘novelty’, which is marked by ambivalence. It inspires, “stimulates spiritual joy”, but in this axiological constellation, the arbitrary and individualistic promotion of novelty does not cease to be attributed to the Protestant Reformers, while the Roman Catholics are entrusted to defend the eternally constant space of worship, free from any voluntarism. Thus, the repertoire of vernacular Catholic hymns developed dynamically in post-Tridentine Poland-Lithuania, though only its ‘ancient’, time-honored part gained the signature of orthodoxy, whereas the fruits of invention of even the most faithful sons of the Church mostly served private devotion. In comparison to the Protestants, the Catholics definitely printed a smaller number of hymn books. Two of these, however, were quite extensive: the anonymous Pieśni nabożne na święta uroczyste [Pious Songs for Religous Celebrations] (1627), published several times, containing more than 140 songs, and Pieśni katolickie nowo reformowane [Newly Reformed Catholic Hymns] (1638) by Stanisław Serafin Jagodyński. All these hymn books present an interplay between ‘antiquity’ and ‘novelty’ that is characteristic of Catholic identity. When the latter serves as evidence of the writer’s and publisher’s commitment, the former is a kind of warranty for orthodoxy and a source of stylistic gravitas, indicated, above all, by language – the more archaic, the more, paradoxically, commendable, referring to the heritage of undivided Christianity. These are, as a Jesuit Walenty Bartoszewski stated in his preface to Parthenomelica albo pienia nabożne o Pannie Naświętszej [Parthenomelica, or Devotional Chants about the Blessed Virgin] (1613), songs “adjusted to the ecclesiastical sense” (Bartoszewski: 2019, 528), which is manifested, inter alia, in their close links with the tradition of

17

18

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Latin hymns, recognized as the voice of the universal Church and as a stabilizer of doctrinal sense. In Catholic imaginative poetry, a specific literary program, displaying the tradition of the medieval Church, also had its first manifestations in the post-Tridentine period. Stanisław Grochowski diligently translated breviary hymns and liturgical sequences taken from the recently published Roman Missal (1570). He also composed extensive hagiographic poems, like Żywot patrona polskiego, św. Stanisława [Life of the Polish Patron, St Stanislaus], Św. Cecylia, męczenniczka Chrystusowa [St Cecilia, Martyr of Christ], and complained about degenerated contemporaneity, when readers demand vernacular translations of the Scripture and postils, convinced that sola fides and sola Scriptura are the foundation of Christianity: “A my, niestety, wiarą się chlubiemy / A Pismem […]” [And we, unfortunately, take pride in faith / and Scripture]. Thus, the idealised vision of the past embraces the image of ancient Poles whose faith was born ex auditu in the course of patriarchal preaching: Ta jedna była ich wiary tablica: Pacierz a Kredo i Bogarodzica. Ostatek pleban powiadał u fary; Taki był zwyczaj cnych Polaków stary (Na też kazania, Grochowski: 1607, 587–588). [This was the only source of their faith: Our Father and Credo, and the hymn ‘Mother of God’. The rest was preached by the priest in the church; Those were the old ways of virtuous Poles.]

Strong liturgical inspirations are visible in the works of early Baroque poets, like Piotr Cieklinski, Kasper Miaskowski, and in the works of later authors, like the already mentioned Stanisław Serafin Jagodyński or Józef Bartłomiej Zimorowic, who paraphrased Church hymns and antiphons, especially Marian ones. Grochowski’s contemporary, Sebastian Grabowiecki, built a significant part of his elaborate Rymy duchowne [Spiritual Rhymes] (1590) on liturgical and sacramental themes (especially the sacrament of penance and the Eucharist), as well as on Church prayers taken from a popular prayer book, Harfa duchowna [Spiritual Harp] (1585), written by a Jesuit, Marcin Laterna. The imagination of many Catholic poets was also inspired by rituals, flourishing paraliturgy, and popular services. It was here that the old forms of piety mixed with the new ones. The richness of forms of Marian worship was reflected in numerous poetic series and collections, such as the anonymous Godzinki o Niepokalanym Poczęciu Najświętszej Maryi Panny [Book

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

of Hours on the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary] (ca. 1616), Jan Białobocki’s Wieniec ozdobny przedziwnej czystości naświętszej Matki Bożej [Beautiful Wreath of Wondrous Purity of the Holy Mother of God] (1644), Wojciech Waśniowski’s Wielkiego Boga wielkiej Matki ogródek [The Garden of the Great Mother of the Great God] (1644), but, above all, Wespazjan Kochowski’s Różaniec Naświętszej Panny Maryjej [The Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary] (1668) and Ogród Panieński [The Virgin’s Garden] (1681) should be mentioned in this context (Nieznanowski: 1989, 45–72; Mazurkiewicz: 2011, 205–207). Pious practices, consisting in compassionate meditation on Christ’s suffering and death, and originating in late medieval forms of devotion retracing the Lord’s way of the cross in Jerusalem, were set and celebrated in the domestic space of so-called ‘calvaries’ (e.g. Kalwaria Zebrzydowska, Kalwaria Pacławska, Kalwaria Wejherowska, etc.), while gaining popularity in Poland-Lithuania over the seventeenth century (Prejs: 2016, 161–180). Those ‘calvaries’ had their own poets, such as Abraham Rożniatowski, who wrote the first Polish Passion epic poem, Pamiątka krwawej ofiary Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa [Memorial of the Bloody Sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ] (1610), for the needs of the sanctuary at Kalwaria Zebrzydowska near Cracow. Later Passion poems, including Chrystus cierpiący [The Suffering Christ] (1681) by Wespazjan Kochowski and Rzewnosłodki głos łabęcia umierającego [The Bitter-Sweet Voice of the Dying Swan] (1665) by Klemens Bolesławiusz, the latter being quite an unexpected Polish adaptation of the poem by the Anglo-Norman thirteenth-century John of Howden, Philomela dulcisonos canens, seem to serve both public devotion (the subtitle of Kochowski’s piece informs that it was “displayed during Lent”), and individual compassionate meditation. The most prominent representation of the genre was probably Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą [New Recruitment to the Old Banner] (1698) by Wacław Potocki, an extensive poem whose dynamics is shaped by the “increasing intensity of pious compassion”, and involves the tools of allegorical Biblical hermeneutics (Czechowicz: 2019, 272, 280), which attest to the familiarity of this poet, converted from Arianism, with Catholic religious literature and preaching (Kowalczyk: 2017). Passion devotion, like Marian piety, also inspires, especially in the second half of the seventeenth century and later, extensive lyrical and epigrammatic collections, which, although proposed as a matter of meditation, became at the same time a peculiar display of poetic ingenium. The motifs, themes, symbols, metaphors of Biblical, liturgical, and patristic origin, as well as those referring to nature, apocrypha, classical literature, science, become in these works a center of sometimes astonishing conceits, prompting to contemplate the miracles of God’s intervention in the world. “Piecu – pojmuj rozumem sens słowa, człowiecze! – / w którym się chleb anielski snadź dla ciebie piecze” [Stove (man, grasp by reason the word’s meaning) / in which the angels’ bread is baked for you] (Ogród Panieński 6, 22) – this is Wespazjan Kochowski’s ‘witty’ image of the Mother of God as Clibanus intellectualis

19

20

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

(Kochowski: 2019, 126). The writers of epigrammatic meditations on the Lord’s Passion were no less creative in discovering amazing coincidences, e.g. “Wiedząc, że człek chleb woli, mniej myśli o niebie, / Ty, chcąc mieszkać w człowieku, zamknąłeś się w chlebie” (Lubomirski: 1995, I 269: Poezje postu świętego 12) [Knowing that man loves bread, thinks less of heaven, / Longing to live in man, Thou lock’st Thyself in bread; transl. by Jean Ward; Wierzbicka-Trwoga: 2016, 90]; “Za łotry umierając, łotry towarzysze / Ma, od łotrów zabity, i ten łotr, co pisze” (Jabłonowski: 1700, G3 v.) [Dying for villains, He has villains as companions, / Is killed by villains, and the one who writes these words is a villain too]. The sources of such exploration of sacred mysteries – involving conceits and ignoring the requirements of decorum – should be sought in the rhetorical education that noble youth received in Jesuit colleges, in their literary exercises, and in the theories of argutia taught there from treatises like De acuto et arguto (ca. 1627) by Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski or Ars nova argutiarum (1649) by Jacob Masen. The influence of the Jesuit education model at the Collegium Kijoviense-Mohileanum, founded by Peter Mohyla in 1633, inspired similar rhetorical tendencies in the Polish poetry of Orthodox writers associated with this excellent Academy, especially in the works of Lazar Baranowicz, rector of the Kiev College in the years 1650–1552 (Łużny: 1996, 128–140; Radyszewśkyj: 1996, I 145–204; Masluk: 1983, 36, 163). His poems from the volumes of Lutnia Apollinowa [Apollo’s Lute] (1671), Księga śmierci albo Żywot Chrystusow [Book of Death or the Life of Christ] (1676) or Apollo chrześcijański [Christian Apollo] (1670), processing hagiographic and meditative tradition, follow a similar stylistic paradigm. They refer to epigrammatic and conceit literature by striving for an enthymematic punch line, and expose paradoxes of God’s economy of salvation. Orthodox poetry, even more so than Catholic verse, explored its own liturgical tradition, with the majority of this kind of literature being written in the Church Slavonic language (Kuczyńska: 2003). Among the scarce Polish-language Orthodox liturgical poems, the most prominent achievement seems to be preserved in the manuscript of two juvenile works by Symeon of Polotsk – Akaphist do Pana naszego Jezusa [Akaphist to our Lord Jesus] and Akaphist najświętszej Pannie [Akaphist to the Holy Virgin] (1648); both these Akaphists reveal the strong influence of Polish Baroque poetics and the Renaissance Psałterz Dawidów [David’s Psalter] by Jan Kochanowski (Łużny: 1989, 253–260; Marinelli: 1995, 239–278; Kozak: 2004, 7–19). For doctrinal reasons neither Marian themes (although you may find adaptations of the Magnificat in the hymn books, such as the hitherto mentioned poem by Zofia Oleśnicka), nor meditative lachrymal poems commemorating the Passion of Christ appear in Protestant literature. In the model of Passion meditation recommended by Luther, there was no place for shedding tears of love and repentance (c.f. Luke 23:28) and visualising the Savior’s suffering; the purpose of meditation was rather to inspire terror over our own sinfulness and bring metanoia (Stępień: 2017, 164–200).

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

This difference is very clear, especially in the poetry of the Polish Brethren, in which moralistic and didactic tones always dominate over lyrical expression. The anonymous Pieśń, w której się zamyka napominanie ku cierpliwości w krzyżu [Song Containing the Admonition to Patience in the Cross] from the hymn book Psalmy niektóre króla Dawida [Some of King David’s Psalms] (1625) develops meditation on Jesus’s suffering in the context of the Sermon on the Mount and Christ’s missionary speech from the Gospel by St Matthew. It does not at all put the Lord’s suffering ‘before the eyes’ of the reader as an experience demanding his or her compassion, but rather makes it the starting point for parenetic discourse and a call to patience, humility and bravery. Arian religious poetry is almost invariably didactic, meant to strengthen Biblical knowledge and doctrine (e.g. Piosnka o Wieczerzy Pańskiej [A Song about the Lord’s Supper] by Samuel Przypkowski from the aforementioned hymn book or Gadki z Pisma Świętego rytmem pisane [Riddles from the Holy Scripture in verse] written by Walerian Otwinowski and surviving in a manuscript).

3. The aspirations of lay people, including lay Catholics, awakened by both the Protestant Reformation and the post-Tridentine renewal, could not be satisfied only by refreshing the old forms of piety, but required new spiritual currents and ways of experiencing faith so that proper religious identity could be shaped in their context, distinguishable both from other Christian denominations and from the heritage of “traditional Christianity” – as John Bossy described it (Bossy: 1985, 1–88). Religious poetry was one of the instruments of stimulating the interiorisation of piety and breaking the ‘collective’ Catholic identity, which was still recommended by preachers. Since the end of the sixteenth century, Spanish mysticism, gaining popularity in Poland-Lithuania, became an ally to these processes of individualising Catholic piety. The works of Louis of Granada were translated by Polish Jesuits, Stanisław Warszewicki and Jan Wuchaliusz Leopolita, and by a Carmelite, Hieronim Drzewiecki; moreover, Granada’s influence is seen in the subtle lyrics of Mikołaj Sęp Szarzyński and in Kasper Twardowski’s allegorical poems. From the 1620s, Polish translations of the writings of St Teresa of Avila started being published, while translations of the works of St John of the Cross circulated in numerous manuscripts. The literary output of these two Spanish mystics inspired the original, but still insufficiently studied poetry of Polish Carmelite nuns who – like their sisters from Spain, Belgium or France – were composing poems as means of introducing allegria into the austerity of convent life (Hanusiewicz: 1999, 99–106). However, it was certainly Ignatian spirituality, with its school of imaginative and affective contemplation, that had the most significant impact on religious culture in Poland-Lithuania. It influenced other schools of spirituality (e.g. Benedictine and

21

22

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Carmelite), and above all modeled the piety of lay Catholics, as it was recommended in Industriae ad curandos animae morbos (1600) by General Claudio Acquaviva who urged the adapting of Ignatian meditation as a tool for popular evangelisation (Kapuścińska: 2015, 126). This intensity of Jesuit inspiration was of fundamental importance to the development of Catholic poetry in the seventeenth and even eighteenth centuries, both in Poland-Lithuania as well as in the rest of Europe (Martz: 1954). It resulted from the fact that a considerable number of writers and poets originated from or were at least educated by the Society of Jesus, and therefore they used poems to propagate certain models of devotion, but it also stemmed from the attractiveness of Jesuit rhetorical techniques allowing for the conceptualisation of spiritual experiences and facilitated the opening of the gardens of the five senses to godly readers. The Ignatian principle of the Application of Senses in the process of meditation, when employed in literature, prompted the intensification of such attributes of style as enargeia and energeia, saturating it with pictorial and sensory immediacy, so that the imaginary reality of the text could be ‘placed before the eyes’ of readers and made accessible to their ‘spiritual senses’, whether it be the terrifying scene of the Lord’s Passion, the picture of hell itself, or a delightful space of mystical meetings with the Beloved. Emblems played a special role in implementing this program. The works of Jesuit emblem promoters, such as Jan David, started reaching Poland very early; it was only a year after the first edition of David’s Paradisus Sponsi et Sponsae (1607) that Stanisław Grochowski translated a part of it as Pięćdziesiąt punktów rozmyślaniu Męki Pana Jezusowej służących [Fifty Points Serving Meditation on the Passion of the Lord Jesus] (1608). However, the real breakthrough took place thanks to emblematic collections based on the famous engravings of Anton II Wierix Cor Iesu amanti sacrum (especially Étienne Luzvic’s Cor Deo devotum from 1627), Pia desideria (1624) by Herman Hugo, and to a lesser extent Otto van Vaen’s Amoris divini emblemata (1615), which almost immediately gained numerous readers in the Commonwealth. In the second half of the century, Pia desideria inspired two vernacular adaptations, one by Mikołaj Mieleszko (1657) and the other by an anonymous author, whose work survived in a Carmelite manuscript (ca. 1662); in the following decades, another two Polish translations were published by Aleksander Teodor Lacki (1674) and Jan Kościesza Żaba (1744). Series of copper engravings Cor Iesu amanti sacrum and some illustrations from the Vaenius collection served religious communities, including Carmelite and Norbertine nuns, as the basis for meditation. Existing pictures were gaining new (usually prose) subscriptions as the articulation of a personal dialogue of the soul with God (Grześkowiak: 2018, 169–218). The emblematic books became an imaginary compendium for Baroque Catholic poetry, serving as “visual topoi” (Kroll: 2018, 203), setting both the stage and the main characters of the mystical and lyrical theater. A soul wandering in the

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

wilderness or tasting the delights of flowering gardens, a soul flying to the heavens with Amor Divinus, resting in the shade of the tree on which he was crucified, breastfed by the Mother of God, were recognisable and sensuous images, derived from emblems, which became the code of Baroque meditative poetry. Despite their provenance, they crossed the borders of confessions. It should be noted that in Poland-Lithuania emblematics did not influence Protestant literature as much as it did in other European countries; however, there are a few examples of its impact. The Calvinist Cent emblèmes chrestiens (1584) by Georgette de Montenay prompted an unknown poet to annotate a copy of the 1584 edition with handwritten poetic Polish subscriptions (Keferstein, Worczulanis: 1967, 518–522; Pelc: 2002, 161–172; Chemperek: 2015, 406). For the needs of the very pious Catholic Duchess Katarzyna Radziwiłłowa, the no less pious Anti-Trinitarian poet, Zbigniew Morsztyn, wrote an excellent series of emblems (Emblemata, ca 1679), based on the anonymous French emblematic cycle Les emblèmes d’amour divin et humain ensemble, using some subscriptions from Pia desideria. The latter collection must have also attracted the interest of other Protestant readers, who provided annotations in several of its preserved copies. In the eighteenth century, Pia desideria started gaining popularity amongst Orthodox readers; the adaptation titled Ifika jeropolitika was published in 1712 in Kiev, followed by two Russian translations in later decades (Grześkowiak: 2018, 202–203). In addition, emblems played an important role in education at the Kiev-Mohyla Orthodox College. Emblems, coats of arms or symbola were used as a starting point in the exercise of writing poems that offered a hermeneutic interpretation of the image (Kroll: 2018, 234). Interest in the mutual relationship of word and image is evident in Baranowicz’s religious poems from his volume Lutnia Apollinowa. Moralistic and Biblical Polish epigrammatic series by Symeon of Polotsk: Trojakie prawo, Trzy stany i ich powinności and Zaniedbanie duszy dla zbytniego o ciele starania [Three Laws; Three States and Their Duties; Neglect of the Soul Caused by Excessive Care for the Body], surviving in a manuscript, reveal their emblematic nature in the context of Dutch engravings being the source of their inspiration (Grześkowiak: 2017, 190–216). Another Orthodox poet, Stefan Jaworski, wrote panegyric emblems in Polish that contained numerous sacred references (Kroll: 2018, 206–233).

4. A belief that the Bible contained poetic parts, which were by no means inferior to the masterpieces of Greco-Roman poets, but also surpassed them in artistic perfection and truth, had been alive in Christianity since the time of Philo of Alexandria (Kugel: 1981, 162–163). In the following centuries, it inspired paraphrases and adaptations aimed at restoring the ‘poetic’ ontology of those parts, as it seemed to have been

23

24

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

lost in the process of language transmission. Those literary endeavors, having an ancient tradition (some of them were recalled in re-editions and anthologies in the sixteenth century, such as Poetarum veterum ecclesiasticorum opera Christiana et operum reliquiae atque fragmenta by Georg Fabricius, 1562), gained popularity due to Christian humanism, resulting in many Latin and vernacular works of varying artistic quality (Modlińska-Piekarz: 2018, 84). However, the Protestant Reformation introduced a normative perspective to reflection on the literary dimension of the Scripture, presenting it as a paradigm of creativity and a rhetorical model for all religious poetry, which – as Calvin emphasised – should not be contaminated with human invention (Kiefer-Lewalski: 1979, 31–34). This belief led to the formation of specific ‘Biblical poetics’ in Protestant literature. On the one hand, it encouraged the imitation of genres and of Biblical rhetorical figures as they were interpreted, for example, by Melanchthon in Institutiones rhetoricae (1521) or by Matthias Flacius Illyricus in Clavis scripturae (1617). On the other hand, it admonished against the decorative dimension of elocution and against allegory (but upheld and even strengthened typological symbolism; Kiefer-Lewalski: 1979, 77–83, 117). The scripturalism of Protestant religious poetry in Poland-Lithuania, being one of its most characteristic features, had – if seen in the long-term perspective – changing dynamics, and was moving swiftly from the rigorism typical of writers of the second half of the sixteenth century to an increasing imaginary freedom of the Baroque poets. Extremely ‘Biblical’ works of the early Protestant Reformation poets, which avoided any sophistication of verse or even distinct genre forms, were to serve catechetic and didactic goals, and in the case of metrical psalms or canticles, also community-building and mnemonic purposes. The metrical form of the latter was not meant to reveal their poetic character but to support memorising of the Psalter, which was commended by Luther as the ‘little Bible’, a compact summary of the whole Scripture and a prayer book for all of life’s occasions. The value of those poems (usually songs) relied on their strict dependence on the Scripture, and the faithful were advised that their devotion should not be based “na not wdzięczności abo rytmów składności, abo nawet na ozdobnej polszczyźnie, jako na prostocie a szczyrości serdecznej” [on the charms of notes or elegance of rhythms, or even on ornate Polish language, but on simplicity and truth of the heart] (Rybiński: 1619,)?( VI r.). In religious poetry, literary artistry and free imagination heralded an unacceptable invasion of secular values, obscuring and deforming the Word of God, which was the only proper aesthetic criterion. Nevertheless, the literary productivity of rigorously treated scripturalism was low. Even when it comes to metrical psalms, Protestant poets in Poland-Lithuania wrote relatively few of them, especially in comparison with other European countries. In the mid-sixteenth century, individual psalms were authored by Jan Seklucjan, Bernard Wojewódka, Andrzej Trzecieski, Mikołaj Rej and Cyprian Bazylik, whereas the Protestant camp as a whole issued only three full versions of a metric Psalter:

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

the hitherto mentioned Psałterz Dawida (1558) by a Calvinist, Jakub Lubelczyk, Psalmy Dawidowe z hymnami [The Psalms of David with Hymns] (1605) written to the melody of the Genevan Psalter by Maciej Rybiński, a senior of the Unity of the Czech Brethren, and Niektóre psalmy Dawidowe częścią poprawione, częścią znowu przełożone na stare noty [Some of the Psalms of David partly corrected, partly retranslated in accordance with the old notes] (1614) by a Calvinist, Salomon Rysiński, although the last mentioned collection, as the title indicates, to some extent used older translations (Meller: 2015, 299). Didactic and mnemonic, as well as exegetic and moralistic goals were, as mentioned above, particularly evident in Biblical poetry written by the Polish Brethren. Such was the purpose behind the previously mentioned Summariusz wszytkiego Nowego Testamentu [Summary of the whole New Testament] (1570), written in Polish alexandrine lines by Marcin Czechowic, and Przypowieści Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa (1599) by Erazm Otwinowski, who made over a hundred New Testament passages into parable-like poems that had features of a Biblical cento (Wilczek: 1994, 106–148). Another example of the radically understood ‘Biblical poetics’ was provided by Józef Domaniewski, also a member of the Polish Brethren congregation. Domaniewski rather summarised than paraphrased the Book of Proverbs, and in Lubcz published simultaneously two language versions of his work: the Latin Proverbiorum Salomonis versio poetica (1623), supplemented with extensive Biblical and theological commentaries, dedicated to voivode Rafał Leszczyński, and the simplified Przypowieści Solomonowe [Solomon’s Proverbs] (1623) in Polish verse, dedicated to the voivode’s wife, Anna. Erazm Otwinowski dedicated his Przypowieści Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa to Prince Konstanty Wasyl Ostrogski, and this decision could be perceived as one of many manifestations of the previously mentioned short-lasting cooperation between Protestants and Orthodox Christians, patronised by the prince. The culture context of any encounter of Orthodox religious literature with ‘Biblical poetics’ was very different than the one in the West; in Ruthenia, “the very idea of ‘sacred’ and ‘divine’ books did not yet correspond to the theological idea of the ‘Holy Scripture’ as a God-inspired set of writings” (Negrov: 2008, 39). Nevertheless, Biblical philology developed dynamically in Orthodox Ruthenia in the sixteenth century (e.g. Ruthenian Biblical translations of Francysk Skaryna, or the Ostroh Bible and the Didactic Gospel in Church Slavonic by Ivan Fyodorov). Moreover, the Holy Bible probably began to perform non-liturgical functions for the first time in Orthodox Church history. The intensity of contacts, especially between the Polish Brethren and the Orthodox believers in Lithuania, influenced the development of Biblical literature in ‘prosta mova’, as manifested, inter alia, in the works of Wasyl Ciapiński and Walenty Niegalewski (Naumow: 2017, 124–133). However, these tendencies did not stir any vivid resonance in the relatively modest corpus of Orthodox religious poetry written in vernacular Polish.

25

26

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

At the beginning of the seventeenth century, a gradual departure from rigorous scripturalism became evident in Protestant narrative poetry, dealing mainly with plots taken from deuterocanonical books, which, as not belonging to the sacred texts of the Hebrew Old Testament, seemed essentially less ‘sensitive’ to the brash practices of poets and could be versed more freely. Turned into epic poetry, they were offered primarily as moralistic and parenetic readings, but provided the opportunity for more ambitious literary exercises. For example, a Calvinist writer benefiting from the patronage of Radziwiłł princes, Samuel Dowgird, in his two volumes of Old Testament paraphrases, i.e. Historyja o Zuzannie i o matce niektórej z siedmią synów od Antyjocha umęczonej [The Story of Susanna and of the Mother Martyred with Her Seven Sons by Antiochus] (1624) and Historyja o Józefie do Egiptu zaprzedanym [The Story of Joseph Sold out to Egypt] (1625), still faithfully follows the Biblical text, but discreetly enriches imagery and elocution, reveals some epic aspirations, and thus goes beyond the paradigm of the duties of a moralist writer (Rusnak: 2015, 47–60). The literary strategies of previously mentioned Rafał Leszczyński, a Calvinist and protector of the Czech Brethren, were even more interesting. His poem, Judith, was largely an adaptation of the famous La Judit (1574) by Guillaume Salluste Du Bartas. La Judit was the first French and Protestant Biblical epic poem indebted to the Virgilian and Ariostic tradition. It is distinguished by the vividness and abundance of its imagery, by bold transgression of the terse Biblical narrative, and by introducing a deep psychological analysis of the characters, more details of the action, rhetorical decor, numerous digressions (Llewellyn: 2016, 51–74). As the work of a Calvinist poet, La Judit obviously appeared as a genuine challenge to the scriptural rigorism dominating in early Polish Protestant literature. As such, Leszczyński’s adaptation follows Du Bartas’s poem only in the first three cantos, but even in those parts the Polish poet finds it appropriate to weaken the enargeia characteristic of the French original, its pictorial content, its sensuous imagery, romantic tensions, naturalistic elements, and digressions (Marczuk: 2015, 265–300). The last two cantos are more or less based on the Biblical narrative itself. The ideal of sermo humilis still seems to hold power over the poetics of Polish Protestant writers. Similar trends would be supported in the following decades, including the early Biblical epic by Wacław Potocki, especially his juvenile and unpublished poem (ca. 1650) Judyta [Judith]. From the beginning of the seventeenth century, in Polish religious epic, the Protestant type of rhetorically sparing, moralistic discourse focused on reproducing the Biblical plot, started being challenged by the new model – a Biblical epic poem requisitioning classical Virgilian and mythological material for Christian purposes (Houghton: 2019, 239). Theologia poetica, the idea that in the sixteenth century found the most distinguished literary expression in the works of Jacopo Sannazaro and Marco Girolamo Vida, sought to reconcile the intellectual heritage

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

of Antiquity and Christianity, making the latter the key to understanding the former (Trinkaus: 1970, II 651–652). This belief, moreover, was strengthened and legitimised by the program of the Society of Jesus. Antonio Possevino discussed the recommended forms of alliance between Antiquity and Christianity in De poesi et pictura ethnica, humana et fabulosa, collata cum vera et sacra (1593), and Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski, known as the Polish Horatius Christianus, claimed in De perfecta poesi and in Dii gentium that though only a Christian may become a truly great poet, the literary beauty of Antiquity should be perceived as masked theology that required deciphering (Urbański: 2000, 29–37). Its charms reflect the highest truth. The Polish reception of the master of the Virgilian Biblical epic, Jacopo Sannazaro, was therefore relatively early and quite significant, as attested to by the preserved sixteenth-century inventories of book stores and private libraries, but above all else by a successful adaptation of De partu Virginis (1526), published by Grzegorz Czaradzki as Rytmy o porodzeniu przenaczystszym Bogarodzice Panny Maryjej [Rhythms on the purest birth of the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary] (1613), and by a preserved fragment of another anonymous (and unpublished) translation from the second half of the seventeenth century (Mazurkiewicz, Buszewicz: 2009, 7–49). Above all, however, the model of ‘classicised Christianity’ triggered the imagination of Catholic poets, alluring them with epic sensuality and encouraging bold imaginary visions, e.g. like in Rotuły na narodzenie Syna Bożego [Poems for the birth of the Son of God] (1612) by Kasper Miaskowski, where Apollo with a retinue of Muses pays homage to the newborn Jesus. In Polish Baroque Catholic poetry, the tradition of the Latin Virgilian Biblical epic interpenetrated with the literary conquest made by Torquato Tasso’s famous heroic poems. His Gerusalemme liberata, published in an excellent translation by Piotr Kochanowski as Gofred abo Jerozolima wyzwolona (1618), established a highly recommended standard for Polish epic poetry in general. This tradition exerted significant influence on two extensive biblical epic poems (‘mesjady’), aiming at retelling the entire history of salvation with Jesus Christ as the central heroic protagonist: Szymon Gawłowski’s Jezus Nazareński, Syn Ojca przedwiecznego wcielony albo Jeruzalem niebieska przezeń wyzwolona [Jesus of Nazareth, the Incarnate Son of the Eternal Father, or Heavenly Jerusalem liberated] (1686), and Świata naprawionego od Jezusa Chrystusa […] historyjej świętej ksiąg dziesięcioro [Ten Books of the History of the World Repaired by Jesus Christ] (1670) by Walenty Odymalski. Both works allude to Tasso as well as to Marco Girolamo Vida and his Christias (1535). The history of Salvation becomes an epic matter, hence carefully shaped ottava rima, as well as intertextual and stylistic references to Virgil, Vida (in Odymalski’s poem even the initial invocation to the Holy Spirit bears features of a similar invocation in Christias), and Tasso. The classical and heroic setting does not eliminate apocryphal inspirations, and together they contribute to building the new epic quality, full of el-

27

28

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

ements of Baroque sensuous aesthetics (Teusz: 2002, 211–236). The excellent poem Tobiasz wyzwolony [Tobit Liberated] (1683) by Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski is another example of a Catholic Biblical epic, modeled not only on Tasso, but also on works by Ariosto, Matteo Boiardo and Giambattista Marino (Brahmer: 1980, 200–202; Prejs: 2004, 165–181). The late Baroque Daniel prorok [Daniel, a Prophet] (1699) by Józef Jan Wadowski refers to Tasso’s traditions too, although the epic tone is disturbed by extensive moralistic tirades, which would become characteristic of the huge Biblical verse paraphrases of the following century, including the works of Rafał Gurowski and Marcin Kurzeniecki.

5. The rigors of scripturalism became relaxed much sooner in lyrics, and the strict formula of the metric psalms evolved towards free and original psalmodic lyrical poetry. Psałterz Dawidów [David’s Psalter] (1579) by Jan Kochanowski, a leading poet of the Polish Renaissance, was a breakthrough in the history of Polish religious lyrics. In his youth, Kochanowski benefited from the patronage of the Lutheran Prince, Albrecht Hohenzollern, then from the support of Prince Mikołaj Radziwiłł, a Calvinist, but he himself remained a Catholic to the end of his life (NowickaJeżowa: 2015, 216–274). His poetic Psalter mirrors to some extent the creative conflict that the poet experienced facing the challenges of being faithful to the Scripture and the temptations of imaginative freedom. Following in the footsteps of George Buchanan, Kochanowski interpreted the Psalms as Horatian odes (though written in Polish verse), requiring a variety of metrical schemes, sophisticated forms of stanza, a rationalisation of imagery and enrichment of rhetorical ornaments. However, careful analysis reveals that these tendencies in his work remain in tension with the harshness of the original Biblical diction, which seems to hold power over the poet’s imagination. Buchanan’s Horatian psalmody was also imitated by Mikołaj Sęp Szarzyński; in his posthumously published volume Rytmy abo wiersze polskie [Rythms, or Polish Poems], 1601, four poems are exact translations of the lyrics from Psalmorum paraphrasis poetica. However, Sęp, probably inspired by the examples of Italian spiritual Petrarchism, also strived for the poetic re-creation of the psalm in modern genres, as in his Psalm CXXX paraphrasis arranged as canzona. Sęp was an ardent Catholic, though – according to some scholars – he hypothetically converted from Calvinism (Błoński: 1967, 17–24), and it is mostly in the Catholic confessional space that Polish poetry (predominantly thanks to Kochanowski and Sęp) developed its meditational and psalmodic lyrics, unlimited by the rules of paraphrase and breaking with the medieval pattern of poetic prayer understood as an ‘invocation and petition’. The excellent sonnets by Sęp, sparkling with intertextual references to the

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

writings of Louis of Granada, employing the rhetoric of paradox and disharmony, building up intriguing elliptic syntax, as well as his original “songs in the shape of psalms” are works in which the Biblical text, still intensely present, is subject to deep internalising and individualising reconstruction. Similar solutions might be noticed in Rymy duchowne [Spiritual Rhymes] (1590) by Sebastian Grabowiecki, also a Catholic, strongly influenced by Italian Petrarchists, who in his virtuoso poetic volume (the poet used forty-nine types of stanzas, including sonnets, terza rima, ottava rima, canzona, and others) on many levels and in a meditative manner processed and rewrote the Biblical text. In the seventeenth century, the spread of this model of meditative and Biblical lyrics contributed to the blurring of confessional borders in Polish religious poetry in general. It appeared attractive, albeit to a very limited extent, to several Orthodox poets writing in Polish, such as Symeon Polotski (e.g. Modlitwa w utrapieniu [Prayer in distress]) or Joannicy Galatowski (e.g. Pieśń o pokorze, Pieśń o śmierci [A Song on Humility, A Song on Death]), although their lyrics gravitated more towards moralising discourse. Meditative lyrics inspired Protestant poets as well. Pieśni pokutne [Penitential Songs] by Olbrycht Karmanowski, an Anti-Trinitarian, differ significantly from the type of utilitarian poetry still dominating in his congregation. Based on Biblical verses and phrases borrowed from popular prayers, Karmanowski’s poems take the form of imaginative quasi-psalms with a strongly marked, individualised subject. However, Catholic poets of the day wrote in a similar manner (e.g. Jan Gawiński, Wespazjan Kochowski), some of them even willingly referring to their original poems as ‘psalms’, although they lack any of the characteristics of a paraphrase. Nevertheless, in penitential lyrics, which were seemingly quite homogeneous by their reference to the Biblical pattern, the confessional distinctions between Catholic and Protestant poets appeared on a different level. Catholic lyrical ‘penitences’, ‘laments’, or penitential ‘elegies’ – as the poets used to call them – usually have, unlike the Protestant poems of this kind, a structure correlated with sacramental confession and penance. These differences resulted from the Protestant and Catholic teachings on justification, which in turn was one of the most important points of the religious dispute. Luther’s idea of justification as an unconditional gift of grace opposed the medieval rite of the sacrament of penance in the medieval Church, in which a sinner was required to examine his conscience, to be contrite, to confess, and to provide satisfaction for his wrongdoings (Cummings: 2002, 333–344). Poems by authors such as Kasper Miaskowski, Hieronim Morsztyn, Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski or even Jan Andrzej Morsztyn, who converted from Calvinism, followed these catechism rules. As it turned out, contrition had considerable poetic potential. The tears of sinners, abundantly shed, became if not the subject (in this respect, Polish poetry kept a certain distance from the Italian poesia lacrimosa), then at least a valued motif of poetic imagery, easily generating

29

30

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

numerous circles of metaphorical associations. The motif of tears was also willingly used in Passion poetry, in which meditative compassio led to vivid expressions of contrition, hyperbolised and explored by poetic conceits; tears flow like streams and rivers, then join with torrents of Christ’s blood, become wine and ink serving the poet to write his pious poems: “Weź za inkaust łzy (o święta pokuto!)” [Use tears as ink (oh holy penance!)] – so wrote Lubomirski in the prologue to his Decymka myśli świętych [Decimal of the Holy Considerations] (Lubomirski: 1995, I 309). The most outstanding achievements of this type of meditative and Biblical poetry belong to the poets of the second half of the seventeenth century. Wacław Potocki, already mentioned above, was raised and educated as an Anti-Trinitarian, but when the Polish Brethren were accused of collaboration with the Swedish invaders and in 1658 the parliament decreed their banishment from the Commonwealth, it prompted his conversion to Catholicism. Most of his poetic output remained in manuscript form, and among them an extensive collection of deeply moving Songs, arranged in several cycles, in which the Biblical word is fully integrated with the dynamic, sensuous, individual lyrical voice. By means of imaginative meditation, the poet became an actor of Biblical events or rather presented them as taking place inside his own self. The other great master of the time, an arch-Catholic, Wespazjan Kochowski, eagerly referring to his original imaginative lyrics as ‘psalms’, infused them with a clear political tone. David’s poetry was for him an archetype of lyrics liberated from the requirements of humanistic elegance, sometimes even brutal. Some of his ‘psalms’ from the collection Niepróżnujące próżnowanie [Non-idling Idleness] (1674) are in fact both religious and political poems; the subtitles explicitly refer to the wars with the Swedes and Turks, and proper names borrowed from the Biblical psalms become the nicknames of participants in those martial events. Characteristic transposition of Biblical realities into Polish political life marks Kochowski’s most famous work, Psalmodia polska [Polish Psalmody] (1695), the series of poetic prose conceived as a Psalter for the new elect nation, to whom God sent His anointed one, Jan III Sobieski, “aby nademloną dźwigał Sarmacyją” [to support weakened Sarmatia] (Kochowski: 1695, 79), and whose glory of the defender of Christianity is to be told by the poet himself who is “na sędźtwo ludu Bożego naznaczony” (Kochowski: 1695, 95) [appointed to judge God’s people], like the Biblical Nazirites. Carefully shaped, arranged in parallel syntactic structures, the rhetorical periods of Psalmodia polska imitate the verses of the Biblical psalms, and the whole series is dominated by the Messianic concept (having already antecedents in Baroque preaching) of the citizens of the Commonwealth as the elect nation (Obremski: 1995, 251–257). The idea of Israel is applied directly to Poland-Lithuania, which – for as long as she remains faithful to Catholicism and fights the foes of the true faith – fulfills the divine project and can count on the special protection of Providence.

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

Undoubtedly, Decymka myśli świętych (1686) by Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski, already mentioned above, is one of the crowning achievements of Polish religious lyrics. To all appearances, it simply develops penitential conventions and has even direct references to the Church liturgy, but the voice of the lyrical self, expanding from these traditional schemes, boldly exposes its separateness, exclusivity, moves prayer into a realm of unruly affections, violates decorum, and thus becomes full of extraordinary poetic truth: Swym tedy głosem, a nie świętych usty, Złośliwy, próżny, wściekły, grzeszny, pusty, Wołam i krzyczę, i głosu dobywam, Wrzeszczę, przykrzę się, twarz łzami umywam (Decymka myśli świętych II, 12–22; Lubomirski: 1995 I, 311). [Then with my own voice, not with the lips of the saints, Malicious, vain, angry, sinful, empty, I am calling and screaming, and dredging up my voice, I am shouting, I am being a nuisance, I wash my face with tears.]

6. In the period from the mid-sixteenth to the end of the seventeenth century, Polish religious poetry probably went through the deepest transformation in its history. From the modest heritage of vernacular songs, functioning on the outskirts of the liturgy and serving community devotion, emerges – mainly due to the influence of Biblical and meditative models, emblems and preaching – abundant, multi-genre imaginative poetry, no longer performing utilitarian functions, but serving the individual expression of subtle spiritual experiences. At the end of this period, it seems to be only weakly marked with differences resulting from diverse confessions of individual writers, because it is also the time when Catholic religious culture dominates in Poland-Lithuania and seems to have had a strong hold on the poets’ imagination and literary taste. Admittedly, however, at earlier stages, it was the confrontation of poetics and doctrines correlated with different denominations that determined the richness, maturity and depth of religious poetry of the end of the seventeenth century. The Protestant Reformation definitely enhanced the importance of the vernacular language as a medium of religious discourse; till that time, such practice was – both in the Catholic and Orthodox space – not only a violation of decorum, but also seemed to threaten the purity of the doctrine. The Protestant perspective also contributed to the display of Biblical patterns as models

31

32

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

of original literary works and taught literal as well as existential reading of the Scripture, encouraging its reader – a poet – to understand the events of sacred history as a paradigm of his own spiritual experiences. Evangelical scripturalism, however, would not have sufficient poetic power if it were not supported by inspirations from meditative literature, mainly Catholic, though one should not forget that meditations written by Protestants (e.g. Lewis Bayly or Henry Montagu) also circulated in the Commonwealth. The fear of idolatry also limited the impact which secular poetry, both classical and modern, had on the poetry written by Polish Protestants, even though in France the widely admired Du Bartas appointed Urania a new Muse to take care of all Christian poetry, and boldly adorned his religious poems with Virgilian trophies. Yet adapting the classical tradition of Petrarchism and Marinism, as well as the achievements of late Renaissance Italian literature, for the needs of religious poetry, was prompted by Catholic poets who would later influence Orthodox and Uniate literary culture of the seventeenth and eighteenth century. What made Catholic religious poetry in some ways closer to the Orthodox was their emphasis on liturgy and paraliturgy, although in the case of Orthodox literature this tendency was mainly reflected in works written in Church Slavonic and Ruthenian. The interpenetration between preaching discourse and poetry, the transmission of loci communes and conceits, as well as fascination with emblems or – more broadly – with the relationship between words and images, with the imaginative possibilities of poetry, were also characteristics of the literature of both denominations. The formation of imaginative Polish religious poetry in the pre-Enlightenment period was the result of this combined and sometimes paradoxical cooperation of all these seemingly conflicting inspirations.

Bibliography Primary Sources Artomiusz, Piotr (1640), Cantional to jest pieśni krześcijańskie ku chwale Boga w Trójcy jedynego […], Gdańsk: Andrzej Hünefeldt. Barclay, John (2013), Icon animorum or the Mirror of Minds, Mark Riley (ed.), Thomas May (transl.), Leuven: Leuven University Press. Bartoszewski, Walenty (2019), Utwory poetyckie, Monika Kardasz (ed.), Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich PAN. Grochowski, Stanisław (1607), Wiersze i inne pisma co przebrańsze, Kraków: Szymon Kempinius.

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

Hosius, Stanislaus (1553), Confessio fidei catholicae christiana, authoritate synodi provincialis, quae habita est Petricoviae anno M.D.L.I mense Iunio, edita […], Cracoviae: apud haeredes Marci Scharffenberger. Jabłonowski, Jan Stanisław (1700), Zabawa chrześcijańska albo żywot zbawienny Pana Boga naszego Jezusa troistemi epigramatami wrażony […], Lwów: Drukarnia oo. jezuitów. Kochowski, Wespazjan (1695), Trybut należyty wdzięczności wszystkiego dobrego dawcy Panu i Bogu, albo Psalmodia polska za dobrodziejstwa Boskie dziękująca, Częstochowa: Drukarnia Jasnej Góry Częstochowskiej. — (2019), Ogród Panieński, Roman Mazurkiewicz/Wiesław Pawlak (ed.), Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich PAN. Lubelczyk, Jakub (2010), Psałterz i kancjonał z melodiami drukowany w 1558 roku/ Polish Psalter and Hymnbook with Melodies Printed in 1558, Janusz S. Gruchała/Piotr Poźniak (ed.), Kraków: Musica Iagellonica. Lubomirski, Stanisław Herakliusz (1995), Poezje zebrane, vol. 1–2, Adam Karpiński (ed.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper. [Oleśnicka, Zofia] (1556), Pieśń nowa, w której jest dziękowanie Panu Bogu wszechmogącemu, że malućkim a prostakom raczył objawić tajemnice Królestwa swojego, Kraków: Łazarz Andrysowicz. Otwinowski, Erazm (1999), Pisma poetyckie, Piotr Wilczek (ed.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IBL. Rybiński, Maciej (1619), Psalmy Dawidowe z hymnami. Pieśni duchowne. Katechizm mniejszy i więtszy z składami dawnemi wiary katolickiej. Modlitw osobliwych sto. Z wielką pilnością i potrzebną wydane na cześć i chwałę Boga w Trójcy jedynego, a na pożytek Kościoła powszechnego apostolskiego na Panie Jezusie Chrystusie, jedynym fundamencie Słowem Bożym zbudowanego, Gdańsk: Andrzej Hünefeldt. Seklucjan, Jan (1897), Pieśni duchowne a nabożne, nowo zebrane i wydane, Teodor Wierzbowski (ed.), Warszawa: Drukarnia K. Kowalewskiego. Skarga, Piotr (1577), O jedności Kościoła Bożego pod jednym pasterzem i o greckim od tej jedności odstąpieniu […], Wilno: Drukarnia księcia Mikołaja Krzysztofa Radziwiłła. Trzecieski, Andrzej (1558), Pieśń nowa o krewkości wielkiej każdego człowieka, a którym obyczajem przyść może ku łasce Pańskiej, Kraków: Mattheus Siebeneicher.

Secondary Sources Babicz, Sergiusz (2004), Twórczość Melecjusza Smotryckiego w kontekście wczesnego baroku ukraińskiego, Terminus 5/2, 13–30. Błoński, Jan (1967), Mikołaj Sęp Szarzyński a początki polskiego baroku, Kraków: Wydawnictwo Literackie. Bobowski, Mikołaj (1893), Polskie pieśni katolickie od najdawniejszych czasów do końca XVI wieku, Kraków: Akademia Umiejętności. Bossy, John (1985), Christianity in the West, 1400–1700, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

33

34

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Brahmer, Mieczysław (1980), Powinowactwa polsko-włoskie. Z dziejów wzajemnych stosunków kulturalnych, Warszawa: PWN. Buchwald-Pelcowa, Paulina (1997), Cenzura w dawnej Polsce. Między prasą drukarską a stosem, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Stowarzyszenia Bibliotekarzy Polskich. Chemperek, Dariusz (2015), Poezja ewangelików reformowanych w Rzeczypospolitej XVII wieku, in: Dariusz Chemperek (ed.), Ewangelicyzm reformowany w Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej. Dialog z Europą i wybory aksjologiczne w świetle literatury i piśmiennictwa XVI–XVII wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 402–418. Chynczewska-Hennel, Teresa (2017), Tożsamość religijna i narodowościowa Rusinów w Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej, in: Marzanna Kuczyńska (ed.), Między Wschodem a Zachodem: Prawosławie i unia, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Neriton, 56–80. Cummings, Brian (2002), The Literary Culture of the Reformation: Grammar and Grace, Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press. Czechowicz, Agnieszka (2019), “Święta, wielka i trudna robota”. Uwagi o kontekstach gatunkowych “Nowego zaciągu” Wacława Potockiego, Terminus 21/3, 269–285. Dyrness, William A. (2019), The Origins of Protestant Aesthetics in Early Modern Europe. Calvin’s Reformation Poetics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fijałkowski, Paweł (2000), Kancjonał Piotra Artomiusza z 1620 roku, Odrodzenie i Reformacja w Polsce 44, 129–148. Frick, David A. (1995), Meletij Smotryc’kyj, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Gordon, Bruce (1996), The Changing Face of Protestant History and Identity in the Sixteenth Century, in: Bruce Gordon (ed.), Protestant History and Identity in the Sixteenth Century Europe, Aldershot, UK: Scolar Press, I, 1–23. Grześkowiak, Radosław (2010), Wprowadzenie do lektury, in: Olbrycht Karmanowski, Wiersze i listy, Radosław Grześkowiak (ed.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IBL, 5–29. — (2017), Wiersze na ryciny jako dominanta polskojęzycznej twórczości Symeona z Połocka, Pamiętnik Literacki 108/3, 185–216. — (2018), Dialogi dzieł dawnych. Studia o intertekstualności literatury staropolskiej, Gdańsk: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego. Hanusiewicz, Mirosława (1999), Theresian Spirituality in the Poetry of the Carmelites from Cracow (17th–18th Century), in: Hubert Łaszkiewicz (ed.), Churches and Confessions in East Central Europe in Early Modern Times, Lublin: Instytut Europy ŚrodkowoWschodniej, 99–106. Houghton, L.B.T. (2019), Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue in the Italian Renaissance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kacprzak, Marta M. (2015), Szesnastowieczna pieśń polska ewangelików reformowanych w kręgu wartości życia prywatnego i publicznego, in: Dariusz Chemperek (ed.), Ewangelicyzm reformowany w Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej. Dialog z Europą i wybory aksjologiczne w świetle literatury i piśmiennictwa XVI–XVII wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 170–215.

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

Kanior, Marian (1994), Misja benedyktynów słowiańskich w kościele św. Krzyża w Krakowie, Folia Historica Cracoviensia 2, 23–30. Kapuścińska, Anna (2015), Theatrum meditationis. Ignacjanizm i jezuityzm w duchowej i literackiej kulturze Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej – źródła, inspiracje, idee, in: Alina Nowicka-Jeżowa (ed.), Drogi duchowe katolicyzmu polskiego XVII wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 119–29. Kawecka-Gryczowa, Alodia (1974), Ariańskie oficyny wydawnicze Rodeckiego i Sternackiego. Dzieje i bibliografia, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. Keferstein, Halina/Worczulanis, Barbara (1967), Polska wersja rękopiśmienna emblematów Georgette de Montenay, Komunikaty Mazursko-Warmińskie 11/4, 518–522. Kempa, Tomasz (2008), Animatorzy współpracy protestancko-prawosławnej w okresie kontrreformacji, in: Tomasz Ciesielski/Anna Filipczak-Kocur (ed.), Rzeczpospolita państwem wielu narodowości i wyznań, Warszawa/Opole: Wydawnictwo DiG, 321–341. Kiefer Lewalski, Barbara (1979), Protestant Poetics and the Seventeenth-Century Religious Lyrics, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Kłoczowski, Jerzy (2000), A History of Polish Christianity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kolb, Robert (2016), Martin Luther and the Enduring Word of God: The Wittenberg School and Its Scripture-Centered Proclamation, Grand Rapids: Baker Publishing Group. Korolko, Mirosław (1977), Charakterystyka religijnych i literackich form staropolskiej pieśni pasyjnej, in: Mirosław Korolko (ed.), Polskie pieśni pasyjne. Średniowiecze i wiek XVI, vol. 1–2, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo PAX. Kowalczyk, Monika (2017), “Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą tryumfującego Jezusa”. O wyznaniowym wymiarze eposu biblijnego Wacława Potockiego, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. Kozak, Barbara (2004), Akatysty polskie Symeona z Połocka, Acta Polono-Ruthenica 9, 7–19. Kriegseisen, Wojciech (2010), Stosunki wyznaniowe w relacjach państwo – kościół między reformacją a oświeceniem (Rzesza Niemiecka, Niderlandy Północne, Rzeczpospolita polsko-litewska), Warszawa: Instytut Historii PAN. Kroll, Walter (2018), Poeta laureatus Stefan Jaworski i emblematyka, Terminus 20/2, 195–253. Kuczyńska, Marzanna (2003), Południowosłowiańska poezja liturgiczna w zbiorach bibliotek polskich. Szczecin: Uniwersytet Szczeciński. Kugel, James L. (1981), The Idea of Biblical Poetry: Parallelism and Its History, New Haven/ London: Yale University Press. Llewellyn, Kathleen M. (2016), Representing Judith in Early Modern French Literature, London/New York: Routledge. Łużny, Ryszard (1989), “Akatysty polskie” – stroniczki z dziejów ekumenicznej poezji religijnej w Polsce, in: Ryszard Łużny (ed.), Chrześcijański Wschód a kultura polska, Lublin: Wydawnictwo KUL, 253–260.

35

36

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

— (1996), Pisarze kręgu Akademii Kijowsko-Mohylańskiej a literatura polska. Z dziejów związków kulturalnych polsko-słowiańskich w XVII–XVIII wieku, Kraków: Uniwersytet Jagielloński. Marczuk, Barbara (2015), “La Judit” Guillaume’a du Bartasa (1574) oraz jej parafraza autorstwa Rafała Leszczyńskiego (po 1620) – kształt gatunkowy i konteksty ideologiczne, Terminus 17/2, 265–300. Marinelli, Luigi (1995), Akafist Najświętszej Pannie (1648) – pierwszy utwór Symeona Połockiego, Ricerche Slavistiche 42, 239–278. Martz, Louis L. (1954), The Poetry of Meditation. A Study in English Religious Literature, New Haven: Yale University Press. Masluk, Vitalij Petrovic (1983), Latinomovni poetiki i ritoriki XVII st. ta іh rol u rozvitku teoriі literaturi na Ukraіni, Kiіv: Naukova dumka. Mazurkiewicz, Roman (2011), Z dawnej literatury maryjnej. Zarysy i zbliżenia, Kraków: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UP. Mazurkiewicz, Roman/Buszewicz, Elwira (2009), Wstęp, in: Grzegorz Czaradzki, Rytmy o porodzeniu przenaczystszym Bogarodzicy Panny Maryjej, Roman Mazurkiewicz/Elwira Buszewicz (ed.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Neriton 2009, 7–49. Meller, Katarzyna (2004), “Noc przeszła a dzień się przybliżył”. Studia o polskim piśmiennictwie reformacyjnym XVI wieku, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UAM. — (2015), Psalm – kalwińska “pieśń nad pieśniami”. O kształtowaniu się ewangelickiej kultury literackiej i duchowej. Na przykładzie przekładów i parafraz Liber Psalmorum z XVI I XVII wieku, in: Dariusz Chemperek (ed.), Ewangelicyzm reformowany w Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej. Dialog z Europą i wybory aksjologiczne w świetle literatury i piśmiennictwa XVI–XVII wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 275–308. Michalski, Sergiusz (1993), The Reformation and the Visual Arts. The Protestant Image Question in Western and Eastern Europe, New York: Routledge. Michałowska, Teresa (2000), Średniowiecze, Warszawa: PWN. Millet, Olivier (1992), Calvin et la dynamique de la parole. Etude de rhetorique reformee, Paris: Champion. Miszalska, Jadwiga (2005), Il sonetto 138 di Petrarca nel barocco polacco: tra letteratura e ideologia, in: Monica Febbo/Piotr Salwa (ed.), Petrarca a jedność kultury europejskiej/ Petrarca e l’unità della cultura europea, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper, 445–454. Modlińska-Piekarz, Angelika (2018), Łacińska poezja biblijna na Śląsku w XVI i XVII wieku, Lublin: Wydawnictwo KUL. Moser, Michael (2017), Too Close to “the West”? The Ruthenian Language of the Instruction of 1609, in: Giovanna Brogi Bercoff/Marko Pavlyshyn/Serhii Plokhy (ed.), Ukraine and Europe. Cultural Encounters and Negotiations, Toronto/Buffalo/London: University of Toronto Press, 119–135.

Denominations and Poetics. Confessional Profiles of Polish Renaissance and Baroque Religious Poetry

Naumow, Aleksander (2017), Biblia i liturgia w systemie wartości kultury ruskiej Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej, in: Marzanna Kuczyńska (ed.), Między Wschodem a Zachodem. Prawosławie i unia, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 121–140. Negrov, Alexander I. (2008), Biblical Interpretation in the Russian Orthodox Church. A Historical and Hermeneutical Perspective, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Nieznanowski, Stefan (1989), Studia i wizerunki. O poezji staropolskiej i jej badaczach, Warszawa: Instytut Wydawniczy PAX. Nowicka-Jeżowa, Alina (2015), Jan Kochanowski wobec protestantyzmu, in: Dariusz Chemperek (ed.), Ewangelicyzm reformowany w Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej. Dialog z Europą i wybory aksjologiczne w świetle literatury i piśmiennictwa XVI–XVII wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 216–274. Obremski, Krzysztof (1995), “Biblizacja” Rzeczypospolitej (Optio vobis datur, eligite), in: Czesław Hernas/Mirosława Hanusiewicz (ed.), Religijność literatury polskiego baroku, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 251–257. Ó hAnnrachain, Tadhg (2015), Catholic Europe, 1592–1648. Centre and Peripheries, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pelc, Janusz (2002), Słowo i obraz. Na pograniczu literatury i sztuk plastycznych, Kraków: Universitas. Prejs, Marek (2004), Staropolskie kręgi inspiracji. Studia o literaturze, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. — (2016), Teatralizacja i oralizacja kultu religijnego w okresie potrydenckim jako wyraz “akomodacyjnej” polityki Kościoła, in: Justyna Dąbkowska-Kujko (ed.), Formowanie kultury katolickiej w dobie potrydenckiej. Powszechność i narodowość katolicyzmu polskiego, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 145–180. Radyszewśkyj, Rostysław (1996), Polskojęzyczna poezja ukraińska od końca XVI do początku XVIII wieku, vol. 1–2, Kraków: Wydawnictwo PAN. — (1997), Poezja ukraińska w języku polskim w służbie religijnej polemiki XVII wieku: Hipacy Pociej – Melecjusz Smotrycki, Acta Polono-Ruthenica 2, 59–70. Romanowski, Andrzej (2018), Wschodnim pograniczem literatury polskiej. Od średniowiecza do oświecenia, Kraków: Universitas. Rusnak, Radosław (2015), Parenetyczny aspekt starotestamentowych adaptacji pióra Samuela Dowgirda z Pogowia, Barok. Historia – literatura – sztuka 43/1, 47–60. Shell, Alison (1999), Catholicism, Controversy and the English Literary Imagination, 1558–1660, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stępień, Paweł (2013), Śmiech w czasach ostatecznych. Tematyka religijna w “Figlikach” Mikołaja Reja, Warszawa: Wydział “Artes Liberales” Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. — (2017), Zbawcza wartość krzyża. O źródłach luterańskiej pobożności pasyjnej w Rzeczypospolitej XVI–XVII w., in: Katarzyna Meller (ed.), Luteranizm w kulturze Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 164–200. Teusz, Leszek (2002), “Bolesna Muza nie Parnasu góry, ale Golgoty…” Mesjady polskie XVII stulecia, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper.

37

38

Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Trinkaus, Charles (1970), “In Our Image and Likeness”: Humanity and Divinity in Italian Humanist Thought, vol. 1–2, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Urbański, Piotr (2000), Theologia fabulosa. Commentationes Sarbievianae, Szczecin: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Szczecińskiego. Wiemer, Björn (2003), Dialect and Language Contacts on the Territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from the 15th century until 1939, in: Kurt Braunmüller/Gisella Ferraresi (ed.), Aspect of Multilingualism in European Language History, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing, 105–144. Wierzbicka-Trwoga, Krystyna (2016), The Reality of the Word. Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski’s “Poezje Postu Świętego”, in: Jean Ward/Maria Fengler/Małgorzata Grzegorzewska (ed.), Striking the Chords of Spirit and Flesh in Polish Poetry. A Serendipity, Gdańsk: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego, 81–95. Wilczek, Piotr (1994), Erazm Otwinowski, pisarz ariański, Katowice: Gnome Books.

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

Jan Kochanowski (1530–1584), the most prominent poet of the Polish Renaissance, lived at a time when the text of the Holy Bible was used, eagerly and in many different ways, as highly attractive literary material. Tales from the Old and the New Testament were subjected by the sixteenth-century authors to often laicizing renarration, biblical heroes served as instructive examples in the parenetic literature of the time, and phrases and formulations found in the sacred books came to serve as a model for the language of religious expression. How widespread was this phenomenon is evidenced by the fact that the Bible was tapped upon, for their own specific purposes, by authors of narrative works popular at the time (such as Baltazar Opec’s Żywot Pana Jezu Krysta, the anonymous Istoryja o świętym Józefie and Sprawa chędoga o męce Pana Chrystusowej), dramas (such as Żywot Józefa by Mikołaj Rej, Jeftes by Jan Zawicki, Castus Ioseph by Szymon Szymonowic), and 16th-century epigrammatic works (such as Mikołaj Rej’s Źwierzyniec, and Erazm Otwinowski’s Sprawy abo Historyje znacznych niewiast)1 . This took place despite the ongoing secularization of social life, and the widespread knowledge of the Holy Scriptures at this time was the effect of research, stemming from humanistic philology, on the literary shape of the biblical text. The main goal here was to produce Polish translations of the Bible that would be as faithful to the original as possible: a task that united a whole spectrum of humanists in a collective effort, catalyzed by the rapid increase, at least at one point, of Protestant believers and their confessional diversity. As a result, at the end of the 16th century, apart from two comprehensive Catholic translations: the Leopolita Bible and the Bible of Jakub Wujek, there was the Brest Bible addressed to the local Calvinists, and Szymon Budny’s Arian translation, not to mention separate translations of the New Testament or the Book of Psalms2 . This exceptional status of the biblical text in the Renaissance period is well reflected in the poetic output of Jan Kochanowski. This is all the more significant as his intellectual formation as well as his literary taste were greatly influenced by his reading of the Greco-Roman classics. And while the author of Laments did

1 See Adamczyk: 1988. 2 A factual, comprehensive discussion of early modern translations of the Bible into Polish is provided by Pietkiewicz: 2016.

40

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

not participate in the above-mentioned collective effort of assimilating the Holy Scripture into Polish, even though his linguistic competence and above-average literary sense would have made him a highly desirable participant in such an undertaking, biblical language permeates his religious poetry to a considerable degree, and in several places in his works he openly keeps very close to the sacred text. It is impossible not to mention here his Psałterz Dawidów published in 1579, a highly successful poetic adaptation of all the 150 pieces from the Old Testament Book of Psalms. Kochanowski’s specific preferences as a reader of the Bible are already evident in his choice of the text to paraphrase. He reached for a book that is decidedly the most poetical, and one that would pose an enormous challenge for any translator, certainly no smaller than the one he undertook in bringing to the Polish reader the works of Horace, Anacreonte, Homer or Sappho3 . Undoubtedly, the renaissance poet was also drawn to the Psalmist by the dominant tone of his prayerful discourse, which escaped the often extremely fierce inter-confessional polemics of the time. Kochanowski, who in the period in question can be counted among the proponents of religious Irenicism in the spirit of Erasmus, must have been attracted by the character of David’s psalms that eschews doctrinal disputes, and by the fact that they are often filled with largely universal anthropological reflection. He also seems to appreciate their vision of God as above all the demiurge and lawgiver who not only safeguards the world’s existence but also protects its moral norms. Moreover, such an image corresponds with the quest, characteristic of the Renaissance, for a permanent order in the temporal reality that guarantees a truly fulfilled existence. Similar aspirations, as well as his attachment to the poetic

3 It is worth remembering that at the time when the Psalter was written, the Polish reader already had at his disposal several other native versions of the Davidic psalmody: these include Walenty Wróbel’s, Mikołaj Rej’s and Jakub Lubelczyk’s translations, to say nothing of those included in complete translations of the Bible. In a sense, therefore, Kochanowski’s “opus magnum” betrays its emulative character also in relation to them. The importance the poet attached to his work can be seen in the fact that for some time he considered dedicating it to King Sigismund II Augustus (d. 1572). This is evident from a letter to Stanisław Fogelweder dated 6th October 1571, in which he asks his influential friend to win the ruler’s favour. One can only assume that the accomplishment of such an ambitious task as creating a Polish version of the Psalter equal to the Hebrew original was expected to ensure Kochanowski a prominent place among his contemporaries, and offering it to the Jagiellonian monarch was supposed to help erase the poor impression made by his slightly earlier Satyr or Wild Man. As it happened, Sigismund Augustus died shortly after this request was made in a letter, so Kochanowski’s expectations were not fulfilled and the Psalter was dedicated to Piotr Myszkowski. In spite of this setback, one can say with certainty that this translation achieved an unprecedented success, measured by its numerous reprints and the fact that individual psalms from it soon found their way into both Catholic and Protestant hymnals.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

diction typical of the psalms, are manifested by Kochanowski in many places in his religious writings, long before he undertook to translate the above-mentioned classical works, for example in his Song “Czego chcesz od nas, Panie…” [What do you expect of us, Lord…] published in 15624 . Although clearly the poet’s intention is not to leave out any of the Psalter’s rich content in his Polish adaptation, it would definitely be difficult to look upon his version of this biblical book as a traditional translation; it is certainly remote from the orthodox-leaning comprehensive translations of the Holy Scriptures listed here. Kochanowski the poet invariably prevails over the philologist or biblical scholar, a fact of which he is well aware. As he himself admits in a letter to Stanisław Fogelweder, while working on the Psalter he was faced with a certain dilemma that was difficult to resolve. He speaks of two allegorically presented goddesses, one of which, Necessitas, represents the imperative to stick to the letter of the biblical source, while the other, Poetica, tempts him with the prospect of giving the translated texts a form that agrees with his own aesthetic sense (Kochanowski: 1980, 751–752). A closer analysis of the end result of his many years of toil leaves little doubt as to which of the two goddesses could ultimately count on the translator’s favour. Kochanowski did not hesitate to expand on the thoughts that he found particularly appealing, or to enrich them with poetic imagery. He did so especially with phrases that in some way corresponded with his own writing. He saturated his adaptation with concepts from the realm of Stoic philosophy, reduced the distance between God and man, tamed the forceful appeals addressed to Israel’s enemies, and adapted the exoticism of culture and nature featuring in the psalms to the concepts and images familiar to readers living in sixteenth-century Poland. There is, however, no better proof of the author’s desire to include his translation within the broadest possible circle of poetry inspired by classical diction than his decision to replace the Old Hebrew verse form, alien to the native ear, with contemporary prosody, often of classical, and therefore pagan, origin5 . An example of the poet’s rather indifferent treatment of a canonical text is the case of Psalm 19, which he decided to use in Song VI, included in the posthumously published collection Fragmenta albo pozostałe pisma [Fragments or Other Writings]. The biblical image captivating the poet to such an extent that he invokes it again, this time in his fully original text, turns out to be the sun, likened to a bridegroom coming out the bedchamber: “Taki więc z swej łożnicy nowy oblubieniec / Wychodzi; na nim złoty płaszcz i złoty wieniec” (“Such, then, from his bed

4 To such conclusions in this regard lead the meticulous findings of Fallek (1931). See also Graciotti: 1989; Rusnak: 2021. 5 On Kochanowski’s paraphrase of David’s psalms, see e.g. Pelc: 2001; Buszewicz: 2001.

41

42

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

a new bridegroom / Comes forth, on him a golden mantle and a golden wreath”; vv. 75–76)6 . Although this comparison is part of a rather elaborate description of the magnificence of God’s creation, the work itself can only be considered religious to a limited degree. In fact, its themes revolve around the essence of beauty, and its primary philosophical contexts include Plato’s dialogues, Symposium and Phaedrus, and the writings of the Italian Neoplatonists7 . Moreover, a large part is played in it by mythological stories: the story of King Jolkos Pelias, unsuccessfully trying to restore his youth, and of Helen, kidnapped by Paris. In addition, the entire song has as its addressee the “Hanna urodziwa” (“handsome Hannah”; v. 65). The phrase taken from the psalm is used in a highly unorthodox manner, placed in a context quite remote from the original, which in fact confirms Kochanowski’s inclusive approach to various cultural traditions, in which the Renaissance tended to find complementary sources of knowledge about the world and mankind. Also Zuzanna [Susanna], based on the thirteenth chapter of the Book of Daniel, can hardly be considered a reliable philological translation. The biblical heroine becomes for the poet a model of a faithful wife who, thanks to her unyielding trust in divine providence, fortunately protects her reputation tarnished by two old men who falsely testify against her. Even though he preserves the work’s basic plot (the only more serious modification that he allows himself was to replace the lentisk and the oak, the trees under which the wicked tryst is supposed to have taken place, with an apple and a walnut tree); rather than by the plot itself. The poet is more intrigued by the psychological layer of the story. In order to convey with reverence the emotions accompanying the woman unjustly accused of adultery – and it is worth recalling that Zuzanna was dedicated to another young woman, Elżbieta Radziwiłłowa née Szydłowiecka – he puts into her mouth a soliloquy, absent from the Book of Daniel, in which on the eve of her interrogation, while pondering in the Renaissance fashion the categories of Fortune and Virtue, she reflects on the difficult situation in which she has found herself. Thus, according to Wacław Walecki, “the heroine of Kochanowski’s work is a vivid, expressive and real character“ (Walecki:

6 The relevant passage from Psalm 19 reads: “ipse [=sol] quasi sponsus procedens de thalamo suo exultavit ut fortis ad currendam viam” (Ps 19:6). The running giant that appears here is also mentioned in Kochanowski’s text, but a bit further on, in verse 86: “Taki przede wszytkimi polem rozmierzonym / Leci obrzym udatny pędem niewściągnionym” (vv. 85–86). More on relations between Psalm 19 and Song VI from Fragments, see Starownik: 2001. All quotations from Jan Kochanowski’s works used in this paper are after: Kochanowski: 1980. If not specified the translations are mine (R.R.). Given the fact that in working on his paraphrase of the psalms Kochanowski used, as has been proven, primarily, if not exclusively, Latin versions of the text (the Vulgate, George Buchanan’s Psalmorum Davidis paraphrasis poetica, Johannes Campensis’ Enchridium Psalmorum), I adopted the Jerome Vulgate, cited after: Biblia sacra: 2007, as the primary point of reference for his other works mentioned in this paper as well. 7 See Elementy platońskie: 2000; Głombiowska: 2001, 181–186.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

2001, 297), one with whom the female addressee of the poem could easily identify. Other adaptation techniques used by the poet include embellishments to the Old Testament’s rather unimpressive descriptions (a good example here is the description of Joakim’s garden), and the introduction into the text of numerous gnomes and moralistic aphorisms8 . Kochanowski also made use of a definite biblical text in Song II 1 from the collection Pieśni księgi dwoje [Two Books of Songs], better known as Pieśń o potopie [Song of the Flood] the title under which it was first published around 1570. Intensive rainfall heralding a disastrous flood brings to mind the deluge sent down by God many centuries before to destroy everything alive. The main theme of the poem is the destructive power of the element, which the passengers of Noah’s Ark managed to resist, nevertheless (vv. 10–68). Once again, however, it must be said that instead of a genuine translation of the relevant passages from Genesis, the author presented his readers with his own poetic account of Old-Testament events. For example, he is less interested in the scale of the destruction meticulously enumerated in the text of the Bible (in Song II 1 the animals sacrificed to the flood are summed up in the succinct phrase “wszystek źwierz iny” [“all other animals”]; v. 26), than in the reversal of the natural order of things brought about by the downpour. Fish are swimming amongst the mountain peaks which only eagles have ever been able to reach, and the water level has reached such heights that it seems as if there is nothing in the world but the sky and the sea9 . Unlike in the biblical text, the mention of Noah and his rescue by God occurs only after he has been made aware of the size of the threat; nor is there any mention of the fact that, in addition to his own family, he takes aboard on the Ark representatives of various species of the earth’s fauna as a guarantee of its future renewal. We do not learn from the song’s text about the survivors’ arrival on Mount Ararat, nor about the measures taken by Noah to assess the situation by releasing the raven and the dove several times. Instead, the author notes the successive stages of restoring the old order when the waters of the flood have finally begun to recede gradually. He also quotes at the end of the song God’s pledge (not to expose mankind to a similar destruction any more), which is important insofar as the promise it contains is supposed to bring comfort at the difficult time of the coming flood. In Kochanowski’s version of the story, even the number of days during which the rain was supposed to continue uninterrupted does not agree – though let us note that this particular discrepancy is in any case quite insignificant. The biblical author explicitly speaks of forty days and forty nights (Gen 7:12); the Polish text 8 See for instance Krzyżanowski: 1962, 185–189; Krzywy: 2008, 21–31. When it comes to Jan Kochanowski’s Zuzanna, the following studies have been dedicated to it: Kupisz: 1987; Walecki: 2001; Vincůrková: 2018. 9 Besides the Book of Genesis Kochanowski may have been inspired here by Horace’ s Carmen I 2.

43

44

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

reads: “Sześć niedziel wtenczas lał deszcz nie przestając” (“Six Sundays the rain poured without ceasing”: v. 13). Only one of the phrases used in the song – quite short, I might add – bears a strong enough resemblance to the original to be treated as an actual translation, and also as proof that the poet, in editing his work, still had the text of Genesis before his eyes. I have in mind here the phrase: “Sam Noe został” (“Noah alone remained”: v. 27), whose equivalent in the Latin version reads “remansit autem solo Noe” (Gen 7:23)10 . As we can see, Kochanowski is not very keen on the idea of faithfully rendering the biblical text in Polish. Even when he undertakes a comprehensive translation of a given book, as in the case of the Davidic Psalms, he does not create a version that could rival the translations from the Leopolita or the Brest Bible in terms of its consistency with the original. Kochanowski the poet almost always prevails over the orthodox translator tied to the letter of Scripture, a poet who, regardless of the task he undertakes, is ready to demonstrate his own “ingenium”, as was well illustrated by the dilemma he described in his letter to Fogelweder mentioned above. But what about works that do not pretend to be philologically relevant to the canonical text? As we have seen, in both Zuzanna and Song II 1 he took the liberty to create relatively loose poetic renarrations based on the Old Testament11 . The question can be asked, however, whether the pieces discussed here so far fully exhaust the range of source material where we should look for Kochanowski’s translation tidbits, if we assume that he is of interest to us first of all as a translator/adaptor of the Holy Scriptures. Given the degree to which his poetic language is saturated with biblical style, the answer to this question must be decidedly in the negative. First and foremost, we should take into account his religious works – these are to be found in the Fragmenta collection and in the final part of Treny [Laments] – but, as it will turn out, not only there, but also in texts that touch upon religious themes only occasionally, such as Fraszki [Trifles], Zgoda [Concord] or Satyr, or in texts that are evidently secular (Pieśń II 10). Let us then trace, largely on the basis of the findings of previous researchers and editors of Jan Kochanowski’s oeuvre, those places in his Polish-language works

10 Of late, the song discussed here has received some attention from Prejs: 2015, 20–24; Szczot: 2020, 317–321. 11 On Jan Kochanowski’s general attitude to the text of the Scripture, Janina Rytel rightfully writes: “The poet’s ‘biblical’ interests are quite wide-ranging; at the same time, from the very beginning they were not characterized by any antiquarian ‘orthodoxy’ or strictness in the treatment of the subject that would be binding for a Hebrew expert in or a theologian working on a heretical translation. Kochanowski treated the Bible as, among other things, a source of poetic themes, and at the same time read it as an educated humanist, so the biblical source of the theme did not prevent him from developing it in the antique convention” (1967, 202). For biblical connotations of Kochanowski’s religious poetry, see also Weintraub: 1974; Graciotti: 1989.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

which show a strong correlation with specific passages of the Scripture, in order to examine more closely, not only on the basis of the best-known cases, the adaptation technique he employed, or the functions he assigned to the biblical phrases translated by him in their new contexts, often quite distant from the original ones. Of key importance for us, of course, will be their convergence on the lexical level rather than that resulting only from ideological affinity. Irrelevant for us here, as not pointing to an unquestionable source of the alleged borrowing, is the affinity suggested by Janusz Pelc (Kochanowski: 1991, 4) between the famous incipit of Trifle I 3 (O żywocie ludzkim [On human life]): “Fraszki to wszytko, cokolwiek myślemy, / Fraszki to wszytko, cokolwiek czyniemy” (vv. 1–2) and the reflection from the Book of Kohelet12 . But the same is true of the phrase “polna trawa” [“wild grass”] that appears in exactly the same epigram (v. 6), a symbol of the impermanence of all the things of this world. As the editor rightly notes (Kochanowski: 1991, 5), the comparison of human life to quickly withering grass appears repeatedly throughout the Scriptures (for example, in Isa 37:27, 40:6–8 and Jas 1:10–11), but in no case the phrase used in the sentence: “Zacność, uroda, moc, pieniądze, sława, / Wszystko to minie jako polna trawa” (“Worthiness, beauty, power, money, fame, / All these shall pass away as the grass of the field”; vv. 5–6)13 , can be more closely and unambiguously connected with any of these places. Completely analogous is the shepherd metaphor from the second stasimon of Odprawa posłów greckich [The Dismissal of Greek Envoys]: “Wy, mówię, którym ludzi paść poruczono / I zwirzchności nad stadem bożym zwierzono” (“You, I say, to whom the people are entrusted / And are entrusted with authority over the flock of God”; v. 163–164). Despite the quite clear biblical inspiration for this approach to the theme of authority and the responsibility that comes with exercising it (although some say that the Homeric inspiration may have played a major role)14 , it is impossible to point to one specific source for the above passage15 . There is a certain risk of error in most of the analysis/discussion that follows. But let us try, with an appropriate measure of caution, to select those places where one can have the least doubt about their biblical origin. And there are, it seems, at least several, if not more than a dozen of them. Thus Kochanowski based the sentence “Ten opatruje, że morze nie wzbierze, / Choć wszytki rzeki w swoje łono bierze” (“He [God] takes care that the sea shall not rise, / Though it takes all rivers into its bosom”; vv. 15–16) in Song III from Fragments on the relevant passage from Ecclesiastes. In the Old Testament, in 12 Pelc pointed to three different places which he thought were close to Kochanowski’s formulations: Eccl 1:2, 1:14, 12:8. 13 English translation after Kochanowski: 2018b. 14 Cf. Rusnak: 2021. 15 For other Pslamic connotations of the monody see Starnawski: 1986, 180–181.

45

46

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

a characteristically biblical manner, the same thought was duplicated: “Omnia flumina intrant in mare, et mare non reduntat; ad locum unde exeunt flumina reventuntur ut iterum fluant” (Eccl 1:7). In another place in the collection, this time in Song V, the following words are said: “Uciekł, a nikt go nie gonił” (“He [the enemy] fled, and no one pursued him”; v. 40). Thus, by echoing the relevant passage from the Book of Proverbs: “Fugit impius nemine persequente” (Prov 28:1), Kochanowski conveyed the idea of discreet care which the Highest extends over the servant who entrusts himself in His hands. Also woven out of obviously biblical quotations was Lament XVII, the one in which the hero of the cycle, tormented by grief over his deceased child, turns to God for the first time in his search for lasting respite. The very incipit of this piece turns out to be particularly significant because it indicates a literary context important from the point of view of the protagonist’s current psychological situation: “Pańska ręka mnie dotknęła” (“God hath laid his hand on me”; v. 1)16 , which is a remarkably faithful translation of the phrase: “manus Domini tetigit me” (Job 19:21). The reference to Job in the first words of the poem not only highlights the similarity between the two fathers, but also indicates Kochanowski’s readiness, by following in the footsteps of his biblical “alter ego”, to take the stance of humbly accepting the death of his beloved daughter as an act of God17 . Less evidently, but nevertheless undeniably, the phrase from Ps 41: “tu autem Domine miserere mei” (Ps 41:44), is echoed in verse 28 of Lament XVIII: “Użyj dziś, Panie, nade mną litości!” [“Lord, manifest thy mercy unto me!”] While the exhortation from Lament XVII: “O mój Boże, / Kto się przed Tobą skryć może?” (“Lord of Light, / Who can hide him from thy sight!”; vv. 11–12), can be traced to as many as two Old-Testament sources. One of them, as the editors (Mayenowa, Woronczakowa, Axer, Cytowska: 1983, 163) point out, may be the following verse of the Wisdom of Sirach: “tuam manum effugere impossibile est” (Sir 16:15), and the other the words of Psalm 139: “quo ibo ab spiritu tuo est quo a facie tua fugiam”. (Ps 139:7). Of the two, the Psalmist’s words appear to be closer to Kochanowski’s, if only because he uses the question form18 . Two further instances of quite probable use of biblical text are to be found in Lament XIX. The statement: “Skryte są Pańskie sądy” (“The ways of God are past our

16 English translations of Laments after Kochanowski: 1920. 17 See also Pelc: 1986, 146. 18 It also seems that the person of God, before whom the speaker of the Lament feels awe, is represented by His face, mentioned in the psalm, more than by the hand specified by Ecclesiasticus. Our intuition is to some extent confirmed by Jan Kochanowski himself, who translates the passage from Psalm 139 using the same verb as in Lament XVII: “Gdzie mam uciec przed duchem Twym przeraźliwym? / Gdzie się skryć przed obliczem Twoim straszliwym?” (”Where shall I flee from Thy terrifying spirit? / Where shall I hide from Thy terrible face?”; vv. 13–14).

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

finding out”; v. 121), may have its roots in the Epistle to the Romans, where quite similar words, also drawn from thelegal lexis, are used: “Quam incomprehesibilia sunt iudicia eius et investigabiles viae eius”. (Rom 11:33). And yet another, perhaps better known, case is the exhortation: “Teraz, mistrzu, sam się lecz!” (“Now, master, heal thyself ”; v. 145), with which the poet’s mother, who appears in the poem, encourages her son to apply to himself the recommendations he had given to others in order to regain inner harmony. According to a fairly generally accepted interpretation, Anna Kochanowska, née Białaczowska, was quoting here the Gospel of Luke, and more specifically the paraphrase evoked by Christ in his speech to the reluctant Nazarenes (“et ait illis utique dicetis mihi hanc similitudinem medice cura te ipsum”; Luke 4:23). Two very interesting cryptic bible quotations can be found in Trifles. The first one indicates, in a truly ominous tone, the foreseeable point of arrival of the Catholic Church under the leadership of Pope Paul IV (Giovanni Pietro Carafa), Kochanowski’s contemporary. In the poet’s harsh assessment, Peter’s ship is heading for Hell, for in his cautionary poem he directly evokes the well-known image of infernum from Matthew’s Gospel (“ibi erit fletus et stridor dentium”; Matt 13:42). Pośle papieski, rzymskiego narodu, Uczysz nas drogi, a sam chybiasz brodu. Nawracaj lepiej niżli twój woźnica, Strzeż nas tam zawieźć, gdzie płacz i tesknica (I 50, Na posła papieskiego, vv. 1–4). O, papal nuncio of the Roman race, You teach us the way, yet yourself miss the place, Convert much better that your coachman’s rein, Beware lest you take us toward tears and pain (I 50, On a Papal Nuncio)19 .

Here Kochanowski addresses the papal legate Luigi Lippomano, who was in Poland at the time, referring to the policy being pursued by his principal. Given a certain similarity between the accusation contained in the work and the accusations often formulated by the dissenting camp that the See of Peter is administered by none other than the Antichrist himself, it would be hard to exclude the possibility that Trifle I 50 is something more than the poet’s reaction to the pathologies afflicting the Church. It is believed that at a young age (the poem was written in 1556) Kochanowski could have been seriously sympathetic to Protestantism. An argument

19 English translation after Kochanowski: 2018b.

47

48

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

for this thesis is the fact that he studied at the Accademy of Królewiec and later received a scholarship from prince Albrecht Hohenzollern, which enabled him to travel to Padua. Moreover, he expressed the same negative emotions towards Carafa in Elegy I 10 in Osm.20 , written shortly afterwards, violently opposing the war against the Spaniards initiated by the Pope21 . That the poet’s potential Protestant leanings turned out to be short-lived is proven by another of the epigrams in the Trifles collection, containing a clear reference to the well-known biblical phrase about a splinter and a log. I have in mind the trifle Na heretyki [On Heretics] (III 22), in which the poet, reproaching his religious opponents for their hypocrisy, uses an exhortation taken from the Gospel of Matthew: “Wyjmij, nieboże, bierzmo pierwej z oka swego, / A potym ździebłka sięgaj w oczach u drugiego!” (“Take, poor heathen, the first out of thine own eye, / And after that thou shalt reach into the eyes of another!”; vv. 5–6). Its faithfulness to the original text is striking. Not only does Kochanowski find exact equivalents for the synonyms used in the original for great offences (“bierzmo” [log] for “trabs”) and smaller ones (“ździebłko” [a little straw] for “festuca”), but he also preserves the imperative form of the sentence. The only difference is that the angry-sounding “hipokryta” [hypocrite] is replaced with the milder, more condescending “nieboże” [poor heathen]: “Hypocrita, eice primum trabem de oculo tuo, et tunc videbis eicere festucam de oculo fratris tui” (Matt 7:5). It is worth noting that the poet’s decision in the above-mentioned cases to polonize the text of the Gospels once with lesser (On a Papal Nuncio) and once with greater accuracy (On Heretics) does not seem to be accidental. This is because in both these pieces he addressed people who were well acquainted with the Holy Scriptures and who regarded them as the supreme and unquestionable authority. This also strengthened the argument used with regard to the eponymous heretics in Trifle III 22. Interesting is the fate of Kochanowski’s borrowing of the phrase taken from the Gospel of John’s: “Spiritus, ubi vult, spirat” (John 3:8). The phrase, which in the gospel serves Jesus to make Nicodem aware of the arbitrariness with which God’s Spirit tends to bestow His graces on some and not on others, is put by the poet in his youthful poem Concord into the mouth of an anonymous dissenter who claims for himself and the women trained to do the same – unjustifiably in the author’s opinion – the right to preach despite being a lay person: Świetcy, widząc ich [księży katolickich] nierząd, w rzeczy poprawili, Jęli się sami kazać i żony wćwiczyli.

20 The abbreviation Osm. stands for Osmólski’s silva manuscript, dated for the late 1550s, which contains three unpublished Latin elegies from Kochanowski’s Italian period. 21 Formore on this, see Rusnak: 2021.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

Więc teraz wszyscy każą, a żaden nie słucha. Spytajże, skąd apostoł? – “Duch – pry – gdzie chce, dmucha.” (vv. 71–74). The laity, seeing their [Catholic priests] misbehavior, improved things, They began to preach to themselves and to train their wives. So now they all preach, but none listens. Ask, where did the apostle come from? – “The spirit – he says – where it wills, it blows”.

At the same time Concordia, complaining about the sudden rise of homebred preachers, reproaches them for misunderstanding Christ’s words and using them illegitimatly to justify the practice, so widespread in the sixteenth century. Kochanowski returned to St John’s gospel once again, but in a completely different context. He used the cited phrase to describe a mysterious force which he blames, in Lament XI, for unceremoniously “confusing men’s affairs” (v. 5). It is not unambiguously identified in the poem, apart from the ominous-sounding term “nieznajomy wróg jakiś” (“some unknown foe”; v. 5), but its association with the spirit mentioned in the Gospel: “Kędy jego [= wroga] duch wienie, żaden nie ulęże” (“Where blows its breath, no man can flee away”; v. 7) raises the suspicion that it is an authority equivalent to God to some degree, and certainly one that imitates His actions and impersonates Him, to the detriment, we might add, of those who are subject to it. Kochanowski also appreciates the parenetic qualities of the Holy Scripture, which is full of easily applicable instructions for everyday life, also in its decidedly secular dimension. Thus, the practical recommendations contained in the Book of Proverbs may well have served the poet to construct, in Song II 10, a portrait of a nobleman’s exemplary wife. It seems that the reflection on the role of the wife in maintaining and increasing the material wealth of the family expressed especially in the second stanza of the poem, may have its ideological roots in the so-called Poem on the Brave Woman (Prov 31:10–31), which concludes this Old Testament book. It shows with a number of examples how a woman’s diligence and resourcefulness can contribute to the overall prosperity of a household. Kochanowski’s poem, instead of mentioning such tasks as the making of linen or spinning, describes the role of the wife in more general terms: Kto z gospodarstwa, a kto zaś z wysługi Zbierze pieniądze i z kupiectwa drugi, Jesli się żona nie przyłoży k’ temu, Zginąć wszystkiemu (vv. 5–8).

49

50

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

One from his land, another from service Will gather money, someone else from commerce, But if the wife will not lend him her aid, Everything will degrade22 .

The above supposition is made more plausible by the poet’s using, in the same Song II 10, the comparison of a wife to a crown on her husband’s head, taken from the Book of Proverbs: “swego męża ona / Głowy korona” (“of high renown / She’s her husband’s crown”; vv. 11–12)23 . The corresponding Old-Testament proverb is: “Mulier diligens corona viro suo” (Prov 12:4). The list of translator’s tidbits presented here should be supplemented with two more cases, significant enough to deserve more attention than the others. This is because the sense of the translated passages in their new context is markedly different from that in the Scripture. The first example is provided by Satyr albo Dziki Mąż [Satyr or the Wild Man], published in 1564. Disillusioned with the rapidly changing social reality of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth of the sixteenth century, the title character, in an expansive speech addressed to the Polish nobility, reproaches his listeners for betraying the role that they should play, in accordance with the time-sanctioned tradition, towards their fellow citizens. This role, of course, involves guarding the country’s security. Meanwhile, instead of perfecting their warrior’s craft and be ready to fight the enemy with dedication when necessary, the native nobility prefer to multiply the profits from their agricultural production. In the poem, the change in the lifestyle of the former knights, as well as the accompanying redefinition of their ethos, is conveyed by remarks on the uses of particular elements of their weaponry in the new, less heroic times: Dalekoście się od swych przodków odstrzelili, A prawieście na nice Polskę wywrócili. Skowaliście ojcowskie granaty na pługi, A z drugiego już dawno w kuchni rożen długi. W przyłbicach kwoczki siedzą albo owies mierzą, Kiedy obrok woźnice na noc koniom bierzą (vv. 59–64). You have far removed yourselves from your ancestors, And you almost turned Poland upside down.

22 English translation after Kochanowski: 2018b. 23 Ibid.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

You hissed your father’s daggers at the ploughs, And from the other one you’ve long since made a long spit in the kitchen. In the visors the quacks are sitting or measuring oats, When the coachmen are taking the horses’ feed for the night.

According to the editors, the source of this neat concept was provided by either Isa 2:4, or Mic 4:324 . Both of these possibilities, at least at first glance, seem equally probable, since the two indicated verses turn out to be almost identical. This coincidence is by no means accidental, because – according to the findings of contemporary biblical scholars – the passage in question found its way into Isaiah as a result of interpolation, the source of which was to be the prophet Micah’s text. It is believed that the interpolator, who is unknown to us, must have wanted to emphasize the universal character of Isaiah’s prophecy. In the final version of the text, the holy city of Jerusalem is to become a kind of “axis mundi,” a place to which all nations will go, and from which God’s Law and lasting, undisturbed peace will radiate: Et erit in novissimis diebus praeparatus mons domus Domini in vertice montium et elevabitur super colles et fluent ad eum omnes gentes. Et ibunt populi multi et dicent: “Venite et ascendamus ad montem Domini et ad domum Dei Iacob, et docebit nos vias suas, et ambulabimus in semitis eius, quia de Sion exibit lex et verbum Domini de Hierusalem”. Et iudicabit gentes et arguet populos multos, et conflabunt gladius suos in vomeres et lanceas suas in falces. Non levabit gens contra gentem gladium nec exercebuntur ultra ad proelium” (Isa 2:2–4).

The departures from the prophecy of Micah are explained partly by the interpolator’s recreating the original text from memory, and partly by his personal convictions. For example, he removes the reference to resting under vines and fig trees, which completes Micah’s description of universal happiness, because he may have cared more about the Gentiles conversion to Moses’ faith than about the earthly pleasures they gained thanks to it (Synowiec: 1976, 24–25)25 .

24 Joel 4:10, which is sometimes mentioned in this context (most recently, for example, in Kochanowski: 2018a, 171), is out of place as a potential source for Satyr’s descriptive text, since the exchange noted therein takes place in the opposite direction than in Isa 2:4 and Mic 4:3. According to the call of the prophet Joel to the Israelites, the plowshares are to become swords, and the sickles – javelins: “concidite aratra vestra in gladios et ligones vestros in lanceas” (Joel 4:10). 25 Having one’s own vineyard and a fig tree was considered a sign of extraordinary wealth in ancient Israel. This is confirmed by the text of the First Book of Kings, where we read: “Habitabatque Iudas et Israhel absque timore ullo unusquisque sub vite sua et sub ficu sua a Dan usque Bersabee cunctis diebus Salomonis” (1 Kings 5:5).

51

52

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

The proof of the originality of Mic 4:3 with respect to Isa 2:4, on the other hand, is to be found both in the greater literary refinement of the former and in its more solid rooting in the whole of Micah’s prophecy. The above-mentioned scene of resting in the midst of lush vegetation, for example, is closely linked to the preceding description, and is its well thought-out continuation: the vines appearing in it are cultivated and tended with the previously-mentioned hoes (“vomeres”)26 and sickles (“ligones”; in Isa 2:4 more correctly: “falces”)27 (Synowiec: 1976, 25). The entire passage from Micah of interest to us here reads as follows: Et in novissimo dierum erit mons domus Domini praeparatus in vertice montium et sublimis super colles, et fluent ad eum populi. Et properabunt gentes multae et dicent: “venite, ascendamus ad montem Domini et ad domum Dei Iacob et docebit nos de viis suis, et ibimus in semitis eius. quia de Sion egredietur lex et verbum Domini de Hierusalem. Et iudicabit inter populos multos et corripiet gentes fortes usque in longinquum et concident gladios suos in vomeres et hastas suas in ligones: non sumet gens adversus gentem gladium et non discent ultra belligerare et sedebit vir subtus vineam suam et subtus ficum suam et non erit, qui deterreat, quia os Domini exercituum locutum est” (Mic 4:1–4).

Yet is it possible, despite the far-reaching parallels between the two biblical passages cited here, to find sufficient arguments for one or the other source of Satyr’s description? It seems that it is. Micah, as a potential inspiration for the Polish poem, could theoretically be indicated by its relative breadth. As we know, apart from noting the transformation that the tools of war will undergo in the future, this Old-Testament prophet paints a picture of universally gained happiness symbolised as resting among the foliage. In Kochanowski’s work, as compared with Isaiah, this description is expanded, though not to create some Arcadian nature scenes, but to exploit to the maximum a concept borrowed from the biblical text. Clearly intrigued by the literary potential of the idea of the transformation of recent weapons into household tools, the poet exploits his own inventiveness by adding a passage about visors that serve either as nests for hens to lay their eggs in, or containers for oats

26 According to Juliusz Synowiec’s convincing explication, it is a hoe that Micah has in mind here. The scholar points out that although the Septuagint already gives the noun “et” appearing here the meaning of “hoe”, and St Jerome, following the Septuagint, renders it with the Latin “vomer” (“blade”, “plough”), in Old Hebrew there is another lexeme meaning “blade” – it is a word coined from “hrsh” (“to plow”), i.e. “mahareshah”. And although the actual meaning of “et” is not entirely certain, there is no other word in the language of the ancient Jews that would support this particular designator (Synowiec: 1976, 19–20). 27 There are some semantic complications with this agricultural tool as well. Rather than sickles, this is more about “the curved knives of the vine-grower, used to cut off unwanted shoots and branches” (Brzegowy: 2010, 212).

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

to be fed to horses: “In the visors the hens sit or measure the oats, / When the coachmen take the horses’ fodder for the night” (vv. 63–64). But he does not stop there. Further down in the text he remarks that in the new times of not caring about defence issues, a cavalry mount (to be precise “nadzieżny”, one to be trusted on the battlefield) has been replaced with a draught horse (“kotczy”) and… oxen (“woły”). Finally, there is the story of a cavalry captain (“rotmistrz”) busy with supervising peasants working in the fields and brandishing a neatly-lathed mace (“toczona maczuga”) for this purpose: Kotczy to nadzieżny koń, a poczet zaś wo ł y, Które stoją i w stajni, i w tyle stodoły. To już rot mist rz, co fuka na chłopy u pługa, A jego przedniejsza broń to c z ona ma c z u g a (vv. 65–68)28 . It is a draught horse, and the post are oxen, which stand in the stable and in the back of the barn. This is the cavalry captain, who barks at the peasants at the plough, And his front weapon is a neatly-lathed mace.

Let us not forget, however, that the poet also made significant cuts to the OldTestament text. He did not remain faithful to the analogy present in the biblical original between the starting point of a particular transformation and its final effect. Let us note first of all that both Isaiah and Micah mention as many as four objects (two belonging to the military sphere and two used in agriculture), of which the first pair, again in both authors, includes those whose relatively large cutting surface is important, i.e. swords and ploughs (“gladio” and “vomeres”), while the second pair – only in the Book of Isaiah – includes sharp-pointed objects: spears and sickles (“lanceas” – “falces”). In Micah’s prophecy, or rather in its Jerome version, which is the one we are considering here, this analogy is disturbed by the fact that the Old Hebrew “mazmerot” was mistakenly replaced with the Latin “ligones”, or “hoes”: a mistake for which there is no justification, since the lances from which the hoes were to be made first needed to be cut (“concident”).

28 Let us note that the image of a former military commander supervising peasants at work may also have its counterpart in the biblical text, namely in the passages – both in Isaiah and Micah – where there talk of no longer practicing for war (“nec exercebuntur ultra ad proelium”: Isa 2:4; “non discent ultra belligerare”; Mic 4:3), that is, about not training recruits, not drilling them in fighting. The “rotmistrz”, instead of commanding his soldiers, oversees peasants engaged in a completely different type of activity.

53

54

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

In the text of Satyr, let us note, only three objects are mentioned (one weapon and two household tools), because here, both ploughs (equivalents of “vomeres”) and spits (a new element in relation to the biblical original) are obtained from “granaty”, a native variety of a “koncerz” i.e. a long and narrow sword intended only for stabbing, with a ridge-shaped or oval shaft (Gradowski, Żygulski Jun.: 1998, 26)29 . And although the poet does not preserve the biblical text’s relationship between the end products of this peculiar kind of recycling – the tools mentioned by the two prophets will be used in agricultural work while Kochanowski refers once to two activities that are far less interrelated: ploughing and roasting meat – he does at least try to reflect the opposition noted here: of a cutting tool (plough) versus a pointed tool (spit). And, if we stick to the opinion that the sole point of reference of the Renaissance author was Jerome’s text, he would only have been able to read about it in Isaiah. However, if this proof is not convincing enough, an additional argument for the Isaiah origin of the imagery used in Satyr can be found by taking a closer look at the verbs used in Isa 2:4 and Mic 4:3, and answering the question which of them the Polish word “skowaliście” (“you hissed”) is closer to. In Micah’s prophecy, the action that will turn swords into plowshares, and spears into hoes, is described by the verb form “concident” (“concido” – “to cut into pieces, slice, chop, hack, tear”) (Plezia: 1959, 647). In Isaiah, on the other hand, the verb “conflabunt” (“conflo” – “to melt”) occurs in that context (Plezia: 1959, 676). When it comes to the Polish verb “skować,” what happens is not simply cutting, splitting, but – as in the case of “conflabunt” – changing the original shape under the influence of high temperature, either by putting it into a smelting furnace, or by heating it and hitting with a sledgehammer. We should also note that by using such a verb, Kochanowski managed to remove the inconsistency that Jerome failed to avoid when translating the Book of Micah. For it is easy to imagine forging a “granat” into a spit as pointed as itself, but also into a ploughshare with a flat and wide blade, all the more so since – as the text of the poem shows – only one “granat” was used to make the spit, while many were needed to forge a ploughshare. The success and logical consistency of the adaptation thus achieved should not, however, hide the poet’s considerable departure from the biblical original. It is hard not to notice, after all, that something that in the case of both prophets constitutes a hope-inspiring vision of future happiness, in the mouth of the malcontent Satyr sounds horrendous and is worthy of condemnation. The general abandonment of the crafts of war completes, both in Isaiah and Micah, let us recall, the prophecy about the restoration and elevation of the holy city of Jerusalem above all others. According to it, Yahweh himself would exercise unchallenged authority there, his

29 For more about this kind of weapons, see Nadolski: 1984, 123.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

Law would be respected by all nations, and God’s decisions would permanently eliminate all war and violence (Stachowiak: 1996, 131–132). Authors of the Christian era had interpreted this prediction in a similar spirit, of which Kochanowski may well have been aware. In the “Mount of the Lord” (mons Domini), which both prophets encourage us to climb, Thomas Aquinas, Eusebius, and Jerome perceive Christ Himself standing above all the prophets and apostles, and Christ’s Church, which is to gather together numerous peoples to give them the longed-for peace. This will happen to humanity at the end of the messianic era, hence, for example, the presence of this passage from Isaiah in the Catholic liturgy of Advent (Grzybek: 1956, 241–243). In his denunciation of the slothful nobility, Satyr uses verbs in the past form (“skowaliście” [you hissed]) and in the present (“siedzą” [they are sitting], “mierzą” [they are measuring], “bierzą” [they are taking]), so the prophecy of the OldTestament authors (if we take into account the biblical context evoked by the adaptation) appears to have been happily fulfilled30 . However, this is not a cause for celebration for the angry speaker. On the contrary, he sharply criticizes the decline of the old chivalric virtues, which he notes with regret. Turning weapons into household utensils, which in the text of the Holy Bible is a sign of a much better reality devoid of bloodshed, a sign of the final triumph of peace over war, is in Satyr’s opinion a sad testimony of the Polish noblity’s betrayal of their former values, but also of their being totally unprepared for the future threats which are difficult to avoid. Such a complete reversal of the sense of the biblical description may have stemmed either from the poet’s negation of the optimistic historiosophy proposed by the two prophets, or from his conviction that the times they announced have simply not yet arrived, so that the state of blissful sloth which the Polish nobility have fallen into seems unjustified and premature. And we should add that the world as described by Satyr definitely does not resemble the messianic reality described in the Holy Scriptures. The neighboring

30 Let us add that, based on the work’s fictional layer, the use of the Bible text by the once poorly educated mythological idol is justified by the Christian re-education he received under the tutelage of the holy men with whom he had to share his forest dwelling:           Wszytko mam z pustelników, co mieszkają z nami           Między lasy i między pustymi górami.           Ci mi naprzód prawego Boga ukazali           I wiarę dostateczną do serca podali                                 (vv. 203–206).             I have everything from the hermits who live with us           Among the woods and among the empty mountains.           They have shown me the true God           And gave me sufficient faith in my heart.

55

56

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

states are growing in strength, and the threat they pose is evident from a number of highly disturbing recent events: W kilka lat Tatarowie pięćkroć was wybrali, Bracią waszę w niewolę Turkom zaprzedali; Despot, w rzeczy despotów onych dawnych plemię, Na waszą wieczną hańbę dwakroć przeszedł ziemię; Moskiewski wziął Połocko i listy wywodzi, Że prawem przyrodzonym Halicz nań przychodzi (vv. 95–100). In a few years the Tatars picked you five times, They sold your brothers into slavery to the Turks; A despot, as the despots of old were called, To your eternal shame he passed the land twice; Moscow took Polotsk and demonstrates letters Saying that Halych comes to him by right of birth.

The sad picture of Poland’s geopolitical situation is completed by looming threats, whether from the Swedes reaching for Livonia or from the “Branshviks” accross the Vistula River. In conclusion, if we assume that Kochanowski’s readers were able to recognise the Old-Testament origin of the passage about daggers and ploughshares and were aware of sense of the original – and it cannot be ruled out that the poet was keen to activate this particular context – the Satyr’s words may well have been intended as a warning against succumbing to the impression that the biblical prophecies may have come true. Namely, that the peace achieved after years of warfare – and someone not necessarily aware of the dangers awaiting the Republic in his times had the right to view it in such categories – did not mean that this state of affairs would last for ever. Another somewhat problematic case from the point of view of translation orthodoxy, is provided by Lament XIX, and specifically its words spoken to the griefstricken poet by his mother, who comes in his dream to his rescue. Widely discussed by scholars as crucial to a full understanding of her message, its final two verses read as follows: “Tego się, synu, trzymaj, a ludzkie przygody / Ludzkie noś; jeden jest Pan smutku i nagrody” (“Then bear man’s portion like a man, my son, / The Lord of grief and comfort is but one”; vv. 155–156). It is pointed out that it represents a succinct yet highly effective fusion of two distinct traditions of Stoicism and the Bible, offered as an ad-hoc consolation. The first part of this final injunction is a faithful translation of Cicero’s maxim “humana humane ferenda”, which Kochanowski most

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

probably read in his Tusculan Disputations (III 16:34), while the second – at least according to the editors of Laments – is supposed to be rooted in one of two or even three places in the Old Testament, usually mentioned in this context: Bar 4:29; Esther 16:21 and Job 1:21 (Mayenowa, Woronczakowa, Axer, Cytowska: 1983, 181). There is no denying that, from the point of view of the cycle’s composition plan31 , the third of the offered possibilities seems to be the most attractive. Two references to the Book of Job, one placed at the beginning and the other at the end, would mark off so-to-speak the “religious” segment of the collection. As it was pointed out above, it was the confession taken from that book, “manus Domini tetigit me” (Job 19:21), that served as an incipit in Lament XVII, the first in the cycle to evoke God so explicitly. In addition, the emotional gap between the plaintive reflection on being touched by the hand of the Lord and the much more cheerful Job verse 1:21 would well reflect the poet’s psychological progress in overcoming his trauma. Unfortunately, the phrase in question: “Dominus dedit, Dominus abstulit”, hardly corresponds, after all, to what the concerned mother has to communicate to Orsola’s father. The situation looks slightly more optimistic with the other two places indicated by the editors: “qui enim induxit vobis mala ipse rursum adducet vobis sempiternam iucunditatem cum salute vestra” (Bar 4:29); and “hanc enim diem Deus omnipotens maeroris et luctus eis vertit in gaudium” (Esther 16:21), as they at least contain words antithetically positioned to each other, which may have been the actual inspiration for “grief ” and “comfort” in the Polish text. In the case of Bar 4:29, the word “misfortunes” (mala) are contrasted with “everlasting joy” (sempiterna iucundas) and “deliverance” (salus); and in Esther 16:21 “sorrows and griefs” (maeroris et luctus) are replaced with “joy” (gaudium)32 . The immediate contexts of the two biblical statements are somewhat different. The Book of Baruch, although dated to a decidedly late Hellenistic period, still concerns the time of the captivity, and is attributed, albeit erroneously, to a close associate of the prophet Jeremiah. And it is to the Jews in Babylon that the author addresses the words of encouragement. Using the affectionate term “children” (filii), he convinces them, that although they have experienced God’s wrath and been put into the hands of their enemies, their time of torment will come to an end.

31 And, as we know, the author attached great importance to getting it right in this respect (cf. Wierzbicka-Trwoga: 2015, 98–101). 32 Let us note that if one of these two verses had in fact inspired the words of the poet’s mother, it would have been another case, after Zuzanna, of Kochanowski using a deuterocanonical part of the Holy Scriptures that is not recognized by Protestantism. While the Book of Baruch, in the oldest version known to us, is entirely in Greek, in the case of the Book of Esther the short passage in question is part of the sixteenth chapter, sometimes integrated with the Hebrew part as a fragment of the eighth chapter.

57

58

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

He commands them to cry out to the Lord with confidence, and He will deliver them. The above-quoted verse of Bar 4:29, which in part crowns this optimistic argument and in part summarizes it, argues that the “everlasting joy” (sempiterna iucundas) and “deliverance” (iucundas) will become the logical consequences of the tribulations they are currently experiencing. The more real, one might say, the present afflictions, the more certain the imminent deliverance. The Book of Esther covers a different period in the history of ancient Israel. Although it is difficult to determine with certainty the time of the book’s events as well as their historicity, it certainly refers to the period of Persian domination. If we assume that the character Ahasuerus stands for Xerxes I, then we are dealing with the first half of the fifth century BC. The words of interest to us in the context of Lament XIX are part of a rehabilitation decree issued by the ruler after Haman’s plotting had come to light, and the entire Jewish diaspora under Persian rule, which had been facing certain annihilation, was suddenly saved. The king declares his will to restore internal order in the country and guarantees full rights to all the peoples living there. He reveals Haman’s misdeeds and the merits of Mordecai and Esther in stopping his criminal designs. He also declares that none of the guilt attributed to them by Haman rests with the Israelites, and warns against giving credence to the slanderous letters Haman sent around. The decree states that he and all his house have already been hanged for their transgressions. Hoc autem edictum, quod nunc mittimus, in cunctis urbibus proponatur, ut liceat Iudaeis uti legibus suis. Quibus debetis esse adminiculo, ut eos, qui se ad necem eorum paraverant, possint interficere tertiadecima die mensis duodecimi, qui vocatur Adar. Hanc enim diem, Deus omnipotens, maeroris et luctus, eis vertit in gaudium (Esther 16:19–21).

It then goes on to emphasize the future importance for the Jews of the thirteenth day of the month of Adar, the day on which “the omnipotent God” (Deus omnipotens) turned their “griefs and sorrows” (maeroris et luctus) into “joy” (gaudium). Despite some ideological similarities, it is difficult to look at Bar 4:29 or Esther 16:21 as particularly close to the formulation of interest to us in Lament XIX. Although it could be linked with the Book of Esther by the “maeroris et luctus”, which can be treated as a counterpart of “grief ” from Kochanowski’s poem, both of the Old Testament phrases taken into account here reflect the successions of evil and good in a quite narrowly defined situational context. In the case of Baruch, the antinomy serves to inspire hope for a change of fate that is to take place in the near future; in the Book of Esther, it simply sums up what has just happened33 . The

33 It should be added for the sake of accuracy that the text of Esther also speaks of the thirteenth day of Adar as a day that is to be exceptionally happy for the Israelites also in the future: “Quibus debetis

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

phrase “The Lord of grief and comfort is but one”, even though it also makes God the sole dispenser of all afflictions and joys34 , captures this concept in the form of a general thought, therefore one devoid of a direct, actualizing context. More importantly, Lament XIX lacks that reassuring temporal sequence where a moment of fear is followed by a long-awaited rescue (the recipients of the Book of Baruch rely only on the words of the prophet, who tries to convince them of this, while in Esther this logic is confirmed by recent events). Kochanowski’s late mother leaves her son with no clear guarantee that – as in the case of the Old Testament Israelites – the sun will shine anew for him. This is easy to understand in the light of her entire, not at all short, argument. Having an exceptionally low opinion of earthly life, she does not seem to have any hope that it could bring even a little bit of true happiness. This is one of the arguments she uses to convince her son that the much too premature death of his daughter has in fact saved her from the many torments of temporal life, particularly acute when one is born a girl. “Dziewka twoja dobry los, możesz wierzyć, wzięła” (“Thy little girl hath chosen well her part”; v. 81), she says at one point without beating about the bush. She adds, “Nie od rozkoszyć poszła; poszłać od trudności, / Od pracej, od frasunków, od łez, od żałości” (“She did not leave a land of much delight, / But one of toil and grief and evil blight”; vv. 51–52). In this spirit she also treats her son’s earthly life, or rather its unspecified span left to him. Ignoring the possible literary laurels he might attain while extolling the innumerable virtues of Paradise, she urges him to start preparing right now for his reunion with Orsola in Heaven instead of falling further into grief: “Tu w czas obróć swe myśli, a chowaj się na te / Nieodmienne, synu mój, rozkoszy bogate!” (“Then turn thy meditations hither, towards / This changeless gladness and these rich rewards”; vv. 77–78). This is in fact the only compensation for the loss he has sustained. Thus Kochanowski cannot be sure which scenario will come true in his case, whether the one suggested by the text of Baruch or Esther, or the one that befell Job, so explicitly evoked in Lament XVII, i.e. a complete return to the status quo, with some new Orsola by his side. The poet, in accordance with the dictates of the Catholic faith, is to prepare for a reunion with his beloved daughter in the realities of the Christian heaven, and in the meantime be ready to endure many more of God’s visitations. This is because his late mother does not view human earthly existence in the categories of successive suffering and compensation, but rather as constant exposure to rather chaotic incidents that can strike a person: “Człowiek urodziwszy się zasiadł w prawie takim, / Że ma być jako celem przygodom wszelakim; / Z esse adminiculo, ut eos, qui se ad necem eorum paraverant, possint interficere tertiadecima die mensis duodecimi, qui vocatur Adar” (Esther 16:20). 34 This, incidentally, is supposed to effectively disprove the suspicions voiced in Lament XI about the influence of “some unknown foe” (v. 5) on human life.

59

60

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

tego trudno się zdzierać” (“For man is born exposed to circumstance, / To be the target of all evil chance / And if we like it or we like it not”; vv. 111–113). And it is to endure them bravely that the poet’s mother encourages him most of all; bravely, but also – according to Cicero’s maxim – humanly (“ludzkie”; v. 156). The awareness that God remains the giver of both the good and the bad should provide consolation in the future – inevitable it seems – struggles with the adversities of fate, but also as protection against another, so seriously experienced, identity crisis. And it is the realization of this truth by her poet son that the mother who comes to his rescue cares most about. As this rather cursory review has shown, the links between Jan Kochanowski’s work and the text of the Scriptures go much deeper than would be apparent from a clearly expressed intention to adapt a particular book or from an explicitly stated subject. The Bible permeates the poetry of Jan Kochanowski both on the imaginative and purely linguistic level, and the range of its influence is by no means limited to his strictly religious works, but can also be seen in some texts on purely secular topics. Evidently – and this is another conclusion stemming from the analyses presented here – Kochanowski rarely aims at a faithful translation of a given biblical passage; much closer to his practice as a translator is an emulative approach to the adapted original, even when it comes to a work as respectable as the Holy Scriptures. Only a few of the cases presented here can be regarded as fully philological translations, meeting the requirements of, for example, translations of the Bible for the purposes of religious practice by one or another of the denominations active in the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth at that time. Incomparably more numerous are the cases where, even if their lexical correspondence with the canonical text seems debatable, it is evident that they are based on a specific fragment of the Holy Scripture, if only on the basis of shared imagery. Here, the most interesting from the point of view of a researcher studying the presence of biblical themes in the culture of past epochs, are those places in the poet’s oeuvre where the meaning of the original is quite different from the sense that the author decided to give to the passages adapted in his own works. Such cases, and here I have in mind Satyr and Lament XIX more emphatically than any other, reveal the poet’s fully individual emulative approach to the text which he currently draws upon as his direct inspiration.

Bibliography Primary Sources Biblia sacra iuxta vulgarum versionem (2007), Recensuit et brevi apparatu critic instruxit Robert Weber. Praeparavit Roger Gryson, Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

Kochanowski, Jan (1920), Laments, Dorothea Prall (transl.), Berkeley: University of California Press. — (1980), Dzieła polskie, Julian Krzyżanowski (ed.), Warszawa: PIW. — (1991), Fraszki, Janusz Pelc (ed.), Wrocław/Warszawa/Kraków: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. — (2018a), Poematy okolicznościowe, Roman Krzywy (ed.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Sub Lupa. — (2018b), Trifles, Songs and Saint John’s Eve Song, Michał Jacek Mikoś/Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (ed.), Lublin: Wydawnictwo KUL.

Secondary Sources Brzegowy, Tadeusz (2010), Tekst i komentarz, in: Księga Izajasza. Rozdziały 1–12. Wstęp, przekład z oryginału, komentarz Tadeusz Brzegowy, Częstochowa: Święty Paweł. Buszewicz, Elwira (2001), Psałterz Dawidów, in: Lektury polonistyczne. Jan Kochanowski, Albert Gorzkowski (ed.), Kraków: Universitas, 17–66. Fallek, Wilhelm (1931), Świat biblijny w twórczości Kochanowskiego, in: Pamiętnik zjazdu naukowego im. Jana Kochanowskiego w Krakowie 8 i 9 czerwca 1930, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności, 383–421. Głombiowska, Zofia (2001), W poszukiwaniu znaczeń: o poezji Jana Kochanowskiego, Gdańsk: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego. Graciotti, Sante (1989), Religijność poezji Jana Kochanowskiego, in: Janusz Pelc/ Paulina Buchwald-Pelcowa/Barbara Otwinowska (ed.), Jan Kochanowski 1584–1984. Epoka – twórczość – recepcja, vol. I. Lublin: Wydawnictwo Lubelskie, 331–347. Gradowski, Michał/Żygulski, Zdzisław (1998), Słownik uzbrojenia historycznego, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN. Grzybek, Stanisław (1956), Mesjańskie Królestwo Pokoju na Sionie (na podstawie Iz 2, 2–5), Ruch Biblijny i Liturgiczny 9 (4–6), 227–243. Kupisz, Kazimierz (1987), Dwie “Zuzanny”: wokół poematu biblijnego, Prace Polonistyczne 43, 9–38. Krzywy, Roman (2008), Sztuka wyborów i dar inwencji. Studium o strukturze gatunkowej poematów Jana Kochanowskiego, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IBL PAN. Krzyżanowski, Julian (1962), Romans polski wieku XVI, Warszawa: PIW. Mayenowa, Maria Renata/Woronczakowa, Lucyna/Axer, Jerzy/Cytowska, Maria (1983), Objaśnienia, in: Jan Kochanowski, Treny, Maria Renata Mayenowa/Lucyna Woronczakowa/Jerzy Axer/Maria Cytowska (ed.), Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 99–182. Nadolski, Andrzej (1984), Polska broń. Broń biała, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. Nowicka-Jeżowa, Alina/Stępień Paweł (ed.) (2000), Elementy platońskie w pieśniach Jana Kochanowskiego (Pieśń VI I Pieśń IX “Fragmentów”), in: Inspiracje platońskie

61

62

Radosław Rusnak (University of Warsaw)

literatury staropolskiej. Materiały z konferencji zorganizowanej przez Zespół Badań Literackich nad Historią Kultury Epok Dawnych Instytutu Literatury Polskiej Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego 14–15 października 1998 r., Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Polonistyki UW, 279–305. Pelc, Janusz (1986), Miejsce Biblii w tradycji według twórców literatury polskiego renesansu, in: Stefan Sawicki/Jan Gotfryd (ed.), Biblia a literatura, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 131–152. — (2001), Jan Kochanowski. Szczyt renesansu w literaturze polskiej, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN. Plezia, Marian (ed.) (1959), Słownik łacińsko-polski, vol. I (A–C), Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. Prejs, Marek (2015), Ład chaosu. Przyczynek do studiów nad wyobraźnią poetycką Jana Kochanowskiego, in: Estera Lasocińska/Wiesław Pawlak (ed.), Wiązanie sobótkowe. Studia o Janie Kochanowskim, Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich PAN, 15–24. Ranke von, Leopold (1981), Dzieje papiestwa w XVI–XIX wieku, Jan Zarański/Zbigniew Żabicki (transl.), introduction by Marian Henryk Serejski, vol. 1, Warszawa: PIW. Rusnak, Radosław (2021), Nie-obecny Nowy Testament. Do dyskusji o kształcie wyznaniowym poezji religijnej Jana Kochanowskiego, Prace Polonistyczne, vol. 76, 133–154. Rytel, Jadwiga (1967), Jan Kochanowski, Warszawa: Wiedza Powszechna. Stachowiak, Lech (ed.) (1996), Księga Izajasza I (1–39). Wstęp – przekład z oryginału, komentarz, Poznań: Pallottinum. Starownik, Agata (2021), “Porządek i ozdoba rzeczy”. Motywy astronomiczne w Psalmie 19 Jana Kochanowskiego na tle biblijnego oryginału i tradycji neoplatońskiej, in: Radosław Rusnak (ed.), Zygmunt II August i kultura jego czasów. W pięćsetlecie urodzin ostatniego jagiellońskiego władcy na polsko-litewskim tronie, Warszawa: Wydawnictwa UW (in preparation). Starnawski, Jerzy (1986), O psalmicznych elementach niektórych utworów Kochanowskiego (poza “Psałterzem”), in: Stefan Sawicki/Jan Gotfryd (ed.), Biblia a literatura, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 168–187. Synowiec, Juliusz (1976), Jerozolima stolicą uniwersalnego królestwa Jahwe (Mi 4, 1–4, Iz 2, 2–4), in: Stanisław Łach/Marian Filipiak (ed.), Królestwo Boże w Piśmie Świętym, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 17–34. Szczot, Monika (2020), Pieśń o potopie. Od Jana Kochanowskiego do Stanisława Grochowskiego, in: Elwira Buszewicz/Justyna Dąbkowska-Kujko/Aleksandra JakóbczykGola/Alina Nowicka-Jeżowa (ed.), Obraz natury w kulturze intelektualnej, literackiej i artystycznej doby staropolskiej, Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 313–329. Vincůrková, Dorota (2018), “Zuzanna” Jana Kochanowskiego wobec konwencji wernakularnych pieśni hagiograficznych, Pamiętnik Literacki 109, 4, 65–86. Weintraub, Wiktor (1974), Religia Kochanowskiego a polska kultura renesansowa, Pamiętnik Literacki 65, 3–22.

“The Lord of Grief and Comfort is but One”: Thoughts on the Biblical Language in Jan Kochanowski’s Poetry

Wierzbicka-Trwoga, Krystyna (2015), Kompozycje cykliczne w poezji Jana Kochanowskiego, in: Estera Lasocińska/Wiesław Pawlak (ed.), Wiązanie sobótkowe. Studia o Janie Kochanowskim, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IBL PAN, 95–107. Wojtyska, Henryk Damian (1977), Papiestwo – Polska 1548–1563: dyplomacja, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL.

63

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century. Cultural Contexts Versus the Authors’ Personalities1

Introduction The authors of parabiblical texts – sermons as far as this paper is concerned – were expected, and indeed obliged, to make use of various sources, i.e. texts from the Bible, works of renowned preachers, and works of literature. This made for the scholarly quality of their sermons which today is described as “second-hand erudition” (Pawlak: 2012, 316–334; Cybulski: 2014; 2018). The sermons were expected to both reach the recipients or listeners as well as move them. The best of the Lithuanian preachers-orators, even when using sermons translated from foreign languages, inserted in them passages relating to the surrounding reality (Gelumbeckaitė: 2009, 66–80). Also, the sermons usually reflect the preachers’ attitudes, their own interpretations of the above-mentioned source texts, and the social relations at the given place and time. The cultural context can be understood in two ways: 1) as traditions, sources, and specific religious views on a global scale, and 2) as the actual reality, specificity of the cultural environment including people’s expectations of a specific kind of word choice/speech style. When it comes to the latter understanding, the preacher’s personal style comes to the fore, and his subjective attitude to the biblical text becomes apparent. The differences in the preachers’ modes of describing the bible characters that matter in the process of catechesis will be illustrated here on the basis of the example of the image of Mary as perpetuated in the sermons of Konstanty Szyrwid2 and Jakub Wujek3 . Szyrwid’s sermons were written in Lithua1 The article was prepared as part of the project “Tekst religijny jako źródło komunikacji międzykulturowej”, financed by NAWA (the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange), No. PJP/PON/2021/ 1/00005/U/DRAFT/00001. 2 The first part of Szyrwid’s sermons covering the period from Advent to Lent, all prepared by the author himself, was published in 1629; the second part came out through the efforts of his pupil Jan Jachnowicz (Jonas Jaknavičius) in 1644, after Szyrwid’s death. 3 His Postylla catolicka [Catholic Postil] and Postylla mniejsza [The Lesser Postil] ran into a number of issues (Estreicher: 1939, 394–398). In Lithuania, Postylla mniejsza enjoyed great popularity. It is assumed that those sermons were treated as a pattern or model by later authors, Konstanty Szyrwid among them. That is why I have chosen Wujek’s works for comparison, although both authors belong

66

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

nian and then translated into Polish, while Wujek’s sermons were known on the territory of the Great Duchy of Lithuania in both their Polish originals and their Lithuanian translations by Mikołaj Dauksza4 . My choice of Mary for this comparison stems from the significance of the Marian veneration developed and perpetuated by the Jesuits. They became the executors of the decisions of the Council of Trent, where momentous regulations concerning the renewal of faith were passed, the new translation of the Vulgate was endorsed, a special significance was given to living according to the Holy Scriptures, and Mary’s role in catechesis was emphasised (Vaitkevičiūtė: 2009, 156–157; Siudy: 2014, 171–187; Budzik: 1997, 7–9). The Jesuits engaged in various types of activity: they printed numerous books on Mary, founded dozens of Marian congregations, confraternities, unions and associations (for more on this, cf. Napiórkowski: 2016, 85; Bednarz: 1964; Grzebień: 1996). All this bolstered religious devotion and lent it variety, but also served to fight Protestantism (Grzebień: 1996). The feature that is most often accentuated in the Jesuits’ depiction of Mary is her immaculate conception. In propagating this dogma they introduced a number of new offices, such as the Little Hours of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Bednarz: 1964, 201–204). The Jesuits’ activity had yet another important aspect. It was not only dedicated to spreading the faith but also focused on the care for the faithful. For example, the Confraternity of Our Lady that started in Wilno [Vilnius] in 1590 held as its objective helping the sick and the poor. This was the case with all confraternities set up by the Jesuits (Bednarz: 1964, 200). We can therefore say that the preaching of the faith by this order was closely linked with their views and attitudes to ordinary people. In accordance with St Ignatius’ assumptions, the Jesuits did not favour purely internal devotion (Bednarz: 1964, 200). It is to be expected that a similar attitude will also find expression in sermons seeking not only to reinforce the addressees’ faith but also to offer them spiritual support in hard times.

to close though different literary epochs. Wujek is placed by scholars in the late Renaissance and early Baroque period, while Szyrwid is considered a representative of early Baroque. It seems, however, that they both followed similar rules of composing sermons by choosing to base them on the Bible. 4 Mikołaj Dauksza translated Postylla mniejsza into Lithuanian in 1599, probably on the basis of the 1590 edition.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

An Outline of the State of Research – Basic Elements in the Depiction of Mary Apart from studies by historians and students of Lithuania’s cultural history5 there is a paucity of publications dedicated to the figure of Mary as presented in works of Lithuanian literature of that period. Only the studies by Ona Daukšienė (2004, 169–186; 2014, 169–186) deal with depictions of Mary in literature, first of all in the religious poetry of M.K. Sarbiewski6 . At the same time, however, there are quite a number of studies dealing with the Marian veneration and its evolution in the works of Polish literature. This line of research was initiated by the mediaeval historian and mariologist Julian Wojtkowski (1955; 1963; 1964; 1965; 1966; 1968). His studies indicate that in all the categories of religious texts that he scrutinized – prayers, hymns and sermons written in Latin or in Polish before the year 1500 – the dogma of divine maternity features the most frequently (Wojtkowski: 1966, 292). An exception to this tendency was only noted by him in Rozmyślanie przemyskie [Reflections of Przemyśl] – on Mary’s birth and early life – and in Marian hymns and songs, where the theme of Our Lady’s virginity prevails. The dogma of divine maternity is also noted and focused on by K. Górski, who observes that “in the times of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in Poland she is above all the Mother” (Górski: 1980, 258). But according to mariologist Roman Mazurkiewicz7 , it is hard to draw a definite conclusion here because both themes – maternity and virginity – appear jointly and co-create the belief in Mary’s virginal maternity (Mazurkiewicz: 2000, 158). Observing the spread of the Marian veneration and juxtaposing its themes, Wojtkowski demonstrates that apart from the invariably dominant themes of maternity and virginity taking the form of a dogma, there often appears the holiness of Mary, followed down the list by her being our mediatrix, advocate, and regina. The feature of veneration that grows in importance as time goes by is her spiritual motherhood, which does not become clearly visible until the 15th century (Wojtkowski: 1965, 256). Mazurkiewicz, when analysing later mediaeval texts, lists such detailed themes

5 To name just a few, Baronas: 2018; Vaišnora: 1958; Ivinskis: 1987; Surdokaite: 2011; Račiūnaitė: 2014. 6 Religious poetry of that period is one of the most important transition zones between theology and literature, hence it will be touched upon in this study when relevant. 7 Roman Mazurkiewicz has been engaged in Marian research for almost three decades. Many valuable studies by this author have been published, including several anthologies. His empirical studies are based on Marian hymns, mediaeval literature, and of late also sermons. In collaboration with Kazimierz Panuś he has published an anthology of Marian sermons from the earliest period till modern times, which provides excellent material for research on Marian preaching (Mazurkiewicz, Panuś: 2014). In this article only the works connected with its subject matter have been used (Mazurkiewicz: 2000; 2002; 2011).

67

68

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

as Mary the mother chosen of the father’s will, immaculately conceived, hallowed in the womb of her mother, and mother of her Lord and Creator. He also mentions the themes of Mary and Christ’s physical and spiritual closeness, and her being perceived as the person who spiritually co-suffers with him. Spiritual motherhood reveals itself primarily in her protection over all the faithful, her mercy, and her advocacy with the Lord, also when she is depicted as the model of Christian life and guardian of pure faith. In the context of spiritual motherhood there also appears Mary’s appellation as Queen and Mother assumed into heaven, which she owes to her earthly role (Mazurkiewicz: 2000, 157–179). Studies on Mary’s depiction in the New Testament have revealed that Mary is presented on the one hand as the object of God’s special choosing, as the Virgin Mother of Christ. On the other hand, and what is specially emphasised, is her obedience, deep faith, and concern for the affairs of God and people. Many of its books show her role at Jesus’ birth, during his childhood, at the beginning of his public activity, at his death, and at the birth of the Church (Napiórkowski: 2016, 65). While noting that she is a symbolic figure and as such not yet fully explored, scholars stress that “The Holy Spirit has not yet revealed all of its facets, just like a sculptor who does not refine all at once the details of a statue. Only gradually will the Church get acquainted with the full sense of that still obscure sketch” (Laurentin: 1989, 45).

The Scope of Research and the Applied Mode of Description As indicated in the introduction, this paper analyses three sets of sermons: those by Jakub Wujek (PMn), Mikołaj Dauksza (DP), and Konstanty Szyrwid (PK I, PK II). Due to the fact that the sermons, like the figure of Mary, are rich in symbolism, this paper also attempts to decipher those symbols. Thus links in the texts of the postils with biblical texts and works of the Fathers of the Church have come under scrutiny. This approach has helped to better understand the sermons, as well as trace the origins of the rhetorical figures used in them: some of them were inspired by the Holy Scripture while others were the fruit of the authors’ own reflections. This study falls within the scope of linguistic research, the point of departure being collecting the data on the basis of the linguistic means of their description. Hence the cognitive approach has also been used to some extent in analysing the texts of the sermons. In extracting the features of Mary’s personal and symbolic figure and in presenting her characteristic forms of behaviour and actions, the ways of defining, naming and comparing them were closely looked at. Thus the extracted themes occurring in Mary’s depictions are cited in accordance with the expressions used in the text, with a view to detecting individual features and reconstructing the authors’ subjective attitudes to the texts of the Bible. Answers were sought to the

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

question why similar, but also different, depictions of the same biblical characters had been created despite the fact that the sermons of that period were expected to closely imitate the Holy Scripture. In Jakub Wujek’s Lesser Postil the image of Mary is presented in eight Marian sermons8 . In Szyrwid’s postils, on the other hand, none of the sermons is especially dedicated to Mary and her image is presented rather scantily. It occurs in six sermons devoted to different feast days9 and always appears in the context of reflections on the person of Christ. Dauksza’s sermons are looked at here only from the linguistic point of view, therefore the way Wujek’s original text was translated and possible differences arising in the process of translation were examined.

Names and Appellations Accorded to Mary The person of Mary in Wujek’s sermons does not have very diverse and colourful names, the most frequent being such appellations as “Panna” [maiden/virgin], “Matka” [mother], and “Maryja” [Mary], occurring in such collocations as “Matka Boża” [Mother of God], “Panna Maryja” [Virgin Mary], “Panna Najświętsza” [the Most Holy Virgin], “Panna Błogosławiona” [the Blessed Virgin]. It is only in the final passages summing up the contents of the sermons that more noble names usually appear, e.g. “Pani świata” [Mistress of the World], “Królowa niebieska” [Queen of Heaven], “Stolica niebieskiego Salomona” [Throne of Heavenly Solomon]. Similar appellations appear in Dauksza’s postil – the Lithuanian translation of Wujek’s text – but as it transpires from data presented in the index to the former’s sermons, where the Polish and Lithuanian names are listed (Kudz I, Kudz II), the word “Merga” – “Panna” [Virgin] is predominant while the word “Motina” – “Matka” [Mother] is much less frequent. In Szyrwid’s sermons the word “Motina” – “Matka”

8 Na Dzień Poczęcia Panny Maryi [On the Day of Conception of the Virgin Mary]; Na Dzień Oczyszczenia Panny Maryi [On the Day of Purification of the Virgin Mary]; Na Dzień Zwiastowania Panny Maryi a Wcielenia Syna Bożego [On the Day of Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary and Incarnation of the Son of God]; Na Dzień Nawiedzenia Panny Maryi [On the Day of Visitation of the Virgin Mary]; Na Dzień Wniebowzięcia Panny Maryi [On the Day of Assumption of the Virgin Mary]; Na Dzień Narodzenia Błogosławionej Panny Maryi [On the Day of Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary]; Na Dzień Ofiarowania Panny Maryi [On the Day of Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary]. I have used the 1909 edition of Postylla Mniejsza (PMn) as well as one sermon from the 2014 anthology, Kazania Maryjne (KMW). 9 Na trzecią niedzielę Adwentu [For the third Sunday of Advent], W niedzielę po Bożym Narodzeniu [On the Sunday after Christmas, W niedzielę pierwszą po Trzech Królach [On the first Sunday after Epiphany], W niedzielę wtorą po Trzech Królach [On the second Sunday after Epiphany], Na niedzielę wtorą Postu [On the second Sunday of Lent], Na piątą niedzielę Postu [On the fifth Sunday of Lent]. Here I have used the critical edition of the sermons (PK I, PK II).

69

70

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

[Mother] predominates with 50 occurrences, the word “Ponna” – “Panna” [Virgin] (29 occurrences) is fairly frequent, while the proper noun “Marija” – “Maryja” [Mary] (13 occurrences10 ) is used less often. The last two labels do not in fact occur alone but are part of more complex phrases: “Ponna Marija” – “Panna Maryja” [the Virgin Mary], “Ponna Švenčiausia” – “Panna Najświętsza” [the Most Holy Virgin], “Švenčiausia Ponna Marija” – “Najświętsza Panna Maryja” [the Most Holy Virgin Mary]. Only the word “Motina” – “Matka” [Mother] is often used on its own, even though it is also accompanied by other words in quite complex phrases: “Dievo Motina” – “Matka Boża” [Mother of God], “Ponna Marija Motina Dievo” – “Panna Maria Matka Pana Jezusowa” [Virgin Mary, Mother of Lord Jesus]. There are hardly any other appellations of Mary. In the Polish text, there once occurred the word “rodzicielka” (a synonym of ‘mother’, lit. ‘one who has given birth’), as did the phrase “służebnica Pana” [the Lord’s servant] deriving from a quotation from the Bible. This warrants the claim that the names used for Mary in both sets of the sermons express such features as mot he rho o d and v i rg i nit y which, through the descriptors “Boża” [of God] and “Najświętsza” [the Most Holy] accompanying the names, are linked with two other key features of the Mother of Jesus, her hol ine ss and mot he rho o d of G o d. Similar appellations for Mary were used in Polish literature in different periods of its development. As Marian Kucała’s studies show, the most frequent label for Mary in mediaeval Polish was the word “Matka” [Mother], used together with qualifiers narrowing down its meaning: “Boska” [of God], “Boża” [of God], “Święta” [Holy], “Najświętsza” [the Most Holy], “Błogosławiona” [Blessed], “wierna” [faithful], “prawa” [true], “niepokalana” [immaculate], “wielebna” [reverend], “dostojna” [noble], “miła” [beloved], “słodka” [sweet] (Kucała: 1988, 135–143). Julian Wojtkowski (1964, 215–257), when analysing the exponents of the Marian veneration in early Polish manuscripts, points out that her holiness was expressed with a handful of very frequently used appellations: “Święta” [Holy], “Najświętsza” [the Holiest], “Najbłogosławieńsza” [the Most Blessed], “Chwalebna” [Praiseworthy], “Czcigodna” [Venerable]. Even in a very expressive Marian sermon by Piotr Skarga the most frequent label for Mary was the word “Matka” [Mother], whereby her central role was emphasized. It is accompanied in the text by qualifiers, which together produce more complex phrases such as “Matka Boża” [Mother of God], “Najświętsza Matka” [the Most Holy Mother], “Przeczysta Matka Boża” [the Most Pure Mother of God] (KMS: 2014, 125–140). It can also be observed that simple appellations got transferred into the works of “Sarmatian” authors (Łukarska: 2012, 398). Somewhat more diversified appellations appear in the sermons of Samuel Brzeżewski from

10 Having access to a hand-copy of Szyrwid’s sermons, I was able to provide these numerical data. For the other sermons such data are not available.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

the mid-seventeenth century, which is connected with a further metamorphosis of Mary’s depiction. He used a number of expressions drawn from the patristic biblical tradition (Mary is referred to among others as “królowa” [queen], “cesarzowa” [empress], “druga Ewa” [the second Eve], “brama” [gate of heaven]), but less formal titles are also used. In the same century, Mary was similarly referred to by Wespazjan Kochowski in his Ogród panieński [the Virgin’s garden] (Dybek: 2019, 243–264). Studies on Mary’s appellations in more recent times, in the 19th and 20th centuries, indicate that the most frequent expressions were still those connected with her maidenhood and virginity although new expressions also occur that emphasise her “model, worthy of imitating, features of a mother and a woman” (for instance, next to “Bogarodzica Maryja” [God-bearer Mary], “Maryja Matka Jezusa” [Mary, Mother of Jesus] there appears the appellation “Maryja Matka pięknej miłości” [Mary, the Mother of beautiful love]) (Rutkowska: 2012, 71)11 . More colourful and varied names appear in Marian hymns (Bieńkowska: 2000, 307–316) or on miraculous images of Mary, but the most complex ones are the expressions in folk songs and prayers (Umińska-Tytoń: 2000, 295–306). The names alone, as we can see, reflect the different features and roles of Mary and the different interpretations of her veneration as it evolved over the centuries.

The Image of Mary in Jakub Wujek’s “Lesser Postil” In sermons wholly devoted to Mary, her figure is at the centre of the preacher’s reflections. In painting her picture Wujek draws upon the events from her life, makes interesting and striking comparisons, and ends each sermon with a laudatory part where he lists all of her achievements and titles. His image of Mary does not contain many metaphoric references. Wujek talks about her features directly and makes use of such references to the beginnings of the world’s creation as the first Eve, or specific images from the Bible such as the morning star, Solomon’s throne, or a rod from the stem of Jesse.

Mary, the vessel of life By evoking the immaculate conception of Eve and comparing her to a beautiful vessel, Wujek lets it be known that Mary deserves being that second vessel, even

11 As material for research I have here used readers and May sermons.

71

72

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

lovelier and made of gold, and symbolising the beginning of a new life. He draws a parallel to Ecclesiasticus (Sir 43)12 , admiring the beauty of the created word: A tak najwyższy rzemieślnik z potomstwa tejże Ewy uczynił statek nierównie zacniejszy i piękniejszy, aniżli on pierwszy, to jest Najświętszą Pannę Maryję, statek boski a dziwny, statek żywota, pełen łaski i świętości, przez który naprawił wszystek rodzaj ludzki13 (PMn, 382). And thus the highest craftsman made of Eve’s progeny a vessel incomparably nobler and more beautiful than that first one, namely the Holiest Virgin Mary, a holy and marvellous vessel, a vessel of life, full of grace and holiness, through which the entire human race was set right.

Mary – the blessed earth Evoking Adam’s having been created of dust, Wujek compares Mary’s body to the earth of which Christ was created. He makes loose references to various books of the Bible (Gen 47, Ps(s) 109, Heb 7) where the coming of the Messiah and the establishment of a new world are mentioned14 : Otóż Chrystus jest on kapłan wieczny, a Panna Matka jego jest ziemia kapłańska. Bo jako pierwszy Adam jest stworzony z ziemi, tak ten wtóry Adam jest stworzony z tej ziemi błogosławionej, to jest z ciała panny Maryi, która nam tego nawyższego kapłana porodziła (PMn, 381). Therefore Christ is an eternal priest, and his Virgin Mother is a land of the priests. Because as the first Adam was created from earth, so this second Adam is created from that blessed earth, namely the flesh of the Virgin Mary, who through birth gave us this highest priest.

12 Bible citations determined on the basis of BWF. 13 In Dauksza’s Lithuanian text the vessel’s description is less lofty, with the adjective “bosky” [holy] omitted (DP 396, 35–38). 14 In all Polish quotations the spelling has been modernized and the basic linguistic characteristics have been kept.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Mary the Immaculate One of Mary’s main features is her immaculate conception, which is perceived as her particular beauty expressed with the words of The Song of Songs, where the author finds the means to describe Mary’s bodily features. What is emphasised here is her purity: Od grzechu tego [pierworodnego] jako jak i od każdego innego była wolna ta Najświętsza Panna, wszystka święta, wszystka piękna, wszystka niepokalana15 . Jako do niej oblubieniec mówi: “Wszystka jesteś piękna, przyjaciółko moja, a makuły nie masz w tobie żadnej” (Cant 4:7) (PMn, 380). From this [original] sin, like from any other kind, was free this Holiest Virgin, all holy, all beautiful, all immaculate. As the beloved sings, “Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee”16 .

Mary – House on the Mount Mary also functions as the symbol of Christ’s church. Referring to the Gospel of Matthew and to the Book of Ezekiel, Wujek evokes Christ’s sermon on the mount, believed to be the Christian moral code. The “new” morality consists in filling the old letter of the Covenant (BT, commentary to Matt 5:1) with love. In his sermon he links the features that are attributed both to the church and to the person of Mary: Ta-ć jest jako pałac na górze zbudowany, to jest na tym rodzaju patryjarchów, królów i proroków fundowany (Matt 5; Ezek 44). Bo jak z wielu kamieni i z wielu koszów ziemi uczyni się góra, tak też z wielu patryjarchów, królów i proroków czyni się ta góra wysoka, nad która jest ta Najświętsza Panna, które ona wszystkie przodki swe daleko przechodzi wysokością, czystością, świętością, chwałą i zacnością. […] Najświętsza Panna ma takowy tytuł, nad który po tytule Pana Chrystusowym nie może być większy i zacniejszy na niebie i na ziemi […] Ona jest studnica łaski, Matka miłosierdzia (PMn, 503). She is like a house erected on a mount, namely built on this kind of patriarchs, kings and prophets (Matt 5; Ezek 44). Because, like many stones and many baskets of earth will make

15 In Dauksza’s text, in Mary’s description the adjective “święta” [holy] is omitted (DP 395, 20–22). 16 In the translations of the quoted excerpts, all Bible quotations have been taken from The Holy Bible, King James Version. Cambridge Edition: 1769; King James Bible Online, 2021, www.kingjamesbibleonline.org [accessed on 01.12.2021].

73

74

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

a mountain, so of many kings and prophets will rise this high mount over which is this Most Holy Virgin, who far surpasses all her ancestors with her height, purity, holiness, glory and nobleness. […] The Most Holy Virgin has such a title that save for the title of Christ the Lord there can be none greater or nobler in heaven and on earth. […] She is a well of grace, Mother of mercy.

Mary – the morning star announcing and giving birth to light Mary is presented as the morning star that announces the arrival of Christ. The theme of the morning star is adopted by Wujek from the Song of Songs, and Mary’s beauty is associated with her fairness and nobleness rather than physical beauty that is extolled in that Bible book. She is possessed of those features thanks to Christ: […] [Maryja] jako zorza napiękniejsza narodzeniem swoim zaświtnąwszy, uprzedziła weście i narodzenie onego Słońca sprawiedliwości, Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa. Przeto ją słusznie Duch Boży w Piśmie Świętym przyrównywa zorzy, gdzie tak mówi: “Któraż to jest, która pochodzi jako zorza nastawająca?” (Pnp 6,10) […] bez żadnego obłoku albo zaćmienia grzechowego, od Słońca onego sprawiedliwości pełnością łaski niebieskiej zapalona i rozświecona, stała sie pewnym posłem Zbawiciela świata tego (który z niej, jako słońce z zorze powstać miał) (KMW, 105). [Mary] having dawned through her birth as the loveliest aurora, preceded the rise and birth of this Sun of justice, our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore it is only right that the Holy Ghost compares her in the Holy Scriptures to a morning star when he speaks thus: “Who is she that looketh forth as the morning?”, (Cant 6:10) […] without any cloud or shadow of sin, from that Sun of justice kindled and illuminated with the fullness of heavenly grace, she became a true messenger of this world’s Saviour (who was to become from her like the sun from the morning star).

Mary – Solomon’s worthy throne Wujek resorts to the image, popular in many sermons, of King Solomon, who Christ is associated with. He evokes the Book of Kings (2 Kings 10:18–20), and in presenting the picture of Solomon’s biblical throne he stresses that it was built by Christ. Mary appears as a pure, meek and silent person accepting the Lord’s will with love:

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Stolec zasię, który ten nasz prawy Salomon Pan Jezus Chrystus zbudować sobie raczył, aby na nim siedział i wdzięcznie odpoczywał, jest-ci ta Panna Przenaświętsza, którą on sobie od wieku obrać i wedle myśli swojej ozdobić raczył, w której naczystszym żywocie odpoczywał, na której łonie piastowan, a na rękach noszon być chciał. […] Co i ta sama Panna, acz pokorniuchna i cichuchna, o sobie przedsię wyznać musiała […] (KMW, 107). And the throne, which this true Solomon Lord Jesus Christ of ours chose to build for himself to graciously sit and rest on, is the Most Holy Virgin, whom he had long before decided to choose and adorn according to his will, in whose purest womb he rested, in whose lap he was tended and in whose arms he wished to be carried. […] That is what the Virgin herself, albeit most meek and silent, had had to admit to.

Mary’s six virtues – the six steps to Solomon’s throne Continuing his comparison of Mary to the throne of Solomon, the preacher enumerates her virtues: purity, faith, obedience, readiness to act according to the lord’s will, and humility, and to each of these he devotes a lengthy section of his sermon. Thanks to these virtues did Christ choose to come and live in Mary’s body: Zasię sześć onych stopniow, po ktorych na stolec swoj Salomon wstępował, sześć nam cnot naprzedniejszych Panny Maryjej znamionują, ktorych sie rozmiłowawszy Syn Boży, krolewskie one stopnie opuściwszy, z nieba na ziemię do niej zstąpić raczył. A te cnoty są: niewinność od wszelakiego grzechu, panieńska czystość, wiara szczera, uprzejme posłuszeństwo, świętej chęci szerokość a pokora Bogu nawdzięczniejsza (KMW, 109). On the other hand, those six steps upon which Solomon ascended to his throne signify for us the foremost six virtues of the Virgin Mary, down which, having come to like them and having left those kingly steps, the Son of God descended from heaven to earth to her. And these virtues are: innocence from any sin whatever, virginal purity, sincere faith, kind obedience, breadth of holy will, and humility most pleasing to God.

Faith – Mary’s greatest blessing In his high praise of Mary’s faith, Wujek refers to the sermons of St Augustine, pointing out that it was the basis of her mission. Owing to her unshaken faith she conceived Christ, who was the fruit of her faith. This, therefore, is her most important virtue:

75

76

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Dla wiary ją błogosławioną nazywa, abowiem więtszego błogosławieństwa (mówi Augustyn święty) ta Panna dostała pojmując wiarę Chrystusową, niżli poczynając ciało Chrystusowe, ponieważ wiarą poczęła i wiarą przyjęła. A iż nie wątpiła, ale uwierzyła, dlategoż też i owocu wiary dostała (KMW, 111–112). For her faith does he call her blessed, because a greater blessing (says St Augustine) did this Virgin receive by embracing the faith of Christ than by conceiving Christ’s flesh, since through faith she conceived and faith she accepted. And as she did not doubt but believed, hence the fruit of faith she was granted.

Mary – a rod from the stem of Jesse The rather cursory biblical descriptions of Jesse’s rod (Isa 11:1) are presented by Wujek in a colourful way. He compares Mary to it, and Christ to a wild flower, white and reddish, whose fame spreads all over the world: Toć jest ona różdżka z korzenia Jesse, która kwiatek on nawdzięczniejszy, kwiatek polny a nie ogrodny, kwiatek biały a rumiany, przebrany z tysiąców, na świat wypuściła, którego wonnością wszystek świat jest napełniony. Toć jest ona panna, o której Ezajasz jaśnie przepowiedział, że miała począć i porodzić syna, i miało być nazwane imię jego Emanuel (KMW, 108). It is her that is that rod from the root of Jesse, who sprouted that most graceful flower, a wild flower not a garden one, white and blushing red, picked from among thousands, its fragrance filling the whole world. She is that virgin about whom Isaiah clearly foretold that she was to conceive and give birth to a son, who was to be given the name of Immanuel.

Mary choosing poverty In Wujek’s sermons there recur depictions of poverty, which is contrasted with wealth and pride. This feature links Mary with Jesus, as does chastity: Panna Maryja, będąc Matką Bożą i syn jej najmilszy, obrali żywot ubogi na tym świecie, a my przed ubóstwem, jako szatanem, daleko uciekamy (PMn, 407). The Virgin Mary, being the Mother of God, and her most beloved son, chose a life of poverty in this world, and we flee from poverty as far as we can, like from Satan.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Mary, silent and pondering Such features as pride and superiority are alien to Mary. Learning about her fate, she ponders upon it rather than tells anyone about it. Her humility Szyrwid quite often is linked with obedience and meekness: [Maryja] acz i Duchem św. była napełniona i świadoma była wszystkich tajemnic wiary św. naszej, a wżdy się z tem nigdy przed ludźmi nie okazywała. Ale tylko zachowała to wszystko, rozważając w sercu swoim, i nie czytamy, żeby więcej, jeno czterykroć w Ewangelijej św. przemówiła (PMn, 464). Though [Mary] was filled with the Holy Spirit and aware of all the secrets of our faith, she never revealed this before people. She merely kept all these things in her heart and pondered over them, and we do not read of her speaking out more than four times in the holy Gospel.

Mary, God’s servant and slave Many examples can be found in Wujek’s sermons of her serving God and obeying his will. This feature of Mary appears to be as important as her unshaken faith. This is how she speaks in the sermons: […] ja nie tylko usty, ale ze wszystkiej duszy i serca wielbię, wysławiam i chwalę nie kogo inszego, jeno Pana Boga mego. W Tym się kocham i w Tym się raduję, jako w Panu Zbawicielu moim, od którego mam te wszystkie dobrodziejstwa. Albowiem On nie z żadnych zasług moich, ze szczerego miłosierdzia swego wejrzał na nizkość mnie służki, albo niewolnicy swojej […] Okazał możność swą nad mną, uczyniwszy mi tak wielkie rzeczy, żem poczęła, męża nie uznawszy, i stałam się matką Syna Jego […] (PMn, 464). not only with my lips but with all my soul and heart do I adore, extol and praise none other than God my Lord. It is Him that I love and find joy in, as my Lord the Saviour, from whom I have got all these good things. Because not for any of my merits but out of pure mercy He looked at my low status as His servant or slave […] He showed his power over me having done great things unto me, so that I conceived without knowing my husband, and became the mother of His Son.

77

78

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

The Image of Mary in Konstanty Szyrwid’s “Sermon Items” The fragments referring to the image of Mary in Szyrwid’s sermons call for a broader commentary, as they only contain the key theses, while their rationalisation is provided in quotations from the Bible. On occasion, the meaning of those statements is clear from the theses in earlier key points or subchapters. Thus we are dealing with a kind of reconstruction of the author’s thoughts based on the reflections from the whole of the sermon, which is constructed in such a way that its key items or theses are closely interconnected. Moreover, over a stretch of several items we find the symbols used by the author to draw Mary’s image. They are similar to those we came across in Wujek’s postil.

A mother of humble origin Mary’s image first appears in Szyrwid’s sermons in the context of reflections on the unwillingness to recognise Christ as the Messiah. Here, Mary does not have any personal traits, only her origin from lower social orders is highlighted. This feature is used as an argument for condemning pride, which prevented the high priests from accepting Jesus as a Messiah. The temporary nature of this phenomenon is highlighted. As Mary is not known to everybody, the author assumes this state of affairs can change: […] regieio Christu sunt grinu, iž mažo miestelo Nazaretho, tewu io kayp anis numane, łetu ir płaku daylidy Iosephu, motinu Mariu teypagi, pagal swieto ne didžiu, ney pokim žmoniu žinamu (PS I 74). they saw that Christ was poor, from a small town, Nazareth, his father, they thought, being Joseph a lowly carpenter, his mother Mary also not prominent in the eyes of the world or important for the people at that time.

High birth is peculiarly provided here with such personal features as wisdom, prudence, justice, and alertness. They are attributed to the son of Mary, but the author probably assumes by extension that they were not alien to the earthly family of Christ. In bible texts poverty by itself foretells special graces in heaven. Bet gimine aukšta, turtas, rubay nedaug padest vnt giero kitu waldžioimo, iey nera gieribiu wiresnibey reykiamu, išminties, proto, teysibes iuteimo, ir kitu tokiu. Kas po rubams vnt waldžios, ne rubu bet gałwos išmintingos reykia vnt ios. Ʒiday tadu didžiey kłaydawo

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Iono ipaćiey del gimines skaystos noredami ažu Mesiašiu aprinkt, a Christu del grinibes atmest (PS I 76). Yet high birth, riches and attire do not matter much in good government if you do not possess the virtues that sovereignty requires: wisdom, prudence, justice, alertness and such like. What is the use of attire in ruling; it is not clothes but a wise head that is needed. Thus the Jews were much mistaken. They wanted to choose John, due to his worthy family, as the Messiah, and reject Christ because of his poverty.

A mother admiring her son’s miracles and pondering upon them In a few successive passages of the sermons Mary is presented as a person who admires such features of Jesus as maturity, divine origin, and ability to act as a king, which Jesus possesses right after birth. The supersensory character of his birth is also connected with where he arrived in this world. All these phenomena are observed and admired by Mary together with Joseph: Toksay gime, kuris ir metu ir wietu saw pats aprinko. Tuometu gime, kad noreio, ir toy wietoy, kurioy noreio. […] Ira tadu kam stebetisi vžgimimy W. Iezaus, bet noretume dabotis, kayp stebeios Iozapas ir Ponna šwynciausia (PS I 169–170). And there was born the one who chose both the time and the place by himself. He was born at the time that he wanted to and at the very place he wanted to. […] There is therefore good reason to wonder at the birth of Lord Jesus, if we care to notice how Joseph and the most holy Virgin wondered.

Szyrwid quite often makes the faithful reflect upon the secrets of the birth of Christ and future salvation, and he searches the text of the Bible for symbols that would illustrate the difficulty in understanding them. Reflections on spiritual matters are described by him as pearls, hidden treasures, bread of life (Prov 2:4–5, Matt 5:4, Rev 2:7; cf. PK 186–190), something invisible, hidden deep in the sea, in the earth (Col 2:3), which requires deep and laborious digging. Mary experiences the gift of pondering together with Joseph. She appears there as a person reflecting not only on the birth of Christ but also on the secret of people’s salvation, which Szyrwid underlines by referring to the appropriate passage from the Gospel of St Luke. His thoughts formulated in a nutshell can only be understood by studying its broader context in the text of the Bible, and it is probably his intention to encourage priests and the faithful to do precisely that:

79

80

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Ponna tadu šwynćiausia ir Iuozafas iog gieray iam daboios, todrin stebeios, ir didi iž tokio mustimo naudu aptureio. ‹Ažułaykie nes wisus žodžius, swarstidama iuos śirdiy sawo (Lk 2, 19)› (PS I 190). Therefore the most holy Virgin and Joseph, as they looked at him closely, were filled with wonder, and great benefits were they given. ‹But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. (Luke 2:19)›.

Mary tries hard to grasp the essence of the birth of the Messiah and of salvation, and as she has been let in on the secret by the angel, she is not surprised. Instead, she experiences the grace of being confirmed in her beliefs and faith while pondering the secrets of the birth and future mission of her son. In these contexts she is referred to as “the most holy Virgin”.

A mother created and chosen In Szyrwid’s reflections one comes upon the statement that all people are equal before God irrespective of their status and origin. As a great miracle of Christ’s birth he points to the son having the possibility to choose his mother. Here he emphasises once again Mary’s humble origin: Tasay gime, kuris saw pats motinu sutwere, ir tokiu aprinko, kokios noreio. Ik śiołay ne wienas sunus noprinko saw motinos. Nes kad tay turetu sunus sawo maciy aba galibey, kiekwienas aprinktu saw ažu motinu karalieny, ir teyp ne wiena prasta žmona ir pawargusi sunaus ne turetu (PS I 167–168). Thus was born he who created his mother, and who chose the one he wanted. Until now no son had chosen his mother. Because if a son had the power to do that, every son would choose a queen for his mother, and no simple and poor woman would have a son.

A mother possessing free will and the right to choose By emphasising the son’s choice of his mother, Szyrwid assumes that Mary, alone among the whole of mankind, enjoyed the same privilege, namely that in her right to decide about her fate she was equal to her Son. Even though elsewhere in his sermons Szyrwid links the right to exercise free will with obedience and humility by supporting this link with the quotation from Luke where Mary refers to herself as “the servant of the Lord”, here he formulates her right to free will unequivocally.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

At the same time, when continuing with the tenet of people’s equality before God, he resorts to rather convoluted statements based on the paradox that any mother, if given free will, would choose to give birth to a prince and then there would be no ordinary children. He indicates thereby that the world also needs humble people, that God loves all people irrespective of their origin, and the Church does not cast off even sinners. This tenet will be developed in the subsequent sermons and themes, where Mary will appear as the symbol of the Church: Ne tiktay sunus motinu, bet ir motina sunu aprinko iž sawo gieros walos. Nes Ponna Maria motina W. Iezaus, ižgirdus nuog Anieło, koksay, tureio gimt iž ios sunus, iey tiktay noretu pati vnt to pritarit, aba noru sawo vnt to pagrižt, teyp padare, kad anuos žodžius ištare: ‹Szitay tarnayte Wiešpaties, tegul stoias mań pagal žodžio tawo (Lk 1,38)›. Tays žodžieys aprinko saw sunu Diewo ažu sunu, kuri pagimditu. Koksay tay stebukłas? Kuri kaday nuog vmǯiu motina aprinko saw sunu, kuri pagal sawo noro pagimditu? Kokiuos sunus saw aprinktu motinos, kad primanitu? Kiekwiena noretu gimdit karuluno, kunigayksćio, didžios gimines. Ne wieno prasto wayko, grino, siratos, pawargusio swietas ne turetu. Bet wienay paćiey Ponnay Mariey tasay duotas ira priwileius (PS I 168–169). Not only did the son choose the mother but also the mother chose the son out of her free will. Because the Virgin Mary, mother of Lord Jesus, having heard from the angel what kind of son was due to be born of her if she herself chose to allow this or bent her will to do so, having heard those words she said: ‘Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.’ (Luke 1:38). With these words she chose to give birth to the son of God. What a wonder! Which mother ever, over the ages, chose the son to whom she would give birth according to her will? What sons would mothers choose for themselves if they had the power? Each one would want to bear a prince or duke, from a noble family. No simple child, poor or an orphan, would the world have. But only the Virgin Mary was given this privilege.

Mother of the Father and daughter of the Son Reflecting on Christ’s human and divine origin, Szyrwid again resorts to a paradox and explains that she gave birth to a man who due to his divine origin is her father, the creator, and thus assumes that Mary herself can be worshipped as the mother of a divine son. Simultaneously, being a daughter of the father, she is to obey him and treat him with adoration and respect. Her uniqueness is highlighted with the rhetorical question at the end of the passage which underscores her connection to the divine and earthly character of Jesus. She becomes as it were part of the miracle, the outcome of God’s earlier intentions.

81

82

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Gime iž tokios motinos, kuri ira draugie ir motina tewo sawo, ir dukte sunaus sawo. Nes Christus pagal Diewistes ira sutwertoias, ir todrin tewas, Ponnos Marios, ir teyp ira ana dukte sunaus to, kuri pagimde. Koksay tay stebukłas? (PS I 169). He was born of a mother who is in one mother of her father and daughter of her son. Because Christ as God is the creator, and therefore father of the Virgin Mary, and she is a daughter of the son she gave birth to. Oh what a wonder this is?

Mary’s virginity A theme that appears a number of times in these sermons is Mary’s virginity. Szyrwid explains the nature of Jesus’ birth of a virgin as a miracle never heard of, and enhances his claim by invoking the Book of Isaiah from the Old Testament: Gime iž Ponnos. Ir tay nauias dayktas, nuog swieto niekaday neregietas. ‹Szitay Ponná prades ir pagimdis sunu (Iz 7, 14)› (PS I 169). He was born of a Virgin. And this is a new thing, not seen since the beginning of the world. ‹Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son (Isa 7:14)›.

The reflections on Mary’s virginity are set in the context of explaining to the faithful what Christ’s mission consists in, which enhances the role of his mother. Szyrwid cites here different descriptors and symbols from the New Testament while explaining the symbolic significance of Christ, which show him as God’s intention in the work of salvation, the one who foreshadows a rebirth in spirit, the banner under which he fights for salvation, and a paragon of all virtues. An important sign, explained through referring it to Mary, is the miracle of Christ’s double origin, where the image of his earthly life is his mother. She foreshadows rebirth in faith (Szyrwid refers here to John 3:2) predicting the purity of this faith. And the purity of faith is linked with immaculate conception, i.e. Mary’s remaining inviolate. So if Christ is here a symbol of the New Covenant, a new faith, then Mary reveals herself as the one who contributes to the spread of pure faith, herself being a symbol of pure faith. Christus žinkłas vntru budu, tay ira praiewas ira, iog nuog paties prasideimo sawo wisas piłnas Buwo, ir dabar ira praiewu, Dwasiu šwintu, ir iž Ponnos prasideio, ir su tobułu išmoniu tuoiaus Buwo, dwi naturi wienoy persunoy Diewiškoy sudeti tureio, gime be pažieydimo ponnistes motinos sawos, [et]c. ir dabar Sakramenty ałtoriaus tułu ir didžiu žinkłu piłnas ira (PS I 192).

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Christ is a sign of the second kind, that is to say he is a miracle, that from his very conception he was full of miracles, and he is now, by the Holy Spirit and of a Virgin he was conceived, and at once he had a complete mind, two characters in one Divine person did he have, and he was born without any impairment to his mother’s virginity, and now in the Holy Sacrament [the Eucharist] he is full of many great miracles.

Szyrwid also subscribes to the thesis of the immaculate conception of Mary herself and assumes that she was born without original sin. And living in this world without human sins elevates her earthly form to the rank of a divine, holy, person. At this point in the sermon a lofty and complex appellation for Mary is used: “the Most Holy Virgin, Mother of God”: Ponna Márya motina Diewo buwo be grieko, pirm kuriami wisi žmones prasidest, ir giema, vntra ir be kitu wisokiu, kuriuos iau nuowoku turedami dáro didžius ir mažus, ába sunkius ir łyngwus. Teyp Bažnićia šwenta, ápe tay numano ir tiki, todrin ir šwenty ios prasideimo neižagto šwenćia (PS II 115). The Most Holy Virgin, Mother of God was without sin. First of all without the original sin, in which everybody is conceived and born, and without all others, which, when capable of understanding, all people commit, small and big, or venial and mortal. This is what the Holy Church understands and believes, and therefore celebrates the feast of her immaculate conception.

In the context of reflections on the life of Christ, Szyrwid again evokes his miraculous entry into this world. Mary’s virginity is described through references to the Old Testament books of Exodus and Numbers. Mary is compared to the burning bush in which the Angel showed himself to Moses while the bush remained intact. She is also compared to Aaron’s rod which miraculously flowered and produced fruit during one night: Pawayzda [Kristaus] tułos figūros senámi Testámenty, ápe io tan swietan ataimu, giwenimu, kunćiu, ir smerti sawimp ažuweria. Prasideimu io iž Ponnos Marios be pažieydimo ponnistes rode krumas vgnim degus, á ne sudegus (Iš 3,1–3). Rikšte Aarono nakti prasprogus pražydus ir wayśius turedama (Sk 17,16–26), tugi ćistu ir nieku budu ne inžagtu Wiešpaties iž Ponnos prasideimu, ir vžgimimu zinklino (PS II 23–24). The character [of Christ] in the Old Testament contains in itself prefigurations of his birth, life, Passion, and death. His birth from the Virgin Mary with her chastity intact was shown by a bush burning without being consumed (Exod 3:1–3) . The rod of Aaron

83

84

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

which over one night sprouted and flowered, and fruit produced (Num 17:16–26). That meant pure and in all respects immaculate conception and birth from the Virgin.

A mother giving birth with joy, without pain The immaculate conception and Mary’s virginity is linked by Szyrwid with the remarkable phenomenon of the birth being accompanied not by unspeakable pain but by great joy. The joy, much greater than the pain that Mary may have experienced, unifies her in a way with the divine origin of Christ and characterises her as a wise person who understands the need for and significance of Christ’s birth. It is reasonable to assume that the author of the sermons is referring here to St Thomas’ Summa Theologica, where St Augustine’s words17 are also invoked: Kitos motinos su sopuleys neišsakitays gimdžia, o Ponna Maria su neišsakitu džiaugsmu sunu sawo pagimde, ir posenam ponnu atliko (PS I 169). Other mothers give birth in unspeakable pain, and the Virgin Mary gave birth to her son with unspeakable joy, and remained a Virgin as she was before.

A mother having pure blood Probably borrowing the phrase from St Thomas, Szyrwid writes about Mary’s “very pure blood” and explains that he has in mind her soul without sin, unblemished by any lustful desires, remaining in a state of spiritual purity, not only chastity of the flesh. The marks of this purity of Mary appear in the context of reflections on the divine and human beauty of Jesus. Iog pradetas buo iž Ponnos Marios krauio łabay ćisto18 , kuris niekami ne buwo ižagtas ney piktays kokieys kayp kitu žmoniu ir motinu gieyduleys sudrumstas, ir kayp purways pamayśitas, todrin łabay gražus prasideio žiwati motinos sawo (PS I 173). As he was conceived of the Virgin Mary’s very pure blood that was in no way polluted, nor stirred up by evil desires as it happens with other people and mothers, as if mixed with mud, he was therefore conceived in his mother’s womb as being very beautiful.

17 Cf. St Thomas, Summa Theologica III, q. 35, par. 6, p. 148. 18 Probably an allusion to Summa Theologica, III, q. 31, par. 5, pp. 118–119.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Elsewhere in his sermons Szyrwid extols Mary’s integrity, listing her purity with her other virtues: poverty, obedience, mercy, piety and patience, a paradigm of which for people to follow was Her and God’s son. Dawe mumus paweyksłu grinibes, kad budamas Wiešpatim ir tewayniu wiso, ‹ne tureio kur gałwos prigłaust›a. Cistibes, kad iž Panos, Dwasios šwyntos darbu prasideio. Kłausimo, kad stoios kłausunćiu Tewo iki smerti, kuriu vnt križiaus numire. Meyłes prieš neprietelus, kad ažu iuos vnt križiaus mełdes. Małds tunkios ir iłgos, kad per cełasnaktis mełdes. Kuntribes, kad sunkiausiose sawo abidose ir mažiausio žinkło rustibes prieš tuos, kurie ii abidiio, ne parode (PS I 67). He set an example of poverty, for when he was Lord and heir of everything he had nowhere to lay his head. Of purity, when he was conceived of a Virgin by the Holy Ghost. Of obedience, when he obeyed his Father until his death on the cross. Of mercy towards his enemies, when he prayed for them on the cross. Of prayer intense and long, when he prayed through the nights. Of patience, when, subjected to the most grievous harm, he acted so modestly that he showed no sign of resentment.

A mother crowning Christ When mentioning the most important events from Christ’s life, such as his birth in God, his human birth, life on earth, Passion and death, Szyrwid also gives the day of his conception in Mary’s womb. By making references to the Book of Psalms and to the wise King Solomon, who is an Old-Testament prefiguration of Christ, Szyrwid extols Mary by presenting her as the mother who crowns the future king, who makes possible his birth into this world. In the verses preceding the reference to the Book of Psalms in the quoted extract there is talk of Solomon’s beautiful throne, which symbolises Mary’s body. Diena Insikuninimo Chrystaus žiwati Pánnos Máriosb. ‹Išeykite dukteres Siono ir weyzdekite vnt karalaus Salomono karuony, kuriu karunowaio gi motina io (tay ira, Panna Maria) dienoy sužiedáwimo, ir dienoy linksmibes śirdies io Gg 3,11› (PS II 124). The day of Christ’s becoming flesh in the womb of the Most Holy Virgin Mary, ‹Go forth, O ye daughters of Zion, and behold King Solomon with the crown wherewith his mother (that is, the Most Holy Mary) crowned him on the day of his espousal, and in the day of the gladness of his heart. (Song of Songs 3:11).›

85

86

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

A mother suffering during the crucifixion To his depiction of Christ’s Passion Szyrwid adds a sentence about Mary’s anguish as she stands under the cross, about her pain as sharp as a sword. Mary is referred to here as the Most Holy Mother: Kinteio ir dayktuose sáwisp prigulinćiose: rubay buwo iam atimti, kuriuos supłesi, terp sawis kotoy pasidaliio, Motina io šwynćiausia ne ižbiłomo sopulo kaławiiu persmegta. Apaštałay ir mokitiniey ir kiti prietelus io ižgunditi, išwaykiti, ir per tułas wietas ižbarstiti. Támi wisámi buwo Wiešpaties kunćia łabay smárki, ney śirdžiu permanoma, ney liežuwiu ižsakoma (PS II 200–2001). He was also suffering in the things belonging to him: his robes taken away from him, which the executioners, having torn them apart, divided among themselves, his Mother most holy stabbed through with the sword of unspeakable pain. The apostles, disciples and other friends, filled with fear [and] driven through different places, were dispersed. In all this the Lord’s passion was very harsh, impossible for the heart to grasp or words to express.

A mother being the home of Christ’s soul The symbol of Mary as Christ’s home appears quite often in Szyrwid’s sermons. But the excerpt quoted below shows that it is not only its physical form that matters here but also spiritual, as it was to become the abode of Christ’s soul. Mary is thus attributed with definite spiritual features, whose possession made her worthy of being “the most beautiful house” for the very beautiful soul of God. Duśia W. Iezaus kayp iau pamineta ira, buwo łabay graži neižsakitu budu, todrin pridereio, adunt namay tos duśios teyp gražios, butu graǯiausi, kuriuose ana tureio giwenti (PS I 173). Lord Jesus’ soul, as it has been said, was beautiful in a way that is impossible to express. It was therefore appropriate that the home of this soul so beautiful should be the most beautiful, where it was to live.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Mary, the Church Somewhat different titles and labels are given to Mary in the sermons in which she appears as the Church. The figure emerging here is no longer personal (as mother of Christ) but symbolic (as mother of the people, of all the faithful). Just like previously Christ’s relations with his earthly mother were analysed, here the preacher tries to present Christ’s relations with the Church, having in mind higher, spiritual ties. Christ’s relations with the Church reveal themselves in the context of comparing human and divine marriage, where a multi-levelled allegory is constructed, with the purpose of showing the value of spiritual ties based on the conversion to a new faith and developing a new type of relationship in a human marriage. In these contexts Szyrwid often makes use of expressions already used before and presents the Church as an earthly, bodily being but, at the same time, gives it supernatural, divine features. Evoking St Paul’s statement that the church is “a pure virgin” (cf. 2 Cor 11:2 BWF), he takes it further and interprets it in his own way. He assumes that the Church is able to spread faith in the hearts of hosts and care for them like a mother. The supersensory miracle here is the possibility to give birth to many souls all at once. Just as Mary was immaculately conceived, the Church is a symbol of pure faith and gives birth with joy, without pain. […] bažniċia wisados ira Ponna ćista, ir motina waysinga. Ponnu wadina iu Apaštałas: ‹Sužiedawau aba sukałbeiau ius ažu wieno wiro, ponnu ćistu statit Chrystuy (2 Kor 11,2)› […] Ponna ira bažnićia del ćistibes sawo, motina del wayku, kuriuos gimdžia. […] wienu kartu daug tukstunciu gimdžia, ko ne gal ne wiena kita motina, reta dwinus gimdžia, ir tay su ne išsakitu sopulu (PK I 220–221). the church is always a pure virgin, and a fertile mother. The Apostle calls it a virgin: ‹I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ (2 Cor 11:2)› […] The church is a virgin for its purity, a mother for the children it gives birth to. […] it gives birth to many thousands, which no other mother can do. A rare one gives birth to twins, but in unspeakable pain.

Evoking the reflections on the equality of people of different status, Szyrwid underlines that all people become equal in faith, and are all elevated to a high status. […] kitos motinos gimdžia sunus ir dukteris tokio stono aba stowio, kokio paćios ira. Grina ir vbagie vbagu ir grinu wayku gimdžia, newalnikie newałniku, baiore baiarayti, kunige kunigaykšti, karalene karalunu. Bet bažnićia gimdžia wisus aukštos gimines, gimdžia

87

88

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

sunus Diewo priimtuosius, gimdžia karalunus, kunigayksćius dungaus karalistes, gimdžia šwyntus, łabay gražius (PS I 221). other mothers give birth to sons and daughters of the same status as they themselves. A poor one gives birth to a poor child, a slave bears a slave, a noblewoman a nobleman, a duchess a duke, and a queen a prince. But everybody the church gives birth to has a high status. It gives birth to God’s adopted children, princes of the heavenly kingdom, it gives birth to saints, all beautiful.

Just as Mary obtained many graces and became a saint by virtue of being Christ’s mother, the Church obtains worthy titles owing to its links with Christ: it became the queen, the judge, and the light of the world. These descriptors were borrowed by Szyrwid from different places in the Book of Psalms and the Gospel of John, and were adjusted to his own thoughts and associations: Tuogi budu ir Christus duosti bažnićiey sawo titułus sawo. Anas ira karalus (Ps 2; Ps 45;), bažnićia ira karalene. Anas ira sudžia (Ps 2; Ps 45), dawe ir bažnićiey idant suditu ir dabar vnt žiames per kunigus, ir gały swieto. Apaštałay ir kiti didesni šwyntieii bus sudžiomis, ir draugie su Christusu sudis. Christus ira świesibe (J 8,12.), dawe ir bažnićiey tu wardu (PS I 222–223). By this token Christ gives the church his own titles. He is the King (Ps 2; Ps 45), the church is the queen. He is the Judge (Ps 2; Ps 45), and gave the Church [the power] to judge, both now on earth through the priests and at the end of the world. The Apostles and other major saints will be the judges, and together with Christ will they judge. Christ is the light of the world (John 8:12), and gave this name to the Church.

Szyrwid devotes a lot more attention to the Church in his sermons when he deals with the roles and missions that it is called upon to perform, but in those passages there are no explicit links to Mary that we could focus on in accordance with the topic of this article. Themes pertaining to the Church may become the subject of a separate specialist article in the future.

Differences and Similarities in the Depictions of Mary in Wujek’s and Szyrwid’s Sermons The sermons of the two outstanding preachers, Jakub Wujek and Konstany Szyrwid, that have been analysed here show marked similiarities in their interpretations of the image of Mary. There is also a lack of additions or departures from Wujek’s

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

original in Dauksza’s sermons when it comes to the way this figure is created, and his translation is rather accurate19 . The shared features stem from the fact that the main source for Mary’s image were biblical texts, both the Old and the New Testament, with the works of the Fathers of the Church often quoted second hand, a common practice in the Middle Ages and considered as a sign of learnedness. Those features should be seen as deriving, on the one hand, from the church-recommended method of sermon writing20 , and on the other, from the “homogeneity” of the preachers’ community of that period on a global scale21 . It may therefore be justified to say that there was an established trend in the development of sermon writing on a broader, general-European scale. It is also true, however, that following established patterns and conscious imitation was the accepted practice in that epoch, and this was not limited to preaching. This is visible, for example, in the religious poetry of that time, especially that of the dogmatic variety written by priests, who clearly transferred their habit of theological argumentation onto poetry22 . Nevertheless, despite the widespread tendencies to reach for set patterns and common themes, there is no lack in the poetry of that period of truly creative works where a more poetic and individualised image of Mary was depicted. One can point here to a poet writing in Vilnius, Maciej Sarbiewski23 . The figure of Mary created by him is revealed through showing many of her properties and focusing on her individual features,

19 For more on the way Dauksza translated Wujek’s sermons, see Lebedys: 1963. We can therefore conclude that the image of Mary in Dauksza’s Lithuanian sermons is presented as the same figure as in Wujek’s sermons, and it reached the faithful in the same form during catechesis. 20 In accordance with the Jesuits’ recommendations, their basis should be the Bible and the works of the Fathers of the Church (Panuś: 2001, 188–198); they were also obliged to use sources recurring in many other works, as evidenced by “registers” attached to their pieces (for such registers in Wujek’s postil, see Cybulski: 2014, 99–119; for indices of works cited in Szyrwid’s sermons, see Vasiliauskienė, Rutkovska: 2016, 195–212). 21 As noted by Wiesław Pawlak, “[i]t reveals itself in the similar intellectual and spiritual formation of authors representing different monastic communities […]. A close integration of the system, predominantly Jesuit, of education, the constant interflow of information and personel, and reliance on the same manuals and standards of church elocution, all of these factors had the effect that, despite the unquestioned differences, the preaching in the Baroque period showed many similarities, thus confirming the cultural unity of a large part of Europe of that time.” (Pawlak: 2005, 27). 22 Stefan Nieznanowski remarks that “[t]he figure of Mary that emerges from the dogmatic trend has few individual features. The schematic nature and generality of her image stems from the writers’ lack of a personal attitude to the presented issue, their attitude having been determined by the teaching of the Church.” (Nieznanowski: 1989, 45). Such a scarcity of images can supposedly be explained by the role of religious poetry of the time: “[those works] defended Catholic Mariology against dissenters and spread the truths of the faith amongst Catholics. They therefore had to follow the reasoning adopted by the Church.” (Nieznanowski: 1989, 70). 23 He wrote in the same period as Szyrwid. He was the likely author of a stemma in verse written in honour of Bishop Eustachy Wołłowicz that was inserted into Szyrwid’s postil (Rutkovska: 2016, 47).

89

90

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

while the description itself is based on a rich repertoire of metaphors (Daukšienė: 2014, 95–134; 2004, 169–186; Nieznanowski: 1989, 52–54). Yet this was a trend that did not become general until later, in the heyday of the Baroque (Nieznanowski: 1989, 71; Szymański: 1995, 70–71), when sermons, richer in imagery, were also to appear24 . Wujek’s and Szyrwid’s presentations of the figure of Mary reveal two ways of propagating the contents of the Bible: by making explicit references to the canonical texts, and by using the method of allegoresis, the essence of which was that during a search for a wider and deeper biblical sense, its meaning was considerably modified, or even replaced with another that had lost its connection with the proper sense of the given biblical passage25 . A frequent phenomenon is also referring OldTestament themes to New-Testament, Christian, realities26 . In the texts of the sermons of both authors the former way predominates, i.e. that of explicit references to, or literal quotes from, the source. All the same, allegory and metaphor are already visible and play an important role in their argumentation, even though they are deeply rooted in the tradition of the epoch: in both sets of sermons, the sources of symbols are various books of the Bible and works of the Fathers of the Church. Without doubt, such conscious imitation applied on a large scale resulted in similar symbolic descriptions of Mary appearing in different sermons. In a short preface to Kazania Maryjne [Marian Sermons], Mazurkiewicz writes: “the pre-figures of the Mother of God are the women of the Old Testament (Sara, Rebecca, Rachel, Deborah, Esther, Jael, the widow from Sarepta, the wise woman of Tekoa, and Miriam the prophetess), as well as Old-Testament concepts, phenomena and objects (the rod from the stem of Jesse, Noah’s ark, the throne of Solomon, Mount Zion, Jacob’s ladder, the morning star, an enclosed garden, a closed gate).” (Mazurkiewicz: 2014, 13). Both Szyrwid and Wujek are rooted here in the cultural background and sermon-composing tradition of that time. Not all of the above-listed prefigurements of Mary can be found in their sermons, but only those which the authors deemed indispensable according to their way of thinking of and interpreting her. While highlighting the repetitions and imitations featuring in the sermons, I am ready to venture the claim that the biblical symbolism is interpreted and applied by each author in his own individual way. Here are a few examples. When drawing a colourful picture of Solomon’s throne, i.e. the body of Mary, Wujek emphasises her purity, meekness, faith, obedience, willingness to make a sacrifice, and her love

24 For the types of sermon concepts in the Baroque period, see Pawlak: 2005, 130. 25 Piechnik spotted such features of argumentation even in Szyrwid’s theology lectures at the University of Vilnius (Piechnik: 1983, 21). 26 Such features of Wujek’s sermons were described by D. Bieńkowska, who also noted some more informal explanations of religious symbols present in the given interpretations (Bieńkowska: 1999, 21).

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

of God. In Szyrwid’s sermons, on the other hand, the reference to the throne is not limited to showing her chastity but she is presented first of all as a mother crowning her future king owing to her high moral attributes. When picturing Mary as the rod from the stem of Jesse, Wujek focuses on describing Christ’s beauty by making use of the metaphoric image of him as a pure and fragrant wild flower. His mother is known in the world thanks to the beautiful fruit born of her womb, whereas in Szyrwid’s sermons the evocation of the same symbol is further enhanced by comparing Mary to the burning bush, and the focus of the description is her immaculate conception. In Wujek’s sermons, Mary’s purity and her ability to bring about a rebirth of the world is also praised by comparing her to the earth, i.e. to the biblical Eve. In Wujek’s sermons, the figure of Mary is the subject of each separate sermon written to mark important dates in the calendar of her adoration. Thus she is the central figure, even though her fundamental features are presented through her union with Christ. The place she occupies in a sermon, of which she is the main focus, also gives her a greater degree of colour, imagery and expressiveness. In the sermons of Szyrwid, where Mary is presented merely in the context of reflections on Christ, her image is created as if on the margin. Her more notable features and forms of behaviour are explained with reference to the actions, features and behaviour of Christ, and are as if mirror reflections of Christ’s features. It is he, and not Mary, who is entitled to richer and more complex metaphors. Such a constant juxtaposition of the human and divine features of Mary and the divine and human qualities of Christ27 constitutes the basic point of reference for the way of looking at the image of Mary, and a tool for constructing that image. A lot of attention is devoted in the sermons to Mary’s immaculate conception, her divine body and pure blood, features from which her high spirituality derives. Christ’s divine features in turn are supplemented by his human origin. Resorting to the image of Mary to propagate the truths of the faith and catechesis, and evoking her earthly image, as well as bringing closer the human person of Christ, may well have been a particularly convenient way to reach the worshippers; allegoric transfers from a concrete figure onto a symbolic one are characteristic of Szyrwid’s sermons. The parallelism applied to describing the relations between Mary and Christ is transferred onto the earthly community with the aim of promoting new relations

27 This theme has its older history in parabiblical writings. It was present in the works of Albertus Magnus, the author of a mariological treatise well known in the mediaeval period, and in the sermons of John Chrysostom and Hieronimus. In such writings, Mary and Jesus share freedom from sin, chastity of the body, and a high moral sense. Also present are the themes of Mary’s immaculate conception and purity of her soul, which “was the noblest but for the soul of the Son of God, as her body was the the most noble and beautiful second only to the body of the Son of God” (Hanusiewicz: 2001, 238–239).

91

92

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

between people. Whole sermons in his postil are devoted to juxtaposing those features, and similar motifs reappear over several sermons. Such creative linking and juxtaposing of similar themes is a defining feature of the preacher’s language and style (Rutkovska: 2020, 15). How the contents of both authors’ sermons have been linked with the Bible are revealed by Mary’s appellations. In the sermons, their authors do not resort to lofty words. They use those that are perfectly matched to the contents of the statements, and use phrases that would not embellish the text. They tend towards ascetiscism in their choice of words and appellations. Two basic themes find expression in them: mate r n it y and v i rg i nit y, connected with Mary’s hol i ne ss and mot he rho o d of G o d. In Polish religious literature at different stages of its development there also occurred similar appellations for Mary which reflected the most important manifestations of the Marian veneration. Similar names for Mary also occur in the New Testament (Napiórkowski: 2016, 65). However, if we were to assess the ways of presenting Mary from the point of view of the linguistic features present in them, we would need to take into account the fact that Wujek used language which already had an established religious terminology, rich vocabulary, and set norms. In the first sermons to be written in Lithuanian on the territory of the Geat Duchy of Lithuania, which are more in the form of summaries, there is clear evidence of the great difficulties that Szyrwid had to overcome when writing a text in a religious koiné which was only just undergoing unification and developing its linguistic norms. It is visible, however, that he was trying to write independently, without being influenced by Dauksza’s sermons written not long before his, as revealed in the naming of Mary: Szyrwid refers to her as “Pana”, “Ponna” (cf. Polish “Panna” [virgin]), while in Dauksza she is called “Merga” (literally “merga” means “a girl, a maiden”). Many more such linguistic differences could be cited. A careful analysis of the contexts where Mary is talked about has made it possible to compile a list of more concrete features attributed to her by both authors. In Wujek’s sermons they form the following sequence: “boska” [of God], “święta” [holy], “pełna łaski” [full of grace]; “piękna” [beautiful], “czysta” [pure], “zacna” [noble], “niepokalana” [immaculate], “bez zaćmienia grzechowego” [without an eclipse of sin], “niewinna” [innocent], “posiadająca czystość panieńską” [having virginal chastity], “głęboko wierząca” [believing deeply], “mająca uprzejme posłuszeństwo, świętej chęci szerokość, pokorę” [equipped with kind obedience, a breadth of holy willingness, and humility], “niska służka” [a lowly maidservant], “niewolnica Pana” [the Lord’s slave], “pokorniuchna” [most meek], “cichuchna” [most silent], “rozważająca” [pondering], “wielbiąca” [admiring], “wysławiająca” [extolling], “chwaląca” Pana [praising the Lord], “piastunka” [carer], “matka” [mother], “matka miłosierdzia” [mother of mercy], “rodzicielka najwyższego kapłana” [mother of the highest priest], “obierająca żywot ubogi” [one who chose a life of poverty]; metaphoric appellations are not numerous: “statek żywota” [the vessel of life], “druga

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Ewa” [the second Eve]; “narzędzie Pana” [the Lord’s instrument], “ziemia błogosławiona” [the blessed earth], “ziemia kapłańska” [the priestly earth], “studnia łaski” [a well of grace], “pałac na górze” [a house on the mount], “zorza najpiękniejsza” [the morning star most fair], “zorza rozświecona przez Słońce (Chrystusa)” [the morning star illuminated by the sun (Christ)], “stolec Salomonowy (z kości słoniowej)” [the throne of Solomon (of ivory)]. In Szyrwid’s sermons Mary has the following descriptors: “według świata niewielka” [small in the eyes of the world], “uboga” [poor], “dziwująca się przy narodzeniu Syna” [wondering at the birth of her Son], “rozmyślająca” [contemplating], “mająca pożytek z rozmyślania” [having benefit from contemplating], “stworzona i wybrana” [created and chosen], “panna nienaruszona” [virgin inviolate], “krwi bardzo czystej” [of very pure blood], “bez grzechu pierworodnego i wszystkich innych” [without original or any other sin], “niczym niezmazana” [by nothing defiled], “żądzami niewzbudzona” [unstirred by lustful desires], “mająca piękną duszę” [having a beautiful soul], “koronująca Chrystusa” [one who crowns Christ], “cierpiąca” [suffering], “matka płodna” [fertile mother], “rodząca dzieci wysokiego rodu” [giving birth to children of noble descent], “rodząca z radością” [giving birth with joy], “posiadająca wolną wolę” [having free will], “sama wybrała sobie syna” [she chose her own son], “jedyna posiadająca ten przywilej (wyboru)” [the only one to have this privilege (of choice)], “królowa” [queen], “sędzia” [judge]; metaphoric descriptors: “boleści mieczem przebita” [stabbed through with the sword of pain], “dom duszy Chrystusa” [the home of Christ’s soul], “światłość świata” [the light of the world], “matka ojca, córka syna” [mother of her father, daughter of her son]. From a comparison of these themes it follows that in both postils two basic profiles invariably predominate: d iv i ne mot he rho o d, and v i rg i na l pur it y combined with i mma c u l ate c onc e pt i on. The bodily form of Mary does not in fact exist in either postil; only her spi r itu a l qu a lit i e s are discussed. However, her detailed features extracted from both texts enable us to notice further differences in the way she was created, and they draw a more concrete image of the Mother and Virgin. In Wujek’s sermons, the main focus in Mary’s description is on such features as d e e p f ait h and ob e d i e nc e to G o d’s w i l l. What is especially highlighted in Szyrwid’s sermons is her f re e w i l l and abi l it y to c onte mpl ate and a d m i re t he m i r a cl e s t hat she e x p e r i e nc e s. Yet this free will thus declared should be understood in the context of the religious aspirations of the day. As Stępień (2009, 16) points out, “true freedom was perceived as the whole of man’s intellectual life, the full life of his intellect and will”28 , and 28 The author refers here to the reflections of Świeżawski, who claims that freedom in the Middle Ages “consists not in unconstrained acts of choice but in acquiring ever fuller possession of the truth (wisdom) and good (love) […] a really free man is one in whom full life, spiritual, natural and

93

94

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

it manifested itself in his relations with God and other people. In analyzing the ways freedom was understood in mediaeval literature, with which the sermons in question have a lot in common, Stępień (2009, 17–48) writes about some of its types: about freedom juxtaposed with love, freedom juxtaposed with grace, and freedom juxtaposed with martyrdom. As it transpires from Szyrwid’s text, Mary’s free will is combined with grace and obedience, but also with the ability to think, understand and admire her son’s actions. It is also justaposed with joy and suffering. Mary’s attitude towards God also reveals similar features in Wujek’s sermons, but here they are presented and named explicitely as obedience and service deriving from deep faith. In Szyrwid’s sermons the ability to contemplate is attributed not only to Mary but also to Joseph29 , who accompanies her in admiring the miracles connected with the birth of Christ and the signs of his divine origin. The emphasis on free will in Szyrwid’s sermons is also visible when he creates other biblical and non-biblical figures (Kuolys: 1986, 143)30 . An important position in the sermons is occupied by Mary’s beauty, which consists in her great spirituality31 . In place of the bodily image of Mary from the previous centuries, in religious literature, now we can encounter her image as a believing and contemplating Mother, d e voi d of pr i d e or d es i re to r is e ab ove ot he rs , one w ho c ons c i ously cho o s e s p ove r t y. These features are named by Szyrwid overtly, while Wujek resorts to a comparison with the Biblical Eve to show Mary’s superiority. In the mediaeval tradition, the descriptions of Mary showed the physical beauty of a woman, although even then it was combined with spiritual beauty (Ostaszewska: 2001, 39). On the decline are the features of a person acting independently who could “grant graces from the surplus of her riches” (Nieznanowski: 1989, 47), to be replaced by one chos e n , me ek , and a c t i ng i n t he sha d ow of C h r ist, and new themes are still in the process of being cristalised. Mary’s high spirituality, which develops and takes shape gradually, is transformed in the sermons into her ability to take care not only of Christ at his birth and in childhood but also of the whole of the redeemed people, even though here too she acts on Christ’s behalf. In both postils Mary is also an image of a ne w f ait h and supernatural, can develop without encountering any kind of resistance from our numerous flaws, and especially from sin.” (Świeżawski: 426–427; quoted after Stępień: 2009, 16). 29 The heyday of the veneration of St Joseph and the Holy Family revealed in prayers, hymns and offices took place in the seventeenth-eighteenth centuries, while the “belief that Mary, Joseph and Jesus together form the perfect personal unity of love […] revealed itself in the late Middle Ages.” (Mazurkiewicz: 2011, 82–83). 30 Darius Kuolys (1986, 143) presented the image created by Szyrwid of a free man capable of reasoning and fighting. Identifying him with the figure of David, the scholar noted that man as presented in Szyrwid’s sermons is a “created God”. 31 A similar conclusion is drawn by Migdał (2004, 401–408) in his article devoted to the description of Mary’s beauty in Wujek’s postil.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

chu rch. She is presented in Wujek’s sermons as c ar r y i ng a sp e c i a l l i g ht , holy and on ly, just and d e vote d. Szyrwid, on the other hand, equips her with t he abi lit y to re i g n and e xe rc is e just i c e, but she also becomes t he l i g ht of t he worl d, has the qualities of l ove, f id el it y and d e vot i on , and is t he on ly one of he r k i nd. It appears that Mary becomes not only the symbol of maternity and purity but also t he s y mb ol of a pu re f re e w i l l, obt ai ne d t h rou g h he r ow n choi c e. This adding of symbols, with their similar interpretations based on Biblical exegesis, has the effect of highlighting different features of Mary in different configurations, and of revealing the authors’ different descriptions and individual perceptions of her. The methods of creating the image of Mary used by each of the preachers, if listed separately, would most likely not help to identify her specific individual features, the sermons’ links with the Bible tradition still being very strong32 . The differences are barely discernible: they arise from a different distribution of accents, the vantage points adopted by the authors, and mainly consist in highlighting some of her features while quickly passing over the others. There is no doubt that these small departures from the recommended approach and from tradition are motivated by the desire to reach the faithful, and are connected with the sermons’ addressees33 . In the case of Wujek’s sermons, which continued to have new reprints, updating and adjusting the text with new addressees and events in mind was hardly possible34 . Szyrwid, on the other had, kept delivering his sermons in Vilnius35 , was a very popular speaker, and knew how to comfort and convert his listeners. This may well be the reason why he devoted so much attention to the human person of Mary. He set her as an example to follow, and called on his listeners to believe not only in God but also in man, in people’s ability to observe, think, and decide about

32 That is probably the reason why for a long time no attempts were made to describe those features (Mazurkiewicz: 2011, 5–6), there being doubts about the sermons’ literary value. This is why “a significant proportion of preachers’ works is not known to literary historians” (Pawlak: 2005, 317). 33 This is also highlighted by W. Pawlak: “The preachers, stirred by pastoral zeal and being men of their epoch, clothed the old ideas preserved at the Council of Trent in forms appropriate for the communities in which they were active” (Pawlak: 2005, 312). 34 The differences between Postylla Katolicka and Postylla Mniejsza have already been discussed in detail (see Cybulski: 2014). The first mentions of the differences between these works and their roles can be found in Estrejcher’s bibliographic descriptions (1939, 397), which say that Postylla Mniejsza was intended for everyman, written in a more accessible style, and contained fewer polemics “with the heresies”. 35 Szyrwid spent in total ten years (1610–1611; 1613–1623 except for 1617–1618) delivering his sermons in Lithuanian, and in the years 1617–1618 and 1623–1624 he preached in Polish at the St Casimir Church. He kept that post for longer than any of his contemporaries. Those were hard times for Vilnius, which had suffered great losses from a devastating fire, hence a preacher was needed who was able to give comfort as well as raise the spirits (Rutkovska: 2016, 13, 18).

95

96

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

their own fate, even if at the same time he strove to inculcate in them obedience and humility. The author also envisaged another type of addressee, namely other Lithuanian preachers, for whom his sermons, written in the form of arguments, could serve as patterns to write their own. He therefore assumed that his summary points could be developed and interpreted, and should lead to extended reflections and the use of their own arguments for validating the contents of the Bible. We can only guess what the actual sermons delivered by Szyrwid were like, and try to find in them the implementation of the views shared by a broader body of Jesuits, who devoted a lot of attention not just to the education but also to the welfare of the faithful by extending spiritual care over them and providing material support.

Final remarks The object of my analysis here has been two sets of sermons written at the turn of the seventeenth century, linked by religious tradition and separated by the personalities of their authors, two outstanding preachers of their time. Well-read in the Holy Scriptures, they followed them faithfully and, using the works of the Fathers of the Church, they preached the truths of the faith in accordance with the tenets of their order. They differ, however, somewhat in the ways they presented the contents of the Bible. By devoting considerable room to Mary, they contributed to the spread and development of the Marian veneration on the territory of the Great Duchy of Lithuania. They reached the faithful in two languages, Polish and Lithuanian, on the basis of the bilingual sermons of Szyrwid, and the well known Polish sermons of Wujek, in the original and in Lithuanian translation executed and supplemented in places by Dauksza. The features of Mary, isolated here, form a base anchored in fundamental dogmas and immersed in tradition, but also updated by the cultural context and the authors’ intentions. The task of completing that image and getting a better understanding of the means of creating Mary’s image in that epoch can be achieved by comparing it with the way the Mother of Christ was presented in sermons by authors belonging to other denominations who the two Catholic preachers were in polemics with, Jakub Wujek more so than Konstanty Szyrwid. It also served as material for such a comparison which would reveal the authors’ creativity in constructing the figure of Mary, and could serve the religious poetry of that time or literary works from a later period. It must be said that the titles of Mary taken from the Bible and playing a significant role in creating her image were already established in various texts, such as the Litany of Loreto or Pancarpium Marianum. Further studies would be desirable offering a more in-depth analysis of the sources used by both authors focusing on their citations, for example.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

The close links of the image of Mary with Christ suggest as it were another aspect of research on those sermons. In view of the fact that Christ is the central figure in the sermons, investigation of the means used to create this figure could broaden the range of our reflections on the ways of portraying biblical figures in written sermons, confirm some of the tentative theses presented here, reveal similar or different features of yet another figure, and lead to broader and better grounded conclusions. While Wujek’s sermons have been the focus of attention of many scholars, Konstanty Szyrwid remains a largely unexplored author, or at least not studied to the degree he deserves. His relevance for Lithuanian culture is exceptional: he was the first in the Great Duchy of Lithuania to write in Lithuanian. The aim of this article therefore is to inspire more analytical research on his sermons. Among the figures that deserve further study is not only the figure of Christ but also the figure of ordinary man, to whom the Lithuanian preacher devoted considerable attention. Translated by Stefan Sikora

Bibliography Primary Sources BT – Pismo Święte Starego i Nowego Testamentu w przekł. z jęz. oryg., Augustyn Jankowski et al. (ed.), Władysław Borowski et al. (trans.), 3rd edition reissued with corrections, Poznań: Pallotinum, 1997. BWF – Biblia w przekładzie ks. Jakuba Wujka z 1599 i transkrypcji typu “B” ks. Janusza Frankowskiego, Warszawa: Oficyna wydawnicza “Vocatio”, 2013. DP – Poſtilla CATHOLICKA. Tai eſt: Iǯguldimas Ewangeliu kiekwienos Nedelos ir ßwętes per wiſſus metus. Per Kunigą MIKALOIV DAVKSZA Kanoniką Mednikų / i łukißko pergeldita. Su wale ir dałaidimu wireuſiuiu. W Wilniui / Drukarnioi Akademios SOCIETATIS IESV, A. D. 1599; http://seniejirastai.lki.lt/db.php?source=2. KMS – Skarga Piotr, Na dzień Wniebowzięcia Przeczystej Matki Bożej, in: Kazania Maryjne, Roman Mazurkiewicz/Kazimierz Panuś (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM, 2014, 125–140. KMW – Wujek Jakub, Na tenże dzień Narodzenia Panny Maryjej kazanie wtóre, in: Kazania Maryjne, Roman Mazurkiewicz/Kazimierz Panuś (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM, 2014, 105–124. Kudz I – Indeks – słownik do “Daukšos Postilė” I (A–N), Czesław Kudzinowski (ed.), Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UAM, 1977. Kudz II – Indeks – słownik do “Daukšos Postilė” II (O–Ž), Czesław Kudzinowski (ed.), Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UAM, 1977.

97

98

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

PK I, PS I – Vasiliauskienė, Virginija/Rutkovska, Kristina (ed.) (2015a), Konstantinas Sirvydas. Punktai sakymų nuo advento iki Gavėnios. – Konstanty Szyrwid. Punkty kazań od Adwentu do Postu. Kritinis leidimas, Vilnius: LKI. PK II, PS II – Vasiliauskienė, Virginija/Rutkovska, Kristina (ed.) (2015b), Konstantinas Sirvydas. Punktai sakymų Gavėniai. – Konstanty Szyrwid. Punkty kazań na Wielki Post. Kritinis leidimas, Vilnius: LKI. PMn – Postilla Catholiczna Mnieysza To jest Krotkie Kazánia, ábo Wykłády świętych Ewángeliy […] Ná dwie Częśći rozdźieloná […] Przez O. Jákubá Wuyká […] W POznániu, Roku Páńskiego. MDLXXXII. Tomasz z Akwinu św. (1962–1986) Suma teologiczna, vol. I–III, Stanisław Bełch et al. (transl.), I–XXXIV, Londyn: Wydawnictwo Veritas.

Secondary Sources Baronas, Darius (2018), Švč. Mergelė Marija – Konstantinopolio ir Lietuvos globėja, Acta Academiae Artium Vilnensis 90, 15–47. Bednarz, Mieczysław (1964), Jezuici a religijność polska (1564–1964), Nasza Przeszłość 20, 149–224. Bieńkowska, Danuta (2000), Językowy wizerunek Matki Boskiej w pieśniach maryjnych, in: Ewa Woźniak (ed.), Inspiracje chrześcijańskie w kulturze Europy. Materiały z konferencji, 11–14 maja 1999 r., part I, Łódź: Archidiecezjalne Wydawnictwo Łódzkie, 307–316. Budzik, Stanisław (1997), Maryja w tajemnicy Chrystusa i Kościoła, Tarnów. Cybulski, Łukasz (2014), Kilka uwag o technice tworzenia kazań na marginesie postylli Jakuba Wujka, in: Krzysztof Koehler/Łukasz Cybulski (ed.), Retoryka Towarzystwa Jezusowego i jej konteksty, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Kardynała Stefana Wyszyńskiego. — (2019), Interpretation in the 16th century Polish Bible Exegesis, in: Joanna PietrzakThébault (ed.), Word of God, words of men. Translations, inspirations, transmissions of the Bible in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the Renaissance, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage. Dybek, Dariusz (2019), Jak “opowiedzieć” Matkę Bożą? Postać Maryi w kazaniu Samuela Brzeżewskiego, Acta Universitatis Lodziensis. Folia Litteraria Polonica 2(53), 243–262. Daukšienė, Ona (2014), “Biblinių šaltinių transformacijos Sarbievijaus religinėje poezijoje”, in: Senoji Lietuvos literatūra, vol. 30, Vilnius: Lietuvių literatūros ir tautosakos institutas, 95–134. — (2004), M.K. Sarbievijaus odės švč. Mergelei Marijai: krikščioniškosios poezijos raidos atspindžiai (Stella Maris), in: Senoji Lietuvos literatūra, vol. 18, Vilnius: Lietuvių literatūros ir tautosakos institutas, 169–186. Estreicher, Karol (1939), Bibliografia Polska XXII, ogólnego zbioru XXXIII, Kraków: Drukarnia Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Gelumbeckaitė, Jolanta (2009), Wolfenbüttelio postilė (1573) kaip seniausia lietuviška antikos, viduramžių ir renesanso autorių antologija, Literatūra 51(3), 66–80. Górski, Konrad (1980), Studia i materiały z dziejów duchowości, Warszawa. Grzebień, Ludwik (1996), Encyklopedia wiedzy o jezuitach na ziemiach Polski i Litwy 1564–1995, Kraków: Wydawnictwo WAM, www.jezuici.krakow.pl/cgi-in/ rjbo?b=enc&n=5558&q=0 (articles: Religijność, Duchowość). Hanusiewicz, Mirosława (2001), Święte i zmysłowe w poezji religijnej polskiego baroku, Lublin: Wydawnictwo KUL. Ivinskis, Zenonas (1987), Marijos garbinimas Lietuvoje, in: Zenonas Ivinskis, Rinktiniai raštai, t. 4: Krikščionybė Lietuvoje, Roma: Lietuvių katalikų mokslo akademija, 579–601. Kucała, Marian (1988), Od Bogurodzicy do Madonny. Nazywanie Matki Boskiej w historii języka polskiego, in: Maria Karpluk/Jadwiga Sambor (ed.), O języku religijnym. Zagadnienia wybrane, Lublin: KUL, 133–144. Kuolys, Darius (1987), “Dvi tikrybi turi tiesa…” J. Bretkūnas ir K. Sirvydas kultūros stilių kaitoje, Pergalė 6, 138–148. Laurentin, Rene (1989), Matka Pana. Traktat mariologiczny, Róża Siemieńska (transl.), Częstochowa: Częstochowskie Wydawnictwo Archidiecezjalne Regina Poloniae. Lebedys, Jurgis (1963), Mikalojus Daukša, Vilnius: Valstybinė grožinės literatūros leidykla. Łukarska, Beata (2012), Tytuły maryjne w wybranych utworach literatury religijnej polskiego baroku, Studia Gdańskie XXXI, 389–399. Mazurkiewicz, Roman (2002), Polskie średniowieczne pieśni maryjne. Studia filologiczne, Kraków. — (2000), Matka Boga i człowieka. Macierzyństwo Maryi w polskim piśmiennictwie średniowiecznym (przegląd ważniejszych motywów), Salvatoris Mater 2, 157–179. — (2011), Z dawnej literatury maryjnej. Zarysy i zbliżenia, Kraków: Wydawnictwo Naukowe UP. Mazurkiewicz, Roman/Panuś, Kazimierz (ed.) (2014), Kazania w kulturze polskiej. Edycje kolekcji tematycznych, vol. 1. Kazania Maryjne, Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Migdał, Jolanta (2004), “Wszystka święta, wszystka piękna, wszystka niepokalana” – o pięknie Najświętszej Maryi Panny w “Postylli mniejszej” Jakuba Wujka, in: Anna TomeckaMirek (ed.), Piękno materialne. Piękno duchowe. Materiały z konferencji, 19–21 maja 2003, Łódź: Archidiecezjalne Wydawnictwo Łódzkie, 401–408. Napiórkowski, Andrzej A. (2016), Maryja jest piękna. Zarys mariologii i maryjności, Kraków: Uniwersytet Papieski Jana Pawła II. Nieznanowski, Stefan (1989), Studia i wizerunki. O poezji staropolskiej i jej badaczach, Warszawa: Instytut Wydawniczy Pax. Ostaszewska, Danuta (2001), Postać w literaturze. Wizerunek staropolski, obrazy – konwencje – stereotypy, Katowice: Gnome. Panuś, Kazimierz (2001), Zarys historii kaznodziejstwa w kościele katolickim, cz. II. Kaznodziejstwo w Polsce. Od średniowiecza do baroku, Kraków: Wydawnictwo “M”.

99

100

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Pawlak, Wiesław (2012), “De eruditione comparanda in humanioribus”. Studia z dziejów erudycji humanistycznej w XVII wieku, Lublin: Wydawnictwo KUL. — (2005), Koncept w polskich kazaniach barokowych, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL. Račiūnaitė, Tojana (2014), Atvaizdo gyvastis: Švč. Mergelės Marijos stebuklingųjų atvaizdų patirtis Lietuvos Didžiojoje Kunigaikštystėje XVII–XVIII a., Vilnius: Vilniaus dailės akademijos leidykla. Rutkovska, Kristina (2016), Konstantino Sirvydo “Punktai sakymų” – XVII amžiaus pirmosios pusės lietuvių ir lenkų kultūros paminklas = “Punkty kazań” Konstantego Szyrwida – zabytek piśmiennictwa litewskiego i polskiego z pierwszej połowy XVII wieku, Vilnius: LKI. — (2020), Švč. Mergelės Marijos kulto atspindžiai Konstantino Sirvydo “Punktuose sakymų”, in: Senoji Lietuvos literatūra 49, Vilnius: LLTI, 15–45. Rutkowska, Joanna (2014), Językowy obraz Bożej Matki w XIX- i XX-wiecznych czytankach i kazaniach majowych, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Państwowej Wyższej Szkoły Zawodowej im. Jakuba z Paradyża. Siudy, Teofil (2014), Recepcja myśli soborowej w kulcie maryjnym w Polsce, Salvatoris Mater 16, 171–187. Stępień, Paweł (2009), O wolności w średniowiecznej literaturze religijnej w Polsce, in: Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (ed.), Humanitas i christianitas w kulturze polskiej, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Neriton, 15–52. Surdokaitė, Gabija (ed.) (2011), Virgo Venerabilis: Marijos paveikslas Lietuvos kultūroje. Religinės kultūros paveldo studijos, vol. 3, Vilnius: Lietuvos kultūros tyrimų institutas. Swieżawski, Stefan (1998), Wstęp do Kwestii 83, in: Św. Tomasz z Akwinu, Traktat o człowieku. Summa teologii 1, 75–89, Stefan Swieżawski (ed., transl.), Kęty: Wydawnictwo Marek Derewiecki. Szymański, Bogdan (1995), Wizerunek Matki Boskiej w poezji polskiej wczesnego baroku, in: Czesław Hernas/Mirosława Hanusiewicz (ed.), Religijność literatury polskiego baroku, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 27–72. Umińska-Tytoń, Elżbieta (2000), Uroczyste i potoczne nazwy Matki Bożej czczonej w cudownych wizerunkach, in: Ewa Woźniak (ed.), Inspiracje chrześcijańskie w kulturze Europy. Materiały z konferencji, 11–14 maja 1999, part I, Łódź: Archidiecezjalne Wydawnictwo Łódzkie, 295–306. Vaišnora, Juozas (1958), Marijos garbinimas Lietuvoje, Roma: Lietuvių katalikų mokslo akademija. Vaitkevičiūtė, Viktorija (2009), Tridento visuotinio Bažnyčios susirinkimo nutarimai ir Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės katalikiškas baroko pamokslas, in: Tridento visuotinio Bažnyčios susirinkimo (1545–1563) įtaka Lietuvos kultūrai, Vilnius: Kultūros, filosofijos ir meno institutas. Vasiliauskienė, Virginija/Rutkovska, Kristina (2016), Konstantino Sirvydo “Punktai sakymų”. Rengimo principai. Rodyklės. Šaltiniai, Vilnius: LKI.

On Creating the Images of Biblical Characters in Sermons from the Turn of the 17th Century

Wojtkowski, Julian (1955), Najświętsza Maryja Panna w Kazaniach gnieźnieńskich, Roczniki Teologiczno-Kanoniczne 1, 103–112. — (1963), Macierzyństwo duchowe Najświętszej Maryi Panny w piśmiennictwie polskim do roku 1500, Roczniki Teologiczno-Kanoniczne 10. — (1964), Początki kultu Matki Boskiej w Polsce w świetle najstarszych rękopisów, Studia Warmińskie 1, 215–257. — (1965), Przedmiot liturgicznego kultu Matki Boskiej w Polsce XIII wieku, Studia Warmińskie 2, 205– 259. — (1966), Kult Matki Boskiej w polskim piśmiennictwie do końca XV wieku, Studia Warmińskie 3, 221–299. — (1968), Matka Boża w maryjnych lekturach monastycznych Polski XIII wieku, Studia Warmińskie 5, 277–323.

101

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

Among the most important creative undertakings of Wacław Potocki, a convert from Arianism and perhaps the most expressive Polish baroque writer, was to provide a poetic paraphrase of sacred history as known from the Scriptures. Alas, most of those works, among them Pieluszki Chrystusowe [Christ’s Nappies], Wieniec Najświętszej Panny [The Wreath of the Blessed Virgin], Prześladowanie Kościoła Bożego [The Persecution of the Holy Church] and Arfa Starego Testamentu z Nowym [The Harp of the Old Testament and the New] (cf. Kukulski: 1962, 124–125) have been lost. Despite this, numerous other works still testify to the importance of the Biblical content in the poet’s preserved artistic output. The surviving works include a diptych entitled Tydzień stworzenia świata [The Week of the Creation of the World] created during Potocki’s Arian period, and Pan Bóg dobry, człowiek zły we wszystkich drogach swoich [A Good God but Bad Humans in All Their Ways] (c. 1648–1652), which is a synthesis of universal history, from the Genesis to the apocalyptic triumph of the City of God, presented from the salvific perspective. Potocki’s ‘Biblical series’ also includes Judyta [Judith] (c. 1652), which qualifies as a romance and is a short but complex narrative in octave stanzas about a brave Israeli widow and her victory, inscribed in the current concerns over the civil war that was destroying Poland in 1648. Potocki’s literary undertaking, diversified in terms of literary genres, includes Pieśni nabożne z różnych miejsc Ewangelijej świętych […] złożone [Pious Songs Created from Various Fragments of the Gospels] (c. 1677), the theatrical Dyjalog o Zmartwychwstaniu Pańskim [Dialogue on the Lord’s Resurrection] (c. 1673–1676) and Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą triumfującego Jezusa [New Recruitment under the Old Banner of Triumphant Jesus] published by the Piarists in Warsaw in 1698, two years after the author’s death – Potocki’s most important poetic adaptation of great Biblical themes. Religious themes thus occupy a prominent place among the works of the author of Nowy zaciąg, who was not only a distinct poet, but also one of the most prolific Polish writers of the seventeenth century. The importance of religious themes in Potocki’s work is also revealed in the ‘secular’ part of his literary output: in the epic Wojna chocimska [The War of Chocim] (1670); in the heraldic Poczet herbów szlachty Korony Polskiej i Wielkiego Księstwa Litewskiego [The Coats of Arms of the Nobility of the Polish Crown and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania] (published in 1696); in the funereal cycles Periody [Periods] (1674), Smutne zabawy [Sad En-

104

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

tertainments] (c. 1677) and Abrys ostatniego żalu [An Image of the Last Regret] (c. 1691); and in two extensive cycles of epigrams and moral parables – Ogród nieplewiony [Unweeded Garden] (c. 1688) and Moralia (1696). The frequency with which pious poems appear in Poczet herbów – a work inspired by the heraldic emblems of Polish noble families and thus seemingly thematically unrelated to the theological discourse and the issues of faith – testifies to the fact that the author of Wojna chocimska took a liking to the type of poetic genre called theologicum. The collection consists of poems praising the virtues of the old Sarmatians, panegyrics praising the ancient origin of the noble houses, coat-of-arms moralia, political warnings, satires, jokes (iocosa), concepts, epithalamia and epitaphs, and – as announced in the elaborate title of the work – “theological teachings”1 . Latin labels like theologicum, mysticum (or mystice), figuratum or – in the Polish version – dyskurs teologiczny [theological discourse] do not appear often in the titles of individual texts; in the entire vast collection of over two thousand poems, they appear only twenty times. This number, however, does not reflect the true amount of explicitly religious content in Poczet herbów or the actual proportions of theologica to other moral or historical stemmata contained in the collection. It can be observed that these proportions are more or less one to one. As a result, the work originally intended as heraldic in fact begins to approach, in its form, a collection of miniature thematic sermons with a conceptualistic touch. Even the author himself senses this peculiar excess of religious instruction in a composition addressed to noblemen who are not eager to read spiritual meditations. At the end of the poem Pokora kluczem [Humility is the Key], which is part of the series of poetic reflections on the Pokora Coat of Arms as an emblem of humility, he reins in his own preaching instincts, expressing the supposition that readers who reach for this versed armorial will expect to read about the bravery of Sarmatian families rather than find a lecture on sacred history and admonitions concerning the path to salvation: “Trzymam pióro, bo rzeką ludzie, że się mylę, / że piszę miasto herbów szlacheckich – postyllę” [I pause my pen, or else people will say I get carried away, / and instead of a noble armorial I write a postil] (p. 582). The most important feature that characterizes poetic reflection in the vast majority of these elaborate sermons, lyrical meditations on the cardinal truths of faith or repentant prayers with which Potocki generously filled the pages of his manuscripts, is his symbolic perception of reality as a Book of the World. Nature, its elements and phenomena, crafts, art, inventions, cultural myths, heraldic emblems and customs – in brief, everything that was chosen as the starting point (or a crucial node)

1 Quotes from Poczet herbów [The Coats of Arms] are taken from Potocki (1696). Location of the quotes is provided in the main text. If not stated otherwise all translations are by the Author of this article.

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

in the poet’s monologue turns out to be not so much a real phenomenon as a figure, i.e. a sign which points to the truths behind worldly things and pursuits and gives them the right sense. For Potocki, the book that offers the ‘right’ (i.e. prophetic) interpretation of the visible reality is the Bible, which has unquestionable power over his creative imagination2 . From the biblical images, the poet weaves the living fabric of his own metaphors, analogies, comparisons, concepts and allegories, through which the world and human matters reveal themselves as messages confirming the importance of the mysteries of faith as well as their permanent relevance. In such an organized process of poetic hermeneutics, episodes from the sacred history turn out to be fully compatible with any chosen contemporary times, and the moral teaching present – or sometimes hidden – in them, harmoniously matches the poet’s chosen theme of reflection. Potocki was a reliable expert on ancient history, both sacred and classical, but in his writing he tackled each kind differently, and each affected different areas of his poetics with varying intensity. Pagan antiquity is the subject area for Potocki the satirist and the moralist. As far as the ‘secular’ aspect of his didactics is concerned, the poet willingly and frequently uses moral examples provided by pagan antiquity, even though his epigrams and moralia are also abundantly illustrated with biblical exempla. The religious aspect of his writing – regardless of whether the element of preachy rhetoric or prayerful lyricism prevails in a particular poem – shows that the Bible infiltrates and stimulates those areas of Potocki’s poetic ingenuity that remain insensitive even to the beauty of the moral parables of classical antiquity. The Bible, or more precisely the Church tradition of allegorical and figurative interpretation of the Bible, activates Potocki’s “metaphorical disposition” and stimulates his analogic thinking. The work in which his susceptibility to scriptural inspiration is revealed in a wide range of effects is the Passion poem Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą triumfującego Jezusa. This piece has an elaborate title page composed of two – somewhat alternative – titles, the second of which also consists of two parts. It must be noted, however, that neither of the titles reveals either the artistic form or specific inventiveness of the text3 . The first title – Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą triumfującego Jezusa, Syna Bożego, nad światem, czartem, śmiercią i piekłem, gdzie traktamentem doczesne błogosławieństwo, żołdem wesołe sumnienie, wysługą korona królewska, która już niezliczonemu tego towarzystwu znaku na wieki wieczne kwitnącym okryła laurem skronie [New Recruitment under the Old Banner of Triumphant Jesus, the Son of God, Victorious over the World, Devil, Death and Hell, in which Earthly Blessing is the Reward, A Clear Conscience is the Soldier’s Pay, and the Royal

2 For more information on Potocki’s Bblical imagination, see Hanusiewicz: 2001, 33–48. 3 On that aspect, see Czechowicz: 2019, 269–285.

105

106

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Crown – One that Eternally Laurels the Temples of the Members of a Countless Military Company Gathered under this Banner – is the Deserved Prize] – points to the inspiration coming from the Sarmatian military discipline, in particular from the conceptual “pious travesty” of the contents of royal letters calling regiments to arms (litterae inscriptionis stipendii) (cf. Łopatecki: 2012, 75–79), and suggests a work whose rhetorical purpose might be close to conceptual sermons. The second title – Krzyż albo żałosna historyja krwawej męki i niewinnej śmierci Chrystusa Pana, Zbawiciela świata z pism świętych [The Cross or The Sorrowful Story of the Bloody Passion and Innocent Death of Christ the Lord, the Saviour of the World from the Holy Scriptures] – does not preclude preaching inspirations and announces a story whose structure will be determined by the subsequent stages of the Passion, and its dynamics by the rising intensity of pious compassion. However, even when considered together, the two complementary variants of the title do not inform the readers that they are about to read a recapitulative work, i.e. an extensive synthesis of the Old and New Covenants, that could give them some idea of the way the sacred history may have been presented in the lost work Arfa Starego Testamentu z Nowym. We know almost nothing about this work. It is mentioned by Potocki in two other texts from a diverse collection of epigrams, Ogród nieplewiony (cf. Potocki: 1907, vol. 2, 72, 75). The title of the lost work implies that it might have been written as an attempt to adapt the tools of typological Biblical hermeneutics to the needs of poetic catechesis4 . In Nowy zaciąg, the station sequences form a meditative account of the Passion and the events immediately preceding it. This sequential method of developing the story of the redeeming sacrifice, reminiscent of the recalling of subsequent Passion stations during the “way of the Cross” processions along routes marked out in the landscape with numerous shrines and chapels at various Polish sanctuaries, is clearly embedded in the booming practice of seventeenth-century Passion devotions5 . From the first lines of the poem it is evident, however, that the poet’s guide in telling the sacred story are the Gospels rather than folk piety. Thus we have here a story pattern that begins with the betrayal of Judas which precedes the Last Supper and then develops with the scenes from the Upper Room along with the agony in Gethsemane followed by Jesus’ capture and his subsequent interrogations into the Way of the Cross, death on the cross and burial. In this linear pattern determined by the subsequent events of the Passion there is, however, no stopping point, because the flowing chronology is only the canvas on which the entire discursive and persuasive structure of Nowy zaciąg is set. The structure of the poem 4 Czesław Hernas (2002, 462) perceived the lost Arfa [The Harp] as a lecture on the relationship between the two Testaments. 5 For more information on this topic, see Kopeć: 1974; Stręciwilk: 1981; Pawlak: 2008, 21–24; NowickaJeżowa: 2009–2011, 174–175.

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

is composed of small units which can serve as an example of a poetic adaptation of preaching principles. They are regularly recurring micro-structures built from fixed elements which, often recognizably if not precisely, reveal similarity to the pattern of a thematic sermon (often with clear references to the sexpartite division into exordium, narratio, propositio, confirmatio, peroratio, and epilogus) and – more broadly – to well-developed meditation on the Bible6 . The units consist of four constituent parts. The first part is a Passion scene from the Gospels serving as the starting point of the narrative. The next part puts that scene in the context of Old Testament themes and images (sometimes by analogy and sometimes by opposition; sometimes the contextualisation takes the form of an extensive prayer). The third part is a narrative which could be described as satirical (in a “pure-genre” meditative text it would be some peculiarity, but the context of Church rhetoric opens a wide range of possibilities for moral discourse, also in its satirical variety). Potocki creates these parts of the text by referring the spiritual pattern discovered in the Passion scene (or some other Biblical image) to the Christian life in general (sometimes also to contemporary religious indifference, or to theological and social issues; bitter analyses of Jewish apostasy ever since the Covenant also regularly appear in this part). Finally, the fourth part takes the form of the narrator’s fervent prayer of repentance, followed by the acknowledgment of his own guilt for Christ’s death and an appeal to the Saviour to have mercy. The poetic scheme outlined above is sometimes broken. The most characteristic example thereof is the description of spring, which opens the part of the poem entitled Czas śmierci Pańskiej – wiosna [The Time of the Lord’s Death – Spring] (pp. 156–161), and although this digression seems to follow the convention of epic poetry, its roots can in fact be found in the Patristic tradition of the allegorical interpretation of the earth’s renewal after winter stagnation7 . Potocki’s Nowy zaciąg is not simply an account in verse of the events from the Gospels or a repetition of Passion scenes enriched with poetic evocation. The artistic cooperation between the poet and the revealed Word goes far beyond repetition of the content, even if the latter is deeply permeated with lyrical emotions, and the story of the crucifixion developed in the poem is more complex than most of the seventeenth-century poetic calls for righteous repentance, piety and co-suffering with the martyred Christ. The inventiveness of Nowy zaciąg can be summarized with Augustine’s famous statement concerning the mutual illumination of the Old and the New Testament: “in Vetere Novum lateat, et in Novo Vetus pateat” (Augustinus: 1845a, 623 [2,73]). In Potocki’s work, the effect of harmoniously aligning the contents of different books of the Bible was magnified in a manner

6 For the composition of thematic sermons, see Pawlak: 2005, 229–247; Brzozowski: 1975, 363–428. 7 For that aspect, see Buszewicz: 2010.

107

108

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

specific to poetry, thanks to evocative metaphors and ideas perfectly imitating the mechanisms of allegorical explication of the Scriptures’ deep meanings. This adaptation is intense and creative, which can also be seen in the rhetorical aspect of the work, i.e. in the structure of the arguments forming the persuasive layer of meditations between the Passion scenes. Potocki shows the Passion as the fulfilment of the Old-Testament figures and prophetic statements. He presents in a similar way not only the Passion but also the whole life of Jesus – the long-awaited Messiah: O Baranku, którego wszyscy nam prorocy obiecowali, wszystkie którego figury znaczyły od stworzenia tego świata […] (p. 10)8 [Oh Lamb, whom all the prophets promised us, whom all figures have represented since the creation of this world (…)]

In each Passion sequence of the poem – from the Betrayal to the Burial – the Saviour is depicted in a recapitulative way which synthesises his entire messianic mission and individual deeds that he performed for the Chosen People, revealing the true meaning of the images and episodes from the Old Testament. “Ustępują figury rzeczom, cienie – ciału” [The figures give way to things, the shadows to the body] (p. 12), repeats the narrator in the spirit of the homily Peri Pascha by Melito of Sardis, thus commenting on the rites of the Last Supper. Potocki could not have known the work of the Bishop of Sardis, but he was very well acquainted, as Monika Kowalczyk has recently demonstrated (Kowalczyk: 2017), with the work Iustus Ioseph by Stanisław Sokołowski, from which he took the typological parallel between Joseph, son of Jacob and Rachel, and Jesus Christ which opens the poem. What is more, Sokołowski’s polemical anti-Arian meditations provide a summary of the complementarity of the books of the Old and the New Covenant, embedded in the Patristic tradition: Clavem universae scripturae ac prophetarum Christum esse verum Messiam non nostri tantum, sed Hebraeorum etiam doctores tradiderunt (Sokołowski: 1586, 5)9 . 8 Quotes from Nowy zaciąg are taken from Potocki: 1698. Location of the quotes is provided in the main text. 9 In the Polish translation by Jan Bogusławski (Sokołowski: 1596, 5–6), the fragment reads: “Klucz wszystkiego Pisma świętego i proroków jest Krystus Pan, Mesyjasz prawdziwy – to nie tylko naszy, ale też i hebrajscy doktorowie podali” [The key to all the Scriptures and prophets is Christ the Lord, the true Messiah – as stated not only by ours, but also by Hebrew doctors].

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

Potocki was familiar with the tradition of typological biblical exegesis, which in the seventeenth century was already part of the standard erudition of religious poets and was the shared asset of in-depth Catholic piety10 . Not only erudite meditations similar to Sokołowski’s work, but, perhaps even more so, the widely read prayer books, testify to the spread of this tradition. In the fifth chapter of Harfa duchowna [Spiritual Harp] by the Jesuit writer Marcin Laterna, an extremely popular prayer book in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries first published in 1585 and then reissued many times till the end of the nineteenth century, the following fragment can be found among the benefits that a pious soul can enjoy by meditating on the Lord’s Passion: Ukochasz się, kiedyć mile Męka Pańska wznowi Abla niewinnie zabitego, Noego sromotnie obnażonego, Izaaka pokornie drwa niosącego, Józefa zdradliwie zaprzedanego, Joba wrzodem szkaradym srodze oszpeconego, Samsona okrutnie związanego, Dawida z gardłem uciekającego, Micheasza jawnie policzkowanego, Elizeusza natrząsaniem chłopięcym wielce zelżonego, Daniela do jamy lwiej popędliwie wrzuconego, Jonasza w głębokość morską żałośnie pogrążonego, węża na koniec od Mojżesza nie bez cudownych spraw i tajemnic zawieszonego. Bo naprzedniejsze figury w Męce Pańskiej skutek i koniec swój wzięły (Laterna: 1612, 320). You will be delighted when the Passion renews your memory of Abel innocently killed, Noah miserably stripped, Isaac humbly carrying wood, Joseph treacherously sold, Job scarred with ulcer and ferociously disfigured, Samson cruelly bound, David running for his life, Micah publicly slapped, Elisha insulted by a boyish bully, Daniel thrown violently into the lion’s den, Jonah miserably sinking into the sea, and, finally, a serpent put upon a pole by Moses not without miracles and secrets. For in the Passion the foremost figures have reached their fulfilment and crown.

Potocki inherited the tradition of Patristic exegesis in a synthetic way and creatively assimilated its mechanisms, using them to build analogical poetic images. The poet uses the Christological key to interpret individual Old Testament episodes, i.e. the events from the lives of the distinguished members of the chosen people, as well as their relationships with family members, friends, opponents or persecutors. It can be observed that his reflection follows, admittedly quite freely, the paths marked by the exegetical quadripartite division of meanings, meandering between historical, moral, allegorical and anagogical senses of the Bible. The interpretation developed by the poet seamlessly connects with the poetics of paradoxes, apparent analogies and free associations that transform the theological lesson into a metaphor. The

10 See, for example Twardowski: 2012; Rożniatowski: 2003; Miaskowski: 1995; Bolesławiusz: 1681.

109

110

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

constant movement of the metaphorical exegesis of poetic imagination revives Biblical images, fills them with contemporary reality as well as with the apologetic, polemical and didactic commitment of the author. The method used by Potocki in his reflections sometimes resembles the so-called synoptic method of the Fathers, which consisted in finding verses or single words in the Bible that were similar to one another in their external form, and then determining their common denominator. For the author of Nowy zaciąg – like for the Fathers of the Church – the Bible contains inexhaustible resources of supernatural wisdom which reveals itself to those who seek it (see Gliściński: 1994, 21)11 . The Bible is represented on the margins of Nowy zaciąg by more than half of its books in 332 notes on 208 pages of the poem’s first printing, of which 143 locations refer to the Old Testament and 189 to the New (in the manuscripts, the numbers vary). Among the books of the Old Testament, Potocki most often chooses from Genesis (38 references), Exodus (27), Kings (19), Judges (12), Psalms (11) and Isaiah (9). He also refers to the Book of Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Chronicles, Judith, Job, Proverbs, Ezekiel, Daniel and Zachariah. The New Testament is most frequently represented in Nowy zaciąg by the Gospels, of which the two most often cited are the Gospel of John (56) in the first part of the poem and the Gospel of Matthew with a similar number of references (51) in the second part. The references to the remaining Gospels do not even reach half of the above-mentioned New Testament references: Luke – 23 and Mark – 18. Potocki also refers to the Acts, Letters to the Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Hebrews, Letters of James and Peter as well as the Apocalypse. It is worth emphasizing, however, that many references to specific Biblical passages have not been marked with a note. The narrator of Nowy zaciąg engages in a dialogue with characters from both Testaments, although the meditative core of the poem is obviously the message from the Gospels presenting, in chronological order, the individual stations of the Way of the Cross. He figuratively presents the prophetic nature of the events from the lives of patriarchs and prophets, and interprets Biblical history as a universal paradigm of experiencing faith and – in a manner of preachy moralisatio – as a mirror capable of judging the conscience and heart of a contemporary person12 . The creative hub of biblical images in Nowy zaciąg draws on the principle of recognition, the basis of figurality and allegory. The poem about the salvific sacrifice of Christ opens with “A Portrait of Him in Joseph” – son of Jacob and “father’s pet” (as described by Potocki) – who is sold by his brothers only to save them later from

11 For more information on Patristic exegesis, see Simonetti: 2000. 12 On the dominance of meditatio and moralisatio in the narration of Nowy zaciąg see Teusz: 2002, 201–205.

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

death in Egypt. According to the traditional interpretation, Potocki reads the story of Joseph as a foreshadowing of Christ’s salvific mission. The meditation on Christ’s mission through the episodes from Joseph’s life begins with a synthetic recollection of the latter as described in the Book of Genesis. Using the method of conceptismo, the poet first identifies Jesus with Joseph, emphasizing all the similarities, and then tears the paralogical bonds of this identity apart and shows, argument after argument, the infinite superiority of Christ’s sacrifice. Potocki makes use of the historical, allegorical, but also moral (contemporaneous “merchants” who disobey Jesus’ word and sell him again to the world) and the anagogical meaning of Joseph’s life (as Joseph brought his brothers from famine to prosperous Egypt, so will Christ, when the time comes, lead the faithful “z tej obłudnego świata poniewierki […] do nieba” [“out of this hypocritical world of misery (…) to heaven”] (p. 4). Details from the history of Jacob’s son return regularly on the pages of Nowy zaciąg until the funeral scene, in which the narrator describes the Saviour presenting his father with a ragged and bloodied “gown of his mortality,” just like Joseph’s brothers showed their father the bloody robe of their younger brother as a proof of his death. The narrative of Nowy zaciąg uses apt metaphors typical of Potocki’s style. Open to the influence of the Bible’s language, the poet’s imagination becomes particularly active, as manifested in the vividness of his comparisons and the dynamics of metaphors whose roots go back to the Patristic interpretation of the Divine Word. The metaphors in Potocki’s writing reveal the poet’s familiarity with tradition, the source of his inspiration. It is also a reliable test for the dynamics of such creative interaction, a process in which poetic thought blends with discursive content resulting in sensual visuality filled with self-knowledge, while the individual threads and layers of the already gleaned images create a language that reflects the verity of intellectual experience. The logic of the metaphors in Potocki’s work focuses on redemption and eschatology. The Bible is present in Nowy zaciąg in two ways, for its role as a source of invention is twofold: it is the centre of the world presented in the poem, but, at the same time, it constitutes a space for the poem’s digressive references. The Bible therefore features here on two levels: on ‘story-telling’ and on the discursive. As a consequence, one can notice three spheres in Potocki’s reflection on the Passion, harmoniously co-existing and overlapping, which focus the reader’s attention and ensure completeness of the poem’s reflections. The first determines the sequence of events of the Passion told in the order in which they are presented in the Gospels13 . The second is reflection on the efficacy of the sacred story, as far as it is revealed in the pattern: figure – fulfilment, announcement in the Old Testament – fulfilment

13 Contrary to established opinions, the sources for the description of the Passion in Nowy zaciąg were not limited to the Gospels only, as noted by Monika Kowalczyk (2017).

111

112

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

in the New. The third sphere of the poem is its poetic didactics, in which the figural model of Biblical exegesis is used to highlight the meaning of man’s moral struggles and to place these struggles within the current validity of the prophetic perspective of the inspired books. In his thus conducted moral reflection, Potocki resorts to the preaching practice of exploring sensus accommodatitius, not only of the Old Testament but also of the entire Bible14 . For the poet, there is nothing unimportant or accidental in the Bible. Even the tiniest details may reveal their role of prefigurement, in accordance with the words of St Augustine that “the Old Testament is a promise expressed by the figure, while the New Testament is a promise understood in a spiritual way” (“Vetus enim Testamentum est promissio figurata, Novum Testamentum est promissio spiritualiter intellecta”; Augustinus: 1845b, 37 [8,9]). Potocki’s biblical reflections also find support in Augustine’s statement from Contra Faustum concerning the fact that the temporal figures which fill the Old Testament conceal a promise of the future things that are to be fulfilled by those living at the end of time15 . For Potocki, everything that can be read on the pages of the Bible – for instance topographic details, names, animal species, artifacts, gestures, words – is worthy of attention because of the inexhaustible potential of its spiritual significance. A prime example here is the grass on which Jesus’ disciples slept during his prayer in Gethsemane. The narrator of Nowy zaciąg sees the grass as an allegory of pleasant transgressions and a “lawn of dissoluteness”, on which a sinner sleeps in lethargy while Satan and the world strike a deal over his soul (p. 36). Potocki does not only keep to traditional figural analogies. He willingly goes beyond the ‘classical’ typologies and allows his own poetic thought to develop, sometimes in quite risky chains of associations. The seventeenth century recipient of literary sermons knew that Noah, who saved his family and animals from the Flood, was a type of Messiah. For the narrator of Nowy zaciąg, however, Noah planting a vineyard or a drunk Noah are also figures of the Saviour. It can be read that Jesus

14 For more information on sensus accommodatitius, see Potesta: 1712, 924–925. 15 Cf. Temporalium quidem rerum promissiones Testamento Veteri contineri, et ideo Vetus Testamentum appellari, nemo nostrum ambigit; et quod aeternae vitae promissio regnumque coelorum ad Novum pertinet Testamentum: sed in illis temporalibus figuras fuisse futurorum, quae implerentur in nobis, in quos finis saeculorum obvenit, non suspicio mea, sed apostolicus intellectus est, dicente Paulo, cum de talibus loqueretur: «Haec omnia figurae nostrae fuerunt»; et iterum: «Haec omnia in figura contingebant illis; scripta sunt autem propter nos, in quos finis saeculorum obvenit»” (Augustinus: 1843, 217–218). Both this passage from St Augustine and the one mentioned above (Augustinus: 1845b, 37 [8,9]) are quoted by Erich Auerbach (2016, 87–88).

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

Nową na górze trupich głów winnicę sadzi, Sam gronem, Krzyż Mu prasą, serce miasto kadzi. Pijany dziś miłością Chrystus w grobie leży, Odkryty, ba, odarty do naga z odzieży. Nie Cham, ociec poganów, ale z niego szydzi Sem, od którego poszedł Abraham i Żydzi (p. 160). [He plants a new vineyard on the hill of the skulls he is the grape, the cross is a press, and his heart is a vat. Christ is lying in the grave drunk with love today, uncovered, stripped naked of his clothes even. Not Cham, the father of the Gentiles, mocks him, but Sem, from whom Abraham and the Jews descended.]

The narrator’s attention is focused not only on tracking the “shadows” of the old Covenant that take on historical and mystical shapes, but also on discovering references that link the Old and the New Testament images with the situation of a Christian fighting a constant battle with the triple enemy of salvation: Satan, the World and the Body. And just like Joseph’s brothers who sold him to the merchants are the prefiguration of Israel sending Christ to death, in Potocki’s narrative they also indicate contemporaneous Christians “selling” Christ to the world by despising his word for their own benefit (p. 4). Judas, in turn, stands for Christians who “sell” Jesus even more cheaply than the traitor himself did: the world is their buyer, and the cardinal sins are their profit: Cóż też wżdy chrześcijanin o Judaszu prawi? Wszyscy klną, każdy łaje, nikt nie błogosławi. […] Tylko żeby w Judaszu na się kto dekretu Nie pisał, niechaj patrzy. A wiele ich pisze. Ma Judasz i dziś swoje w handlu towarzysze, Co z nim daleko marniej, niźli za pieniądze –  Za cielesne przedają Pana swego żądze. Nieszczęśliwe trzydzieści chrześcijanom groszy: Gniew, pycha i z łakomstwem bydlęce rozkoszy (p. 10). [What does a Christian always say about Judas? Everyone curses, scolds him, nobody blesses him

113

114

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

[…] But mind that in [rebuking] Judas you do not pass a judgment on yourself, as many do. Judas even today has associates in trade, who, with him, though cheaper than for money sell the Lord for bodily lusts. Unfortunate for Christians thirty silver pieces: wrath, pride, gluttony and animal pleasures.]

The sequence of events in the sacred history has been imprinted on the entire history of man’s spiritual struggles and the poet always strives to uncover this pattern in the events viewed through the medium of the Divine Word, because for him the prophetic character of Biblical figures does not cease with their expected fulfilment in Christ. What is characteristic of Nowy zaciąg is the baroque poet’s creative combination of rhetorical craftsmanship, impressive biblical erudition, and his sensitivity to allegory and figurality. The poem’s narrative, to a large extent didactically oriented, synchronizes Passion events with doctrinal and moral reflection that is developed in parallel. By setting in motion the metaphorical potential inherent in the scenes from the Stations of the Cross and through the narrator’s clearly dialogic creation, the whole work is orientated on striking a deep cord with the recipient’s religious imagination and stimulating his or her reflection and prayer. Despite being written in Polish alexandrine, Nowy zaciąg resembles a poetic and rhetorical meditatio on the history of salvation which culminates in Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross. This meditation is extensive indeed, for it has been counted to occupy 5500 lines (Brückner: 1898, 355). The work is both lyrical and apologetic, epic and strongly rhetorical, polemical, satirical, solidified into a whole with a deep biblical foundation and the gravity of religious experience, expressed, among others, in a series of strongly metaphorical prayerful self-reflections that accompany the scenes of the Passion. The dynamics of the poem’s narration, however, go far beyond the capacious formulas defining meditation as “an internal activity of the mind focused in a special way on the selected object and striving to recognize it comprehensively by reaching its inner principle” (cf. Kostkiewiczowa: 2010, 10). Thematic meditation, as suggested by the definition cited above, is obviously not synonymous with filling one’s intellect with the contents of the contemplated object, but the type of focus on the object assumed here is not easy to reconcile with the rhythm imposed on the reader’s attention by Potocki’s passion for observation, his synchronous imagination and the habit of analogic thinking, resulting in a poem full of long and divergent chains of connotations entwined with multi-layered visual and thematic associations.

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

The metaphorical images in Nowy zaciąg, like those in Potocki’s other religious texts, show that he was influenced by the model of interaction with the Holy Scriptures that is typical of the preaching and meditative literature of the Baroque. The poet himself pointed to Church oratory as one of the sources of his creative inspiration when on the title page of the poem’s manuscript he used the words “Reliable sermons of God’s Church”16 . It is not known which published sermons were actually Potocki’s inspiration. On the margins there are only biblical sigla, a few references to ancient works (Historiae by Tacitus, Naturalis historia by Pliny, Pharsalia by Lucan, as well as some unspecified works of Josephus, Suetonius and Plutarch) and a note referring to Historia Francorum by Gregory of Tours. It is not easy to identify the specific Church authors whose works Potocki used when writing his poem on the Passion, the obvious reason being the very choice of the work’s theme, which in turn determines the choice of rhetorical devices in the poetic discourse. The repertory of devices typical of this kind of rhetoric and its convention of paradoxes and analogies, had been developed over the centuries by texts attributed to such authors as Augustine, Bernard of Clairvaux, Bonaventure or Johannes Tauler. Original features of motifs and images are scarcely perceptible or not present at all in the arguments developed in countless baroque sermons and meditations on the Passion, which continue or just repeat the biblical parallels present in the writings of the Fathers of the Church and theological writers. On the other hand, Potocki, who abundantly drew from the tradition of figural exegesis, is reluctant to reveal his erudition in the field of biblical “figures and shadows” which portend the salvific sacrifice of Christ. For example, the description of the wounds on the arms and legs of the crucified Jesus as four rivers flowing out of Paradise (Nowy zaciąg, pp. 165–166) is probably a development of an image taken from Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, who described an outflow of blood and water from the spear-pierced side of the Saviour in the drama Christos paschon17 . The image was then disseminated in the Passion meditations of the Middle Ages and was adopted by writers in the subsequent epochs. It resembles a description from chapter 36 (Iesus cum cruce sublevatur) of Exercitia super vita et passione Salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi attributed to Johannes Tauler. The chapter compares the bleeding wounds of Christ, inflicted by the sudden lowering of the cross into a prepared hole in the rock, to the rivers of the Garden of Eden (see Tauler: 1565, 85). A similar description is found in Meditatio 41 (Christus cruci affigitur) of Compendium seu breviarivm absolutissimum omnium meditationum by Luis de la Puente (1645, 515–516), an

16 W. Potocki, Nowy zaciąg Jezusa Syna Bożego nad światem, śmiercią i piekłem. […] Krzyż albo historyja krwawej męki i niewinnej śmierci Chrystusa Pana, Zbawiciela świata, naprzód z świętych, a potym z poważnych Kościoła Bożego kaznodziejskich pism, ojczystym […] wyrażona rymem, Kraków, The Princes Czartoryski Library, MS 1250. 17 Cf. Papczyński: 2008, 163, note 47. For the description, see PG 38: 221–224.

115

116

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

ascetic work originally written in Spanish, translated in the seventeenth century both into Latin and Polish (see Puente: 162118 ). What is more, a comparison of the blood flowing from the wounds of the crucified Jesus to the rivers of Eden can also be found in Polish baroque sermons (see, for example, Gospodarz nieba i ziemie Jezus Chrystus Syn Boży, Bóg wcielony i naprawca świata [The Master of Heaven and Earth Jesus Christ The Son of God, God Incarnate and the Renewer of the World] by Jacek Liberiusz [1665, 218]), which makes it impossible to establish with certainty Potocki’s reading or the sources he actually used in his work. It is a similar story with other analogies that build the meditative layer of Nowy zaciąg showing, for example, Jesus in a crown of thorns and burning with love as the real burning bush of Moses and Abraham’s lamb that got stuck in the thorns of human sins (pp. 110–111); or showing Abraham, when ready to kill Isaac, holding a flame in one hand and a knife in the other as a figure of God holding a torch of mercy in one hand and the sword of justice in the other, the sword which he lowers on his Son during the Passion (p. 138). Following the example of preachers seeking to liven up their narrative, the narrator of Nowy zaciąg invents and enters into dialogue with the protagonists of the Gospels and the participants of the main events (Christ, Mary, Peter, Judas, Caiaphas, Pilate, Pilate’s wife, Herod, Simon of Cyrene, etc.) and with Old-Testament characters (Abraham, Joseph, Moses, and David) who contribute to the extensive historical and spiritual context of the Passion. The method of storytelling used by Potocki consists of a dynamic rhetorical interaction with the participants of the drama of salvation, whom the narrator of the poem asks, instructs, admonishes, argues with, pesters, and even derides (Judas or Herod). Although in Nowy zaciąg there is no sign of Mary’s lament, known from the tradition of medieval apocryphal literature, in which Mary recalls the joy of the Annunciation and asks dramatic questions about the fulfilment of its promises, Potocki does not resign from a subjective expression of Mary’s pain. The lyrical monologue of the Mother of God included in the text is not elaborate or particularly emphasised. What is more, it appears in a rather unexpected moment, namely when the lots are cast for Christ’s robes. The choice of this scene as the context of a mother’s words bestows unexpected emotional strength upon them. Mary, whose heart is torn like the robes of Jesus, despairs while looking at the slaughterers gambling for her son’s tunic that it will not be inherited by Christ’s disciples (like the mantle of the prophet Elijah was inherited by Elisha), but by robbers and lechers (p. 168). By making particular stages of the Passion the theme of his poetic meditations, Potocki used the material he had collected freely and abundantly from all sources of Church oratory, the most important being the allegorical and typological tradition

18 For the description of the bleeding wounds of Christ, see p. 135.

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

of biblical hermeneutics, whose artistic potential Potocki revealed by creating visual parallels forming an outline of poetic reflection on the salvific act of the incarnate God – the Lamb who sheds his blood “to the last drop” to redeem the sinner. The style of the spiritual exegesis of the revealed Word that is manifested in Nowy zaciąg turns out to be surprisingly convergent – toutes proportions gardées – with the style of St Augustine, who was prone to spiritual interpretation of the events of both the Old Testament and the Gospels, and remained, according to Manlio Simonetti, in constant allegorical disposition (Simonetti: 2000, 347–364). This style stems, on the one hand, from the didactic, if not pastoral, character of the poet’s work, but also from the intensity of his biblical reading on the other. Due to the latter, the Word of the Scriptures, no longer as an obvious element of the writer’s erudition but as an organic part of his sphere of imagination, is capable of binding its elements, creating new entities from them and giving them meaning in accordance with their own aspirations. These pictorial sequences, in which the dynamics of fantasy transforms exegesis into metaphors, in fact create an extensive plan of lyrical digressions by means of which the structure of the reflection on the Passion is expanded19 . The principle that the poet seems to follow in his interpretation of the details of biblical scenes also resembles the one proposed by St Augustine, namely dilectio, i.e. building the love of God and one’s neighbour as the purpose of reading the Bible, but also as an important criterion in assessing the value of the proposed interpretation (cf. Simonetti: 2000, 347–348, 350). In his satirical work, Potocki is very critical of preachers whose secular ambition seems to stimulate them to construct their sermons by using the conceptual mechanism of intellectual surprise (Pawlak: 2002, 161–186). According to the author of Nowy zaciąg, a priest should not confuse his mission with the claim of a poet to being the only one after God who deserves the reputation of the creator/discoverer of miracles. As a writer of religious poetry, however, Potocki himself mixes the prerogatives of a preacher and a poet. He creates a literary space for the meeting of the Revealed Word and human invention that never tires of searching for ways to aestheticise the conceived truth. To implement his creative ideas, Potocki uses countless witty surprises and potential paradoxes discovered – through the guidance of religious writing – in the language the Bible uses to tell the story of salvation.

19 Aleksandra Glazer (1981, 68–69) indicated the specific digresiveness of Nowy zaciąg. See also Hanusiewicz: 1998, 190; Kasprzak-Obrębska: 1998, 248–249.

117

118

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Bibliography Primary Sources Augustinus (1843), Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres, PL 42:207–518. — (1845a), Quaestionum in Heptateuchum libri septem, PL 34:547–824. — (1845b), Sermo IV [8,9], PL 38:33–52. Bolesławiusz, Klemens (1681), Rzewnosłodki głos łabęcia umierającego abo pienia wdzięczne wielebnego ojca Jana Hondemiusza […] o żywocie i męce Chrystusowej […], Kraków: Wojciech Regulus. Laterna, Marcin (1612), Harfa duchowna, to jest dziesięć rozdziałów modlitw katolickich […], Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. Liberiusz, Jacek (1665), Gospodarz nieba i ziemie Jezus Chrystus Syn Boży, Bóg wcielony i naprawca świata […], Kazimierz przy Krakowie: Balcer Śmieszkowic. Miaskowski, Kasper (1995), Historyja […] gorzkiej męki i okrutnej śmierci Boga wcielonego Jezusa Pana, in: idem, Zbiór rytmów, Alina Nowicka-Jeżowa (ed.), Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich PAN – Stowarzyszenie Pro Cultura Litteraria, 71–107. Papczyński, Stanisław (2008), Pisma pasyjne, Wiesław Pawlak/Marek Miotk (introduction), Ryszard Roman Piętka (transl.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Księży Marianów MIC. Potesta, Felix (1712), Examen ecclesiasticum, in quo universae materiae morales omnesque fere casus conscientiae excogitabiles resolvuntur […], Coloniae: Wilhelm Metternich. Potocki, Wacław, Nowy zaciąg Jezusa Syna Bożego nad światem, śmiercią i piekłem. […] Krzyż albo historyja krwawej męki i niewinnej śmierci Chrystusa Pana, Zbawiciela świata, naprzód z świętych, a potym z poważnych Kościoła Bożego kaznodziejskich pism, ojczystym […] wyrażona rymem, Kraków, The Princes Czartoryski Library, MS 1250. — (1698), Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą tryumfującego Jezusa Syna Bożego […]. Krzyż albo żałosna historyja krwawej męki i niewinnej śmierci Chrystusa Pana, Zbawiciela świata, z Pism świętych […] ojczystym wyrażona rytmem, Warszawa: O.O. Scholarum Piarum. — (1907), Ogród fraszek, Aleksander Brückner (ed.), vol. 2, Lwów: Towarzystwo dla Popierania Nauki Polskiej. — (1697), Poczet herbów szlachty Korony Polskiej i Wielkiego Księstwa Litewskiego […], Kraków: Mikołaj A. Schedel. Puente de la, Luis (1645), Compendium, seu breviarivm absolutissimum omnium meditationum […], Vilnae: Typis Academicis Societatis Iesu. — (1621), W[ielebnego] O[jca] Ludwika Pontana […] rozważenia o przedniejszych wiary ś[więtej] tajemnicach. Część czwarta, która historyją w sobie zamyka wszytkiej Męki Pańskiej […], J. Węgrzynkowic (transl.), Jarosław: Jan Szeliga.

Biblical Figural Exegesis As the Source of Imagery in the Religious Poetry of Wacław Potocki

Rożniatowski, Abraham (2003), Pamiątka krwawej ofiary Pana Zbawiciela naszego Jezusa Chrystusa, Janusz Gruchała (ed.), Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich PAN – Stowarzyszenie Pro Cultura Litteraria. Sokołowski, Stanisław (1586), Iustus Ioseph sive in Iesu Christi Domini nostri mortem et passionem […] meditationes […], Cracoviae: Jan Januszowski. — (1596), Sprawiedliwy Józef albo o męce i śmierci Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa rozmyślania […], Jan Bogusławski (transl.), Kraków: Jan Januszowski. Tauler, Johannes (1565), Exercitia […] piissima, super vita et passione Salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi […], Antverpiae: Philippus Nutius. Twardowski, Kasper (2012), Piosneczki Emmanuelowe (1619), Agnieszka Czechowicz/ Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee (ed.), in: Radosław Grześkowiak/Roman Krzywy (ed.), “Umysł stateczny i w cnotach gruntowny”: prace edytorskie dedykowane pamięci Profesora Adama Karpińskiego, Warszawa: Wydział Polonistyki Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 75–89.

Secondary Sources Auerbach, Erich (2016), Figura, in: James I. Poter (ed.), Jane O. Newman (transl.), Time, History, and Literature. Selected essays of Erich Auerbach, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 65–113. Brückner, Aleksander (1898), Spuścizna rękopiśmienna po Wacławie Potockim, Rozprawy Akademii Umiejętności. Wydział Filologiczny 27. Brzozowski, Marian (1975), Teoria kaznodziejstwa (wiek XVI–XVIII), in: Marian Rechowicz (ed.), Dzieje teologii katolickiej w Polsce, vol. 2: Od odrodzenia do oświecenia, part. 1: Teologia humanistyczna, Lublin: Wydawnictwo Towarzystwa Naukowego Katolickiego Uniwersytetu Lubelskiego, 363–428. Buszewicz, Elwira (2010), Obraz Chrystusa Zmartwychwstałego w polskiej poezji nowołacińskiej, in: Albert Gorzkowski/Łukasz Kamykowski/Kazimierz Panuś (ed.), Via pulchritudinis. Wątki biblijne w literaturze i kulturze polskiej, Kraków: Wydawnictwo Unum, 259–275. Czechowicz, Agnieszka (2019), “Święta, wielka i trudna robota”. Uwagi o kontekstach gatunkowych Nowego zaciągu Wacława Potockiego, Terminus 21, 3, 269–285. Glazer, Aleksandra (1981), “Nowy zaciąg” Wacława Potockiego na tle wybranych mesjad staropolskich, Acta Universitatis Wratislaviensis. Prace Literackie 22, 61–72. Gliściński, Jan (1994), Wstęp, in: Elżbieta Kolbus (ed., transl.), Quodvultdeus, Księga obietnic i zapowiedzi Bożych, Jan Gliściński (inroduction), Emil Stanula (consult.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Akademii Teologii Katolickiej. Hanusiewicz, Mirosława (2001), Bóg w świecie z ciała i krwi. Słowo biblijne w “Pieśniach nabożnych” Wacława Potockiego, Roczniki Humanistyczne 49, 1, 33–48. — (1998), Święte i zmysłowe w poezji religijnej polskiego baroku, Lublin: Redakcja Wydawnictw Katolickiego Uniwersytetu Lubelskiego.

119

120

Agnieszka Czechowicz (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Hernas, Czesław (2002), Barok, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN. Kasprzak-Obrębska, Halina (1998), Dwie późnobarokowe mesjady, in: Jan Okoń (ed.), Literatura a liturgia. Księga referatów międzynarodowej sesji naukowej Łódź, 14–17 maja 1996, Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego, 241–252. Kopeć, Jerzy J. (1974), Dzieje nabożeństwa Drogi Krzyżowej w Polsce, Roczniki Teologiczno-Kanoniczne 21, 4, 42–59. Kostkiewiczowa, Teresa (2010), Medytacja – wstępne spostrzeżenia i uwagi, in: Teresa Kostkiewiczowa/Magdalena Saganiak (ed.), Medytacja. Postawa intelektualna – sposób poznania – gatunek dyskursu, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Kardynała Stefana Wyszyńskiego. Kowalczyk, Monika (2017), “Nowy zaciąg pod chorągiew starą tryumfującego Jezusa”. O wyznaniowym wymiarze eposu biblijnego Wacława Potockiego, Warszawa: Wydział Polonistyki Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. Kukulski, Leszek (1962), Prolegomena filologiczne do twórczości Wacława Potockiego, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. Łopatecki, Karol (2012), “Disciplina militaris” w wojskach Rzeczypospolitej do połowy XVII wieku, Białystok: Instytut Badań nad Dziedzictwem Kulturowym Europy. Nowicka-Jeżowa, Alina (2009–2011), Barok polski między Europą i Sarmacją, part. 1: Profile i zarysy całości, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Neriton. Pawlak, Wiesław (2008), Bł. Stanisław Papczyński wśród barokowych kaznodziejów, in: S. Papczyński, Pisma pasyjne, Wiesław Pawlak/Marek Miotk (introduction), Ryszard Roman Piętka (transl.), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Księży Marianów MIC, 7–53. — (2005), Koncept w polskich kazaniach barokowych, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe Katolickiego Uniwersytetu Lubelskiego. — (2002), Paradoxa theologica Wacława Potockiego wobec kaznodziejskich “nowin”, Roczniki Humanistyczne 50, 1, 161–186. Simonetti, Manlio (2000), Między dosłownością a alegorią. Przyczynek do historii egzegezy patrystycznej, Tomasz Skibiński (transl.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo WAM. Stręciwilk, Janina (1981), Męka Pańska w polskiej literaturze barokowej, in: Henryk Damian Wojtyska/Józef Jerzy Kopeć (ed.), Męka Chrystusa wczoraj i dziś, Lublin: Redakcja Wydawnictw Katolickiego Uniwersytetu Lubelskiego, 102–119. Teusz, Leszek (2002), Bolesna Muza nie Parnasu Góry, ale Golgoty… Mesjady polskie XVII stulecia, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper.

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

Despite the fact that the editorial history of his manuscript reaches back to the early1900s and so has been extant for more than 100 years, Tomasz Nargielewicz, a Dominican writer, is not widely known amongst Polish scholars. Regardless of the significance of that editorial history and the intriguing intricacies of the writer’s life, my aim lies not in recalling those histories. What I regard as more beneficial is to ask about something that is lost from the records of the writer’s biography and was until recently neglected – though probably acknowledged in some way – by modern editors of his works preserved in a single autograph manuscript known as the Pawl. 3 codex. This question could be posed thus: what exactly is the codex and how should we perceive its contents, namely the collection of prose entitled Różne historyje [Various stories]? Needless to say, this is a fundamental question determining every editorial endeavour, and – as it is – it immediately recalls other, more familiar editorial and critical concepts of the text and work itself. Keeping them in mind, I will try to focus primarily on the material facts, trying to leave aside abstract – which is not to say inconsequential – editorial deliberations about the nature and means of distinguishing the document and the work. After analysing some hypotheses about the codex, I will try to draw a textual context for collections of prose fiction similar in genre or subject-matter to that of Nargielewicz’s Różne historyje (RH), trying to find a reason for the composition of his work contained in Pawl. 3 manuscript. The codex under question is a small book divided into two parts; the first one is a collection of religious verse entitled Arfa kościelna [The Church Harp]. It contains five original autobiographical poems as well as over one hundred and forty religious poems translated into Polish from Latin and in most part corresponding with prayers used in the Dominican order. The second part is a set of prose narratives gathered under the title Różne Historyje; it consists of twenty seven novellas (according to conventional classification) based on Gesta Romanorum and three adaptations of popular romances: Historyja wojny miedzy Pompejuszem i Julijuszem [The Story of a War between Pompey and Julius], Historyja o rzymskim cesarzu Otonie i żenie jego z dziećmi [The Story of Roman Emperor Octavian and His Wife

122

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

and Children], Historyja o królewnie Magielonie i Pietrze hrabi z Prowancyjej [The Story of Princess Magielona and Duke Peter form Provence]1 . The distinctiveness and separateness of Arfa kościelna from Różne historyje is widely accepted and undisputed, so I will not touch on this matter here (cf. Cybulski: 2019). My main interest lies in the prose (RH), which is of greater importance, since it is exactly this section of the codex that was edited and published in the 1960s by Teresa Michałowska, and from that moment it was the object of wider critical attention in textual studies (Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 221–334; Kazańczuk: 2013; Gacka: 2013; Dąbrówka: 2019). To say the codex itself was edited would be an exaggeration since it was never edited in its entirety, but what attracts serious attention is that the same could be said about the prose, since Michałowska’s edition focused only on some parts of the RH. This way of proceeding was of course due to some observations that caught the attention of the scholar following her line of reasoning, but when recently new plans of editing Nargielewicz’s prose came into being, new questions arose concerning the legitimacy of that reasoning, the nature of textual material and thus the scope of the edition. All those matters have to be analysed anew so that the edition can be true to historical facts, not to a received principle or modus operandi. But let’s not anticipate the facts and return to the initial question with the hope of finding the answer, and with it some guidelines for future editing of the prose. For the sake of this article I will divide current stands into two hypothetical settings. According to the first hypothesis, the codex is considered a temporary repository of texts. In this pesrspective Różne historyje is nothing more than a set of works of two different genres (novellas and romances) gathered under one title in order to separate them from the initial part of the codex written in verse or to preserve the materials gathered in one volume in an unclear but certainly non-obligatory order. This assumption can be viewed as an outcome of a twofold line of reasoning: a strong focus on describing the characteristics of early modern Polish novellas and of a particular editorial approach to manuscript collections deriving from the Lachmannian approach to textual witnesses. As for the first case, it can easily be said in Michałowska’s defence that she did not actually act like an editor, even though she supplied her arguments on the history and structure of novellas with a popular edition of stories written by Nargielewicz (Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965). In her work, we will not find bold editorial claims. What we will find instead is a detailed record and a precise description of the early modern genre based mainly on Nargielewicz’s writing. Seen in that perspective the edition of his novellas attached to her book is mainly exemplificatory material

1 For a full description of the codex and its contents see Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 63–65; Cybulski: 2022.

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

for her thesis based not on editorial but generical criteria. Even describing other novellas taken from different sources, be it handwritten or printed, Michałowska did not focus on matters of textual transmission or the impact of their textual surroundings on the general concept of the whole work or collection as such. These were matters only touched upon and then put aside (Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 35–42). Nevertheless, excerpting from the manuscript prose of a similar genre and publishing it was in itself a powerful statement that leads us to the second matter. In doing so, she left future readers with a belief that the novellas were a separate work residing previously in a distorted state in the manuscript. As I mentioned, Różne historyje consists of long and short narratives. Those texts are preceded by a frontispiece decorated in floral patterns and a preface poem dedicated, as stated in its title, to the curious reader, where we can find important information about the purpose of creating the narratives that come later. Simply put, they were meant to be a remedy for melancholy. In her edition, Michałowska assigned the title as well as the opening poem only to those excerpted texts, which is equal to saying that from now on they are critically assigned only to those texts. This not only led to confusion, since now one title refers to two separate material phenomena, but also left the remaining narratives untitled. No less important is the assumption about the nature of the codex that stands behind this editorial decision. Although never stated directly by Michałowska, in her edition, the codex is regarded as a potentially corrupted textual witness of the early state of composition preceding print, and thus a repository in which only texts of works are preserved in an unfixed, temporary and somehow distorted state which does not obligate the editor to treat any of its aspects as mandatory, no matter how appealing they may be. The fact that she dealt with a manuscript, opposed to a ‘proper’ print, only strengthened the argument and distrust to the material text, opening the way to a strong conviction that the work lies somewhere beyond the material sphere, what in turn strengthened the role of editorial judgement in giving the text its ‘correct’, error-free shape. The text of a work has to be fully established. Michałowska did just that by making the criterion of the literary genre her main editorial principle; undermining the legitimacy of the only textual witnesses. She established not only what is called the linguistic code, but also the content and overall shape of the work stripped of three romances not included in her edition and left unedited to this day. The initial argument aimed at sharpening the distinction between genres in the long term blurred our view of the work since this genre-specific approach was then adopted by other scholars who were trying to define not the boundaries of genres pursued by Nargielewicz, but of his works on the basis of – needless to say – the foundation of generic purity. In consequence, other speculations came about, like the one stating that the romances

123

124

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

about Octavian and Magielona placed among novellas were perhaps hidden in the maze of smaller stories2 . I will return to this subject later. As inappropriate as it may seem today, the edited work was prepared in the mid1960s, long before the social and materialistic approaches to textuality emerged from the stormy textual debate3 , and, besides, it wasn’t completely ill-conceived after all. The concept of the edition was strengthened by the fact that, according to Michałowska, Nargielewicz created his manuscript during his imprisonment, to which he was sentenced for moral and political offences. Thus, the prose was written as a remedy not for melancholic readers, because in this case there probably were none, but for the writer alone. This would explain the small, easy-to-hide format of the book (15,5 × 9 cm), and surely it would reinforce the hypothesis about the temporary and unofficial character of its composition, determined by discretion or even self-censorship. According to a second hypothesis (which, I admit, I like most) the codex was a handwritten pocket ‘edition’. To call a manuscript an edition is surely a move that raises a red flag since it suggests equalling the means of composition and dissemination (to say the least) of manuscript and printed codices. Although that is not what I am trying to suggest, some similarities can be traced, the main one being the phase or state of the work and document ready to reach the wider public. The other possibility considered here, is to see the codex with all its content as a finished, fully composed object, an imitation of small pocket editions mostly of verse, but also of prose, popular at that time. In this case, the small book would potentially be meant for a wider audience, thus making the initial poem preceding the prose something more than just a conventional rhetorical figure. Accordingly, the nature of this part of the codex would not be accidental and occasional, but instead highly intentional and purposeful. Moreover, this work would be comprised not only of words, but also of hand-crafted drawings surrounding the title page. The argument behind such a view is the following. Considering the length of the codex (approximately 300 pages), the substantial amount of literary material contained in it, the meticulous handwriting, and the gravity of Nargielewicz’s penalty, it is highly unlikely that all the works it contained were written during his imprisonment. The sentence for moral and political offences was three years in prison. As far as we can tell, this was the most severe punishment in the Dominican order, and as such it would exclude any possibility of writing or free access to books from a local library (Gałuszka: 2010). If, however, this was not forbidden, it is still unlikely that in such a short time one would manage to 2 The arguments I have recalled have been repeatedly discussed at editorial meetings on the subject of Nargielewicz’s prose. Some are presented by Dąbrówka, Gacka, Kazańczuk (2019). 3 Amongst others, G.T. Tanselle (2005) gave a broad account of the different propositions. See also Bryant: 2002, 17–63; Cybulski: 2017.

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

write as much and copy the whole material from a working draft to a fair copy that has survived to this day; for the codex, bearing almost no signs of corrections, written consistently by one careful hand, is unmistakably a fair copy. As for the handwriting concordantly described as very clear and executed with meticulous care, I seriously doubt that such an effort, visible on every page, could be a sign of a minor investment in something temporary. Quite the opposite, it reveals great commitment or a clear intention, if you will, to preserve texts in a particular arrangement. This would be to show how important it was. If we look closer, it becomes even more apparent in the composition of Różne historyje. Besides the fact that it was given a frontispiece decorated with floral patterns – almost resembling the compositional variety inscribed in the title – as well as the opening poem, which are both derived from print culture, obvious signs of a beginning of a book or its part, the narratives themselves are arranged according to a noticeable symmetrical pattern: the opening narrative is a romance, followed by fourteen novellas. The sixteenth narrative is again a romance, and again, after twelve novellas, there is another one followed by a history of St Magdalene that closes the whole volume (Cybulski: 2019, 100). The abovementioned concept of hiding romances does not convince me simply because what stands as the first “story” of Rózne historyje is exactly a romance: Historyja wojny między Pompejuszem a Julijuszem. What I see reminds me rather of a narrative fabric crafted from interwoven strands, various in kind, but coherent in patterns of colour and weave that bind them. All of this can be spotted with the naked eye, but I believe deeper investigation into the structure of all of the narratives can lead to finding even more intertextual relationships linking them together. As for the generical perspective alone, the argument of coherence in this case is not really something that should only be taken into account here and scrupulously executed. This is not to say it should be discarded either. Paying respect to Michałowska’s achievements on the field of poetics does not necessarily mean that we have to follow her editorial decisions or blindly base our own understanding of textual matters on her generical argument alone. What we should do, on the other hand, is incorporate this knowledge in a wider scope of investigation, taking into account not only (or not mainly) one genre (novella), but also examining the nature of a romance and novella as well as manners of authorial and non-authorial transmission of those genres, especially those which became the basis for Nargielewicz’s own re-workings. By doing so, we bring into play scribal and compositional habits that may have been known to the author and in some way adopted by him. But first, let us ponder for a moment on the nature of the novella and romance, strictly speaking on their intertextuality. It is widely known that stories gathered under the title Gesta romanorum, in Polish translation printed as Historyje rzymskie rozmaite z róznych dziejów z wykładami obyczajnemi krótko zebrane […] [Various Roman Stories from Different Times, with Moral Explanations Briefly Gathered]

125

126

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

since the sixteenth century, were compilations of various texts utilising a variety of common motifs and themes widely reused over the centuries. What bonded such diverse composition together was not simply its generic consistency, but rather a set of reoccurring structural elements, narrative formulas, topics repeated in several stories, as well as their moral tenor. This medieval compilation has not only been preserved through subsequent centuries, but even gained popularity in renaissance and baroque literature – in Poland Historyje rzymskie had several editions of which not many survived because of them being read so often. The inconsistent length of Gesta romanorum transmitted in manuscripts was more stable in print; what has changed over the years was the way the stories were utilised, their function shifting from mainly moral applications to entertainment (Krzyżanowski: 1962, 106–127; Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 111–113, 120–122; Michałowska: 1970, 167). What remained unchanged, however, was their generical and thematical inconsistency. As such, Gesta romanorum influenced the early modern novella, but after that they did not fade into oblivion. Since the time of Decameron not only sermons but novellas as well began to reach for thematic, fabular and allegorical material present in Gesta; knowing or having a sense of novelistic structure Nargielewicz returned to the very roots of the genre when he decided to adapt, in his Różne historyje, more than two dozen stories from Historyje rzymskie rozmaite. At this point (seventeenth century), the novella, although pronounced, was at the same time a very intertextual genre as it took inspiration from various sources: ancient, medieval and contemporary; secular and religious; oral and written; print and manuscript. In most cases those inspirations were not direct as certain fables, motifs, characters were somehow present in the literature circulating during the writer’s lifespan and in his social environment. In some ways novelistic works took shape and followed an (inter)textual path that was similar to Gesta romanorum containing texts of different length, telling stories of various characters presented in a simple or more complicated plot consisting of one or several strands (KruszewskaMichałowska: 1965, 187–189; Michałowska: 1970, 175–205). Nargielewicz’s Różne historyje easily fit into this description4 . Romances, on the other hand, were usually single works rarely gathered in authorial groupings (Chrétien de Troyes and Adenet le Roi), and even then not always transmitted in fixed arrangements (Huot: 2000, 64–66). In the history of romance literature, however, a different practice can be traced, revealing significant freedom of the copyist-reader. Some works of the medieval period were variations on the story known from a popular romance. They either retold the story in a slightly different manner, altering some details, or told a brand-new story about what preceded or followed the events described in the prototype work. Although created separately,

4 For a broad study of Polish novelistic tradition see Michałowska: 1970.

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

they were sometimes gathered in manuscript collections of romances linked by similar topics or characters, like in the famous case of the Arthurian cycles (Bruckner: 2000, 25–27). It is worth emphasizing that many such medieval collections “simply present tales of love and chivalric adventure, undoubtedly chosen entirely on the basis of narrative interest. In this respect, romance manuscripts differ notably from lyric manuscripts in both French and German, the vast majority of which are arranged in author corpora.” (Huot: 2000, 67). What’s more, there are many known medieval codices containing romances alongside other genres such as chansons de geste or fabliaux – of course there could be different criteria for placing texts together but, among other factors, similarity of topics, characters, events and social contexts played an important integrating role (Gaunt: 2000, 49–51; Huot: 2000, 63–68; Wright: 2005, 499; Busby: 2008a, 66–72; Busby: 2008b, 147–151). Those secondary manuscript settings also testify to some degree a deeper interconnection between genres. For example, the 14th century romance of Octavian is known to be an example of “the coalescence of fabliau elements into a distinct (French) genre” (Wright: 2005, 481; cf. Gaunt: 2000; Busby: 2008b, 146), and this influence has been recognised as more than just incorporation of a few topics or motifs. The result of this “coalescence” was the emergence of a twofold construction which emerged as a result of the amalgamation of two genres. The most vivid examples here are the comic juxtapositions of characters, mainly young Florent and his foster-father Clement: To prevent the collapse of the romance and fabliau worldviews, the author of FO cordons off the two kinds of material with precision, firmly and insistently identifying some individuals, settings, and tactics as “fabliau,” others as “romance.” This is effected in part by setting up structural symmetries in the text. Florent exposes his incompetence in a fabliau setting (the hawk and palfrey episodes) then excels in a romance one (the encounter with the giant). The process is repeated with Clement, who is a fish out of water at the palace (beating the minstrels, hiding the cloaks) but masterful in the fabliau project of horse-thievery. Specific parallels between episodes are also employed: the disguising of Clement as a Saracen (lines 4075–93) recalls Florent’s initial arming for battle (lines 2191–2268) (Wright: 2005, 489–490)5 .

Although my examples come from a period remote from Nargielewicz’s lifetime, the habits of writers, composers of romances and their audiences did not change as much as one may think. Also romance as a genre as well as particular works were still a source of inspiration for renaissance and baroque authors. Reaching back

5 Julian Krzyżanowski (1962, 61–63) recognizes this comic strain but does not associate it with intertextual influences.

127

128

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

to medieval roots of romance writing is legitimised not only by the provenance of Octavian, a fable still lively in the early modern period, but also by the fact that the romance of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries did not drift far away from its prototypes. This can be said mainly about the importance and way of shaping the love thread as well as the basic principle of shaping the fable in the adventure incarnation of romance still following the scheme of events and meanings introduced in Theagenes and Chariclea (Bohuszewicz: 2009, 131–132, 202). We can also find examples from this period of pairing romances with other genres under one title or in one manuscript. For instance, the printer (or maybe translator, that we do not know) of the Historyja o cesarzu Otonie [The Story of Emperor Octavian] (1569) accompanied the romance with two short narratives, as did the editor of Antypasty małżeńskie [Marriage Antipastos] (1650) who merged the romance of Princess Banialuka with two other stories. Clearly the eclectic nature of romances and novellas went along with the specific manner of their textual transmission, in both cases witnessed by collections or compositions of various texts. After recalling some structural characteristics of novellas and romances, it is now time to ask if there were any interconnections between those two genres, are they in any way similar, did they take inspiration from each other or maybe from the same sources? In other words, is there anything in their structure that would help us understand why works of those genres were put together under one title. We can easily assume that the lack of the notion of generic purity may have contributed to that practice but taken alone it cannot be considered as a sufficient explanation. Let us then take a closer look at some features of those genres, bearing in mind that the answer to the question will – in part at least – cast some light on the composition of Różne historyje as a work consisting of both romances and novellas. Teresa Michałowska’s book, which initiated the sense of separateness of Nargielewicz’s romances from his novellas, in itself bears the stigma of ambiguity. On the one hand, she established the shape of the work as consisting of novellas only, but at the same time, in the same book, she gave enough arguments that could support an opposite stance like the one I am trying to substantiate (Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 14–45). Basing her arguments on Nargielewicz’s writing, she did not, however, clarify the coherence of the work as a whole. Let us make an attempt to do so by utilizing some basic information. It is crucial to notice that Michałowska (1965, 42) herself included romances among the genres related to novellas along with the exemplum, epylion and facetious writings. Both the romance and novella could represent moral truths and/or serve as entertainment. As for the fable and arrangement of events, the novella was surely in many cases less complicated than a romance, as the action usually focused on one character or pair of characters and the plot did not expand beyond a single strand. In other words, the novella can be said to be less complex, shorter and therefore more condensed in structure than a romance. However, this kind of novelistic

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

construction was not a strict rule and writers did not always keep to it. Neither did Nargielewicz. If simplicity and brevity were the only means of distinguishing novellas from romances, one could be tempted to classify as a romance texts of an indistinct generic nature: O dziwnym sporządzeniu ś. Grzegorza papieża [About the Peculiar Provision of St Gregory the Pope], O wielu wielkich trudnościach króla Apollona [About Many Great Difficulties of King Apollo], O mężnej dzielności i wiernej życzliwości dwóch zacnych rycerzów [About the Bravery and Allegiant Kindness of Two Worthy Knights] (Nargielewicz: 1965, 225–269). Romance, on the other hand, adopted many events and actions, several turning points and episodes. In the early days of the genre the narrative technique of interlacing played a crucial role: “It expresses both the impetus to segment the narrative into separate units and the equally powerful compulsion to associate and continue romance across such divisions” (Bruckner: 2000, 25). It was one of the factors enabling continuations and the emergence of romance cycles. As for characters, both genres could reach for noble personas – though characters from lower branches of society were also utilized in novellas – and both had a tendency to arrange characters and events into opposing parallel groupings: virtuous and malicious, what is chosen and what is imposed, etc. (Bohuszewicz: 2009, 102; Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 193–194). In chivalric fables they both employed similar motifs: submission of the lover (usually a knight) to his chosen one, idealization of the main characters; and topics such as unusual circumstances of the protagonists’ birth, love at first sight, a lovers’ tryst, a protagonist’s victory over his enemy, kidnapping, recognition and so on (Michałowska: 1972, 463–466; Bruckner: 2000, 19–20, 23). We will find them not only in the three texts mentioned above, but also in typical romances placed in RH. For instance, what makes the stories of St Gregory, Apollo and two knights similar to one another and to romances is their complicated episodic structure and loose connections between episodes and events (Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 187–188). As for familiar motifs, the main characters descend from noble families, fall in love with princesses, fight wars against their enemies and face several adversities and conspiracies that lead to reversals of fortune: Gwido is unexpectedly recognized by his companion; Gregory is recognized by his mother whom he had by then married. The daughter of Emperor Antioch falls in love with Apollo when she first sees him at the tournament but due to Antioch’s negative attitude towards their relationship she is forced to meet with her beloved in secret in the palace garden, just as the title character of the romance of princess Magielona. It might be said that although we have the means to distinguish the genres under discussion either by referring to the early modern discussions on the matter dispersed in multiple statements (e.g. Turner: 2012; Michałowska: 1970, 26–93), or by using more modern means of describing genres (e.g. Bohuszewicz: 2009; Liu: 2006), it can also be said that those distinctions did not and do not form a strict set of rules and, in consequence, some works formed a kind of “involuntary

129

130

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

literary borderline of two genres” (Kruszewska-Michałowska: 1965, 189). We can even go one step further by saying that some degree of fluidity or instability was part of the nature of those genres, allowing a constant flow of creative energy resulting in multiple reshapings and reconfigurations of texts; this is also the reason why it is still so difficult to define romance as a genre. Michałowska claims that blurred boundaries between genres may stem from and reveal the authors lack of theoretical awareness. To my mind, this criticism is far too severe, especially considering the somewhat natural cognation of those genres6 . Romances shared or even borrowed their fables, motifs, character types, arrangement of events and topics from novellas, fabliau, chanson de geste and, vice versa, novellas were sometimes based on romances. Wandering on this broad and fertile borderline must have been as involuntary as inevitable. The textual history of Polish versions of Octavian may serve as further confirmation of that diagnosis. As I have already mentioned, in printed Polish translation the romance was accompanied by two shorter narratives. They were appended not as a filler, a mere addition with little or no relevance to the main story (arrangements of titles in print did not leave any doubt about the hierarchy of texts) just to amuse the reader for a few minutes longer. On the contrary, knowing the story of Octavian, the agent responsible for that arrangement of texts created something what we may call a “continuous narrative sequence” (Huot: 2000, 67). A particular element of the plot was chosen and used to weld three texts together. What the criteria of choice were and how they were supported is quite interesting: Okazuje sie w przeszłej historyjej Otona cesarza, ktory nad małżonką swą i dziatkami jej wielkie a srogie okrucieństwo uczynił […] iż to rzecz niepodobna, aby miała białagłowa od jednego mężczyzny zaraz dwoje zacząć. […] Więcejby to za dziw, gdy sie białegłowy w tych rzeczach omylą, ktore o tym wespoł miedzy sobą naczęściej rozmawiają. […] A wżdy sie i miedzy jemi trafiają, ktore są domnimania Otonowego, […] Ale ta, o ktorej nam przyszła historyja powie, prawie a szczerze tak rozumiała (Historja: 1928, 178). It shows in the previous story of Emperor Octavian, who showed such great and fierce cruelty towards his wife and her children […] that it is an extraordinary thing for a woman to conceive twins from one man. […]

6 Keith Busby (2008b) presents an elaborate discussion of the dilemmas of defining generic borders in medieval prose. Although the notion of genre in seventeenth century literary theories varies significantly from that of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the problematic scholarly endeavors to pin down generic features and impose clear distinctions is a persistent phenomenon.

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

It would be more of a wonder if women were mistaken in those matters, of which they speak amongst themselves most frequently. […] Even so there are some amongst them who share Octavian’s presumption […] But the one, about which we will hear in the next story, believed in this truly and honestly.

The anonymous author of this interlude, which appeared between the first two stories, found it appropriate to precede the last story with a similar explanation: Ale iżechmy tu o płodności w rozmowę weszli, zdała mi sie rzecz przystojna przypomnieć tu starą historyją o jednym ślachcicu niemieckim, ktory […] sie Frydrychowi Trzeciemu, cesarzowi rzymskiemu, z pocztem synow swych okazał […] (Historja: 1928, 187). Since we started a discussion about fertility, I considered it appropriate to recall an old story about a German nobleman, who […] presented himself, along with his many sons, to Frydrych III, Emperor of Rome […].

So then, what was chosen were neither love affairs or deeds of nobility, nor battles and victories of knights, but the birth/possession of many children or the fertility of a woman’s womb in general. It may seem that the bond is formed not through a distinctive attribute of genre but through the simple maintenance of narrative continuity, achieved through selecting any more or less precisely defined event or theme, even if very trivial, and developing it anew in a different manner. I will argue, however, that in this case the choice was not accidental, nor does it testify against the learnedness of the agent. By picking the birth of Octavian’s sons and the insidious intrigue of his mother as a point of reference, he actually chose a turning point for the romance, the very pivotal event which set in motion the whole subsequent action that would be impossible without it. Let us not forget that this detail was also mentioned in the work’s title (Historja: 1928, X). Thus, for the readers, these statements are announcements of a parallel topic (peculiarities of birth), and also of another compelling intrigue, forcing them to ask the question: “What will happen this time?” and preparing them for the plunge deeper into another reader experience. After reading the last of the three tales, the reader then happily reaches “The End of the Stories” (“Dokończenie historyj”; Historja: 1928, 192). The translation of Octavian known from this edition very likely served as the basis for Nargielewicz’s adaptation (Nargielewicz: [1689–1692], 87–120v). Interestingly enough, he made use not only of this single text, but embraced the idea of this edition as a whole by picking the romance as well as the first story that came with it and placing them in his own work in the same order. The last printed tale, as well as the composer’s elucidation of the interconnections between the stories, were rejected in the process. Taking into account the overall length of Różne historyje

131

132

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

and the number of tales contained in it, this decision must provoke at least two questions: why such explanations were excluded in general and what principle – if any – molds such a variety of texts together. By the time Różne historyje was created7 the Octavian romance had already been edited in Polish translation at least once (1569), although we cannot completely discard the possibility that in the seventeenth century at least one print, unknown to us, had been issued8 . In the eighteenth century, the work was printed several times. Thus, although at the end of the seventeenth century, readers of novels and romances, such as Nargielewicz himself, could have been familiar with the three stories collected in the Octavian print(s), we can presume that they definitely knew the practice of collecting narratives, not all of which were provided with precise explanations concerning the reason behind particular arrangements. The editor of Antypasty apparently considered this pointless and so did Nargielewicz. Simply put, such explications were perhaps not necessary, for the reader himself could find textual interconnections justifying the coherence of a work or collection of texts. He was prepared to do so due to rhetorical training received at school (Mack: 2004, 24–41). Various narrative sequences, announced or not, elaborately introduced or not, were known to the reading audience, practiced by writers, text collectors and printers, for it was a skill they had learned previously at school. Decoding rhetorical structures and composing texts along the same rhetorical lines was part of standard educational programs in the seventeenth century and formed basic reader and writer competence as well as a cultural communion among the literati: “The grammar school inculcated knowledge as well as skills. The poems and histories pupils read, the maxims and stories they learned and reproduced, provided a shared stock of principles” (ibid., 12). Moreover, romances may have played an important role in that process, for they were “repertories of technique as well as of moral teaching” (ibid., 136). The practice of writing and gathering several texts on the same topic is also testified in countless rhetorical notebooks and commonplace books containing imitations of certain works of classical authors, such as Jan Kochanowski, usually a few on a particular subject such as death, a child/son, greed, war, neighbor, etc.; subsequent reworkings were often entitled “on

7 Michałowska insists this happened during Nargielewicz’s imprisonment (1689–1692), but it could be argued that he wrote the work earlier (Michałowska: 1967, 96–97; Cybulski: 2019; Cybulski: 2022). 8 It must be stressed, however, that there is no evidence whatsoever to support this hypothesis except for the romance being known to Nargielewicz a hundred years after the first and only edition preceding Nargielewicz’s work left the printing press, as well as the knowledge that the 18th century prints were highly dependent on the edition from 1569. All this leads to a supposition that the romance could have been transmitted in some form during the time between 1569 and the first half of the eighteenth century, when it reappeared on the book market (Historja: 1928, viii–xviii; cf. Krzyżanowski: 1962, 57, 63).

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

the same subject”, “Idem” or “on the same matter once again”9 . Textual interplay was at the very heart of literary culture and it needed no introduction. It is worth recalling here what the driving force of romances and novellas was: they followed “the non-mimetic logic of design, which” meant building “the narrative structure through echoes and conventions constantly reinvented” (Bruckner: 2000, 24); at the heart of the genre lies constant retelling and reshaping. I would argue that for this reason explanations such as those printed in Historyja o cesarzu Otonie did serve the reading audience to the same degree as as they served the work itself. They were not simply aids for readers which were meant to instruct them on how to deal with an odd practice, a figment of the composer’s mind, but they also played a role – an important one – in emphasizing the coherence of a work based on the concept of narrative variation on one or several topics. This could be achieved by different means: strengthening and emphasizing narrative continuity by additions that clarify textual interconnections or simply by placing relevant information in the title. The edition of Historyja o cesarzu Otonie represents the first practice, its title page informing us only about the romance of Octavian. Therefore, the introduction and justification of the two added stories were placed inside the text in narrative form (Historja: 1928, X); on the other hand, Różne historyje (and Antypasty) represent the second practice. They provide no direct narrative links between subsequent stories, with the work informing us about the compositional strategy in its title: Różne historyje z różnych wiarygodnych awtorów wybrane a dla zabawki przystojnej i przestrogi rozsądnej każdego stanu ludzkiego w ten mały snopek zebrane [Various stories selected from various reliable sources and gathered in this small collection for the appropriate amusement and sensible admonition of people of all status], leaving readers on their own with the task of finding pleasure in tracking down textual fluidities (Bryant: 2002, 112–140) or, in other words, “the pleasure in sameness and difference” (Cerquiglini: 1999, 36)10 . What differs Różne historyje from the aforementioned edition, however, is the number of texts and their variety which is repeatedly stressed in the title. Obviously, there is no single strand or motif binding them together; even Michałowska (1965, 114) noticed distinct thematic inconsistency in this work. Nonetheless, I will try to argue that even though the idea of composition based on interweaving themes is not perfectly consistent, at least in the rudimentary state presented below, we can

9 Examples of such sources are countless. They can also be found among manuscripts from the Dominican library in Lviv, the place where Nargielewicz resided as a lecturer of theology: Archive of the Polish Dominican Province in Cracow, ms. 735. See also Danysz: 1921; Ulčinaitė: 1984; Montusiewicz: 1984, 206–209; Niedźwiedź: 2009; Pawlak: 2009. 10 It is almost impossible to refrain from noticing how important and potentially fruitful the concept of textual fluidity is in regard to the early modern period, especially when it comes to manuscript culture.

133

134

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

easily trace at least some thematic regularities. To achieve this, I will first abandon the modern classification of motifs used by Michałowska (ibid., 112–113) and work on a more rudimentary level, performing the simple task of naming what we see as we read. For example, in the middle of the work, we can identify a sequence of texts about faithfulness of women: 14–1811 ; stories 11–18 also form a sequence on women’s flaws, such as curiosity, talkativeness, greed and unfaithfulness. The motif of faithfulness, along with lawful and unlawful children in stories 16–18, recurrs in stories 26–27. On the other hand, stories 28–30 present a recurrent theme of children beginning their adult life by forcing their will on their family: a son insists on inheriting the crown while his father, the king, is still alive; Prince Peter from Provence and the Israeli aristocrat Magdalene decide to leave home despite the objections of their parents and guardians. On a more general level, misleading appearances can be recognized as the subject of stories 2, 5, 7, 9–10, 16–18, 23–26, 29–30. We should stop here, as at this point we may feel the need of some sort of standardization, since in this kind of working reconnaissance it is easy to oscillate between separate categories such as turning points (e.g. departure from home), moral themes (curiosity, greed) or popular topics (misleading appearance), because in fact every one of them can potentially be regarded as a binding factor or a link. At the same time, it can be said that those links lack continuity, various entities come and go, as soon as we grasp one theme it disappears and reoccurs a few stories later in a different form, sometimes as a marginal incident, forcing upon the reader the necessity of constant search, and evoking a feeling of confusion in the critic. There is also one more important matter worth mentioning that permeates many narratives in RH simply because it was felt and described as the essence of romance and was declared numerous times in many works of this kind. At the end of Magielona we find a short monologue on fate that boils down to a sentence from Seneca: “Nemo confidat nimium secundis. Nemo desperet meliora lapsus”. Fortune changes and the verdicts of fate and God are unknown. The only certainty lies in the inevitable and sudden changes of fate and events that can eventually lead to a fortunate ending. Interestingly enough this truth, closing a typical romance, was swiftly echoed by the opening of Historyja o światowym życiu, świątobliwym dokonaniu i szczęśliwym na ziemi i w niebie uwielbieniu Świętej Magdaleny [The Story of the Worldly Life, Saintly Passing Away and Fortunate Worship on Earth and in Heaven of Saint Magdalene] that came right afterwards (Nargielewicz: 1965, 317). The appearance of such a claim in a romance and novella placed next to each other is quite symptomatic. It provides yet another connection between texts which, after all, form an “involuntary literary borderline of two genres” and for that very

11 I am referring to the sequence of narratives in RH outlined by Michałowska (1965, 64–65).

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

reason they are bound to share a plethora of similarities from motifs, characters and topics, to narrative structures and rules governing the development of events. Does this diversity discredit the coherence of Różne historyje? I believe not, it manifests what was already announced in the title and it can be argued that the logic of variety gives the reader the freedom to identify the connections between texts that suit their liking: “Prawda im trudniejsza, tym jest przyjemniejsza, a poznanie, które wiele kosztuje, jest wyżej cenione” (“The more difficult is to achieve the truth, the more pleasing it is, and cognition which costs a lot of effort is in higher esteem”; Pelc: 1993, 169). Consequently, the method employed is not undermined as incapable of finding one main link for all stories just because there may be no such singular, let us say thematic, strand – coalescence in this case may depend on a different rule, that of uniformity in disharmony or concordant discord. In medieval romance collections and compositions of various texts, narrative sequences were not always organized according to clear and precise principles, although at the same time, rooted in the aesthetics of return, “continuation was the first principle of this literature” (Cerquiglini: 1999, 36). Part of the inheritance of early modern romance was, then, variance of form and structure as well as the generic drive towards narrative continuity which made it possible to sequence stories of various kinds that were focused around a recognizable, but not fixed, set of attributes. To repeat this yet again, this generic property was manifested in various medieval cycles of romances, manuscripts and editions of Gesta romanorum, and in different novelistic cycles as well as in printed and manuscript collections of romances and novellas12 . It is true that in many cases what they represented in the early days was the individual liking of readers and scribes, not the authors, but in later periods we clearly observe the appearance of similar compositions, or cycles, that bear a different kind of authority deriving not from the audience receiving texts and arranging them for themselves, but from authors (if we are to hold this somewhat dubious opposition) organizing them for others to read. Those copositions represent what I have referred to as continuous narrative sequences. In descriptions of medieval romances, this term is used to describe cycles of texts forming a clear continuation or reshaping of a particular story, thus it describes texts with a strong fictional relationship, usually created by different authors and sometimes even during a long time span. The baroque incarnation of the continuous narrative sequence would take the path of placing alongside various stories gathered around a similar topic or topics with more or less direct fictional references. As an author and reader, Nargielewicz must have been well acquainted with both this tradition as well as with baroque aesthetics,

12 Despite a large number of studies on particular genres and certain works we still lack a comprehensive and detailed study of early modern prose collections.

135

136

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

thus more than anything else ‘varietas’ should be considered as a rule governing the composition of Różne historyje13 . So, it may be claimed that the RH manuscript could in fact be a precious collection purposefully made for potential reader(s) rather than just an accidental repository created only for the safe keeping of quite a few texts. Even so, I would like to claim that what those arguments show is the lack of facts about the history of the codex and the dangers of substituting the missing information with attractive interpretations of what could have happened, what the author wanted, etc. Probably someone could come up with other additional hypotheses about the nature of that codex, and although I am mostly in favor of the second one presented here, what I would propose instead of simply promoting it, is basing editorial decisions on a few undisputable facts. The manuscript of Różne historyje is a complete and coherent autograph fair copy; although we do not know who ordered the binding of it, we have no reason to doubt that the arrangement of texts was changed in any unauthorised way in that process. Also, the overall appearance of the manuscript should satisfy both editors who are concerned with the author’s intentions and those interested solely in the document itself, because in its current state it is the only reliable source of information about the text and the work preserved in manuscript form and entitled Różne historyje. Moreover, Nargielewicz created a composition, generically composite but nevertheless coherent, that is based on binding two branches of literary tradition. He followed the practice of collecting stories in a continuous narrative sequence, which was as old as the genres themselves, reaching back to their medieval and renaissance roots and still practiced in the seventeenth century. At the same time, this kind of composition went along the lines of baroque aesthetics favoring variance and complexity. In this view, generical variety within RH does not have to be at odds with the coherence of authorial composition. Neither does it testify to a poor theoretical awareness of the composer. Putting all this into editorial perspective means that a comprehensive and reliable scholarly edition of Różne historyje must take as its subject the whole set of texts gathered under this title, that is novellas as well as romances. No more and no less. In this case, however, finding a solution in a particular case does not solve the bigger problem which caused the controversy in the first place for the very reason that it underlies our critical attitude towards works similar to RH. Part of the problem with such compositions, especially in manuscript form, lies partially in our lack of knowledge and interest in arrangements which at first seem vague or

13 I am referring to ‘varietas’ mainly with regard to the composition of RH, but it could be easily extended on the broader field of style. About the characteristics of Nargielewicz’s style see KruszewskaMichałowska: 1965, 94–213; Michałowska: 1970, 266–274.

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

indistinct. This is because they are cluttered with a variety of materials or writings, sometimes on a number of topics and by several authors, or are anonymous (cf. Niedźwiedź: 2009, 91–92). Predominant editorial principles have also taught us a certain way of dealing with manuscripts. Hidden behind modern labels, the old trustworthy Lachmannian school encourages us to treat such manuscript clusters of texts as repositories of textual witnesses, not as works on their own right, and that is mostly because this editorial school derives from a modern view on textuality. Although the so-called Lachmannian method was used primarily on medieval literature, it was meant to shape it according to the preferences of a modern audience raised on print, not on manuscript culture. Although this approach may still be instructive in some textual situations, in most it may lead to misunderstandings or, even worse, to eliminating from critical attention manuscript collections as distinct cultural objects, and with them an important piece of knowledge about manuscript culture. Collections like Różne historyje and Antypasty małżeńskie are discussed by scholars only if they contain one or two works that are for some reason unique (like Nargielewicz’s reworkings of Gesta romanorum) or of celebrated authors (like Hieronim Morsztyn). With a few notable exceptions, the Pawl. 3 codex being one of them, the main focus in such cases is exclusively on particular works, not on the collection as such. Unlike printed works, early modern manuscripts were unique testimonies of literary taste and visions of how the writer perceived his works, and how he shaped their perception. At the same time, manuscripts were deemed to change in the course of transmission, in which every new version differed somehow from others while still remaining a record of the same work. According to Stephen Nichols, this remarkable nature of manuscript texts was the result of a “generative force of transmission” (Nichols: 2011, 77). All of this may seem familiar but is it really? What I would propose as a general rule, which applies not only to the case of Nargielewicz’s manuscript, is a wide investigation into, as well as recognition and description of early modern manuscript culture as such, and in its particular local representations. In other words, before asking the question “to what extent is this particular manuscript corrupt?”, we should ask “what shaped it? what did accurate transmission and faithful representation mean in the times it was created? Do we know any similar codices and, if so, what do they tell us? If they do not serve the reconstruction of the works they carry, are they of no importance at all?” By the above mentioned investigation and recognition of textual culture, I mean not only theoretical, but also bibliographical work that will reveal the existence of different kinds of codices, created in different social configurations, both secular and clergy, and will lead to their description. Only after fulfilling this task, having fully understood the nature of manuscript textuality in its communicative and perceptual contexts, can we begin to think about editing it accurately. Certainly, many observations and theoretical propositions can be found, for example in new

137

138

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

philological studies, social text approaches, fluid text theory, etc. Labels, of course, are secondary; more important are the conceptual tools that will allow us to grasp and manage this phenomenon. And in this regard, those schools work very well as general overviews, but they are not sufficient for local conditions because of their general approach, and because they use either medieval or modern manuscripts as example material. This demand for a materialistic shift is not just an easy way out when we choose documents instead of critical editions, in which there is usually an attempt to reconstruct the work on the basis of different media. It actually reveals a pronounced reluctance to create histories of texts when we do not know enough about them, and expresses the will to accept manuscript histories which we would have otherwise ignored.

Bibliography Primary Sources Historie świeże i niezwyczajne (1961), Teresa Kruszewska (ed.), Warszawa: PIW. Historja o cesarzu Otonie (1928), Julian Krzyżanowski (ed.), Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności. Historye rzymskie. Gesta Romanorum (1894), Jan Bystroń (ed.), Kraków: Akademia Umiejętności. Nargielewicz, Tomasz (1965), Różne historyje z różnych wiarygodnych awtorów wybrane a dla zabawki przystojnej i przestrogi rozsądnej każdego stanu ludzkiego w ten mały snopek zebrane i ułatwionemu od swoich trudności czytelnikowi dla rozerwania melancholicznej fantazyjej podane pracą pisarza takiego, który sam spróbował dobrego i złego, Teresa Kruszewska-Michałowska/Krystyna Stefanicka (ed.), in: Teresa KruszewskaMichałowska, “Różne Historyje”. Studium z dziejów nowelistyki staropolskiej, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 221–334. — [1689–1692], Różne historyje z różnych wiarygodnych awtorów wybrane a dla zabawki przystojnej i przestrogi rozsądnej każdego stanu ludzkiego w ten mały snopek zebrane i ułatwionemu od swoich trudności czytelnikowi dla rozerwania melancholicznej fantazyjej podane pracą pisarza takiego, który sam spróbował dobrego i złego, ms. Ossolineum Pawl. 3.

Secondary Sources Bohuszewicz, Paweł (2009), Gramatyka romansu. Polski romans barokowy w perspektywie narratologicznej, Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Mikołaja Kopernika.

“The pleasure in sameness and difference”. Editing the Works of Tomasz Nargielewicz OP (†1700)

Bruckner, Matilda Tomaryn (2000), The Shape of Romance in Medieval France, in: Roberta L. Krueger (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Romance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 13–28. Bryant, John (2002), The Fluid Text. A Theory of Revision and Editing for Book and Screen, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Busby, Keith (2008a), The Manuscripts of Chrétien’s Romances, in: Norris J. Lacy/Joan Tasker Grimbert (ed.), A Companion to Chrétien de Troyes, Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 64–75. — (2008b), Narrative genres, in: Simon Gaunt/Sarah Kay (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Medieval French Literature, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 139–152. Cerquiglini, Bernard (1999), In Praise of the Variant. A Critical History of Philology, Betsy Wing (transl.), Baltimore/London: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Cybulski, Łukasz (2017), Krytyka tekstu na rozdrożach. Anglo-amerykańska teoria edytorstwa naukowego w drugiej połowie XX wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IBL PAN. — (2019), Retoryka tekstologii, Teksty Drugie 2, 93–107. — (2022), “Nowe niebo duchowne…” – dzieło Tomasza Nargielewicza OP? Atrybucja autorstwa, Pamiętnik Literacki (in print). Danysz, Antoni (1921), Jezuicki kanon lektury starożytnych autorów i przykład jego stosowania w szkole polskiej, in: idem, Studja z dziejów wychowania w Polsce, Kraków: Skład Główny Książnicy Polskiej, 157–193. Dąbrówka, Andrzej (2019), Ars sine scientia nihil est. Respons na koreferat dra Łukasza Cybulskiego, Teksty Drugie 2, 108–116. Dąbrówka, Andrzej/Gacka, Dotora/Kazańczuk, Mariusz (2019), Jak wydawać twórczość Tomasza Nargielewicza? Stanowisko Pracowni Literatury Średniowiecza IBL PAN w sprawie edycji krytycznej kodeksu Ossolineum Pawlik. 3, Teksty Drugie 2, 82–92. Gacka, Dorota (2013), Mediewalizm, prezentyzm – klucze do rozumienia “Historyi o Otonie” Tomasza Nargielewicza, in: Andrzej Dąbrówka/Maciej Michalski (ed.), Oblicza mediewalizmu, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskiego Towarzystwa Przyjaciół Nauk, 53–80. Gałuszka, Tomasz (2010), Kara więzienia w późnośredniowiecznej polityce penitencjarnej dominikanów polskich, Kwartalnik Historyczny 4, 65–79. Gaunt, Simon (2000), Romance and Other Genres, in: Roberta L. Krueger (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Romance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 45–59. Huot, Sylvia (2000), The Manuscript Context of Medieval Romance, in: Roberta L. Krueger (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Romance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 60–77. Kazańczuk, Mariusz (2013), Barokowy romans na kanwie średniowiecznej fabuły. O “Magielonie” Tomasza Nargielewicza, in: Andrzej Dąbrówka/Maciej Michalski (ed.), Oblicza mediewalizmu, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskiego Towarzystwa Przyjaciół Nauk, 33–52.

139

140

Łukasz Cybulski (Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw)

Kruszewska-Michałowska, Teresa (1965), “Różne Historyje”. Studium z dziejów nowelistyki staropolskiej, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. Krzyżanowski, Julian (1962), Romans polski wieku XVI, Warszawa: PIW. Liu, Yin (2006), Romance as Prototype Genre, The Chaucer Review 4, 335–353. Mack, Peter (2004), Elizabethan Rhetoric. Theory and Practice, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Michałowska, Teresa (1970), Między poezją a wymową. Konwencje i tradycje staropolskiej prozy nowelistycznej, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. — (1972), Romans XVII i 1 połowy XVIII wieku w Polsce. Analiza struktury gatunkowej, in: Janusz Pelc (ed.), Problemy literatury staropolskiej, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, vol. 1, 427–498. Montusiewicz, Ryszard (1984), Kultura retoryczna kolegiów w XVII i połowie XVIII wieku, in: Barbara Otwinowska (ed.), Retoryka a literatura, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 193–210 Nichols, Stephen (2016), Mutable Stability, a Medieval Paradox. The Case of “Le Roman de la Rose”, Queeste 2, 71–103. Niedźwiedź Jakub (2009), Sylwa retoryczna. Reprezentacja kultury literackiej XVII i XVIII wieku, in: Iwona Dacka-Górzyńska/Joanna Partyka (ed.), Staropolskie kompendia wiedzy, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo DiG, 85–97. Pawlak, Wiesław (2009), “O pewnym sposobie naszych literatów, że przy niewielkim czytaniu mogą się łatwo wielkiemi erudytami pokazać”. Kompendia jako źródło erudycji humanistycznej, in: Iwona Dacka-Górzyńska/Joanna Partyka (ed.), Staropolskie kompendia wiedzy, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo DiG, 45–72. Pelc, Janusz (1993), Barok – epoka przeciwieństw, Warszawa: Czytelnik. Tanselle, Thomas (2005), Textual Criticism since Greg. A Chronicle, 1950–2000, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. Turner, James Grantham (2012), ‘Romance’ and the Novel in Restoration England, The Review of English Studies 63, 58–85. Ulčinaitė, Eugenija (1984), Teoria retoryczna w Polsce i na Litwie w XVII wieku. Próba rekonstrukcji schematu retorycznego, Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich. Wright, Glenn (2005), The Fabliau Ethos in the French and English Octavian Romances, Modern Philology 4, 478–500.

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament1

Introduction The Lithuanian New Testament that appeared in Königsberg in 1701 was the first complete Lithuanian translation of the New Testament to appear in print. Until then it had been translated into Lithuanian at least three times: it had been part of the complete Bible translations undertaken by Johannes Bretke (Jonas Bretkūnas) and Samuel Boguslaus Chylinski (neither of these translations was printed but both are extant in manuscript form), and a third version, by Jan Borzymowski the Elder, is mentioned in the records of the Lithuanian Evangelical Reformed Synod. The so-called Bythner New Testament came into readers’ hands in the early years of the 18th century. It was long in the making, and its changing fortunes reflect shifts in the view which the Reformed Protestants took of the importance of the Lithuanian language and its use in printing. Compiled in Kėdainiai and printed in Königsberg, the so-called Bythner version of the New Testament is special in that it was intended for readers both in the Grand Duchy and in Lithuania Minor. The Soviet Lithuanian Bibliography lists two impressions from the same typeset, differing only by their title pages and by the preface by Bernhard von Sanden prefixed to the second. Both impressions are extant in a sizeable number of copies held by libraries in Lithuania, Poland, Latvia and Germany (LTSR bibliografija: 1969, 50–53). Interestingly, most copies of the second impression listed in the Soviet Lithuanian Bibliography as being in Lithuanian collections are defective, with the title page lacking. In his History of the Lithuanian Bible (1816, 29–30) Ludwig Rhesa also mentions a third version with a preface by Samuel Bythner. In Rhesa’s opinion this preface, consisting of a number of congratulatory formulae in solemn Latin, contributes nothing relevant to the history of the Lithuanian Bible. The only thing of interest to us here is that it was allegedly written by Samuel Bythnerus, Superattendens ecclesiarum Evangelicarum Lithuanicarum, hinc inde dispersarum2 . This preface is said to have been contained only in some copies, and none of them seems to have survived. Canon XXV of the Provincial Synod held in Bielica between July 30 and August 9, 1702, contains

1 I wish to thank Łukasz Cybulski and Kristina Rutkovska for their valuable editorial comments and my husband Axel Holvoet for his help with the English version of this article. For the remaining shortcomings I am solely responsible. 2 Samuel Bythner, Superintendent of the Lithuanian Evangelical churches dispersed over many places.

142

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

the news of the printing of the New Testament as well as words of thanks for the initiator of its translation and publication, Samuel Bythner (ChBšalt: 102 doc.). The translators are not named, and we can only guess who they were. The dedication for Frederick I, King of Prussia, contained in the edition intended for Prussian Lithuania, is signed by “the ministers and elders” of the Reformed Churches, but there is no mention of Bythner. It is probably because of the acknowledgement in the Synodal proceedings that Bythner is widely held to be the author of this translation (Aliulis: 1989; Biržiška: 1960; Citavičiūtė: 2006; LTSR bibliografija: 1969; Rhesa: 1816; Stang: 1932). In library catalogues, Bernhard von Sanden and Friedrich Schuster, the authors of the prefaces, are sometimes erroneously referred to as translators (e.g. in the Lithuanian National Library catalogue), though von Sanden knew no Lithuanian and Schuster states clearly in the preface that his part was that of an editor. Virtually no research has been carried out into the circumstances of the compilation and publication of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament, the authorship of the translation, its translation sources and its reception. It is mentioned in reference works by subsequent translators and researchers of the Lithuanian Bible such as Jakob Quandt (1735, 14–15), Ludwig Rhesa (1816, 25–31), Friedrich Kurschat (1864, 20), Vaclovas Biržiška (1960, 356–360), Jonas Reitelaitis (1912, 249–250) and others. The Bythner New Testament has been used as a source of linguistic data by historians of the Lithuanian language: quotations from the 1701 New Testament and comments on its language can be found in Bezzenberger (1877), Kazlauskas (1968), Palionis (1967) and others. In spite of all this there is no single special study of the New Testament translation. More recent works mentioning the Bythner New Testament rarely go beyond what had already been established by previous authors. In the absence of more recent research Rhesa’s Geschichte der litthauischen Bibel (1816), recently republished in Liucija Citavičiūtė’s edition of Rhesa’s selected works (Citavičiūtė: 2011), is still relevant today. As far as the language is concerned, the attempt undertaken by the editors to provide a translation adapted to the needs of congregations in different dialectal areas of Lithuania was not successful. Neither in Prussian Lithuania nor in the Grand Duchy did readers find the text easy to understand. The linguistic features characteristic of Reformed writers from Kėdainiai were not appreciated in Prussian Lithuania (Quandt: 1735, 15; Jöcher: 1751, 116). In the Grand Duchy, the Bythner New Testament never gained popularity, perhaps because of the numerous editorial changes made with the Prussian-Lithuanian reader in mind. Formulations diverging from current ecclesiastical usage seemed objectionable to Reformed ministers, who would soon find a text better suited to their expectations in the New Testament translated by Philip Ruhig and others (Reinhold Rozenberg, Christoph Rebentisch, Hiob Naunynas) under the supervision of Jakob Quandt, printed in Königsberg in 1727. The Bythner New Testament seems, however, to have been read not only by Protestants, but also by Roman Catholics. The Gaigalaitis Collection of the National

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Mažvydas Library in Vilnius holds a copy of the Bythner New Testament on whose title page the mention of the book having been printed “at the behest of the most gracious King of Prussia etc. etc.” has been carefully erased and overpainted with the IHS monogram of the Jesuit order, and from which the Latin title page and Schuster’s preface have been torn out.

Illustration 1: The title page of Bythner’s New Testament, with dedication to the Prussian King erased and overpainted with the monogram of the Jesuit order. Reproduced from a copy held by the Lithuanian National Library, shelfmark GC407.

This and similar evidence for clandestine diffusion of the Bythner New Testament in the Grand Duchy points to the sorely-felt gap created by the lack of a Roman Catholic Bible translation, a gap that was definitively closed in the early 20th century by the publication of Juozapas Skvireckas’ translation. More than a hundred years after it was printed, the Bythner New Testament was used by Samogitian Bishop Juozapas Arnulfas Giedraitis (Józef Arnulf Giedroyć) in preparing a

143

144

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

Catholic translation of the New Testament (1816), and new editions of the Bythner New Testament appeared in 1844 and 1846 (Aliulis et al.: 1989, 673–674). The 1701 New Testament is still awaiting its researchers. We have no study of the circumstances of its translation, the people who contributed to it and the features of its language, with its relation to the source texts and to earlier Lithuanian Bible translations remaining obscure. In the main part of this article I will attempt, on the basis of the prefaces to the 1701 New Testament, to provide the bibliographical information I have been able to collect concerning Bythner and other persons involved in this Bible translation project, and the proceedings of the Lithuanian Reformed Synod (held by the Wróblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and the Martynas Mažvydas National Library), to present the general picture emerging from the extant source materials concerning the circumstances of the compilation of the 1701 New Testament, its translators and editors. In the final part I will raise the question of the translation sources and the possible use of earlier Lithuanian Bible translations.

The historical context of the Bythner New Testament as reflected in the proceedings of the Lithuanian Evangelical Reformed Synod At the turn of the 17th century the position of the Lithuanian language among Reformed Protestants grew stronger, and the printing of Lithuanian books became a ground for competition between the religious communities. The Evangelical Reformed churches therefore had to confront the question of a Lithuanian Bible translation. By the mid 17th century, however, as war broke out against Sweden and Muscovy and the so-called Deluge ravaged the country, the idea of a Lithuanian Bible translation seemed far off. Then, unexpectedly, the question was put on the agenda of the 1661 convocation of the Synod, held in Kėdainiai, by Samuel Boguslaus Chylinski, a bursary holder of the Reformed Szwabiszki foundation, who, amid this tide of hardship engulfing the Grand Duchy, had translated the whole Bible into Lithuanian during his stay in England and arranged for the printing of the Old Testament (up to Psalm 40) in London3 . After having presented the whole of his translation – both the printed and the manuscript parts – to the Convocation, he was given permission to continue the printing after a careful check of the translation, to be carried out by Jan Borzymowski, Superintendent of Samogitia, and Teodor Skrodzki (ChBšalt: doc. 30). Unfortunately the correctors expressed unfavourable

3 More can be found on Chylinski and his Bible translation in Kavaliūnaitė: 2008; 2015 and 2019.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

opinions on the quality of Chylinski’s translation and the printing of the Old Testament in London was discontinued. As we can see from the source documents, the initiators behind the decision to stop the printing of the Chylinski Bible were Jan Borzymowski and the delegate sent to England by the Synod to collect support for the Reformed churches of Lithuania, Jan Krzysztof Kraiński (ChBšalt: doc. 51). The motives were manifold. The Synod was interested most of all in garnering English support for the reconstruction of Reformed churches in Lithuania, while a Lithuanian Bible had ceased to be a priority. On the other hand, as the Lithuanian Bible project was already under way with the support of many English scholars and men of letters, the idea came naturally to Samogitian Superintendent Jan Borzymowski, appointed corrector of Chylinski’s Bible, to have his own translation printed instead of that of a young and not widely known student of divinity. The Synodal records show that at about that same period Borzymowski started working on his own version of the New Testament, and on June 7, 1663 the Vilnius Provincial Synod decided that Borzymowski’s translation, rather than Chylinski’s, should be printed in London (ChBšalt: doc. 53). At Kraiński’s initiative, the Synod requested the loan and conveyance to Kėdainiai of Jonas Bretkūnas’ manuscript Lithuanian Bible translation, which was to serve as a model in reviewing Chylinski’s Old Testament translation (ChBšalt: doc. 53). In his report on his mission to England, Kraiński cites several letters addressed to him by Borzymowski, suggesting that these two Synod delegates had joined their efforts in preventing the printing of Chylinski’s Bible. At the same time they were not averse to the idea of a Lithuanian Bible being published in England. They thought it could be commercially profitable in Prussian Lithuania, and Kraiński even wrote in his report: “Rozumiałbym żeby i to była rzecz potrzebna jescze raz rewokować go per Delegatum in Lithvaniam, ż eby Ecclesia utatur labore, i we rs yj e j j e go n i e p o stp onow a ł a c a l e z go ł a, dla jego zbrodni i uporu.”4 (ChBšalt: doc. 51). Ultimately, Borzymowski and Kraiński were successful in ensuring that the printing of the Chylinski Bible was stopped. On June 7, 1663 the Vilnius Provincial Synod decided that another delegate should be sent to England in the person of Mikołaj Minwid, who was to recommend the printing of a New Testament translation made by Jan Borzymowski jointly with other ministers instead of Chylinski’s version (ChBšalt: doc. 53). Charles II’s Privy Council was, however, unable to assess the relative merits of the two translations. Chylinski rejected the correctors’ sweeping disparagement of his translation, which was not supported by references to specific translation mistakes (ChBšalt: doc. 56). The final decision was therefore simply not to resume the printing.

4 “I think he (Chylinski) should, through the delegate’s efforts, be summoned once more to Lithuania, s o t hat t he C hu rche s m i g ht g ai n t he b e nef it of h is work and h is t r ansl at i on m i g ht not b e disp arage d only on account of his evil deeds and obstinacy”.

145

146

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

Almost twenty years went by before the Synod took up the question of a Lithuanian Bible translation again. The Vilnius Provincial Synod of June 30, 1680 requested Jan Borzymowski the Younger, the son of the above-mentioned Samogitian superintendent, to put his father’s manuscripts in order. A new translation project, to be supervised by Mikołaj Minwid, superintendent of the Transvilian Church District, was launched. Stanisław Monkiewicz, Samuel Bythner and Samuel Lipski were appointed translators, and editorial tasks were entrusted to Stanisław Monkiewicz, Jan Borzymowski (the Younger) and Samuel Bythner (ChBšalt: doc. 69). One year later, the proceedings of the Vilnius Provincial Synod of June 15, 1681 contain an entry saying that the New Testament manuscripts entrusted to Transvilian superintendent Minwid were destroyed in a fire that broke out in the Biržai manse (ChBšalt: doc. 72). Ingė Lukšaitė doubts whether the manuscript could really have been destroyed, as an inventory which Minwid drew up of the losses caused by the fire does not mention such an item (Lukšaitė: 1970, 37). If the manuscript was indeed consumed by the fire, the question of a new translation obviously had to appear on the agenda. The Synod proceedings, however, do not reflect any dramatic change of circumstances calling for concerted action: we find no reference to the formation of a new team of translators and editors, no discussion of the translation sources to be used, or of the competences of possible translators. The only entry that could be relevant here is from the proceedings of the Provincial Convocation of Dubingiai for July 7–9, 1682, where it is stated that Mikołaj Minwid is entrusted with supervising the process of translation, revision and printing of a Lithuanian Bible. Jan Borzymowski the Younger and Samuel Bythner are appointed translators (ChBšalt: doc. 83). In the years to follow we find regular entries in the Synod proceedings emphasising the importance of the undertaking as well as reaffirming the Synod’s earlier canon authorising Mikołaj Minwid, superintendent of the Transvilian District, to represent the Synod in all dealings connected with the Bible translation (ChBšalt: doc. 86; 88; 90; 91; 92). Minwid died in 1688 after having served for some time as the Synod’s delegate charged with recovering the proceeds from the collection for the Lithuanian Bible initiated by Chylinski. Canon 4 of the proceedings of the Provincial Synod of Zabłudów, inaugurated on June 4, 1690, contains the decision to send the Bible translation to the press: Desiderijs Chwalcow B[ożych] w Dystrykcie Zawilejskim zostaiących, akomodując się Synod S[więty] z dawnych czasów zaczęte Opus, przedrukowanie Biblij Litewskiej iż dotychczas według dawnych Kanonow Synodowych do efektu nie przyszło, teraz mając już Nowy Testament na litewski język przełożony i do przedrukowania snadnego sposób podany, aby przynamniej ad interim Nowy Testament był wydrukowany, ad effec-

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

tuandum hoc negotium Wieleb[nemu] Ks[iędzu] Seniorowi Zawilejskiemu committitur 5 (ChBšalt: doc. 94).

The Elder of the Transvilian District was, at that time, Samuel Bythner. Canon 26 of the same Synod brings the news of the death of Mikołaj Minwid and the assignment of the sums left over from the proceeds of the English collection: part is to cover expenses for translation work, and part is entrusted to Samuel Bythner, who has committed himself to having the Bible translation published as soon as it is completed. To what extent the translation was completed at that moment, and in what measure individual translators had contributed to it, is not clear. Eight years had gone by since the fire at the Biržai manse, so that there had been ample time to bring a new translation project to fruition. Yet seven more years had to elapse before the Provincial Synod held in Bielica in 1697 could finally announce that Bythner had submitted the first part of the New Testament translation and the ministers Jan Paterson, Thomas Ramsay (Ramza), Karol Gierdwil and Aleksander Skomin were charged with giving the whole translation a final check and sending it to the press (ChBšalt: doc. 100). Five more years were needed for Bythner to be able to present the printed New Testament to the Provincial Synod of Bielica (ChBšalt: doc. 102). We can thus distinguish five stages in the proces of preparation and publication of the New Testament that is now associated with Bythner’s name: 1. In 1680 a search is launched for Jan Borzymowski the Elder’s manuscript translation, and the proces of revision and preparation for the press can begin. This task is entrusted to Stanisław Monkiewicz, Samuel Bythner, Samuel Lipski and Jan Borzymowski the Younger. 2. In 1682, the loss of the New Testament manuscript in a fire at the Biržai manse is announced. The supervision of all translation work is put in the hands of Mikołaj Minwid, whereas Jan Borzymowski (the Younger) and Samuel Bythner are appointed translators. 3. In 1690, after the death of Mikołaj Minwid, Samuel Bythner is entrusted with supervising the editing and publishing process of the Lithuanian New Testament, whose translation is now complete.

5 “Consenting to the request of God’s worshippers in the Transvilian District, the Holy Synod [has decided] that, as the task of printing a Lithuanian Bible, undertaken many years ago, has still not come to fruition in conformity with the canons of previous synods, now that we have a complete version of the New Testament ready for the press, ad interim at least the New Testament should be printed, and the supervision of this task is entrusted to the Reverend Elder of the Transvilian District.”

147

148

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

4. In 1697, the completion of the translation work is announced and ministers Jan Paterson, Thomas Ramsay (Ramza), Karol Gierdwill and Alexander Skomin are entrusted with the final revision. 5. In 169? the text is in the hands of the editor, who does what he can to make it more palatable to the readers from Prussian Lithuania. As can be seen from the Lithuanian prefaces by Friedrich Schuster, contained in both print versions of the New Testament, the language editor is Schuster himself. The printing is started. A Latin preface is added by Bernhard von Sanden. Princess Luise Charlotte Radziwiłł and King Frederick I of Prussia each donated 500 guilders toward the printing of the New Testament (ChBšalt: doc. 98), and what Mikołaj Minwid had been able to recover from the proceeds of the collection that had been organised in England for the printing of the Chylinski Bible (£37) was also used to cover part of the printing expenses. (ChBšalt: doc. 94). Minwid had, moreover, obtained a donation of about £100 from William Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury (ChBšalt: doc. 78 and 81). Considering the length of the translation and editing process, which was spread over two decades, and the large number of people involved in the undertaking, it is legitimate to pause once more over Bythner’s actual contribution, as well as that of others, to the New Testament text that appeared in 1701. We may also raise the question if this translation owes anything (and, if so, how much exactly) to earlier Lithuanian versions of (parts of) the New Testament: Jonas Bretkūnas’ manuscript translation of the whole Bible (1579–1590) (BNT), Bartholomaeus Willent’s Gospels and Epistles (1579) (VEE) and Chylinski’s manuscript New Testament (1660) (ChNT). Borzymowski the Elder, whose translation was to become the basis for the projected New Testament, served as corrector of Chylinski’s translation, and it is likely that Chylinski’s translation was found in Borzymowski’s library after his death. If this was the case, it would have been natural for those charged with a new translation to draw inspiration from it, albeit critically. In the period preceding this new translation project, the Reformed Protestants had published two postils: the so-called Morkūnas Postil (1600) (MP) and the Sum of the Gospels, which appeared as part of the Book of Christian Devotion (1653) (KN). The pericopes contained in these books could also have been an additional translation source.

The people involved in the making of the 1701 New Testament We know little about the people involved in the translation and editing of the Bythner New Testament. They were mostly Reformed ministers or officials of the Synod (superintendents), some of whom taught at the grammar schools of Biržai and Kėdainiai. They had received a thorough training at foreign universities and

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

had spent considerable time abroad. As the available data concerning them are scattered over many sources, some of them are brought together here in succinct form. Samuel Bythner Samuel Bythner, who was part of the New Testament project from the very beginning when the decision was made to prepare Jan Borzymowski the Elder’s version for the press until the publication of the new translation, was born in Poland around 1632. He was the son of Martin Bythner, Elder of the Transvilian District (?–1673), who was descended from the German gentry. Samuel Bythner was educated at the Słuck grammar school and subsequently graduated from the University of Frankfurt on Oder. Between 1673 and 1687 he was minister of the Naujamiestis congregation. In 1687 he was appointed intendent of the Vilnius District, to advance a year later to the position of superindentent of the Transvilian District and Elder of Biržai. In 1698, having been appointed Samogitian superindendent, he decided to settle closer to the Prussian border and moved to Kėdainiai. He entertained a close relationship and regular correspondence with the Prussian court preacher Daniel Ernst Jabłoński, who was instrumental in his obtaining political support from Prussia (Grużewski: 1912; Bythner to Jabłoński, VU Library Catalogue), and he also corresponded with Johann Richard Fehr, Councillor to the Prussian King (VUB F4-(A205)15929–15933), as well with another unidentified Royal Prussian Councillor (VUB F4-(A231)17970, 17972). It was through Bythner’s advocacy that in 1701 King Frederick I of Prussia allowed a Calvinist church to be established in Königsberg (which then belonged to the Samogitian Reformed Church District), to serve the needs of Polish and Lithuanian Reformed Protestants fleeing to Prussia. In 1705 this Calvinist centre was expanded with a printing house. The old Kėdainiai printing house had been transferred to Słuck in 1670, and in 1698 the Synod of Żuprany entrusted Bythner with arranging its relocation to Königsberg. Samuel Bythner and Jerzy Rekuć were jointly in charge of the printing house. In 1710 Bythner fell victim to the plague and died (Studnicki: 1937). Bythner was a loyal champion of the interests of the Reformed Church. His rise to a leading position in the Evangelical Reformed community took place against a backdrop of fierce interconfessional strife in which Roman Catholicism was already prevailing. In the first decade of the 18th century the Catholics sought to gain a firm footing in the last strongholds of Calvinism, Kėdainiai and Słuck. The Reformed churches in these cities narrowly escaped a Catholic takeover, and that only after the Prussian King had threatened retaliation against the Catholics of East Prussia. In the letters Bythner wrote, in defence of his co-religionaries, to Johann Fehr, Counsellor to the Prussian King, and to Daniel Ernst Jabłoński, Superintendent of the Reformed Protestants of the Grand Duchy, he described

149

150

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

the grievous plight of the Reformed congregations and their increasingly desolate churches, complaining, for example, about a military levy of 800 thalers imposed on the Reformed community of Kėdainiai by the Vilnius voivode Michał Wiśniowiecki, the sum of which exceeded the congregation’s complete assets. Bythner often had to intervene for his Reformed brethren, requesting help, for example, in recovering the Kėdainiai manse, founded by the Radziwills, or in having Reformed services brought back from the outskirts to the centre of Tilsit, etc. On June 22, 1707, Bythner complains, in a letter to Fehr, about the reproaches which the Vilnius bishop, K.K. Brzostowski, had cast on the Reformed Protestants for seeking help from a foreign ruler. In response, Bythner points out there is no alternative to this, as in their own country the Protestants have no patrons left to protect them from persecution (Lukšaitė: 2003; Jovaiša: 2006; Grużewski: 1912; Łukaszewicz: 1842 and 1870). Apart from his role in the translation and publication of the Lithuanian New Testament, Bythner has no known achievements in the domain of Lithuanian writing. He is credited with having published a catechism published in 1680 in Königsberg, entitled Pradžia pamoksla Del Mažu Weykialu […] (PP 1680) (Biržiška: 1960, 357; VUB catalogue), but the language of the New Testament quotations in this little work differs markedly from that of the 1701 New Testament, so that the authorship of the catechism remains disputed. The following quotations from the Bythner New Testament and the Catechism clearly show the differences: Matt 26:28 PP 17,13 Tay eaſt krauias mano nauia Teſtamenta kurs uʒu ius ir uʒ tułus ißileia ant atłaydima grieku. BtNT Nes tas ira kraujas mano naujo Teſtamento kurſai pralietas bus uź daugel nt atłéidimo griekû. “For this is my blood of the new Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins”6 . John 6:57 PP 18,23 Kas manę ragauja per manę bus giwas BtNT Taip ir kas manę wáłgo / gijwas bus del manęs. “As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me.”

Bythner is the only person to be involved in the production process of the 1701 New Testament from its very inception until its completion, and he certainly deserves a large share of the credit for it. Achievements in the domain of Lithuanian writing were not, however, Bythner’s main concern. No Lithuanian texts can be ascribed

6 All English renderings of Bible quotations are taken from the Authorised Version.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

to him with certainty. His efforts to have a Lithuanian New Testament printed for Reformed Protestants unable to read Polish were notable, but they were mainly organisational – he took care of financial matters and of the printing process, but whether he actually worked on the text is hard to tell, just as it is difficult to evaluate the share the other translators and editors mentioned in the Synod proceedings had in the production process. He was the man who kept up relations with Königsberg in confessional matters, arranged protection for Protestants from the Grand Duchy seeking refuge in Prussia, worked towards strengthening the Protestant spirit, and, in collaboration with Bernhard von Sanden and Friedrich Schuster, had the New Testament translated in Kėdainiai adapted to the needs of both Lutheran Lithuania Minor and the Calvinists of the Grand Duchy. Jan Borzymowski (the Elder) Jan Borzymowski the Elder was born on October 11, 1610 in Kėdainiai. He was educated at the Kėdainiai grammar school and subsequently in Szydłowo and Słuck. In 1636, he matriculated at Leiden University, but subsequently went on to study at the Franeker Academy. There he defended a thesis entitled Disputatio theologica, in qua discepatur de questione hac: An quod quis tenetur credere, id omne sit verum? (Borzymowski: 1637). After graduating he became a catechist at Kėdainiai and was later appointed a preacher and minister at Naujamiestis. From 1653 onward he was a preacher in Kėdainiai and Samogitian superindendent, later also co-elder of the Vilnius District. At the end of his career he was superintendent of the two main Reformed Church Districts, Samogitia and Vilnius. Borzymowski was fluent in Lithuanian and took a lively interest in the publication of Reformed literature in Lithuanian. He was one of the principal initiators and authors of the Book of Christian Devotion (1653, KN). As a man of considerable learning, his influence on the Synod was felt strongly. Borzymowski’s involvement in the compilation of a Lithuanian New Testament is discussed separately above. He died in Kėdainiai in 1670 (Biržiška: 1960, 308–310; ChBšalt: doc. 8; Lukšaitė: 2000, 270; Postma, van Sluis: 1995, 71, 73; PSB vol. 2). Jan Borzymowski (the Younger) Jan Borzymowski the Younger was born around 1645 in Naujamiestis. He was co-elder of the Vilnius District and preacher. He was educated at the Kėdainiai grammar school and after having served for a year as a catechist, was appointed minister at Lubcza and home preacher to Frąckiewicz-Radzymiński, standardbearer of Nowogródek. In 1670 he became head of the Słuck grammar school, and from 1685 he was co-elder of Vilnius. Borzymowski died in 1687 in Vilnius, so that he must have worked some seven years on the New Testament translation, starting

151

152

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

from 1680 (Biržiška: 1960, 380–381; ChBšalt: doc. 69; Łukaszewicz: 1843, 231; PSB vol. 2). The proceedings of the Provincial Synod of Zabłudów held shortly after Borzymowski’s death mention that the translation of the New Testament had been brought to completion, which suggests that Borzymowski the Younger may have been one of the two authors of the basic translation text, alongside Bythner. Mikołaj Minwid Mikołaj Minwid (?–Biržai 1688) was the son of Reformed minister Samuel Minwid, Transvilian and Samogitian superintendent, home preacher to the Radziwills, subsequently minister at Šventežeris and Seirijos. Samuel Minwid was involved in the compilation of the Book of Christian Devotion, the most important publication of the Reformed Protestants. His son Mikołaj was also a Reformed minister in the church districts of Transvilia and Samogitia. He put a lot of effort into organising the printing of a Lithuanian Bible, seeking financial support for this in England. His first mission to England with the aim of supervising the printing of the New Testament text the Synod had decided to publish instead of Chylinski’s translation (1663) was unsuccessful. After his return from his mission Minwid was first appointed minister in Raseiniai, then in 1667 he was transferred to Kėdainiai and, finally, to Naujamiestis. In 1671 he became co-elder of Samogitia, and two years later he was elected to a committee charged with supervising the archives of the Reformed Churches of the Grand Duchy. In 1673 he moved to Kėdainiai again after having been appointed superintendent of Samogitia. From 1679 onward he was Transvilian superintendent (PSB vol. 21/2). After his second mission to England to explore the possibilities of having the Bible project revived (1675), Minwid was entrusted with supervising the translation and publication of a Lithuanian New Testament. He took a broader view of his task and extended his plans to a complete Lithuanian Bible. In a letter from 1680 addressed to Stanisław Niezabitowski, cupbearer of Kalisz, he writes that he has received from Jan Borzymowski the Younger a complete corrected copy of all the books of the Old Testament. There can be no doubt that he is referring to Chylinski’s manuscript. Minwid writes that Krzysztof Kraiński should be persuaded to put at the Synod’s disposal the Royal letters patent concerning the printing of a Lithuanian Bible in London (ChBšalt: doc. 27 and 71). The Synod hoped to obtain King Charles II’s support for the Lithuanian Bible, as Chylinski had done earlier. In a letter written in 1680 to William Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, who had graciously received Minwid during his first mission, the Synod requests the matter be brought before the King (ChBšalt: doc. 70). An extant copy of the archbishop’s written decision concerning the Lithuanian Bible states that the Dutch Church in London has disbursed the sum of £37, being the remainder of the proceeds of the earlier collection towards the printing of the Chylinski Bible. Sancroft also commits himself to supplementing this amount with funds from an additional collection.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

He furthermore urges the petitioners to find more competent people to assist them in producing a high-quality translation. Sancroft finally ordains that whatever is left from the printing of the Bible should be used towards the subsistence of Lithuanian Reformed alumni in England (CBšalt: doc. 73). Memorandum No. 4 of the proceedings of the Synod held on June 15–21, 1681 states that Borzymowski the Elder’s manuscript New Testament has been lost in a fire, and memorandum No. 96 of the same Synodal records requests Minwid to continue his endeavours to have a Lithuanian Bible printed abroad (ChBšalt: doc. 72), which would suggest the parts of Chylinski’s Old Testament not yet printed in London were now ready for the press. Having received £100 from Sancroft, Minwid embarked on his journey back to Lithuania, buying paper for the Bible printing during a stop in Danzig, and hoping the amount still missing would be forthcoming in England (ChBšalt: doc. 74–81). In the canons of every session of the Lithuanian Reformed Synods concerning the Lithuanian Bible starting from 1685 (Żuprany, Bielica, Kajdanowo) Minwid receives official assurance as to his mission to supervise the production of the Lithuanian Bible, until the proceedings of the 1890 Synod of Zabłudów finally bring the news of Minwid’s death and the Synod’s authorisation for the printing of the New Testament under the supervision of Samuel Bythner (ChBšalt: doc. 94; ASJL 1626–1637: 2011, XXII, XXXVI, 41, 43, 45, 64, 67, 78, 95, 99, 115, 122, 129, 149, 158, 170, 171; PSB vol. 21; Łukaszewicz: 1843, 217). Jan Paterson Jan Paterson was born around 1659 in a family of Lithuanian Reformed Protestants. We know that from 1681 onward he studied in Berlin, Frankfurt on Oder, Marburg and Leiden. From 1686 he was a Reformed minister in Kėdainiai and rector of the Kėdainiai grammar school; he later served as a minister in Kelmė and Biržai, finally to rise to the rank of co-elder of the Samogitia and Transvilian superintendent. In addition to his efforts towards a Lithuanian translation of the New Testament, he also compiled a new pastoral agenda for the Lithuanian Reformed Churches. It was printed in Königsberg in 1695, but no extant copies are known (Biržiška: 1987, 136; ChBšalt: doc. 93; PSB vol. 25/2). Paterson was among the New Testament editors appointed by the 1697 Provincial Synod of Bielica. Thomas Ramza (Ramsay) Thomas Ramza (Ramsay) was a Lithuanian Reformed minister of Scottish descent. Ingė Lukšaitė established that he was an orphan, brought up by the Kėdainiai alderman Levinston (Lukšaitė: 1970, 23). After attending the Kėdaniai grammar school he matriculated at the University of Franeker in 1671, and afterwards spent a year at Groningen University as a student of divinity. According to Nicholas Hans, he

153

154

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

was awarded a bursary intended for Lithuanian alumni enabling him to study in Edinburgh (Hans: 1958). Michael Ayre has found evidence showing that Ramza must have studied at Cambridge for some time, though he was not matriculated there because at that time the university did not officially award degrees to Nonconformist Protestants (Ayre: 2019, 350). Between 1677 and 1691, Ramza lived in London. Between 1692 and 1701 he was rector of the Kėdainiai grammar school. He also served (1698–1699) as a preacher at the Kėdainiai Reformed Church and from 1699 onward as preacher of the White-Russian District. The last known letter by Ramza was sent in 1703 from Župrany to the Reformed Synod. In England Ramza had Latin dedications printed for James, Duke of York, the Duke of Albermale and a number of prominent personalities at Cambridge University7 . Archives of England hold letters written by Ramza to William Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, the elders of the Dutch Congregation in London, John Spencer, master of Corpus Christi College, Elias Ashmole and others. The letters are mostly panegyrical in tone and abound in complaints about his miserable conditions, concluding with a request for support allowing him to make the journey back to Lithuania. In one of his letters to Archbishop William Sancroft, Ramza said he had founded a school of grammar and rhetoric. From 1680 onward Ramza was one of the team of scholars hired to translate Robert Boyle’s chemical and medical treatises into Latin (Hunter, Davis: 1999–2000). To this day Cambridge University Library is in possession of a leather child’s shoe made in the Polish fashion, with a note stating it was donated by the widow of Thomas Ramza, translator of the New Testament into Lithuanian (Ayre: 2019, 350–354; ChBšalt: doc. 100; Oates: 1961). In fact, Ramza’s widow was giving her husband more credit than he deserved. In 1697 the Provincial Synod of Bielica entrusted Ramza together with Jan Paterson, Karol Gierdwill and Alexander Skomin to look through the New Testament translation, which was already completed.

7 Climax Panegyrica vitae serenissimi ac celsissimi principis, Jacobi Eboraci & Albaniae Ducis, &c. Fabrefacta per T. Ramsaeum. Londini, Excudebat Nathaniel Thompson, Anno Domini MDCLXXXII. Apostrophe ad Idaliam Matrem de Redivivo Caesare, Serenissimo Invictissimoque Carolo II Britanniarum Monarcha, &c. Occasione Statuae in Regio Londinatum Excambio positae. Authore T. Ramsaeo Lituano. Londini, Typis Johannis Darby, Impensis Authoris. MDCLXXXV. Elogium faelicis fati Britanniae, sub auspiciis serenissimi ac potentissimi Gulielmi III. Mag. Brit. Franc. & Hyber. Regis; exerti A Supremo Gentis Senatu. Concinnatum a Thoma Ramsaeo Lituano Theol. Londini, Impensis Authoris Anno MDCLXXXIX (for further details see Oates: 1961). A few works by Thomas Ramsay are available through Pro Quest’s EEBO (Early English Books Online) corpus: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo2/A45761.0001.001?c=eebo;c=eebo2;g= eebogroup;rgn=works;view=toc;xc=1;rgn1=author;q1=Ramsay [accessed on 01.12.2021].

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Karol Gierdwill Little is known about Karol Gierdwill. Between 1655 and 1661 and from 1686 onward he was a lector (church reader) at Biržai and deputy director of the Biržai grammar school. He was still in Biržai in 1711 (ChBšalt: 100; Lukšaitė: 1970, 29–30). He was among the editors appointed by the 1697 Bielica Synod to look through the New Testament translation. Aleksander Skomin The only things that are known about Alexander Skomin are, first, that as a minister with a good command of Lithuanian he was appointed as a coadjutor in Biržai in 1686 (Lukšaitė: 1970, 30), and, secondly, that many years later, in 1694 he apposed his signature, together with Samuel Bythner, to the inventory of the Reformed Church of Beinorava and its manse (LNMB RF: F93–134). In 1697, Skomin was entrusted, together with others, with editing the Lithuanian New Testament translation. Bernhard von Sanden the Elder Von Sanden was a Lutheran theologian and professor at the University of Königsberg. He was born in 1636 in the East Prussian town of Insterburg. After graduating from Königsberg University he travelled in Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, France and England. On his return he served as a deacon and later on as a pastor in Königsberg. He was first the pastor’s deputy and then subsequently pastor of the Altstadt Church and Consistory member. Having obtained his doctor’s degree in theology he became professor extraordinarius in 1675 and ordinarius in 1682. Six years later, he rose to the rank of primarius professor of divinity and senior court preacher. In 1690 he was appointed general superintendent (Ober-Aufsicht) of the churches of Prussia. 1701 he participated, together with Bishop Benjamin Ursinus, in the coronation of King Frederick I of Prussia and was himself ordained a bishop. According to Jöcher, it was von Sanden who supervised the editing and publication of the 1701 New Testament. He died on April 19, 1703 (Jöcher: 1751, 116). Von Sanden certainly played a leading part in having the New Testament translation adapted to the needs of the Lithuanians of East Prussia and prepared for the press. He furthermore provided it with a Latin preface in which he gave an overview of the translations of the Bible in the vernacular languages and of Lithuanian religious literature. This preface is contained in one of the two impressions of the Lithuanian New Testament that appeared in 1701. There is, however, no evidence that he was involved in the translating and editing process itself, and there is no reason to assume that he knew Lithuanian.

155

156

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

Friedrich Schuster Friedrich Schuster was a Lutheran pastor of considerable achievements in publishing Lithuanian-language religious texts for the needs of the Lithuanian churches of Prussia. Born in 1671, he attended the Cathedral School and matriculated at Königsberg University on April 16, 1689. At the time when the New Testament translation was being edited and adapted to the linguistic peculiarities of Prussian Lithuania, he was an aspirant pastor. After the printing of the New Testament he was appointed pastor at Budwethen. Friedrich Schuster was the editor of Klein’s third hymn book (Kleinas: 1705) and the author of six hymns added to Klein’s hymnal (Michelini: 2012, 27–53). He was also one of the two compilers of a bilingual edition of Luther’s Small Catechism printed in Tilsit and intended for the Prussian Lithuanians (Engel: 1722). This was the first bilingual catechism for Prussian Lithuania. The church order appended to it is in Lithuanian only. Only one complete copy of this catechism is extant in Halle University Library8 ; a defective copy is kept in Riga9 . Schuster died in Budwethen on January 21, 1750 (Biržiška: 1963, 15–16; MLE, katekizmas). His involvement in the 1701 New Testament project probably went beyond his authorship of one of the two prefaces: he was almost certainly the editor, or one of the editors, entrusted with adapting the Kėdainiai translation to the needs of Prussian Lithuanians.

Versions and structure of the Bythner New Testament Bythner’s New Testament was compiled in Kėdainiai at the initiative of the Reformed Protestants of the Grand Duchy but published in collaboration with the Lutherans of Prussian Lithuania. It was printed in 1701 in the Reussner printing house. It is extant in two versions, differing in their title pages and prefaces, but containing the same New Testament text. The manuscript of the translation is not extant.

8 Der kleine Catechismus D. Martin Luthers : Deutsch und Litthauisch : […] mit einhelliger Ueberinstimmung aller Ertz-Priester und Pfarrern in Litthauen/ Aufs neue in Tilsit Anno 1722. übersehen. (Bibliothek der Franckeschen Stiftungen Halle ; http://nbn-resolving.de/ urn:nbn:de:gbv:ha33-1-198041 [accessed on 01.12.2021]). 9 Der kleine Catechismus D. Martin Luthers: Deutsch und Litthauisch […] mit einhelliger Uebereinstimmung aller Ertz-Priester und Pfarrern in Litthauen / Aufs neue in Tilsit Anno 1722 uebersehen, Königsberg, 1722. = Maźas Katgismas D. Mertino Luteraus Lietuwißkay ir Wokißkay Ant Maloningiáusojo Prusû Karáliaus Isákimo wissû Wyskupû ir Klebonû Lietuwoj’ Sutarimu Iß naujo Tilźeje Mete 1722, pérweizdėtas. Ir Karaláuczuje iß spáustas (Academic Library of the University of Latvia, shelfmark D65572).

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

The first version, containing a dedication to Frederick I, King of Prussia, was presented to the King on the occasion of his coronation. The title page states that this is the first printed New Testament in Lithuanian, produced at the behest of the King of Prussia: “Naujas Teſtamentas Wieſzpaties musu Jezauss Kriſtaus, Pirmą kartą ant Swieto Lietuwiſchkoj kałboj, Ant Iſakimo Maloningiauſio Karalaus Prussu &c. &c. &c. Su didʒiu dabójimu perguldijtas o Ant Garbės Diewui Traicej‘ Szwentoj‘ wienatijam, Lietuwos źmonėms ant iſzganitingos naudos Iſzspáuſtas. Drukawojo arba iszspáude Spáustuwoj Reusnéro Karalaučiuj’, Métu MDCCI”10 .

Illustration 2: Title page of the Bythner New Testament bearing the statement that it has been printed at the behest of the King of Prussia. Reproduced from a copy held be the Lithuanian National Library, shelfmark LDA1/701.

10 “The New Testament of Our Lord Jesus Christ, translated for the first time into the Lithuanian language with great diligence at the behest of the most gracious King of Prussia &c. &c. &c, and printed for the greater glory of God, One in the Holy Trinity, and for the redemptive benefit of the people of Lithuania, at the Reussner printing house in Königsberg, in the year MDCCI”. Quoted from the copy held by the Wróblewski Library, shelfmark LK18/28.

157

158

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

The book consists of: 1) a Latin dedication to the Prussian monarch, signed by the Reformed ministers and elders together with the author of this Lithuanian version Samuel Bythner; 2) an address to the Christian reader, signed by “Frid[ericus]. Sigismund[us]. Schusterus / M[inisterii] Cand[didatus], collaborator on this translation”; 3) the complete New Testament; 4) Old Testament readings for the Sunday services and for festive days; 5) a list of the Epistles and Gospels to be read on Sunday and on festive days. The title page of the second impression does not claim that the Lithuanian translation presented to the reader is the first ever to be made, but instead emphasises that it is intended for the readers of both Prussian Lithuania and the Grand Duchy: “Naujas Teſtamentas Lietuwißkas / Su didʒiu dabójimu perguldijtas ir Lietuwnikams tiek Karalijſteje Pruſſôs tiek ir didźioje Lietuwoje nt ißmánimo sudawáditas / nůg Cʒijrû Lietuwnįkû. Su Prakalb ape pérguldimus Sʒ. Ráßto ing kałbas kiekwienai giminei prigimtas Bernhardaus von Ʒanden / D. Sén. Karalaucʒuje / Ißſpáustas nůg Potámkû Reuʒnėraus. Métu 1701.”11

11 “The Lithuanian New Testament, adapted by true Lithuanians with great diligence to the understanding of Lithuanians both in the Kingdom of Prussia and in Greater Lithuania. With a preface concerning the translations of the Holy Scripture into the languages native to all peoples by Bernhardus von Sanden. In Königsberg / Printed by the heirs of Reussner in the year 1701”. Quoted from the version in the repository of Old Lithuanian texts of the Institute for the Lithuanian Language: http://www.lki.lt/seniejirastai/db.php?source=26 [accessed on 01.12.2021]. It is based on the copy held by the Institute for Lithuanian Literature and Folklore, shelfmark B1172.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Illustration 3: Title page of the Bythner New Testament stating that the translation is intended for the faithful both in the Kingdom of Prussia and in Lithuania Major. Reproduced from a copy held by the Institute for Lithuanian Literature and Folklore, shelfmark B 591.

This impression is richer in content: the dedication to the King is followed by an ample Latin preface by Bernhard von Sanden, senior court preacher and general superindendent, professor of divinity at the University of Königsberg, and Friedrich Schuster’s Lithuanian preface is preceded by a page with errata in Latin. The New Testament text, the Old Testament readings for the Sunday services and for festive days and the list of Epistles and Gospels to be read on Sunday and on festive days are identical in both editions. The two impressions of the 1701 New Testament thus differ as to their title pages, the presence or absence of von Sanden’s preface, and the inclusion or omission of errata. We could surmise that, in an attempt to get the edition ready in time for Frederick I’s coronation on January 18, 1701, during which the monarch was to be presented with a copy of the newly printed New Testament, a shorter version was

159

160

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

first produced, without von Sanden’s preface but with a mention of the King’s merit in bringing about this important achievement. A second, supplemented impression with a list of addenda et corrigenda followed slightly later. In his preface von Sanden gives a broad historical survey of Bible translations, starting with the Septuagint and the Vetus Latina, and the Old Testament translations into Syriac, Coptic, Persian, etc. mentioned by St John Chrysostom. He then moves on to the Vulgate and the Armenian and Gothic Bibles, to conclude with an overview of the vernacular translations of modern times – Bulgarian, Moldovan, English, Spanish, Polish (the Leopolita Bible), Russian, Czech, German (the Luther Bible), Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Saami, etc. Von Sanden points out that the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, published in Madrid in 1667, also includes vernacular translations of the Bible. He emphasises the importance of Brian Walton’s ninelanguage Polyglot Bible. Von Sanden compares King Frederick to the Egyptian King Ptolemy II Philadelphus, who gave the order to have the Hebrew Holy Scripture translated into Greek. In the tenth section of his preface, von Sanden goes on to discuss Bible editions in the Baltic languages. He points out the dialectal differences between the Kingdom of Prussia and Lithuania Major, and he also mentions the 1545 Prussian Catechism. Among Lithuanian editions he describes or at least mentions Martynas Mažvydas’ Catechism, Lazarus Sengstock’s Enchiridion and Hymnal, Bartholomaeus Willent’s Gospels and Epistles, Johannes Bretke’s (Jonas Bretkūnas’) complete Bible translation, which remained in the manuscript, the 1600 Žemčiūga Teologiška (Margarita Theologica) translated by Simonas Vaišnoras, the 1625 Psalter of David edited by Johannes Rhesa, and Daniel Klein’s Lithuanian grammar. Von Sanden thinks that the extinction of the Prussian language has led to an expansion of the Lithuanian language area, which, in his view, creates the need for a Lithuanian New Testament for the use of the churches. He hails the publication of the Bythner New Testament, emphasising King Frederick’s personal merit in having brought it about. The Lithuanian preface by Friedrich Schuster, contained in both impressions, opens with the claim that “Naujas Teſtamentas Lietuwiſzkas negál geriaus pérgulijtas buti kaipo kada pagal Wokiſzko / Lénkiſzko / ir labiáuſay pagal Grėkiſzko Liezuwio graźey ſudawáditas tampa. […] Del tos prieźaſties ſtójos, jog ſzis Lietuwiſzkas pérguldimas […] źodźeis ir iſzmánimu kas ijpacźey labiáuſas muſu darbas buwo ſudera su nefalſzijwu Grėkiſzku lieźuwiu”12 (BtNT: xxxv–xxxvii). The new translation had been carried out in Kėdainiai, and its language was based mainly on the Samogitian dialect, but for the benefit of the readers of Prussian Lithuania, alongside words 12 “the Lithuanian New Testament could not have been better rendered than by finely shaping it after the model of the German, the Polish, and most of all the Greek tongue […] This is the reason why both in its wordings and in its interpretations – which were our main concern – the present Lithuanian translation […] is consonant mainly with the authentic Greek tongue.”

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

and expressions current only in the Grand Duchy. their counterparts in the dialects of Prussian Lithuania were added in brackets, e.g.: Pusćia (giria) “desert”; Dasiléist biaurijbes, nećijstatą darijt (Pérźengt wenćiawonijstę) “commit impurity, commit adultery”; Paszłáwinimas, szłáwint (Źegnone) “blessing”. Brackets were also used for marking words lacking in the original but added in translation for greater clarity or elegance of expression; this had already become standard practice in Protestant translations of the Bible (noted also for Polish Bible translations from Königsberg by Winiarska-Górska: 2017, 42). The Synodal records documenting the inception and progress of the New Testament translation project do not mention the question of the targeted readership. The decision to distribute the new translation in both Lithuania Minor and Major could have been based on pragmatic considerations, taking into account the size of the readerships and the important support of the King of Prussia. Schuster’s comments on the editorial process suggest that the efforts to adapt the language, especially the vocubulary of the translation, to the needs of readers in Prussian Lithuania constituted its final stage.

The question of the sources of the BtNT The discussion of how a translation source was sought for the new Bible edition should be placed in the context of the translators’ confessional identity and the communities that stood behind them, but it should also involve an analysis of the language of the translation. Unlike the Lutherans, who usually chose Luther’s Bible as the basis for their translations, Reformed Protestants made a point of translating “from the authentic sources”, that is, from the original languages. This is reflected in Schuster’s emphasis, in his preface, on the translations’s close adherence to the Greek; in rendering the meaning of the Greek text, however, he thought it important to profit from the experience of the German and Polish translators. It is unclear which German and Polish sources Schuster had in mind, and whether these were actually used in the translation process. The most plausible German source would have been the Luther Bible, and among Polish translations the Brest Bible (1563) and the Danzig Bible (1632), the most important Calvinist Bibles in Polish, are the most obvious candidates; for confessional reasons it is unlikely that the Catholic Wujek Bible could have been meant. More research is needed to establish whether direct influence of the Polish Protestant Bibles can be substantiated. As far as possible Lithuanian models are concerned, there were at that moment few Lithuanian versions of the Bible or its parts, and the translators must have been aware of all the available Lithuanian texts from which inspiration could be drawn. Borzymowski the Elder had access to Bretke’s manuscript translation of the whole Bible. If it should turn out that there was a detectable influence of the Bretke Bible

161

162

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

in BtNT, then that would corroborate Lukšaitė’s conjecture that Borzymowski the Elder’s translation was not destroyed by fire and that it could have served as a basis for the new translation. On the other hand, Borzymowski the Elder’s library must also have contained a copy of Chylinski’s manuscript New Testament, with whose correction Borzymowski had been entrusted, and it could also have been a source for the 1701 New Testament, the more since the Synod had instructed Borzymowski the Younger to collect all of his father’s manuscripts and to use them as a basis for the new translation. It is conceivable that after the fire at the Biržai manse, as the translation work had to be organised anew, the decision was made to use this translation as well. After the memorandum in the Synodal records about the fire at the Biržai manse, no mention is made of the need for organising a new translation team, which suggests that an existing Lithuanian text, or several existing texts, could have been taken as a basis. Other possible sources, apart from these manuscript translations, could have been the Lutheran Lithuanian Gospels and Epistles by Bartholomaeus Willent (VEE 1579) or the pericopes translated by the Reformed Protestants of Kėdainiai and contained in the Book of Christian Devotion (1653) as well as in Jokūbas Morkūnas’ Postil (1600). Though these publications covered but part of the New Testament text, they were freely available in Kėdainiai and could serve as models for translatiors. What then does the text of the Bythner New Testament show? Is it based on Jan Borzymowski the Elder’s translation, as was the stated intention of the Synod? How can we know whether its manuscript was really lost in a fire at the Biržai manse? We know that while working on his translation Borzymowski the Elder had access to Bretke’s manuscript Bible (ChBšalt: doc. 52), so that the influence of Bretkūnas’ translation on Borzymowski, who was to be one of its principal readers, is hardly doubtful. But a comparison of the 1701 New Testament with earlier Lithuanian translations does not reveal any direct influence of Bretke. As mentioned above, Bretke’s Bible translation had been brought to Kėdainiai from Königsberg at the request of the Synod. There is no evidence of its having been used in correcting Chylinski’s translation, and it would have been surprising if it had. The Synodal records suggest that the Synod decided to use Bretke in correcting Chylinski’s Old Testament while Minwid was charged with having Borzymowski’s translation of the New Testament printed in England. Bretkūnas’ manuscript had long been returned to Prince Radziwill’s library in Königsberg (ChBšalt: doc. 52) when the translation work for what was to become the Bythner NT was carried out in the Grand Duchy, so that direct influence on this translation must be excluded while indirect influence could be assumed only if we were sure that Borzymowski the Elder’s translation had not been consumed by fire, as the Synodal records claim. We do find correspondences with Bretke, but they are not conclusive as they are usually shared with Willent, sometimes also with Morkūnas and the Book of Christian Devotion. More often the translation coincides with Willent but not with Bretke.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Thus in Matt 4:6 Bythner’s NT has ir neßôs tawe ant rankų / idant nepaźeistumbei ant akmens kojos tawo “and in their [italicised in the Authorised Version – G.K.] hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone”, which echoes Willent’s ir turęs tawe ant rankû neschoti idant nepaßeistumbei ant akmens koyas tawa but for the fact that turęs neschoti (where the modal verb turėti seems to render the German modal verb werden […] tragen) is replaced with neßôs in conformity with the Greek ἐπὶ χειρῶν ἀροῦσίν σε. The choice of the verb pažeisti “hurt, wound” is repeated in Morkūnas’ Postil and the Book of Christian Devotion, and only Bretke stands out with the use of the verb ištikti “affect, strike, hurt” in his rendering ir ie ant Rankų tawe neschos, idant Koią tawa ne ischtiktumbei ant akmenio (with the variant ing akmenį). Any influence of Bretkūnas’ Bible on the Bythner New Testament could only have been mediated by Borzymowski the Elder’s translation. The fact that no such influence can be detected suggests that Borzymowski’s translation was indeed consumed by fire, and a new translation had to be done. Who were its authors? If it is known as the Bythner New Testament, there is a good reason for that. Bythner was the only person who took full responsibility for the whole translation project from its very inception in 1680, when, together with Borzymowski the Younger, Stanisław Monkiewicz and Samuel Lipski, he was charged with preparing Borzymowski the Elder’s translation for the press. Synodal records state that after the fire of 1682 the translation was in the hands of Borzymowski the Younger and Bythner. They worked together for five years, until the death of Jan Borzymowski the Younger. It is likely that at that time they had already translated most of the New Testament, for in 1690 the records of the Zabłudów Synod state that the translation is finished and authorisation is given for its printing. At this stage it was Bythner, now superintendent of the Transvilian district, who succeeded Minwid as the person in charge of the translation project. To what extent Bythner was at all involved in the translation and editing process during the seven years that followed is hard to tell. Jan Borzymowski the Younger’s share in the translation was probably no smaller than Bythner’s. But nothing can be said with certainty as to the contribution of individual translators and editors as the manuscript of the Bythner New Testament is not extant and no other writings from the hand of the appointed translators and editors facilitating their identification have come down to us. A certain influence of Willent’s Gospels and Epistles is, at any rate, undeniable. Usually, however, the matching text fragments can also be found, with some variation as to spelling, in the Book of Christian Devotion as well as in Morkūnas’ Postil. This can be seen in Luke 11:27, where Bythner has pagirtas (ißganijtas) źiwátas / kuris tawę neßiojo / ir krutis kurias źindei. This differs only in small details of spelling and morphology from Willent’s rendering Pagirts jra ßiwats / kuris tawe neschoia / ir krutis kurias tu ßindai, as well as Pagirtas ira ǯiwatas kurſay táwe neßioia / ir krutis kuriás tu ǯinday in Morkūnas’ Postil, and Pagirtás ʒiwatás / kurſay

163

164

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

tawe neſioio (sic!) / ir krutis kuriás ʒinday in the Book of Christian Devotion. Bretke’s rendering is an outlier: it diverges from Willent and has not inspired any of the subsequent translators: Ischganitas [editorial variant: palaimingas] ßiwatas, kursai tawe neschaia ir kreklai, kuros tu ßindai [with an editorial variant Kreklas, kurį tu ßindai] (BB). Establishing whether there is a direct influence of Willent or whether it was mediated by the Calvinist authors would therefore require some additional research. One thing is, however, clear: the Reformed translators whose texts are contained in the Bythner New Testament willingly drew inspiration from the translations of their Lutheran predecessors. Willent’s Gospels and Epistles in particular seems to have been available to them and whole sentences appear to have been taken from this text. The Bythner New Testament shows an undeniable overlap with Chylinski’s New Testament, which suggests that the translators could have let themselves be inspired by this version. This seems all the more likely since the manuscript New Testament which Chylinski had brought to Lithuania is likely to have been held in Borzymowski the Elder’s library and must ultimately have come into the hands of Borzymowski the Younger. It is, however, very difficult to prove any direct influence of Chylinski’s translation. In those places where Bythner’s translation is closer to Chylinski’s it is also closer to the Greek original. Faithfulness to the Greek text is a feature which Chylinski’s translation inherited from its main source, the Statenvertaling; but it was also one of the professed aims of the BtNT translators. It would be hard to prove that Chylinski’s influence was involved if the translators of the Bythner NT could have arrived at a similar rendering by simply checking with the Greek text. In Acts 13:31 the BtNT has Kursai buwo regėtas per daug dienû nůg tû / kurie drauge su jů atėjo iß Galilėos Ieruʒalen, “And he was seen many days of them which came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem”. This clearly diverges from Willent and Bretke, whose renderings (VEE: Ir ghis passirode per daug dienu, BB Ir passirode per daug dienų [editorial variant: O ghis passirode per daug dienu]) follow Luther’s (vnd er ist erschienen viel Tage) in replacing the connecting relative clause of the Greek ὃς ὤφθη ἐπὶ ἡμέρας πλείους, “who was seen many days” with a main-clause construction and rendering ὤφθη with pasirodė, “appeared” (G ist erschienen). The Bythner NT exactly matches Chylinski’s rendering Kursey regietas buwo per daug dienu, but both versions may independently reflect the Greek source text. The relationship of the Bythner New Testament to previous Lithuanian Bible translations thus remains unclear and more research is needed to establish how much it owes to the Lutheran and Calvinist translating traditions that preceded it. Interestingly, however, there is hardly any doubt that it has, in its turn, deeply influenced a well-known Catholic translation of the New Testament, the Naujas įstatymas published in 1816 by Samogitian Bishop Juozapas Arnulfas Giedraitis (Józef Arnulf Giedroyć). Apart from changes in spelling, word order and sometimes morphology, the renderings are often identical, as can be seen, e.g., in John 1:30.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Bythner: Taſai ira ape kurį ſakiau: Eina paſkuy manę wijras kurs pirm manęs ſtójos: jog pirm buwo ne kaip aß; Giedraitis: Tasay ira, ape kuri sakiau: Eyna paskuy manęs wiras, kursay stojos pirm manęs: jog pirmiaus buwo, nekayp asz, “This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is preferred before me: for he was before me.”

In conclusion Our aim in this article has been to review the evidence available at present concerning the endeavours and historical processes among the Reformed Protestant community of the Grand Duchy that led to the publication of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament after the abandonment of the Lithuanian Bible project initiated in England by Samuel Boguslaus Chylinski. The compilation, editing and printing of the so-called Bythner New Testament is an interesting example of collaboration of Lutherans and Reformed Protestants in the history of Lithuanian Bible translating. The translation process itself, however, is shrouded in mystery. We do not know who the translators were, which source texts – German, Polish and Lithuanian – they consulted in addition to the Greek originals, and what kind of translation strategy they followed. For this article I have carried out but a very preliminary reconnaissance, comparing the Bythner text with a number of influential Lithuanian translations of the Bible or its parts. The Bythner New Testament is still awaiting a systematic philological investigation that will yield a better understanding of the place of this first printed Lithuanian New Testament in the history of Lithuanian Bible translation, both with regard to its relationship to its antecedents and to the influence it has undoubtedly exerted on subsequent translators.

Bibliography Primary Sources BNT – Navias Testamentas. Ing Lietuwischkų Ließuwį perraschitas per Ioaną Bretkuną Labguwos Pleboną. 1580. In: Biblia tatai eſti Wiſsas Schwentas Raſchtas, Lietuwiſchkai pergulditas per Jana. Bretkuna., Textedition des Bandes 7 der Handschrift: Das Neue Testament. Evangelien und Apostelgeschichte Labiau 1580, Biblia Slavica VI: Supplementum: Biblia Lithuanica 2.7, bearbeitet von Jochen D. Range, für den Druck eigerichtet von Stephan Kessler, Paderborn [et al.]: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2017. Borzymowski, Johannes (1637), Disputatio theologica, in qua discepatur de questione hac: An quod quis tenetur credere, id omne sit verum? Franekerae: Balckius. BtNT1 – Naujas Testamentas Wieszpaties musu Jezauss Kristaus / Pirmą kartą ant Swieto Lietuwischkoj kałbo / Ant Isakimo Maloningiausio Karalaus Prussu &c. &c. &c. Su didʒiu

165

166

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

dabójimu perguldijtas o Ant Garbės Diewui Traicej‘ Szwentoj‘ wienatijam, Lietuwos źmonėms ant iszganitingos naudos Iszspáustas. Drukawojo arba iszspáude Spáustuwoj Reusnéro Karalaučiuj’, Métu MDCCI. BtNT2 – Naujas Testamentas Lietuwißkas / Su didʒiu dabójimu perguldijtas ir Lietuwnikams tiek Karalijsteje Prussôs tiek ir didźioje Lietuwoje nt ißmánimo sudawáditas / nůg Cʒijrû Lietuwnįkû. Su Prakalb ape pérguldimus Sʒ. Ráßto ing kałbas kiekwienai giminei prigimtas Bernhardaus von Ʒanden / D. Sén. Karalaucʒuje / Ißspáustas nůg Potámkû Reuʒnėraus. Métu 1701. ChNT – Kavaliūnaitė, Gina (ed.) (2019), Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija, vol. 2: Naujasis Testamentas Viešpaties mūsų Jėzaus Kristaus lietuvių kalba duotas Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski. Tomus 2: Novum Testamentum Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Lthvanicâ Linguâ donatum a Samuelo Boguslao Chylinski, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas. Digital version http://www.chylinskibible. flf.vu.lt. ChBšalt – Kavaliūnaitė, Gina (ed.) (2015), Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija, vol. 3: Chylinskio Biblijos istorijos šaltiniai = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski. Tomus 3: Fontes ad Historiam Samueli Boguslai Chylinski Bibliae Lithuanicae Illustrandam, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas. GĮ – Giedraitis, Juozapas Arnulfas (1816), Naujas įstatymas, Vilnius. Digital version at http://seniejirastai.lki.lt/db.php?source=73. KJV – The Holy Bible, Conteyning the Old Testament and the New […] Imprinted at London by Robert Barker, Printer to the Kings most Excellent Majestie Anno Domini 1611. KN – Knyga nobažnystės (1653), Kniga Nobaznistes Krikśćionißkos […] Kiedaynise, Drukawoia Joachimas Jurgis Rhetas. MP – Morkūnas, Jokūbas (1600), Postilla Lietuwiszka Tátái est / Ižguldimás prástás Ewángeliu ąnt kožnos Nedelios ir Szwentes per wisus metus […] Wilnvy / Per Jokubą Morkuną […]. PP – Pradžia pamokslo (1680), Pradzia pamoksla del mazu Weykialu […] Katechismas maziasnis […] Königsberg. PSB – Polski Słownik Biograficzny (1935), Warszawa: Nakładem Polskiej Akademii Umiejętności. VEE – Vilentas, Baltramiejus (1579), Euangelias bei Epistolas […] pergulditas […] per Baltramieju Willenta… Königsberg.

Secondary Sources Aliulis, Vaclovas et al. (1989), Šventojo Rašto lietuviškieji vertimai. Bibliografinis indeksas. 1579–1941, in: Naujasis Testamentas. Vertė Česlovas Kavaliauskas, Salzburg, 665–680. ASJL 1626–1637 – Liedke, Marzena; Guzowski, Piotr (2011), Acta Synodów prowincjonalnych Jednoty Litewskiej 1626–1637, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Ayre, Michael Broun (2019), The Scottish Community in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, 1630–1750, Vilnius: Humanitas. Bezzenberger, Adalbert (1877), Beiträge zur Geschichte der litauischen Sprache auf Grund litauischer Texte des XVI. und des XVII. Jahrhunderts. Goettingen: Robert Peppmüller. Biržiška, Vaclovas (1960), Aleksandrynas. XVI–XVII amžiai. Čikaga: JAV LB kultūros fondas. — (1987), Lietuvos studentai užsienio universitetuose XIV–XVIII amžiais. Redagavo ir papildė Mykolas Biržiška. Su Adolfo Šapokos įvadu, Čikaga: Lituanistikos instituto leidykla. — (1963), Aleksandrynas 2. XVIII–XIX amžiai, Čikaga: JAV LB Kultūros fondas. Citavičiūtė, Liucija (ed.) (2011), Martynas Liudvikas Rėza. Raštai. I tomas. Vilnius: Lietuvių literatūros ir tautosakos institutas. — (2006), Prielaidos lietuviškos knygos plėtotei Karaliaučiuje pirmajame XVIII amžiaus dešimtmetyje: Sekant Johano Jakobo Kvanto biografijos pėdsakais, Senoji Lietuvos literatūra 22, 239–267. Engel, Gabriel (1722), Der kleine Catechismus D. Martin Luthers: Deutsch und Litthauisch […] mit einhelliger Uebereinstimmung aller Ertz-Priester und Pfarrern in Litthauen / Aufs neue in Tilsit Anno 1722 uebersehen, Königsberg, 1722. = Maźas Katgismas D. Mertino Luteraus Lietuwißkay ir Wokißkay Ant Maloningiáusojo Prusû Karáliaus Isákimo wissû Wyskupû ir Klebonû Lietuwoj’ Sutarimu Iß naujo Tilźeje Mete 1722, pérweizdėtas. Ir Karaláuczuje ißspáustas. Grużewski, Bolesław (1912), Kościoł Ewangelicko-Reformowany w Kielmach. Rys Historyczny na dokumentach urzędowych, Warszawa: Rubieszewski i Wrotnowski. Hans, Nicholas (1958), Polish Protestants and their connections with England and Holland in the 17th and 18th centuries, The Slavonic and East European Review 37, 88 (Dec 1958), 196–220. Hunter, Michael/Davis, Edward (ed.) (1999–2000), The Works of Robert Boyle, London and Brookfield Vermont. Jöcher, Christian Gottlieb (1751), Allgemeines Gelehrten-Lexicon, Leipzig: Johann Friedrich Gleditschens Buchhandlung. Jovaiša, Liudas (2006), Protestantiškosios bažnyčios: “tylusis šimtmetis”, in: Vytautas Ališauskas (ed.), Krikščionybės Lietuvoje istorija, Vilnius, 2006. Kavaliūnaitė, Gina (ed.) (2019), Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija, vol. 2: Naujasis Testamentas Viešpaties mūsų Jėzaus Kristaus lietuvių kalba duotas Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski. Tomus 2: Novum Testamentum Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Lthvanicâ Linguâ donatum a Samuelo Boguslao Chylinski, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas. — (ed.) (2015), Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija, vol. 3: Chylinskio Biblijos istorijos šaltiniai = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski. Tomus 3: Fontes ad Historiam Samueli Boguslai Chylinski Bibliae Lithuanicae Illustrandam, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas.

167

168

Gina Kavaliūnaitė (Vilnius University)

— (2015a), Apie pirmųjų protestantiškų Biblijų vertimų į lietuvių ir lenkų kalbas vertimo metodus (remiantis Brastos, Gdansko, Bretkūno ir Chylinskio Biblijos vertimais), Senoji Lietuvos Literatūra 38, 13–60. — (ed.) (2008), Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija. Senasis Testamentas, vol. 1: Lietuviško vertimo ir olandiško originalo faksimilės = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski, vol. 1: Vetus Testamentum Lithuanicâ Lingvâ donatum a Samuelo Boguslao Chylinski. Unâ cum texto belgico, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. Kazlauskas, Jonas (1968), Lietuvių kalbos istorinė gramatika. Vilnius: Mintis. Kleinas, Danielius (1705), [Šusteris, Frydrichas, ed.]. Naujos su pritarimu wissu Baznicios musu Lietuwoje Mokitoju pagerintos Giesmiu Knygos Taipoieg Maldu Knygeles. Labjausey Baznycose Wartojimos Patogiey sutaisitos ir Szezey iszduotos, Karalauczuje Priderikio Reusnero palikta Naszle. Kurschat, Friedrich (1864), Zur Geschichte der littauischen Bibel, Evangelisches Gemeindeblatt 20–08–1864, Koenigsberg. LTSR Bibliografija (1969), Binkytė, E., Čyžas, T. ir kt. (ed.) LTSR bibliografija. Knygos lietuvių kalba 1 1547–1861, Vilnius: “Mintis”. Lukšaitė, Ingė (1970), Lietuvių kalba reformaciniame judėjime XVII a., Vilnius. — (2003), “Reformacijos Lietuvoje raida ir evangelikų bažnyčių istorija XVI–XVIII a.”, in: Arthur Hermann (ed.), Lietuvos evangelikų bažnyčios. Istorijos metmenys, Vilnius. Łukaszewicz, Józef (1870), Archeografičeskij sbornik dokumentov otnosiaščichsia k istorii sewierozapadnoj Rusii 8, Wilna. — (1843), Dzieje kosciołow wyznania helweckiego w Litwie II, Poznań: w Drukarni Orędownika. Michelini, Guido (2012), Mažosios Lietuvos giesmynai iki 1705 m., Res Humanitariae 11. MLE (2003), Mažosios Lietuvos enciklopedija, vol. 2, Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos institutas. Oates, J.C.T. (1961), An Old Boot at Cambridge, in: The Book Collector. Autumn, London. Palionis, Jonas (1967), Lietuvių literatūrinė kalba XVI–XVII a. Vilnius: “Mintis”. Postma, Ferenc/Van Sluis, Jan (1995), Auditorium Academiae Franekerensis. Bibliographie der Reden, Disputationen und Gelegenheitsdruckwerke der Universität und des Athenäums in Franeker 1585–1843, Leeuwarden: Fryske Akademy. Quandt, Johannes Jakobus (1735), In Christo herzlich geliebter Leser!, in: Biblia Tai essti Wissas Szwentas Raßtas, Seno ir Naujo Testamento, Pagal Wokißką Pérguldimą D. Mertino Lutaeraus, Karaláuczuje. Reitelaitis, Jonas (1912), Švento Rašto į lietuvių kalbą istorija, Vadovas 12, 47. Rhesa, Ludwig (1816), Geschichte der litthauischen Bibel. Koenigsberg: Hartungsche Hofbuchdruckerei. Stang, Christian (1932), “Archivalia”, in: Archivum Philologicum, vol. 3, 35–36. Studnicki, Wacław (1937) Bythner Samuel, PSB, vol. 3.

On the Genesis of the 1701 Lithuanian New Testament

Winiarska-Górska, Izabela (2017), Szesnastowieczne przekłady Pisma Świętego na język polski (1551–1599) jako gatunek nowożytnej książki formacyjnej. Warszawa: Zakład Graficzny Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego.

169

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

The implementation of the documents adopted by the Council of Trent was to ensure a comprehensive reform of the Church in capite et in membris, that is, as stated in the decree concerning the opening of the council, through “the advance and exaltation of the Christian Faith and religion […], the extirpation of heresies, […] the peace and unity of the Church, […] the reform of the clergy, […] the suppression and destruction of the enemies of the Christian name.” (Canons: 2011, 11)1 . Two of these documents directly concerned preaching: Decretum super lectione et praedicatione [Decree on Teaching and Preaching] adopted during the fifth session (17 June 1546), in particular chapter 2: De verbi Dei concionatoribus et quaestoribus eleemonysariis [Preachers of the Word of God and Questors of Alms]; and Decretum de reformatione [Decree Concerning Reform] adopted during the twenty-fourth session (11 November 1563), in which canon 4 specified who had the duty to deliver sermons (Canons: 2011, 24–28, 197–198). The resolutions of the Council of Trent were primarily of a disciplinary nature. Under the threat of Church punishments, they obligated all priests to deliver sermons and regulated matters related to preaching. The guidelines regarding the form and content of sermons formulated during the Council of Trent seem vague, but at least three circumstances must be taken into account in order to evaluate them properly. First, it was the intention of the Council Fathers that all documents be nuda et simplex (“bare and simple”) (O’Malley: 2013, 19), i.e. limited to what is essential and necessary, but at the same time universal and timeless. Secondly, preaching the Word of God was a priority, as evidenced by the fact that the decree concerning this was adopted as one of the first documents (cf. McGinness: 1980, 110)2 . Thirdly, the conciliar canons regarding preaching and their subsequent reception should be understood and evaluated in the context of the entire doctrinal and reformative work of the Council of Trent with which they are closely related (cf. Reiner: 1915, 523), just to mention the later canon on the founding of seminaries (Canons: 2011,

1 The study also uses the author’s previous work (cf. Pawlak: 2006 and 2016). 2 The history of the Trent decree super lectione et praedicatione was reconstructed in detail by Reiner (1915, 256–317, 465–523). The general history and the content of the decree in the context of the entire council are presented by Jedin (1957, 83–103), and O’Malley (2013, 89–102; cf. Giombi: 2013, 100–106).

172

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

177–181). The canon contributed to the rise in the intellectual level of the clergy and exerted a considerable influence on Church elocution (O’Malley: 2013, 212. Cf. O’Donohoe: 1957; Librowski: 1969; Kopiec: 2012; Gręźlikowski: 2013; Piela: 2013). “In its disciplinary or ‘reform’ goals, Trent saw itself as promoting a more effective ‘care of souls’. Contrary to its popular image, Trent was therefore a pastoral as well as a doctrinal council” (O’Malley: 2013, 17). The resolutions of the Council of Trent referred to the earlier initiatives aimed at renewing and developing preaching in Catholic Europe. The initiatives included, among others, Libellus ad Leonem X, a memorial of Paolo Giustiniani and Pietro Quirini written around 1513 in the form of a letter to the pope. The authors demanded a restriction on the privileges of regular (non-secular) clergy and postulated a return to a more ‘evangelical’ style, i.e. the style of preaching based on the Bible and patristic models (Giombi: 2013, 94–97; Giustiniani, Quirini: 1995). Echoes of these demands are also found in the provisions of the Fifth Council of the Lateran (Papal bull by Leo X of 19 December 1516, Supernae maiestatis praesidio, the chapter “on the manner of preaching” – circa modum praedicandi), repeated in later church legislation. Interest in the problems of preaching is also evidenced by the instruction prepared by Cardinal Gaspar Contarini at the behest of Paul III, issued in 1542 as the work of Cardinal Reginald Pole and entitled Litterae pontificiae de modo concionandi (Jedin: 1957, 465; McGinness: 1995, 33–35, 223; Gleason: 1993, 260–272). A little earlier, in 1538, the very same Contarini, as the Bishop of Belluno, drew up instructions for the clergy of his diocese. The instructions were a preview of subsequent documents of this kind issued by bishops throughout Europe (Hudon: 1989, 457–470). Attempts to reform the clergy also had an impact on the homiletics of the pre-Trent period (O’Malley: 2013, 40–41). The last phenomenon that left a deep mark on the theory and practice of preaching, both before and after the Council of Trent, was Renaissance humanism. Its influence on Church elocution can be described, in a simplified way, by the following two statements: first, Church elocution was based on Biblical and patristic foundations in accordance with the philological principle of a return to the sources; and secondly, it was subordinated to the rules derived from classical rhetoric. The best-known spokesman for the tendencies which were already observed in the preaching practice of the papal court in the second half of the fifteenth century (McGinness: 1980, 117; O’Malley: 1979b) was Erasmus of Rotterdam, the author (also well known in Poland) (Cytowska: 1972 and 1980; Backvis: 1968; Kacprzak: 2010) of the textbook Ecclesiastae sive de ratione concionandi libri quatuor published in 1535 (Weiss: 1974, 83–108; Kleinhans: 1978, 253–266; O’Malley: 1985, 1–29; Kilcoyne, Jennings: 1997, 5–24; Domański: 2001, 163–224; Kuran: 2007, 25–32). The work was a significant point of reference for later theoreticians of preaching and in a provocative way promoted the model of a sermon based on classical patterns (cf. O’Malley: 1985, 13, 29; Mack: 2001, 98), which – for a long time, though not without resistance – dominated the

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

style of religious elocution throughout Europe, not only its Catholic part (cf. O’Malley: 2013, 43–44; Fumaroli: 2002, 117–172; Taylor: 1997). Ecclesiastae had many editions and met with enthusiastic, though not uncritical, reception. According to John W. O’Malley, despite some noticeable analogies with the medieval artes, Ecclesiastae was a deliberate and effective attack against this trend in the homiletic tradition (O’Malley: 1985, 12–13). As a kind of humanist manifesto calling for a return to Biblical and patristic sources and for a reconciliation of preaching with classical rhetoric, it turned out to be extremely effective. Virtually all later authors identified themselves with these postulates, even those who, like Alfonso Zorrilla (in De sacris concionibus recte formandis, 1542), criticised Erasmus’s work as lengthy and impractical (O’Malley: 1985, 17–18; O’Malley: 1979a, 262–273). Ecclesiastae influenced the Catholic theory of Church elocution even after it was placed on the Index of Forbidden Books along with the other writings of Erasmus. There are no direct references to the classical rhetorical tradition in the conciliar documents on preaching, but the ‘spirit of humanism’, metaphorically speaking, hovers over them, and over the entire council. The Humanists with Erasmus at their head mounted one of the most successful propaganda campaigns in all history to convince Europeans of the excellence of their style of education, of the indispensability of the communication skills it inculcated, and of the Christian character-formation it promised to deliver. The reality of the Humanists’ schools surely did not always measure. […] By the time the Council of Trent met, the conviction was widespread that “all the well-being of Christianity and of the whole world depends on the proper education of youth” [Pedro de Ribadeneira], that is, education in the Humanistic mode (O’Malley: 2013, 45)3 .

This conviction found expression, above all, in the pursuit of a return to the Biblical and patristic sources in preaching practice, which is why the first part of the Decretum super lectione et praedicatione [Decree on Teaching and Preaching] consists of the chapter on the establishment of lectureship in Holy Scripture and the liberal arts (De instituenda lectione Sacrae Scripturae et liberalium artium). Regardless of the earlier attempts to reform the Church, it was the Council of Trent that oriented many of the changes in Church elocution which followed the Council. As stated by John W. O’Malley, in Catholicism after the council the pulpit entered into almost a golden age. As with all questions of historical influence, it is impossible to say how much of this great outburst of

3 Cf. “I teologi di Trento hanno riconosciuto la legittimità di un’arte oratoria cristiana” (Fumaroli: 2002, 125).

173

174

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

preaching was directly due to the council. Other important factors were at play, including the invigorating influence of the Humanist movement on preaching, the revived vigor of the mendicant orders, which were almost by definition “orders of preachers”, and the preeminence the Jesuits gave to preaching among their ministries. Still, the council insisted in two places that preaching was among the “principal duties” – or was perhaps the principal duty – of the bishop. […] The indisputable fact is that by the early seventeenth century Catholic clergy across the board had never before been engaged in preaching on such a scale, on so many different occasions, and in so many different forms. This enterprise was supported by sometimes massive theoretical treatises, the so-called ecclesiastical rhetorics, which told preachers how to do it. To this phenomenon, the council at least provided an impetus and was, therefore, a contributing cause (O’Malley: 2013, 257–258).

The resolutions of the Council of Trent were gradually adopted throughout the Church and implemented with varying degrees of success. In the case of provisions regarding preaching, their implementation took place primarily through administrative proceedings which referred to universal and particular Church law. It is worth mentioning canonical visitations during which bishops checked whether priests regularly gave sermons and whether they were qualified to do so. Countless episcopal instructions and synodal resolutions provided guidance in this regard as they regulated virtually all areas of religious life, including preaching. The synods were not limited to repeating the conciliar recommendations, but in a more or less creative way developed and adapted them to the local conditions (Bayley: 1980, 43–45; cf. Giombi: 2013, 106–112; Giombi: 1992, 73–102). In addition to synodal legislation, the issues related to preaching were regulated by the pastoral letters of bishops and the instructions of religious superiors. One of the best-known documents of this kind is the letter of Saint Francis de Sales from 1604, written in the form of concise homiletic treatises and known in Latin translation as Modus concionandi (Sales: 1662). Other examples include the letters of the Superior General of the Society of Jesus, Claudio Acquaviva, from 1599 and 1613 ([Acquaviva]: 1635, 294–297, 365–387; cf. Bayley: 1980, 57–58). The best-known example of reform activity in the spirit of the Council of Trent was the work of the Archbishop of Milan, St Charles Borromeo. During nearly twenty years of episcopal ministry, he convened eleven diocesan and six provincial synods. The decrees of these synods, Acta Ecclesiae Mediolanensis, published immediately and in 1582 collected in one volume that was repeatedly reissued, constitute a monument to the post-Trent legislation. Their significance goes far beyond the Church province of Milan. Subsequent editions of Acta spread all over Europe, with several dozen copies preserved in Polish collections alone, serving as a source of inspiration for other diocese heads, including Polish bishops (O’Malley: 2013, 260–261; Góralski: 1988; Headley, Tomaro: 1988; Boer: 2001, 127–131; Wojtyska:

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

1984, 27–46; Wojtyska: 1986, 527–549). Borromeo attached great importance to preaching and prepared extensive Instructiones de praedicatione verbi Dei (1566) with preachers in mind (Borromeo: 1890, col. 1206–1248; cf. Westervelt: 1993; O’Malley: 1993b, 139–157; McGinness: 1995, 42–44; Giombi: 1997, 69–80). Although the requirements set by this work were high and proved difficult to fulfil in practice, they had an impact on the quality of preaching, even at a relatively low, parish level. Similar activities were undertaken throughout Catholic Europe, initiating the ‘golden age of the pulpit’ (cf. Schneyer: 1969; Schütz: 1972; Panuś: 1999; Taylor: 2001; Edwards: 2004). Certainly, not all features of preaching in the second half of the sixteenth century and in the seventeenth century can be explained by the resolutions of the Council of Trent. As noted by John O’Malley, “within a year of the council’s closing, the Catholic body-social was thus moving into Tridentinismo, that is, into phenomena claiming origin in the council but in fact taking a step beyond it” (O’Malley: 2013, 263). This remark might also refer to Church elocution, which was influenced by various factors, not always in line with the intentions of the Council Fathers. Nevertheless, it can be said that the Council’s merit was not only in the formal and legal ordering of matters related to preaching, but also in a general increase in the level of Church elocution, and, in particular, its closer connection with the Bible, which was related to the concern for the proper formation of the clergy4 . The Trent or, more precisely, the post-Trent reform of preaching, also proved extremely fruitful for the theory of Church elocution. The first century after the Council of Trent was not only the ‘golden age of the pulpit’, but also the ‘golden age of homiletics’, which was the second method – after the administrative and institutional work mentioned above – of implementing conciliar canons regarding sermons. The two strategies were quite closely related to each other: first, the administrative activities undertaken by the Church generated a need for theoretical reflection, e.g. in the form of textbooks for the students of seminaries; secondly, theoretical reflection was expressed in documents and legal acts, which sometimes – like in the case of Instructiones de praedicatione verbi Dei in Milan – became more or less comprehensive guides on the theory and practice of preaching. It was, as described by Marc Fumaroli, a kind of “institutional rhetoric” which was more effective than any other, at least in the Catholic world (Fumaroli: 2002, 151)5 . In short, the theory of preaching found expression in various forms, not only in systematic scientific treatises or textbooks, but also in guides concerned with the practical application 4 Cf. chapter 7 of Decree concerning reform (Twenty-Fourth Session, 24 November 1563): “During the celebration of the Mass the Sacred Scriptures are to be explained” (Canons: 2011, 198–199). 5 S. Giombi (1998b) refers to this homiletic reflection as precettistica (regulations), as opposed to the relevant treatises and handbooks on the theory of preaching (trattatistica).

175

176

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

of the official documents of the Church, and in the sermons themselves, especially those that were addressed to the clergy or preachers and provided direct guidance on ars praedicandi6 . The first attempts to translate the conciliar directives on preaching into the language of more detailed, normative instructions addressed to preachers were made when the Council of Trent was still in session. In 1551, a commission appointed for this purpose by Julius III and led by Cardinal Marcello Cervini prepared the document De praedicatione verbi Dei. A few years later, in 1555, Cardinal Cervini persuaded Cristoforo da Padova, the Superior General of the Augustinians, to draw up analogous instructions (Canones verbi Dei) for preachers subordinated to him (McGinness: 1995, 36–37). Perhaps even before the end of the Council (probably still in the 1550s), a guide of the third Superior General of the Society of Jesus, St Francis Borgia – entitled Ecclesiastes sive de ratione concionandi instructio – was written, though it was not published until 1592 (McGinness: 1995, 38–39). Shortly after the Council of Trent, in 1566, the already mentioned work from Milan, Instructiones de praedicatione verbi Dei, appeared in print. The documents and instructions mentioned above can be considered as harbingers of the abundance of homiletic works that appeared in the first decades after the Council. The boom was related to the interest in the broadly understood rhetoric awakened by humanism, and it resulted in a “thousand neglected authors” that James J. Murphy wrote about years ago (Murphy: 1983, 20–36). A significant proportion of them – according to some researchers, about 15% – worked in the field of broadly understood homiletics, both Catholic and Protestant. It is estimated that by the end of the seventeenth century, several hundred works on this subject had been published (cf. Knape: 1992, col. 1294; Caplan, King: 1949a, 185–206; Calpan, King: 1949b, 243–252; Caplan, King: 1950, 161–162; Caplan, King: 1954, 235–247; Green, Murphy: 2006; Shuger: 2004, 116). The best-known among them are the textbooks by Italian authors: Agostino Valier (De rhetorica ecclesiastica ad clericos libri tres, Verona 1574), Giovanni Botero (De praedicatore verbi Dei, Paris 1585) or Francesco Panigarola (Il Predicatore, Venice 1609); and Spanish ones: Louis of Granada (Ecclesiasticae rhetoricae sive de concionando libri sex, Lisbon 1576) and Diego de Estella (Modus concionandi, Salamanca 1576) (Fumaroli: 2002, 149–151). Soon after the Council of Trent, the treatise by Louis of Granada became perhaps the most important work of the post-Trent homiletics and, together with the handbook of Agostino Valier, acquired a quasi-canonical status (Fumaroli: 2002, 151–155; see also Zarate-Ruiz: 1987; McGinness: 1995, 50, 58–60, 235–236; 6 For example, a sermon from 1655 given by Portuguese Jesuit António Vieira, which was known in Latin translation throughout Europe (cf. Sermo pro Dominica Sexagesimae, in: Vieira: 1708, 1–20). Extensive fragments of this sermon were used by Polish Jesuit Andrzej Murczyński (1749, 89–95) in a sermon on preaching and listening to the word of God.

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

Mack: 2001, 269–272). Many similar works had been published by the end of the seventeenth century, e.g. the treatise by Nicolas Caussin, De eloquentia sacra et humana libri XVI (Paris 1619), which was repeatedly reissued. These rich source materials still remain relatively unknown and are rarely used in studies on early preaching7 . The treatises mentioned above have diverse characteristics, resulting from different approaches to the topic in question, references to the various literary traditions and individual aesthetic preferences of their authors. Undoubtedly, one of the most important classification criteria within the post-Trent theory of preaching was the attitude towards the classical rhetorical tradition. The problem occupied the minds of early theorists and was formulated in different ways, e.g. in the following questions: Is rhetoric necessary for those who spread the Word of God? Does the knowledge of elocution befit a preacher? What conditions should Christian elocution fulfil and what is its relation to that taught by pagan authors? What is the difference between the art of rhetoric and the art of preaching, and between a speech and a sermon?8 The answers to these questions sometimes differed quite radically. For instance, while Francesco Panigarola was in favour of the far-reaching autonomy of preaching, Paolo Aresio, who argued with him, was inclined to include preaching in a broadly understood art of speech, similarly to painting, where artists create paintings on various subjects, secular or religious, but still practise the same art (Aresio: 1627, 66). It is not difficult to notice that the works of the early theorists of homiletics resonate with the same doubts that had been raised much earlier in the writings of the Church Fathers, including, among others, De doctrina christiana by St Augustine (cf. Giombi: 1998a, 473–496). The latter dispelled these doubts in favour of rhetorical art, though not without reservation: Now, the art of rhetoric being available for the enforcing either of truth or falsehood, who will dare to say that truth in the person of its defenders is to take its stand unarmed against falsehood? […] Since, then, the faculty of eloquence is available for both sides, and is of very great service in the enforcing either of wrong or right, why do not good men study

7 For a synthetic review of this material, see Neumayr: 1938; O’Malley: 1983; Shuger: 1985, 337–365; 1988, 55–117; 1993, 121–142; McGinness: 1995, 29–62; Giombi: 1998b, 581–612; 2002, 137–217; Mouchel: 1999, 431–97; Mack: 2001, 257–278; Kneidel: 2011, 3–20. 8 “Se alla predicatione della parola di Dio necessaria l’eloquenza? Se al predicatore della parola di Dio convenga o disdica l’eloquenza? Quali conditioni debba havere la nostra eloquenza christiana? Quale proportione habbia la nostra eloquenza con quella, che insegnarono gia i maestri del dire?” (Panigarola: 1609, 22). “Qual differenza si ritrovi fra quest’arte della Predica e l’Oratoria, e fra l’Orationi, e le Prediche?” (Aresio: 1627, 65–72). Cf.: “Detur-ne aliquod genus eloquentiae Divinum? An concionator divinus eloquentia uti debeat? Quid sit rhetorica divina et quomodo ab humana differat?” (Carbone: 1595, 1–17, 24–27).

177

178

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

to engage it on the side of truth, when bad men use it to obtain the triumph of wicked and worthless causes, and to further injustice and error? (Augustine: 1873, 121–122).

The above opinion inspired many advocates of the Tridentine reform of the Church, just to mention the Jesuit Pedro Perpinyá, who, in 1561, encouraged students of the Roman college to fight the heretics with their own weapon, that is, with the art of elocution9 . Augustine’s opinion also became authoritative for the post-Trent theory of preaching, in which a kind of compromise was reached or, as formulated by Marc Fumaroli, the “marriage” of theology and rhetoric took place. For some theorists, such as Lorenzo Villavicente, it was a forced marriage and a necessary evil; for others, like Luca Baglione, it was a relationship of love (Fumaroli: 2002, 129, 141, 154); for the majority, to sustain this comparison, a marriage of convenience additionally preceded by a marriage settlement with numerous conditions and restrictions, as was the case with many marriages of the time. The motto of the compromise was expressed by the words of St Augustine, who stressed the importance of the human factor in spreading the Word of God: “but the condition of our race would have been much more degraded if God had not chosen to make use of men as the ministers of His word to their fellow-men” (Augustine: 1873, 6). This meant recognizing the human art of elocution as the rightful and privileged instrument for expressing and communicating the truths of the faith (cf. Fumaroli: 2002, 125, 147). Louis of Granada talked in a similar vein “about the utility and necessity of the rhetorical art” (de rhetoricae artis utilitate et necessitat) (Granada: 1578, 3–14; cf. Valier: 1574, 10–11 De ecclesiasticae eloquentiae utilitate). Other representatives of the sixteenthand seventeenth-century homiletics agreed that Church elocution was an art in the classical sense10 , to which at least some, if not all, rules and principles of rhetorical theory applied. The alliance, or the marriage, of rhetoric and theology that took place in the post-Trent theory of preaching did not mean that Church elocution was fully

9 “[…] arma impiis et persidiosis extorqueamus e manibus, ut eisdem ipsi petantur telis, quibus nos oppugnant: et quoniam in utramque partem valet copia dicendi, ut eam haeretici transferunt ad Ecclesiam opprimendam, sic nos ad eandem fortiter defendendam convertamus.” (Perpinian: 1592, 230; cf. McGinness: 1980, 118). 10 Compare the definition of Church rhetoric provided by A. Valier (1574, 11): “Ars autem, quae ecclesiasticam eloquentiam christiano populo tam utilem docet, rhetorica ecclesiastica appellatur: quae est ars sive facultas inveniendi, disponendi et eloquendi ea, quae ad salutem animarum pertinent” [“Art that teaches Christians useful Church elocution is called Church rhetoric: it is the art or the ability to invent, arrange and preach what concerns the salvation of human souls.”]. This is, of course, the definition of rhetoric provided by Quintilian (Institutio oratoria V, 10, 54) adapted for the needs of preaching: “[…] rhetorice est inveniendi recte et disponendi et eloquendi cum firma memoria et cum dignitate actionis scientia”. The above adaptation expresses the alliance of classical rhetoric and post-Trent homiletics. If not stated otherwise all translations are by the Author of this article.

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

subordinated to the rules of rhetoric. What is more, the awareness of the former’s autonomy and specificity can be seen as growing over time. This stemmed not only from the prejudice against rhetoric and the belief in the unique, supernatural character of the preaching ministry (hence the terms rhetorica divina, caelestis, sacra or orator sacer, orator divinus) (O’Malley: 1985, 19), but also from locating secular and Church elocution in different living environments (Sitz im Leben). For this reason, at least two main trends can be distinguished in the post-Trent Catholic homiletics: (1) conservative tradition, closer to the medieval artes praedicandi, which made the effectiveness of the preacher’s persuasion dependent primarily on non-linguistic factors, such as the broadly understood ethos of the speaker: holiness, sincerity, and passion of the preacher himself; and (2) liberal tradition, which emphasised the role of language means, and thus rhetorical tools, in the process of persuasion (Shuger: 1993, 123–124). This does not change the fact that “the post-Trent model of Church rhetoric expressed the syncretism of Antiquity and the Bible typical of that time” (Korolko: 1986, 165). The phenomenon is also visible in the Polish theory and practice of preaching of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Formally, the decrees of the Council of Trent were adopted and accepted by the Catholic Church in Poland11 during the provincial synod in Piotrków in 1577. As a matter of fact, the reform in the spirit of the Council of Trent began earlier thanks, among others, to the Jesuits, who established their first institutions (colleges) in the 1560s. The post-Trent reform is associated with a number of phenomena that shaped Polish Catholicism in the past centuries. Some of them can still be observed today (cf. Jobert: 1974; Kłoczowski: 2000). Undoubtedly, one such phenomenon was the dynamic development of preaching. In Poland, like in the rest of Europe, the post-Trent period was the ‘golden age of pulpit oratory’. The representatives of that period were eminent speakers such as Jakub Wujek SJ (1541–1597), Piotr Skarga SJ (1536–1612), Fabian Birkowski OP (1566–1636), Szymon Starowolski (1588–1656), Franciszek Rychłowski OFM (1611–1673), or Tomasz Młodzianowski SJ (1622–1686). It is estimated that in the seventeenth century alone, about 100 collections of sermons and about 800 individual occasional sermons (usually the funerary ones) of Catholic authors were published (Drob: 1998, 328; Skwara: 2009. Cf. Brzozowski: 1975, 361–428; Panuś: 2001 and 2005; Pawlak: 2005)12 .

11 The name covers the entire Polish-Lithuanian state, i.e. The Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, since 1569 joined by a real union (Union of Lublin) and forming the so-called Commonwealth (Polish: Rzeczpospolita). 12 This material is also well illustrated with sermons published in the series: “Kazania w Kulturze Polskiej. Edycje Kolekcji Tematycznych”: Kazania maryjne: 2014; Kazania funeralne: 2014; Kazania pasyjne: 2014; Kazania wielkanocne: 2019; Kazania adwentowe: 2019; Kazania bożonaro-

179

180

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

In Poland, like in other countries, the work of bishops was of fundamental importance for the renewal of the Church after the Council of Trent. The bishops referred to the authority of universal and particular Church Law. Particular Church Law found expression mainly in synodal legislation and, on a smaller scale, in pastoral letters, ordinances and episcopal instructions. The goal was to organise virtually all areas of life of both the clergy and the laity according to the general norms of Church Law adapted to the local conditions or customs (Wójcik: 1969, 440–483; Jabłoński: 1975, 327–334; Kakareko: 1996). The same applied to preaching, which was given much attention in Church documents. The statements the documents contain on this topic are the first form of homiletic reflection. The priests engaged in preaching were informed exactly as to what those reflections were, and under threat of Church sanctions, they were obliged to follow the guidelines contained therein13 . Concern for the proper level of preaching in Poland, even in the period preceding the Council of Trent and its closure, was reflected in the provisions of the provincial synods in Łęczyca in 1527 and in Piotrków in 1542 and 1557 (Brzozowski: 1975, 371–373; Platt: 1992, 41–42). Synodal documents reminded the priests of the obligation to preach and to study the Bible and the teachings of the Church Fathers, use appropriate models found in the collections of sermons and homilies, possess “old and new” synodal statutes and avoid scholastic subtleties (Ulanowski: 1895, 42–43 [366–367], 65 [389]). The Synod in Piotrków (1557) – perhaps already under the influence of the Trent decree on the adoption of the Vulgate and the interpretation of the holy books – warned against distorting their sense (Ulanowski: 1895, 120 [444]). All the recommendations are essentially in line with the spirit and the letter of the provisions of the Council of Trent and with the post-conciliar synodal legislation14 . “Later synods also constantly appeal to those delivering sermons to rely primarily on the Bible and the works of the Fathers of the Church; they also encourage the writing and publishing of relevant postils in Polish” (Brzozowski: 1975, 372–373; Kuran: 2007, 43–49). It is impossible to list all the synods whose resolutions contain canons on preaching. Those include the provincial synod in Piotrków (1577) and the diocesan synods

dzeniowe: 2019; Kazania patriotyczne: 2019. Editions are available online: https://repozytorium.ptt. net.pl/xmlui/handle/item/67 [accessed on 10.02.2020]. 13 “The achievements of the synodal work recorded in the form of statutes were an obligatory reading for parish clergy and alumni of the seminaries. In some dioceses, one of the conditions for the admission to the Holy Orders was to have the statutes. Statutes were very often addressed directly to priests who, under the threat of punishment, had to acquire them and study diligently.” (Jabłoński: 1975, 328). 14 The conclusions of the synod in Łęczyca (1527) were in particular treated as still valid, as evidenced by their inclusion in the set of rights collected by Primate Jan Wężyk (1630, 86–87).

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

in Cracow (1601 and 1621), Włocławek (1568, 1607, 1620, 1628, 1634 and 1641), Przemyśl (1554 and 1641), Płock (1593), Vilnius (1602), Chełm (1604 and 1624), and Wrocław (1592) (Ulanowski: 1895, 173–174 [497–498]; Constitutiones: 1609, 5–6; Reformationes: [1621], 155–157; Statuta: 1890, 57–58, 70–72, 155–156, 173, 195–196, 201–203, 227–228; Sawicki: 1955, 165, 249–250; idem: 1952, 309, 315–317; idem: 1948, 18; idem: 1957, 91, 139–141; idem: 1963, 617–620). The canons or constitutions concerning sermons that are contained in synodal statutes are generally very short. Treated as a whole, they create a set of provisions that take into account all the most important aspects of the preaching ministry and therefore deserve particular attention (cf. Decretales: 1883, 316–342 De officio concionatoris). Their primary feature is heavy dependence on the Trent decrees15 . This is connected with the second feature of the synodal resolutions, namely their brevity and conciseness, determined by their addressees, i.e. above all, the clergy working at the lowest, parish level. Synodal resolutions most frequently set the minimum standards that could be implemented by the clergy who did not always represent the highest intellectual level and worked with the faithful with even lower mental powers. It can therefore be said that the provisions on preaching contained in the synodal resolutions were a kind of folk homiletics formulated for those who constituted the vast majority of the faithful at the time, i.e. simple inhabitants of villages and towns16 . Thus the level of such homiletics was not very high, and its advantage, especially for a modern historian, is that it gives us an idea of what preaching looked like in practice at the lowest, parish level, especially in the rural areas.

15 Cf.: “Et cum omnia fere supradicta a Sacro Conc. Trid. sint instituta, et tradita in Cap. 2. Sess. 5, speramus ea non gravatim a religiosis omnis exequenda fore” [“And since almost everything mentioned above was decided at the Council of Trent and formulated in the documents of the fifth session in chapter two, we hope that it will be put into practice by all clergy without any delay”] (Reformationes: [1621], 157). 16 See the statutes of the Provincial Synod held in Piotrków in 1628: “Quoniam in Regno hoc, et Magno Ducatu Lituaniae, maior pars est villarum quam civitatum vel oppidorum, et in villis difficile ad executionem deduci potest, ut rustici vel incolae villarum ad discendam doctrinam christianam pomeridiano tempore conveniant, ipsique parochi, in villis praesertim, plerumque impediti esse possint, quominus eidem doctrinae christianae docendae attendere valeant, praecipitur ut parochi in villis constituti, conciones ad populum habeant ex Catechismo Concilii Trid. ad parochos, tempori accomodatas ex materia Orationis Dominicae, Salutationis angelicae, Symboli Fidei, aut decem preceptorum Decalogi, alias iuxta praefationem dicti Catechismi Conc. Trid. ad parochos”. [“Because in the Kingdom as well as in the Great Duchy of Lithuania there are more villages than towns and cities, and it is more difficult in villages to make people come and listen to Christian teaching in the afternoons, and priests themselves, especially in the country, usually experience difficulties in teaching, it is decided that rural presbyters preach sermons from the Catechism of the Council of Trent for priests, [according to the Liturgical Year] in which they will explain the Lord’s Prayer, Angelic Greeting, Apostles’ Creed, the Decalogue, according to what has been said in the preface to the said catechism”] (Decretales: 1883, 320).

181

182

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

One might think that the synodal documents provide a realistic, though sometimes quite depressing, picture of the environment in which the priests worked at that time. Complaints about the religious ignorance of the faithful were common (Constitutiones: 1601, 5; Constitutiones: 1613, fol. A2r.). Even in 1634, the Bishop of Włocławek, Maciej Łubieński, noticed during his parish visits a widespread ignorance, especially among the common people, of the basic truths of the faith, the sign of the cross, Our Father, the formula of sacramental confession, the Decalogue or the Precepts of the Church (Chodyński: 1890, 201–202). Even if such complaints seem exaggerated, they constitute a proper context in which the guidelines on preaching contained in the synodal resolutions should be analysed and evaluated. These guidelines are, first of all, of a disciplinary nature. They remind the priests of the obligation to preach on Sundays and Church holidays, as well as in Advent and Lent (Decretales: 1883, 316; Sawicki: 1962, 315–316; idem: 1957, 91), and subject the preachers to increased control by the bishops (Decretales: 1883, 330; cf. Reformationes: [1621], 156). As for the preachers’ competences, they are required, above all, to have high moral standards (sanctitas vitae) so that their lives correspond to their preaching and give no grounds for scandals. Education only comes up second and must be understood as the knowledge of the truths of the faith and the Bible17 . In the interests of the intellectual formation of priests, they were advised to read suitable theological texts (Decretales: 1883, 328; Sawicki: 1963, 620). As far as the postulated content of the sermons is concerned, the emphasis on their catechetical aspect was a characteristic phenomenon. Moreover, other postconciliar statutes had similar overtones. Their prevailing concern was to deepen the knowledge of the truths of the faith and revive sacramental life (Jabłoński: 1975, 329; Słowiński: 2005, 125–129; Rusiecki: 1996; Kuźmina: 2002) in accordance with the letter and the spirit of the Trent decrees. The close relationship between preaching and catechisation was reflected in the very titles of the synodal resolutions (e.g. De doctrina catechistica et verbi Dei praedicatione) and in the recommendations that the priests should focus their sermons on teaching the basic truths of the faith. This, of course, resulted from the universally established religious ignorance of the common people, especially dangerous in the face of pervasive heresies, hence the repeated

17 “Cum ipse Salvator noster, cuius omnis actio nostra debet esse institutio, primum coeperit facere, postea docere, facile inde quisque, cui praedicandi verbi Dei opus apostolicum atque adeo Domini nostri Jesu Christi munus incumbit, doceri potest, cum singulari vitae innocentia, sanctissimis moribus, et omnibus virtutibus debere esse excultum” [resolutions of the synod in Płock (1593): “Because our Saviour, whose behaviour should be an example for us, first began to act, then to teach, therefore everyone who devotes himself to the apostolic, and hence Christ’s, work of preaching will easily understand that he should be characterized by peculiar innocence, sacred customs and all virtues”] (Decretales: 1883, 329; Sawicki: 1952, 315; cf. idem: 1957, 90–91; 1963, 617; Chodyński: 1890, 71, 173).

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

encouragement to explain to the faithful the rudiments of the Catholic doctrine contained in the Apostles’ Creed the Lord’s Prayer and the Decalogue based on The Roman Catechism, its translations or adaptations18 . As recommended by the Council of Trent, the preachers were also to teach the principles of Christian morality, i.e. to encourage people to cultivate the love of God and one’s neighbour, practise works of mercy and virtues, and avoid misdeeds and transgressions (Sawicki: 1952, 317; idem: 1955, 249). Despite the emphasis on the catechetical purpose of the sermons, the post-Trent church legislation in Poland also drew attention to the need to explain to the faithful the word of God contained in liturgical readings. There were various attempts to solve this issue, but most frequently it was suggested that the sermon be simply divided into two parts: homily (commentary on the readings) and catechism (lecture on the truths of the faith, usually based on The Roman Catechism) (Decretales: 1883, 320–322). It was according to this schema that Kazania albo ćwiczenia chrześcijańskie na XVIII niedziel z wykładem tak na Ewangelie jako też na XII członków wiary chrześcijańskiej [Sermons or Christian Exercises for 18 Sundays with a Lecture on the Gospels as well as 12 Elements of the Christian Faith] were created by Józef Wereszczyński (Kraków 1587). In the post-Trent synodal regulations relatively few guidelines regarding the style and the composition of the sermons can be found. Their common denominator is care for broadly understood decorum, that is, for adapting speech to the circumstances surrounding it, and in particular, to the level of the listeners. It was also recommended that the sermons take into account the liturgical calendar of the Church (Constitutiones: 1609, 34–35). The sermons were to be set in a moderate, serious style, which is why the synod in Wrocław (1592) encouraged following the model of the “holy fathers” and avoiding inappropriate jokes and invectives (a scommatibus maledictis et convitiis omnino abstineant) (Sawicki: 1963, 619). The recommendations of the synod in Włocławek (1641) are in a similar vein. They additionally contain a warning that preachers should not seek vain glory or bore their listeners (Chodyński: 1890, 227–228; cf. Sawicki: 1955, 250). An important source of particular canon law was also the norms contained in pastoral letters and ordinances of bishops, such as the letter of the Bishop of Vilnius, Jerzy Radziwiłł, from 1582, who, after becoming the Bishop of Kraków, published the letter again, though with minor modifications, at the end of the synod in 1593 (Sawicki: 1948, 133–138; Nasiorowski: 1992, 47–52). However, the most important

18 Cf. statutes of the provincial synod in Piotrków in 1628 (Decretales: 1883, 320, cited below) and synods: of Warmia in 1575 (“Catechismum parvum P. Canisii per tempus Quadragesimae, vel quando erit commodum, quotannis pro concione populariter explicari volumus”; ibid., 319), in Płock in 1593, Kraków in 1601 and 1621, Chełm in 1604 and 1624, and others (cf. Kliszko: 1950, 67–72).

183

184

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

document of this kind was Cardinal Bernard Maciejowski’s Epistola pastoralis (Jabłoński: 1975, 336–338; Nasiorowski: 1992). The pastoral letter, edited by Father Łukasz Doktorek and announced at the synod in Kraków in May 1601, was issued and printed together with the synodal resolutions the same year (Maciejowski: [1609], 19–82). In 1607, the letter was added to the statutes of the provincial synod in Piotrków. After the changes introduced in Rome in 1608, it became the law in many Polish dioceses, as confirmed by the synod held in Piotrków in 1628 (Synodus: 1641, fol. B3v–I2r). Published together with the synodal resolutions or separately (cf. Maciejowski: 1640), Epistola pastoralis was the “first post-Trent outline of pastoral theology in Poland”, which, until Poland’s partitions, was the norm and model for later documents of this kind (Jabłoński: 1975, 336, 338). Chapter eight of Epistola pastoralis, De praedicatione verbi Dei, is devoted to delivering sermons (Nasiorowski: 1992, 195–198). Its content essentially overlaps with the provisions of the synods referenced above. This is because one of the sources of Epistola pastoralis, in addition to the canons of the Council of Trent, was Polish synodal legislation, which later, after the publication of the letter, referred, in turn, to its norms and formulations. This allows us to treat the chapter De praedicatione verbi Dei as a kind of compendium of post-Trent institutional homiletics in Poland. Its significance lies not in its originality or an exceptionally high level, but in the fact that it had the greatest impact on the clergy and on preaching. A ‘reading list’, usually a short one including the Bible, the catechism, and above all, the ready collections of sermons, was almost a fixed point of synodal constitutions and pastoral letters addressed to the preachers. Initially, the recommended collections contained the works of foreign authors, especially the Fathers of the Church, as suggested by the synod in Łęczyca in 1527, but later also included newer ones, such as the works of Johannes Eck, recommended at the synod in Piotrków in 1542. During the same synod, bishops were ordered to collect sermons of a learned and recognised author and publish them for the benefit of the less educated (imperitiores) clergy. The sermons would serve as an example for inexperienced vicars (Ulanowski: 1895, 42–43 [366–367]). The synod, in 1557, also burdened the archbishop with publishing a collection of homilies for Sundays and holidays with a catechism from which simple priests would teach the common people. Such a collection, the synod justified, would be an effective antidote to heretical postils (Ulanowski: 1895, 120 [444]; cf. Brzozowski: 1975, 372). It is difficult to state unequivocally whether the constitutions meant works in Latin or in Polish; whatever the case was, the next provincial synod, held in Warsaw in 1561, explicitly ordered that a publication in Polish be prepared which would cover the liturgical agenda, the teachings on the sacraments and the catechism as well as a collection of homilies (Ulanowski: 1895, 139 [463]). The implementation of this task was not immediate. Only after seven years was a translation of The Roman Catechism (Katechizm albo nauka wiary i pobożności krześcijańskiej, Poznań 1568) published

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

on Stanisław Hozjusz’s initiative (Słowiński: 2005, 93). We had to wait even longer for the Polish Catholic postil, so in the same year Stanisław Karnkowski, the Bishop of Włocławek, promised that he would make every effort to create “a postil in the native language, containing a lecture on the Catholic doctrine and the gospels for Sundays and holidays”19 . Undoubtedly, such initiatives were a response to Protestant postillography, with the popular Postylla (Kraków 1557) by Mikołaj Rej as a prime example. Rej’s work was at that time treated by the Catholics as a threat. The first Polish Catholic postil was Postylla by Jakub Wujek (Kraków 1573–1575). It was followed by the work of Marcin Białobrzeski (Postilla orthodoxa, Kraków 1581) and the collections of sermons by Józef Wereszczyński, Hieronim Powodowski and Piotr Skarga (Kolbuszewski: 1921; Maciuszko: 1987; Kuran: 2007, 65–94; Cybulski: 2013; Komorowska: 2015). Since then, synodal constitutions and pastoral letters, apart from recommending the works of foreign authors, such as Thomas Stapleton, Louis of Granada or Joannes Osorius, also advised the preachers to read and use the works of Polish authors, especially those of Wujek and Skarga (Sawicki: 1948, 135)20 . The legal norms cited above shed some light on the genesis of Polish Catholic postils, emphasising the fact that their authors were commissioned by the Church authorities and the clergy was the primary recipient of their works. This explains a somewhat peculiar phenomenon, namely the sermons devoted to various aspects of preaching. They form another trend in homiletic reflection, an intermediary between homiletics contained in Church legislation (precettistica) and in textbooks (trattatistica). Sermons of this kind sometimes have the form of short homiletic treatises, all the more valuable because in addition to the normative part they often contain descriptions of specific customs, phenomena or pathologies that were common in earlier preaching practice. Remarks addressed to the preachers appear in most collections of sermons created in the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries. The collections include Kazania na niedziele i święta [Sermons for Sundays and Holidays] (Kraków 1595, 1597) by Piotr Skarga (cf. Korolko: 1971, 78–84), and, above all, the works of Mikołaj of Wilkowiecko (c. 1524–1601), Fabian Birkowski and Szymon Starowolski. Mikołaj of Wilkowiecko (Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka: [1579], 265r–355v; cf. Związek: 1968, 84–85;

19 “[…] dabitur a nobis opera, ut aliqua postilla conscribatur materna gentis nostrae lingua, quae complectatur doctrinam catholicam, et qua explicentur Evangelia dominicis festisque diebus in Ecclesia recitari consueta” (Chodyński: 1890, 57). 20 “[…] Cathechismus Concilii Tridentini, cum Postillis Wuieci et Scargae […]”(Constitutiones: [1609], 35); “[…] ut quilibet parochorum habeat Postillam super Evangelia Dominicarum et festorum per annum currentium, alicuius authorum probatorum, ut sunt Staphletoni, Granantensis, Osorii, vel in vulgari contiones Patris Iacobi Wuieci, vel Patris Petri Scargae, Societatis Iesu Theologorum” (Constitutiones: 1613, fol. Ar).

185

186

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

idem: 1969, 214–225) included a number of theoretical and normative remarks on Church elocution in two extensive sermons/treatises from the volume Flores sermonum (Kraków 1577). In addition to the speech at the funeral of Piotr Skarga, Fabian Birkowski spoke on the subject of Church elocution many times in his sermons on Sundays and holidays, and in Latin “Church speeches” (Orationes ecclesiasticae) from 1622 (Birkowski: 1612; idem: 1623, 359–365; idem: 1628b, 51–59, 134–147, 714; idem: 1628a, 334–342, 598–605, 802–810; idem: 1622, 234–247, 367–377, De oratoribus christianis oratio, 415–437; cf. Żelazko: 1974, 449–463; Panuś: 2005, 99–102). Szymon Starowolski’s theoretical awareness finally came to the fore in the collection of sermons Arka testamentu [The Ark of the Testament] from 1648 (Starowolski: 1648, 313–331, 355–375). The other authors who addressed these issues were, among others, Bazyli Rychlewicz (c. 1640–1710) and Benedykt Zawadzki (1652–1705) (Rychlewicz: 1698, 493–494; Zawadzki: 1700, 198–204). The sermons of the authors mentioned above are little-known expressions of theoretical reflection on preaching. Some of them can be considered as quasiguides for preachers which present the main aspects of preaching in an orderly way. Starowolski came closest to this form of expression in his first sermon for the sixth Sunday after Epiphany, in which he tried to answer three basic questions: “What is the similarity between God’s word and a mustard seed?, Why is it that Christians today listen to the word of God continually but with little benefit for their souls, and those who preach do not draw people to Christ the Lord like His disciples and their successors, the Church Fathers, did?”, and “What are the shepherds and preachers of God’s word to do so that people benefit from their sermons and God’s glory is increased?” The unquestionable advantage of this specific type of preaching homiletics is its roots in the reality contemporary to the authors, hence the specific image of the “theatre of elocution” of the time and its main participants, an image which is sometimes colourful and satirical. Of the many issues raised by the ministers, three are particularly noteworthy. First, there are the issues of, to use modern terminology, fundamental homiletics, or the theology of preaching in the broad sense. In synodal legislation they are barely present; in the sermons discussed here – on the contrary – they are very strongly exposed and this exposition is the element connecting them with the theory of preaching formulated in post-Trent homiletic treatises (cf. O’Malley: 1985, 19). The favourite topics discussed by the authors of the sermons cover the unique, supernatural character and power of the word of God, revealed in the Holy Scriptures and explained from the pulpit (cf. Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka: [1579], fol. 270v–272r)21 . They also discuss the preacher’s dignity associated with

21 “[…] the word of God, not having the elocution of this world in itself, but so simply uttered, has passed through all wisdom of this world, and appeared so respectable to all the world that the

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

it, incomparable with the rank of a secular speaker (Birkowski: 1623, 360)22 . The second issue is closely related to the previous one, namely the broadly understood ethos of the speaker (sanctitas vitae), which, regardless of the supernatural aspects of Church elocution, is considered the most important and necessary condition for the effectiveness of the preaching and its persuasive power (Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka: [1579], fol. 321v)23 . In comparison with the ethos of the speaker, the rhetorical or simply linguistic means of influence are of secondary importance, and this, in turn, is the third thread constantly present in the statements of the authors cited here (Skarga: 1595, 122)24 . Of course, close reading of these sermons reveals all sorts of hesitations and inconsistencies regarding the issues in question, but it can be argued that their authors represent the homiletic trend that Debora Shuger describes as conservative. To reiterate, its representatives claim that the effectiveness of preaching depends primarily on non-linguistic factors, such as the Holy Spirit, the preacher’s holiness and the example of his life (Shuger: 1993, 123)25 . The statements about the art of preaching contained in the sermons themselves can be treated as a kind of bridge between the recommendations for the preachers formulated in the official documents of the Church and homiletics in the narrow sense, contained in treatises and textbooks. As indicated earlier, numerous works of this kind appeared in Europe in the first decades after the Council of Trent. This partly explains the modest achievements of Polish authors: the demand for works of this kind was met by compilations made by foreign authors: numerous, easily accessible, and, in addition, recommended by the Church authorities. Homiletics

22 23

24

25

teachings of philosophers, rhetorica, mathematica, logica, metaphysica, medicina and iurispridentia had to become servants of theology and they give way to the goodness of God’s word, just like mere iniquity and falseness give way to the truth.” (Starowolski: 1648, 314). “The doctors and preachers, then, are the mouth of God through which Christ himself speaks and the Spirit of his heavenly Father.” (Birkowski: 1628a, 338). “For a preacher’s life says more than a word” (Birkowski: 1628b, 53); “[…] He is to live a God-fearing life and conform with his sermon in such a way that his life is a genuine example of all his sermons.” (Ibid., 53; cf. Starowolski: 1648, 323). “Hence, it will be said that the preacher who eagerly obeys […] eloquence and uses rhetorical figures, will diminish the importance of God’s word […]” (Birkowski: 1628b, 57). “The words of God are beautiful, for they are true. […] The elocution of the speakers of this world does not have the beauty that comes from the truth; for it is sometimes full of exaggeration, that is, full of lies […]” (Ibid., 137). Cf. “[…] nisi Dominus illuminet mentem auditoris interius, in vacuum laborat sermo doctoris exterius […]. Qui enim aliis praedicat, non in sua sapientia, vel eloquentia confidere debet, sed in virtute Dei” [“(…) if the Lord does not enlighten the listener from within, then the speech of the teacher from outside is in vain. (…) Whoever teaches others should not trust his wisdom or elocution, but God’s power.”] (Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka: [1579], fol. 340v–341). “The word of God in the mouths of doctors and humble preachers does more to human hearts with their silence and devout meditation than the elocution of a sophisticated speaker.” (Starowolski: 1648, 315).

187

188

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

as a separate section in the theory of elocution must have been widely taught in seminaries and religious colleges, because manuscripts containing this type of material, most frequently from the late seventeenth and the eighteenth centuries, have been preserved (Lichański: 2000, 190, 195, 198; Kuran: 2014, 201–226). As for the earlier period, Polish Catholic homiletics is represented by only three works: Partitiones ecclesiasticae by Stanisław Sokołowski (1537–1593) published in 1589, and two treatises of the Jesuits: Modi LX sacrae orationis variae formandae (Antwerp 1668) by Kazimierz Wijuk Kojałowicz (c. 1617–1674) and Breve directorium concionatoris (Vilnius 1699) by Bartłomiej Baltazar Dankwart (1629–1699). The works by Seweryn of Luboml (1532–1612) – Theatrum seu potius officina concionatorum praedicatoribus et theologis […] necessaria, Venice 1597 – and Konstanty Szyrwid (c. 1579–1631) – Punkty kazań od Adwentu aż do Postu litewskim językiem z wytłumaczeniem na polskie [Sermon Plans from Advent to Lent in the Lithuanian Language with an Explanation in Polish], Vilnius 1629 – are homiletic guides rather than proper textbooks on Church elocution (Rutkowska: 2016). Published in Krakow in 1589, Partitiones ecclesiasticae [Categories of Church Elocution] certainly does not belong to the most important homiletic works (Sokołowski: 1589; idem: 1591; its contemporary edition and translation into Polish can be found in: Ryczek: 2011, 154–239). However, Stanisław Sokołowski was exceptionally well prepared to write the treatise. He enjoyed the reputation of an outstanding theologian and preacher during his lifetime. “His sermons, patterned after Cicero’s speeches, are of the highest humanist value in Polish religious literature. He also had the greatest patrological erudition among contemporaneous religious writers […].” (Brzozowski: 1975, 373). Partitiones ecclesiasticae thus arises from the author’s own experience as a preacher and from his extensive knowledge that was not only theological. As stated by the translator and publisher, Sokołowski’s work stands out against the background of contemporaneous treatises in this field with its “creative processing and skilful fusion of the principles of patristic exegesis and the concept of Aquinas’ rhetoric. The latter’s theoretical thought harmoniously coexists within the rhetorical model defined […] as rhetorica christiana [Christian rhetoric] with the hermeneutic views of Origen of Alexandria and St Jerome on the interpretation of the Bible” (Ryczek: 2011, 9). The title of the work and the form of the dialogue clearly refer to Cicero’s work, Partitiones oratoriae, but it is possible that Sokołowski also knew the dialogue of St John Chrysostom, On the Priesthood, which also raised issues related to preaching. This can be considered as a manifestation of the already mentioned syncretism of Antiquity and the Bible, which is also evident in the use of classical rhetorical terminology and examples derived from the ancient tradition, as well as in the constant references to authors of different Biblical texts and to the Fathers of the Church, whom Sokołowski sets as an example: “In whose image is a preacher educated? First of all, in Christ’s, then, Saint Paul’s, the prophets’, the apostles’, and

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

the Holy Fathers’, among whom everyone believes that St John Chrysostom should be distinguished” (Ryczek: 2011, 163). Patristic as well as Biblical erudition, is the most striking feature of Sokołowski’s dialogue. It clearly demonstrates the author’s preferences, which are also visible in the characteristic recommendation: “Let him not abandon the maxims [as appropriate] to the place and time when they occur, but let them be borrowed not so much from Demosthenes, Plato or Cicero, as from David, Isaiah, Solomon and other prophets” (Ryczek: 2011, 197). Despite this kind of recommendations, Sokołowski’s work is permeated with the idea of selecting and adapting elements of classical culture to Christianity, which was developed and implemented by the Church Fathers dear to him. The preacher should, in the first place, use the so-called theological places (loci theologici – revelatio divina non scripta, Scriptura Sacra, traditio, authoritas conciliorum generalium, decreta pontificum, consensus Patrum, ius canonicum), but may, depending on the circumstances, also reach for Jewish and pagan literature, especially philosophical (Ryczek: 2011, 177–189). Of course, in Sokołowski’s textbook there is also room for other issues, such as the purpose of Church elocution, the preacher’s duties, and composition and style of a sermon26 . However, they take the form of general directives rather than specific technical guidelines. From the point of view of a researcher of texts on preaching, however, the most interesting feature in Partitiones is the desire, visible on many levels, to synthesise various traditions: classical, biblical, patristic as well as contemporary with the author and native at the same time, for Sokołowski uses preachers known in his time as models, with Piotr Skarga as a prime example. According to the author himself, the motto of this synthesis was the statement attributed to Saint Augustine: “Everything that is true anywhere belongs to us” (“Quidquid enim uspiam verum est, hoc nostrum esse”). Due to its title, form and content, Sokołowski’s work can be treated as an almost perfect example of Renaissance classicism in homiletics. It is a rather different case with Kazimierz Wijuk Kojałowicz’s work, whose title (Modi LX sacrae orationis variae formandae [Sixty Ways of Composing Sermons]) seems to ostentatiously manifest varietas, one of the key concepts of Baroque aesthetics. Even if on closer reading the individual modi (modes) turn out to be only slightly different variants of

26 Index operum Stanislai Socolovii in the edited volume provides relevant information about the content of the work: “Concionatoris officia quae. Finis in concionando quottuplex, praesidia et instrumenta quae. In tota sua facultate quae videnda. Merces eius. Concionator unde materiam habebit et quot modis adhibebit. Argumentis quot et quibus utetur. Quomodo copiosus videbitur. Caute et prudenter orationem suam instituere, personae suae oblivisci debebit. Quid scire. Quem ordinem sequi. Quam artem dicendi. Quas materias tractare. Quomodo tractare. Quibus exordiis uti, quomodo benevolentiam captare debebit. Quo genere narrationis saepius utetur. Quibus utetur figuris. Ad quorum se imitationem componet. Et quos affectus movebit. Concionandi facultas a quibus distinguatur.” (Sokołowski: 1591, fol. Xxx2r).

189

190

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

the same pattern, they still seem to be distant from Sokołowski’s postulate, written so many decades earlier, concerning the principle of simplicitas and, allusively evoked, the Horatian principle simplex et unum. Also, the layout of the work, which does not respect the traditional division into inventio, dispositio, elocutio, memoria, and actio, testifies to the author’s more relaxed attitude towards classical patterns. The author apparently had a practical, not a theoretical goal, which is why the systematic description of preaching based on logical criteria had to give way to concise rules and examples illustrating them. And perhaps that explains why Kojałowicz’s work turned out to be quite attractive to readers and was the only Polish work of this kind to have several editions (Vilnius 1684, Cologne 1676, 1679, 1694, Košice 1754) and become famous abroad (cf. Hochenleutner: 1724). The last of the seventeenth-century homiletic works is Breve directorium concionatoris (Vilnius 1699) by Bartłomiej Baltazar Dankwart. Similarly to Stanisław Sokołowski’s Partitiones ecclesiasticae more than a century earlier, Breve directorium is also a concise guide containing general advice for preachers. Its most characteristic feature is the emphasis on the non-rhetorical means of persuasion, i.e. Divine inspiration and the example of the preacher’s personal life (sanctitas vitae). “Everyone can do only as much as God allows him to”, the author reminds the reader at the very beginning, quoting the words attributed to Saint Ignatius of Loyola, and then adds: In the [listener’s] heart, however, the Holy Spirit does not shout but calls. And if He does not cry, then the preacher’s voice will be the voice of a parrot: it will arouse laughter, but will not move the soul. And for a preacher not to be like a parrot or a dulcimer, but to speak effectively, he must have the support of the Holy Spirit who will call and act in the listener’s heart. How will it happen, then? Saint Ignatius says: “God gives strength according to how much one tries to prepare for the reception of his work”27 .

In accordance with this declaration, the entire first part of the work is an ascetic guide, which contains instructions on how the preacher should approach God

27 “Tantum quivis potest, quantam illis Deus vim addit. […] In corde autem Spiritus Santus non clamitat, sed clamat. Et nisi ille clamet, vox concionatoris erit vox psittaci: poterit movere risum, sed non animum. Ut igitur concionator non sit instar psittaci, aut cymbali, sed dicat cum fructu, debet habere coadiutorem Spiritum S[anctum], qui in corde auditoris clamet et operetur. Hoc autem quomodo? Pergit S[anctus] Ignatius in sua doctrina: Tantam porro Deus vim addit, quanto quis propius et interius cooperatur ad suscipiendos eius motus” (Dankwart: 1699, fol. A–Av). Cf. “[…] denique de concionibus Ignatii aiebat Lainius non fuisse illas Quintiliani et Tullii incude informatas, sed tamen qualibet eloquentia fortiores; tantum potest quivis, quantam Deus illi vim addit; tantam porro addit, quanto propius atque interius illi coaptatur ad suscipiendos eius motus.” (Bartoli: 1665, 379).

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

(“Quae concionatorem cum Deo coniungunt?”) (Dankwart: 1699, fol. A3–B2v). The instructions include the right motives, or intentions, that the preacher should follow (Intentio), the role of a prayer (Oratio), the mortification of the soul and the body (Mortificatio) and a reflection on the word of God and the truths of the faith (Meditatio). The modification of the classical definition of a speaker can be considered a kind of summary and leitmotif of this part of the work: “Cato said: an orator is a good man who is experienced at speaking. A preacher should first be a good man, that is, united with God, and then trained in speaking”28 . In accordance with this modified definition, it is only in the second part of the treatise that the concise general guidelines on the rhetorical competence of a preacher can be found29 . They regard properly selected readings, diction exercises, listening to and imitating known preachers, adapting to the level of listeners and skilfully bringing them pleasure (delectare), instructing (docere) and moving them (movere). The last paragraph concerns sermons dedicated to Mary and the saints (Conciones Beatissimae Virginis et sanctorum). It is hard to recognize this work as original; it is, however, permeated with a clearly anti-rhetorical and anti-baroque attitude, visible in the remarks directed at Church speakers contemporary to the author who represent the tendencies considered today as typical of baroque preaching. The arguments presented above allow us to include the guide of the Polish Jesuit among the ‘conservative’ trend in the post-Trent homiletic reflection distinguished by Debora Shuger. The chronological scope of this article is limited to approximately one hundred and fifty years starting from the inauguration of the Council of Trent. It was, as described by Jerzy Kłoczowski, “a period of great reforms”, the implementation of which, in accordance with the Ecclesia semper reformanda principle, did not end in the seventeenth century. It was then that what Hubert Jedin called the Tridentine era in the history of the Church was formed, and what John W. O’Malley prefers to describe as early modern Catholicism (Kłoczowski: 1986, 9–100; O’Malley: 2000, 1–15). Preaching played a significant role in those reforms. It was one of the most important tools for forming the faithful in accordance with the spirit and the letter of the decrees of the Council of Trent. As far as the research on preaching is concerned, the homiletic theory of the times is of primary importance as an expression of the conventions and principles governing early Church elocution and as a mirror in which some tendencies and transformations that Church elocution underwent are reflected. As indicated by the discussion above, the achievements of Polish authors, i.e. systematic, textbook studies in this field, are modest, although they

28 “Cato aiebat: Orator est vir bonus, dicendi peritus. Prius concionator debet esse vir bonus, hoc est, Deo coniunctus, tum deinde in dicendo exercitatus.” (Dankwart: 1699, fol. A4). 29 “De iis, quae concionatorem disponunt erga homines.” (Ibid., fol. B2v–D7v).

191

192

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

reflect the main trends in the homiletics of the period in question. The theory of preaching contained in official documents of the Church and formulated explicitly in the sermons is hence all the more important. Its actual impact on the shape of preaching, and through preaching on the shape of the post-Trent culture in Poland of the second half of the sixteenth and the first half of the seventeenth century requires further study, as does the theory’s relation (not necessarily genetic) to the homiletics formulated in analogous foreign sources. These basic questions can only be answered by means of more detailed and in-depth research.

Bibliography Primary Sources [Acquaviva, Claudio] (1635), De formandis ac bene instituendis nostris concionatoribus and Monita formandis concionatoribus accomodata, in: Epistolae praepositorum generalium ad patres et fratres Societatis Iesu, Antverpiae: Ioannes Meursius. Aresio, Paolo (1627), Arte di predicar bene, Milano: Giovanni Battista Bidelli. Augustine, Aurelius (1873), On Christian Doctrine, in: The Works of Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, Marcus Dods (ed.), vol. 9, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, Bartoli, Danielo (1665), De vita et instituto S[ancti] Ignatii Societatis Iesu fundatoris libri quinque, ex Italico […] Romae edito latine redditi a P[atre] Ludovico Ianino ex eadem Societate, Lugduni: Laurentius Anisson. Birkowski, Fabian (1612), Na pogrzebie wielebnego ojca księdza Piotra Skargi […] kazanie, Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. — (1622), Orationes ecclesiasticae, Cracoviae: Burchardus Kuikius. — (1623), Kazania na święta doroczne, Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. — (1628a), Kazania na święta doroczne…, vol. 2, part 2, Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. — (1628b), Kazania na niedziele i święta doroczne, vol. 2, Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. — (2014), Na pogrzebie wielebnego ojca księdza Piotra Skargi […] kazanie, Magdalena Komorowska (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego. Borromeo, Charles (1890), Instructiones praedicationis verbi Dei, in: Acta Ecclesiae Mediolanensis ab eius initiis usque ad nostram aetatem, Achille Ratti (ed.), vol. 2, 1: Acta Ecclesiae Mediolanensis a sancto Carolo […] condita, part 4: Instructiones variae, Milan: Typ. Pont. S. Josephi. Canons (2011), The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, H.J. Schroeder (transl.), Charlotte, North Carolina: TAN Books. Carbone, Ludovicus (1595), Divinus orator vel de rhetorica divina libri septem, Venetiis: Societas Minima. Chodyński, Zeno (ed) (1890), Statuta synodalia dioecesis wladislaviensis et Pomeraniae, Varsaviae: Franciszek Czerwiński.

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

Constitutiones (1613), Constitutiones synodorum dioecesis vilnensis per […] Benedictum Woyna […] celebratae, Vilnae: Ioanes Karcan. Constitutiones (1630), Constitutiones synodorum metropolitanae eccl[esiae] Gnesnen[sis] provincialium […], iussu vero et opera […] D[omini] Ioannis Węzyk, Cracoviae: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. Constitutiones [1609], Constitutiones synodi dioecesanae cracoviensis celebratae anno Domini MDCIX kal. iunii, Cracoviae: Officina Lazari. Dankwart, Bartłomiej Baltazar (1699), Breve directorium concionatoris apostolici, Vilnae: Typis Academicis Societatis Iesu. Decretales (1883), Decretales summorum pontificum pro Regno Poloniae et constitutiones synodorum provincialium et dioecesanarum regni eiusdem, vol. 1, Posnaniae: Jaroslaus Leitgeber, 1883. Epistolae (1635), Epistolae praepositorum generalium ad patres et fratres Societatis Jesu, Antverpiae: Ioannes Meursius. Giustiniani, Paolo/Quirini, Pietro (1995), Lettera al Papa. Paolo Giustiniani e Pietro Quirini a Leone X, Geminario Bianchini (ed.), Modena: Artioli. Granada, Luis de (1578), Ecclesiasticae rhetoricae, sive de ratione concionandi libri sex, Coloniae Agrippinae: Haeredes A. Birckmann. Hochenleutner, Gelasius (1724), Modus et praxis utiliter concionandi…, Augustae Vindelicorum: Sumptibus Philippi, Martini & Joannis Veith. Kazania adwentowe (2019), Panuś Kazimierz/Ostafiński, Witold (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kazania bożonarodzeniowe (2019), Panuś Kazimierz/Jungiewicz, Anna (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kazania funeralne (2014), Panuś Kazimierz/Skwara, Marek (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kazania maryjne (2014), Panuś Kazimierz/Mazurkiewicz, Roman (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kazania pasyjne (2014), Panuś Kazimierz/Gruchała, Janusz Stanisław (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kazania patriotyczne (2019), Panuś Kazimierz/Skwara, Marek (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kazania wielkanocne (2019), Panuś Kazimierz/Gruchała, Janusz Stanisław (ed.), Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Kojałowicz, Kazimierz Wijuk (1668), Modi LX sacrae orationis varie formandae a p[atre] Casimiro Wiiuk Kojalowicz Societ. Jesu S[anctae] T[heologiae] Doctore in gratiam incipientium collexti et praxibus illustrati, Antverpiae. [Maciejowski, Bernard] [1609], Epistola pastoralis ad parochos dioecesis cracovien[sis], in: Constitutiones synodi dioecesanae cracoviensis celebratae anno Domini MDCIX kal. iunii, Cracoviae: Officina Lazari.

193

194

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

— (1640), Epistola pastoralis bonae memoriae illustrissimi cardinalis Macieiowski […], Posnaniae: Wojciech Regulus. Makowski, Adam [1637], Obraz wielebnego ojca Fabiana Birkowskiego […] wystawiony na kazaniu pogrzebnym, Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka [1579], Flores sermonum in evangelia dominicalia post festum Sanctissimae Trinitatis, Ecclesiae catholicae usurpata […], Cracoviae: Maciej Garwolczyk. Murczyński, Andrzej (1749), Słowo Boże na niedziele całego roku po różnych kościołach opowiedziane, Sandomierz: Collegium Societatis Iesu. Panigarola, Francesco (1609), Il Predicatore, Venetia: B. Giunti/Giovanni Battista Ciotti. Perpinian, Petrus Johannes (1592), De arte rhetorica discenda, in: idem, Orationes duodeviginti, Ingolstadii: David Sartorius. Reformationes [1621], Reformationes generales ad clerum et populum Dioecesis Cracovien[sis] pertinentes ab […] D[omino] Martino Szyszkowski […] in Synodo Dioecesana sancitae et promulgatae A[nno] M.DC.XXI die decima Februar[ii], Cracoviae: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. Rychlewicz, Bazyli (1698), Kazania począwszy od Adwentu aż do Wielkiejnocy inclusive […], Kraków: Mikołaj Aleksander Schedel. Sales, Francis de (1662), B[eati] Francisci Salesii Episcopi Gebennensis Modus concionandi, Herbipoli: Iobus Hertz. Sawicki, Jakub (1948), Concilia Poloniae. Źródła i studia krytyczne: vol. 2: Synody diecezji wileńskiej i ich statuty, Warszawa: Towarzystwo Naukowe Warszawskie. — (1952), Concilia Poloniae. Źródła i studia krytyczne: vol. 6: Synody diecezji płockiej i ich statuty, Warszawa: Towarzystwo Naukowe Warszawskie. — (1955), Concilia Poloniae. Źródła i studia krytyczne: vol. 8: Synody diecezji przemyskiej obrządku łacińskiego i ich statuty, Wrocław: Ossolineum. — (1957), Concilia Poloniae. Źródła i studia krytyczne: vol. 9: Synody diecezji chełmskiej z XVI–XVIII wieku obrządku łacińskiego i ich statuty, Wrocław: Ossolineum. — (1963), Concilia Poloniae. Źródła i studia krytyczne: vol. 10: Synody diecezji wrocławskiej i ich statuty, Wrocław: Ossolineum. Skarga, Piotr (1595), Kazania na niedziele i święta, Kraków: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. Sokołowski, Stanisław (1589), Partitiones ecclesiasticae. Ad Petrum Costcam, Episcopum Culmen[sem], Virum Amplissimum, Cracoviae: Ex officina Lazari. — (1591), Partitiones ecclesiasticae […], 2. ed., in: idem, Opera, [vol. 1], Cracoviae: Architypographia Regia et Ecclesiastica Lazari, 751–764. — (2011), Partitiones ecclesiasticae. Ad Petrum Costcam, Episcopum Culmen[sem], Virum Amplissimum. Podziały wymowy kościelnej. Do Jaśnie Oświeconego Piotra Kostki, biskupa Chełmińskiego, in: Wojciech Ryczek, Rhetorica christiana. Teoria wymowy kościelnej Stanisława Sokołowskiego, Kraków: UNUM, 154–239. Starowolski, Szymon (1648), Arka testamentu zamykająca w sobie kazania niedzielne całego roku na dwie części rozdzielone, z których pierwsza część pars hyemalis jest rzeczona, Kraków: Krzysztof Schedel.

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

Synodus (1641), Synodus provincialis gnesnensis provinciae sub […] Joanne Węzyk […] Petricoviae Anno Dni millesimo sexcentesimo vigesimo octavo […] celebrata, Cracoviae: A. Piotrkowczyk Ulanowski, Bolesław (1895), Materiały do historii ustawodawstwa synodalnego w Polsce w w. XVI, Kraków: Akademia Umiejętności. Valier, Agostino (1574), De rhetorica ecclesiastica ad clericos libri tres, Venetiis: Andrea Bochinus. Vieira, António (1708), Sermones selectissimi, foecunditate materiarum, sublimitate, subtilitate et acumine conceptuum admirabiles, Coloniae Agrippinae: H. Demen. Wężyk, Jan (1630), Constitutiones synodorum metropolitanae eccl[esiae] Gnesnen[sis] provincialium […], iussu vero et opera […] D[omini] Ioannis Węzyk, Cracoviae: Andrzej Piotrkowczyk. Zawadzki, Benedykt (1700), Kazania na niedziele doroczne […], Warszawa: Collegium Scholarum Piarum.

Secondary Sources Backvis, Claude (1968), La Fortune d’Érasme en Pologne, in: Actes du Colloque International réuni à Mons du 26 au 29 octobre 1967 à l’occasion du cinquime centenaire de la naissance d’Érasme, Mons: Centre Universitaire de l’État, 173–202. Bayley, Peter (1980), French Pulpit Oratory 1598–1650. A Study in Themes and Styles with a Descriptive Catalogue of Printed Texts, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Boer, Wietse de (2001), The Conquest of the Soul: Confessions, Discipline, and Public Order in Counter-Reformation Milan, Leiden: Brill. Brzozowski, Mieczysław (1975), Teoria kaznodziejstwa (wiek XVI–XVIII), in: Marian Rechowicz (ed.), Dzieje teologii katolickiej w Polsce, vol. 2, part 1, Lublin: TN KUL, 361–428. Caplan, Harry/King, Henry H. (1949a), Latin Tractates on Preaching: A Book–List, The Harvard Theological Reviev 42, 3, 185–206. — (1949b), Italian Treatises on Preaching, Speech Monographs 16, 243–252. — (1950), Spanisch Treatises on Preaching, Speech Monographs 17, 161–162. — (1954), Dutch Treatises on Preaching: A list of Books and Articles, Speech Monographs 21, 235–247. Cybulski, Łukasz (2013), Dwie postylle Jakuba Wujka czy jedna? Problem korespondencji tekstów, Studia Classica et Neolatina 10, 140–152. Cytowska, Maria (1972), Erasme en Pologne avant l’epoque du concile de Trente, in: Erasmus in English. A Newsletter Published by University of Toronto Press, Toronto, 10–16. — (1980), Erazmianizm w literaturze polskiej XVI–XVII wieku, in: Teresa Michałowska/Jan Ślaski (ed.), Studia porównawcze o literaturze staropolskiej, Wrocław, 7–28.

195

196

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Domański, Juliusz (2001), Erazm i filozofia. Studium o koncepcji filozofii Erazma z Rotterdamu, Warszawa: Aletheia. Drob, Janusz (1998), Drukowane kazania franciszkańskie w XVI i XVII wieku. Próba postawienia problemu, in: Henryk Gapski/Celestyn Napiórkowski (ed.), Franciszkanie w Polsce XVI–XVII wieku, part 1, Niepokalanów: Wydawnictwo Ojców Franciszkanów. Edwards, Otis Carl Jr (2004), A History of Preaching, Nashville: Abingdon Press. Fumaroli, Marc (2002), L’età dell’eloquenza. Retorica e “res literaria” dal Rinascimento alle soglie dell’epoca classica. E. Bas, M. Botto, G. Cillario (transl.), Milano: Adelphi: 2002. Giombi, Samuele (1992), Dinamiche della predicazione cinquecentesca tra forma retorica e normativa religiosa: le istruzioni episcopali ai predicatori, Cristianesimo nella Storia 13, 1, 73–102. — (1997), La predicazione di San Carlo Borromeo: fonti, metodo, stili, in: Franco Buzzi/ Danilo Zardin (ed.), Carlo Borromeo e l’opera della “grande riforma”. Cultura, religione e arti del governo nella Milano del pieno Cinquecento, Milano: Silvana, 69–80. — (1998a), La Chiesa e l’eloquenza. Radici antiche del motivo «antiretorico» e sue riprese moderne, Intersezioni 18, 473–496. — (1998b), Precettistica e trattatistica sulla retorica sacra in età tridentina. Linee storiografiche e ipotesi di ricerca, Rivista di storia e letteratura religiosa, vol. 34, no. 3, 581–612. — (2002), Sacra eloquenza: percorsi di studio e pratiche di lettura, in: Edoardo Barbieri/ Danilo Zardin (ed.), Libri, biblioteche e cultura nell’Italia del Cinque e Seicento, Milano: Vita e Pensiero, 137–217. — (2013), Riforma della Chiesa e riforma della predicazione: la precettistica ecclesiastica sul predicare nel XVI secolo, Franciscan Studies 71, 97–100. Gleason, Elisabeth G. (1993), Gasparo Contarini. Venice, Rome, and Reform, Berkeley/ Los Angeles/Oxford: University of California Press, 260–272. Góralski, Wojciech (1988), Reforma trydencka w diecezji i prowincji kościelnej mediolańskiej w świetle pierwszych synodów kard. Karola Boromeusza, Lublin: Redakcja Wydawnictw KUL. Green, Lawrence D./Murphy, James Jerome (ed.) (2006), Renaissance Rhetoric. ShortTitle Catalogue 1460–1700, Ashgate: Aldershot. Gręźlikowski, Janusz (2013), Pierwsze seminaria duchowne w Polsce – recepcja dekretu Soboru Trydenckiego o seminariach, Teologia i Człowiek 22, 2, 63–84. Headley, John M./Tomaro, John (ed.) (1988), San Carlo Borromeo: Catholic Reform and Ecclesiastical Politics in the Second Half of the Sixteenth Century, Washington: Folger Shakespeare Library. Hudon, William V. (1989), Two Instructions to Preachers from the Tridentine Reformation, Sixteenth Century Journal 20, 3, 457–470. Jabłoński, Mieczysław (1975), Teoria duszpasterstwa (wiek XVI–XVIII), in: Marian Rechowicz (ed.), Dzieje teologii katolickiej w polsce, vol. 2, part 1, 327–334. Jedin, Hubert (1957), Geschichte des Konzils von Trient, vol. 2: Die erste Tagunsperiode 1545/47, Freiburg: Herder, 83–103.

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

Jobert, Ambroise (1974), De Luther a Mohila: La Pologne dans la crise de la Chrétienté, 1517–1648, Paris. Kacprzak, Marta M. (2010), Humanitas Erazma z Rotterdamu w kulturze polskiej, in: Alina Nowicka-Jeżowa (ed.), Humanitas. Projekty antropologii humanistycznej, part 2: Inspiracje filozoficzne projektów antropologicznych, Warszawa: Neriton, 41–92. Kakareko, Andrzej (1996), La riforma della vita del clero nella diocesi di Vilna dopo il Concilio di Trent (1564–1796), Roma: PUG. Kilcoyne, Francis P./Jennings, Margaret (1997), Rethinking “Continuity”: Erasmus’ “Ecclesiastes” and the Artes Praedicandi, Renaissance and Reformation 21, 5–24. Kleinhans, Robertr G. (1978), Ecclesiastes Sive de Ratione Concionandi, in: Richard L. DeMolen (ed.), Essays on the Works of Erasmus, New Haven: Yale University Press, 253–266. Kliszko, Zenon A. (1950), Kazania katechizmowe w polskim ustawodawstwie synodalnym, Ateneum Kapłańskie 52, 1, 67–72. Kłoczowski, Jerzy (1986), Średniowiecze i Rzeczpospolita, in: Kłoczowski Jerzy/Müllerowa Lidia/Skarbek Jan/Chróścicki Juliusz A., Zarys dziejów Kościoła katolickiego w Polsce, Kraków: Znak. — (2000), A History of Polish Christianity, Cambridge: University Press. Knape, Joachim (1992), Barock, in: Gert Ueding (ed.), Historisches Wörterbuch der Rhetorik, vol. 1, Tübingen: Niemeyer. Kneidel, Gregory (2011), Artes Praedicandi: Theories and Practice, in: Peter McCullough/ Hugh Adlington/Emma Rhatigan (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the Early Modern Sermon, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3–20. Kolbuszewski, Kazimierz (1921), Postyllografia polska XVI i XVII wieku, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności. Komorowska, Magdalena (2015), Kształt edytorski postylli polskich XVI i XVII wieku – w poszukiwaniu staropolskich konwencji wydawniczych, Terminus 17, 3 (34), 317–367. Kopiec, Jan (2012), Znaczenie trydenckiego dekretu z 1563 r. o obowiązku tworzenia seminariów duchownych, Kościół w Polsce. Dzieje i kultura 11, 47–55. Korolko, Mirosław (1971), O prozie “Kazań sejmowych” Piotra Skargi, Warszawa: PAX. — (1986), Rola retoryki klasycznej w interpretacji Biblii na przykładzie literatury kaznodziejskiej w Polsce XVI wieku, in: Stefan Sawicki/Jan Gotfryd (ed.), Biblia a literatura, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL. Kuran, Magdalena (2007), Retoryka jako narzędzie perswazji w postyllografii polskiej XVI wieku (na przykładzie “Postylli katolicznej” Jakuba Wujka), Łodź: Wydawnictwo UŁ. — (2014), “Eloquentia sacra”, czyli retoryka w służbie kaznodziejstwa (analiza rękopiśmiennego kompendium retorycznego anonimowego autora reformackiego z XVIII wieku), Acta Universitatis Lodziensis. Folia Litteraria Polonica 3, 201–226. Kuźmina, Dariusz (2002), Katechizmy w Rzeczypospolitej XVI i na początku XVIII wieku, Warszawa: Stowarzyszenie Bibliotekarzy Polskich.

197

198

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

Librowski, Stanisław (1969), Dekret Soboru Trydenckiego o seminariach i pierwsze seminaria diecezjalne w Polsce, Ateneum Kapłańskie 72, 2, 204–236. Lichański, Jakub Zdzisław (2000), Retoryka od renesansu do współczesności – tradycja i innowacja, Warszawa: DiG. Maciuszko, Janusz T. (1987), Ewangelicka postyllografia polska XVI–XVIII wieku. Charakterystyka – analiza porównawcza – recepcja, Warszawa: Chrześcijańska Akademia Teologiczna. Mack, Peter (2011), A History of Renaissance Rhetoric 1380–1620, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mcginnes, Frederick J. (1980), Preaching Ideals and Practice in Counter-Reformation Rome, Sixteenth Century Journal 11, 2. — (1995), Right Thinking and Sacred Oratory in Counter-Reformation Rome, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Mouchel, Christian (1999), Les rhétoriques post-tridentines (1570–1600): la fabrique d’une société chrétienne, in: Marc Fumaroli (ed.), Histoire de la rhétorique dans l’Europe moderne: 1450–1950, Paris: PUF, 431–497. Murphy, James Jerome (1983), One Thousand Neglected Authors: The Scope and Importance of Renaissance Rhetoric, in: James Jerome Murphy (ed.), Renaissance Eloquence: Studies in the Theory and Practice of Renaissance Eloquence, Berkeley: University of California Press, 20–36. Nasiorowski, Sławomir (1992), “List pasterski” kard. Bernarda Maciejowskiego, Lublin: Redakcja Wydawnictw KUL. Neumayr, Maximilian (1938), Die Schriftpredigt im Barock. Auf Grund der Theorie der katholischen Barockhomiletik, Paderborn: Schöningh. Niekraszewicz-Korotkaja, Żanna (2009), “Quinta essentia” христианской гомилии в понимании o. Казимира Виюка-Кояловича SJ и современных ему. представителей киевской проповедническoй школы, Senoji Lietuvos Literatura 27, 309–351. O’donohoe, James A. (1957), Tridentine Seminary Legislation. Its Sources and Its Formation, Louvain: Universitas Catholica Lovaniensis. O’malley, John William (1979a), Lutheranism in Rome, 1542–43: The Treatise by Alfonso Zorrilla, Thought 54, 262–273. — (1979b), Praise and Blame in Renaissance Rome. Rhetoric, Doctrine, and Reform in the Sacred Orators of the Papal Court, c. 1450–1521, Durham: Duke University Press. — (1983), Content and Rhetorical Forms in Sixteenth-Century Treatises on Preaching, in: James Jerome Murphy (ed.), Renaissance Eloquence: Studies in the Theory and Practice of Renaissance Eloquence, Berkeley: University of California Press, 238–252. — (1985), Erasmus and the History of Sacred Rhetoric: The Ecclesiastes of 1535, Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook 5, 1–29. — (1993a), Form, Content, and Influence of Works about Preaching before Trent: the Franciscan Contribution, in: idem, Religious Culture in the Sixteenth Century. Preaching, Rhetoric, Spirituality, and Reform, Aldershot: Variorum, 27–50.

The Form and Content of Polish Catholic Works on Preaching in the Post-Tridentine Period (1565–1700)

— (1993b), Saint Charles Borromeo and the “Praecipuum Episcoporum Munus”: His Place in the History of Preaching, in: idem, Religious Culture in the Sixteenth Century, 139–157. — (2000), Trent and All That. Renaming Catholicism in Early Modern Era, Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. — (2013), Trent. What Happened at the Council, Cambridge, MA./London: The Belknap Press of harvard Univeristy Press. Panuś, Kazimierz (1999), Zarys historii kaznodziejstwa w Kościele Katolickim, part 1: Kaznodziejstwo w Kościele powszechnym, Kraków: Wydawnictwo M. — (2001), Zarys historii kaznodziejstwa w Kościele Katolickim, part 2: Kaznodziejstwo w Polsce od średniowiecza do baroku, Kraków: Wydawnictwo M. — (2005), Wielcy mówcy Kościoła w Polsce, Kraków: Wydawnictwo UNUM. Pawlak, Wiesław (2005), Koncept w polskich kazaniach barokowych, Lublin, Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL. — (2009), Od Sokołowskiego do Szylarskiego. Z dziejów homiletyki XVI–XVIII wieku, Barok 16, 1(31), 15–39. — (2014), O wymowie kościelnej Stanisława Sokołowskiego i nie tylko, Ruch Literacki 55, 3, 357–365. — (2016), Teoria kaznodziejstwa w Polsce wobec reformy trydenckiej (do połowy XVII wieku). Rekonesans, in: Justyna Dąbkowska-Kujko (ed.), Formowanie kultury katolickiej w dobie potrydenckiej. Powszechność i narodowość katolicyzmu polskiego, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 435–496. Piela, Michał (2013), Znaczenie dekretu Soboru Trydenckiego “Cum adolescentium aetas” (15 VII 1563) o obowiązku tworzenia seminariów duchownych, Studia Salvatoriana Polonica 7, 13–26. Platt, Dobrosława (1992), Kazania pogrzebowe z przełomu XVI i XVII wieku. Z dziejów prozy staropolskiej, Wrocław: Ossolineum: 1992. Rechowicz, Marian (ed.) (1975), Dzieje teologii katolickiej w Polsce, vol. 2, part 1, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL. Reiner, Johann E. (1915), Entstehungsgeschichte des Trienter Predigtreformdekretes, Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie 39, 256–317, 465–523. Rusiecki, Marian (1996), Przedmiot katechezy potrydenckiej w Polsce (1566–1699), Lublin: Redakcja Wydawnictw KUL. Rutkovska, Kristina (2016), “Punkty kazań” Konstantego Szyrwida – zabytek piśmiennictwa litewskiego i polskiego z pierwszej połowy XVII wieku, Vilnius. Ryczek, Wojciech (2011), Rhetorica christiana. Teoria wymowy kościelnej Stanisława Sokołowskiego, Kraków: UNUM. Schneyer, Johannes Baptist (1969), Geschichte der katholischen Predigt, Freiburg im Breisgau: Seelsorge Verlag. Schütz, Werner (1972), Geschichte der christlichen Predigt, Berlin/New York: De Gruyter. Shuger, Debora K. (1985), The Christian Grand Style in the Renaissance Rhetoric, Viator 16, 337–365.

199

200

Wiesław Pawlak (The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin)

— (1988), Sacred Rhetoric. The Christian Grand Style in the English Renaissance, Princeton: Princeton University Press. — (1993), Sacred Rhetoric in the Renaissance, in: Heinrich F. Plett (ed.), RenaissanceRhetorik/Renaissance Rhetoric, Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 121–142. — (2004), The Philosophical Foundations of Sacred Rhetoric, in: John Corrigan (ed.), Religion and Emotion: Approaches and Interpretations, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Skwara, Marek (2009), Polskie drukowane oracje pogrzebowe XVII wieku. Bibliografia, Gdańsk: Słowo / Obraz Terytoria. Słomiński, Kasper (1892), Ks. Stanisław Sokołowski. Studium do dziejów kaznodziejstwa XVI wieku, Przegląd Powszechny 9 (35). Słowiński, Jan Z. (2005), Katechizmy katolickie w języku polskim od XVI do XVII wieku, Lublin: Wydawnictwo KUL. Stachowski, Franciszek Ksawery (1818), Rozbiór dziełka Stanisława Sokołowskiego pod napisem “Partitiones ecclesiasticae”, Miesięcznik Połocki 1, 1, 43–53. Taylor, Larissa Juliet (1997), The Influence of Humanism on Post-Reformation Catholic Preachers in France, Renaissance Quarterly 50, 1, 119–135. — (ed.) (2001), Preachers and People in the Reformations and Early Modern Period, Leiden: Brill. Weiss, Michael James (1974), “Ecclesiastes” and Erasmus: The Mirror and the Image, Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 65, 83–108. Westervelt, Benjamin Wood (1993), The Borromean Ideal of Preaching: Episcopal Strategies for Reforming Pastoral Preaching in Post-Tridentine Milan, 1564–1631, Harvard: UMI Dissertation Services. Wojtyska, Henryk Damian (1984), S. Carlo Borromeo e la Polonia negli anni 1578–1584, Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia 38, 27–46. — (1986), L’influsso in Polonia e in Lituania, in: San Carlo e il suo tempo. Atti del convegno internazionale nel IV centenario della morte (Milano, 21–26 maggio 1984), vol. 1, Roma: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 527–549. Wójcik, Walenty (1969), Kościelne ustawodawstwo partykularne w Polsce przedrozbiorowej na tle powszechnego prawodawstwa, in: Księga tysiąclecia katolicyzmu w Polsce, part 1, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 440–483. Zárate-Ruiz, Arturo (1987), Fr. Luis de Granada’s Ecclessiastical Rhetoric: An Interpretative Study, Madison: University of Wisconsin. Związek, Jan (1968), Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka i jego działalność kaznodziejsko-literacka, in: Mieczysław Żywczyński/Zygmunt Zieliński (ed.), Studia historyczne, Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL. — (1969), Argumentacja biblijna w kazaniach niedzielnych ks. Mikołaja z Wilkowiecka, Ruch Biblijny i Liturgiczny 22, 4. Żelazko, Roman (1974), Kaznodzieja według Fabiana Birkowskiego, in: Chrześcijańska odpowiedź na pytanie człowieka. W 750-lecie służby polskich dominikanów Bogu i ludziom, Warszawa: Polska Prowincja Dominikanów, 449–463.

Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw)

Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575) by Maciej Wirzbięta1

Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae in principle does not appear in studies devoted to the history of the Reformation in Poland or in studies on the history of spirituality, education, and Polish translations of the Bible in the Renaissance2 . The author and publisher of this work, Maciej Wirzbięta, was born probably around 1523 and died in 1605 (cf. inter alia Ptaśnik: 1921, 184–186; Ptaśnik: 1922, 74–78; Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1981, 5–7; Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1983, 366–369). Before proceeding to discuss Elementaria institutio…, it is worth pausing at the person of Wirzbięta himself, one of the most famous printers operating in Cracow in the sixteenth century, whose activity was linked to the most important writers of the Calvinist denomination. He was a Calvinist and an active member of Jednota in south-eastern Poland (Małopolska – Lesser Poland, Polonia Minor). For these reasons, Mikołaj Rej (cf. inter alia Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1981, 5–7; Stankiewicz: 1971, 257–268; Ślękowa: 2007, 68–75; Karpiński: 2007, 96–99), Stanisław Sarnicki, Jakub Niemojewski, Andrzej of Przasnysz, Krzysztof Trecy and Jakub Sylwiusz published their works in his printing house in Sławkowska Street. It is also not surprising that in 1570 Wirzbięta’s workshop prepared the edition of Konfesja sandomierska [The Confession of Sandomierz]3 , a confession of faith of Christian churches based on the Second Helvetic Confession, but also the edition of Colloquium Piotrkowskie [The Discussion of Piotrków, 1566] by Stanisław Sarnicki, the most important testimony of the theological dispute between Stanisław Sarnicki and Grzegorz Paweł of Brzeziny during a parliamentary session in Piotrków in 1565 (cf. Górski: 1929, 133–137). Maciej Wirzbięta also printed the Polish translation of Heinrich Bullinger’s Compendium christianae religionis (probably done

1 The results of the research supported by a NCN grant (No. 2014/13/B/HS2/00469 – “Kwestia godności kobiecej i jej przesłanki w O ślachetności a zacności płci niewieściej (1575) Macieja Wirzbięty. Studium przekładu” / Women’s Dignity and its Premises in the Treatise O ślachetności a zacności płci niewieściej (1575) by Maciej Wirzbięta. Study of the translation) were used in this article. 2 Only Margarita Korzo has mentioned this text in her article on the Polish translations of Calvin’s Second Geneva Catechism. For more information cf. Korzo: 2012, 191–201. 3 For more information about the edition of Konfesja sandomierska cf. Długosz-Kurczabowa: 1995, VII. About the Sandomierz Consensus (14.04.1570) cf. Halecki: 1915; Augustyniak: 1994, 18–22.

202

Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw)

by Wirzbięta himself and Krzysztof Trecy) entitled Opisanie wiary chrześcijańskiej [Describing the Christian Faith] (1573; cf. Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1981, 13; Lehmann: 1937, 97–98, Wojtkowska-Maksymik: 2017, 113–124) and one of the most beautiful postils by Mikołaj Rej (Świętych słów a spraw Pańskich, które tu sprawował Pan a Zbawiciel nasz na tym świecie jako prawy Bóg, będąc w człowieczeństwie swoim, Kronika albo Postylla [The chronicle or postil of the holy words and deeds of Christ, which our Lord and Saviour as the true God and man did here in this world] 1557). In addition to polemical writings, the Wirzbięta printing presses published popular romances, treatises on upbringing, the most famous of which where Żywot człowieka poczciwego [The Life of a Righteous Man, 1567/1568] by Mikołaj Rej and Dworzanin polski [The Polish Courtier, 1566] by Łukasz Górnicki. Finally, it cannot be forgotten that in 1575 Wirzbięta published both Elementaria institutio… as well as O ślachetności a zacności płci niewieściej [On the Nobility and Excellence of the Female Sex], which is his own version of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa’s De nobilitate et praeccellentia foeminei sexus [The Declamation on the Nobility and Preeminence of the Female Sex, 1529] (cf. Wojtkowska-Maksymik: 2017, 165–351). In the 1580s and 1590s, Gospodarstwo dla młodych a nowotnych gospodarzów [A Farm for the Young and Modern Landlords] and Tablica albo Konterfet Cebesa [The Tablet of Cebes], moralizing and didactic works by Wirzbięta, which can be combined with the Elementaria institutio…, were published (cf. Kulas: 2014, 113–115; Wirzbięta: 1989)4 . Wirzbięta was also one of the first Polish Renaissance printers to publicly and consciously dedicate his own works or works he published to women (e.g. Teodora [Fiodora] Wołłowicz, Krystyna Chodkiewicz, who were the wives of rich and wealthy politicians and religious activists: Ostafi Wołłowicz, Jan Hieronimowicz Chodkiewicz). It is worth remembering that both writers and readers were attracted to Wirzbięta’s printing house by his specific way of publishing books. It demonstrated – in modern language – his leadership skills and the fact that he attached great importance to the appearance of the book in accordance with the principle that a work could affect the intellect and emotions of recipients only when both its content and appearance (a careful selection of initials, typeface, vignettes, woodcuts, printer’s marks, title pages) were appealing. One cannot overlook another fact, the excellent editing of books and their typesetting, thus there are rarely any linguistic errors, typos, etc. (cf. Piekarski: 1932, 358; Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1974, 5–12).

4 It should be mentioned that Wirzbięta wrote some other works, especially dedicatory letters and poems, which he attached to books published in his printing house in Sławkowska Street (cf. WojtkowskaMaksymik: 2017, 80–126).

Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575)

As I have already mentioned, Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae was published in 1575 (Ill. 1). A unique and incomplete copy of this publication can be found at the National Library in Sofia (shelf mark: Fot.4o .714adl.; cf. Wirzbięta: 1575)5 . The work was printed in a small, textbook format (16o ), which was related to the recipients of the book. It was meant to be read and used first of all by teachers and parents. The book consists of four parts preceded by a list of letters (and corresponding speech sounds) of the Latin and Polish alphabets (cf. Wirzbięta: 1575, A2 r.–A4 r.; Ill. 2)6 . In the first part there is information about the Christian’s obligations to God (Quidnam pensi Deo debeat homo Christianus), in the second (Quid proximo suo solvere debeat), about duties towards relatives (parents, teachers, friends, servants, superiors), in the third (Quomodo animus excolendus sit), recommendations for caring for the soul, in the last (Quomodo corpus curandum), principles of caring for the body. Such a composition reflected the main features of the evangelical catechism books designed to shape conscience, piety, a particular lifestyle and decency. The influence of evangelical catechisms can also be found in the title itself and specifically in the Latin term institutio, here meaning education, upbringing, which appears in the title of John Calvin’s Institutio Christianae religionis (1536)7 . The main task of the teacher was to provide their students with a strict and devout upbringing, and the rules of education were constructed in the form of bilingual, Polish-Latin sentences. The majority of them are simply quotes from the Bible adapted to the specific circumstances, activities, tasks, responsibilities of the child, parent, and teacher. This form of certain parts of Elementaria institutio… was undoubtedly influenced by the tables of duties (Haustafeln) present in the evangelical catechisms or the Lutheran and Calvinistic hymnals, including those

5 I was using the digitalized version available on the website of the National Library in Sofia: www.nationallibrary.bg [accessed on 06.05.2019]. Korzo found the second copy of this work in the National Library of Poland in Warsaw (shelf mark: XVI.0.433adl.). The print from the Polish National Library has no title page and no conclusion; minor lexical differences in comparison with the copy from Sofia are noticeable too (cf. Wojtkowska-Maksymik: 2017, 130–131). According to Korzo, it is an earlier edition of Elementaria…, previously unknown, but noted in the bibliographies (e. g. Kawecka-Gryczowa: 1981, 5, 58) with the title Preces seu Institutiones pueriles (cf. Pilarczyk: 2003, 71; Korzo: 2012, 192; Korzo: 2015, 177–182; Korzo: 2016, 78–79). Preces… was mentioned by Wirzbięta himself in his dedication to Elementaria institutio…: “Qua ratione quisque ab adolescentia instituatur, plurimum referre scimus. Ea propter Preces seu institutionem puerilem, superioribus annis excussam, ne temere nunc tumultorieque imprimatur, in hanc Elementaria institutionem redegimus” (Wirzbięta: 1575, A1 v). 6 For this reason, the book appears in research on Polish primers (cf. Pilarczyk: 2003, 71, 217, 259, 408; Korzo: 2015, 177–182; Korzo: 2016, 78–79). 7 For more information about books containing the evangelical catechism in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the sixteenth century cf. Winiarska-Górska: 2015, 140–157.

203

204

Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw)

published in Poland in the sixteenth century (e.g. Catechismus and Oeconomia by Jan Seklucjan printed in the 1540s)8 . The domestic codes usually contained list of obligations that people in various callings and stations in life have, as both a command and blessing from God and, of course, instructions or exhortations concerning the attitudes and behavior of family members towards each other. The Haustafeln, in the form of a collection of short biblical passages (quotations or paraphrases) should also be considered the quintessence of the evangelical method of teaching, which aimed at reducing educational content to the core, usually to cautions or advice from the Bible (according to the principle of sola Scriptura). Wirzbięta, when quoting excerpts from the Bible in Polish, did not use existing translations, such as the Brest Bible of 1563, which he must have been familiar with, but translated the passages himself (Pilarczyk: 2001, 192; Korzo: 2015, 178). Here are two examples from the third part. The first concerned respect for one’s father and the second, penalties that parents should administer to children: Parentibus debent liberi. 1. Honorem. Eccle. III et VIII. Kto we ćci ma ojca swego, pociechy Qui honorat patrem suum, iucundabitur doczeka po syniech, a w dzień prośby swej in filiis, et in die orationis suae będzie wysłuchany i dłużej żyw będzie. W exaudietur, vitaque vivet longiore. In sprawie i rozmowie, i we wszej cirpliwości opere et sermone et omni patientia ćci ojca twojego, żeby przyszło na cię honora patrem tuum ut superveniat tibi błogosławieństwo od Boga, ażeby błogosławieństwo benedictio a Deo, et benedictio illius jego na dzień ostatni trwało. in novissimo maneat (Wirzbięta: 1575, B7 v.–B8 r). Liberis debent parentes. 1. Doctrinam et disciplinam. Pro. XXIII. Nie odejmuj od dziecięcia karania, Noli substrahere a puero disciplinam jeśli bowiem skażesz go rózgą, nie umrze.

8 About Polish tables of duties cf. Winiarska-Górska: 2016, 91–118. About the New Testament household codes, on which Martin Luther relied when he was writing the Haustafeln attached to the Small Catechism cf. Schrage: 1974, 1–22.

Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575)

Si enim percusseris eum virga, non morietur: Ty rózgą skarzesz go, a duszę tu virga percuties eum et animam jego z piekła wybawisz. Głupość eius de inferno liberabis. Stultitia wpoiła sie jest w sercu dziecięcym, colligata est in corde pueri a rózga karności wypędzi ją. et virga disciplinae fugabit eam (Wirzbięta: 1575, C1 r.).

In the first and third parts there are also texts of prayers (morning prayers, the Lord’s Prayer, the Hail Mary, the Apostles’ Creed, prayer to the Holy Spirit, Psalms 50, 66, 8, 30; cf. Wirzbięta: 1575, A4 v.-B3 r.-v.), fragments of the liturgy of the Lord’s Supper (cf. Wirzbięta: 1575, B4 v.-B6 v.) and the general confession of sins (cf. Wirzbięta: 1575, E1 r.-E8 v.). Their aim was to facilitate a young person’s proper behavior in church and guarantee their activity during the service. As we read, “Let the child know: a church is not a rogue cave, but a house of prayer. And for this, no dealing, no laughter, no immorality shall be exercised in it, but when it is the time to sing, let him sing away. And free from singing, let him confess his sins to God and let him ask for mercy”9 . An important place in the education of a young mind was also occupied by the teaching of the Ten Commandments, the list of which was in the third part10 , and the study of examples of prayers, among others of biblical kings of Judah (Jehoshaphat and Manasseh; Wirzbięta: 1575, F5 r.-F7 v.) and Mary (The Magnificat; cf. Wirzbięta: 1575, F4 r.-v.). It seems that among the prayers included in Elementaria institutio…, Wirzbięta attributed a special significance to Psalm 30. Its translation (found in the third part) is the only one that has a verse form and the following commentary – “Cura omnis in Deum reicienda” (Wirzbięta: 1575, D4 r.-v.). Perhaps Wirzbięta decided to distinguish this particular psalm because of its contents, which are close to the theology of Calvinism, namely, first of all, the dependence of man’s

9 “Niech wie dziecię: kościół nie jaskinia łotrowska być, ale dom modlitwy. A dla tego nie giełdę, nie śmiechy, nie rozpustności będzie sprawował w nim, ale gdy śpiewania czas jest, niech czyni to, co napoczciwiej. A od śpiewania wolny, niech wyznawa grzechy swe Panu i niech miłosierdzia prosi” (Wirzbięta: 1575, A7 r.). If not stated otherwise all translations are by the Author of this article. On the relationship between the primers and the Bible o prayer books cf. Butterworth: 1953, passim; Devereux: 1968, 29–44. 10 Cf. Wirzbięta: 1575, C7 r.-C8 r. (Decem praecepta Dei, Iudeis per Mosen data in duabus tabulis lapideis. Exodi. XX), C8 r.-v. (Epilogus horum pareceptorum per Christum Matth. XXI. Mar. XII. Lucae. X).

205

206

Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw)

salvation on God’s grace, the sinner’s unconditional faith in the Creator’s power and the sinner’s conviction of the power of God capable of oppressing all enemies11 . It is worth noting that the book contains information indicating the author’s denomination. Perhaps this information was given due to the influence of the Calvinists’ discussions with the Polish Brethren, which, after all, were carried out throughout the 1560s and 1570s. They primarily concerned the divinity of Jesus Christ and the dogma of the Holy Trinity, and Wirzbięta was aware of them for he printed polemic writings directed against the Arians12 . Perhaps to distance himself from the Polish Brethren doctrine and to emphasize fidelity to Calvinism, in the third part, beginning with the reminder of the human soul’s tendency to do evil, there are remarks about the role of faith in the process of salvation and about Christ, the Son of God and mediator, who redeemed humanity from sin: Fide vitam aeternam haberi animus primum discat. This is eternal life (so Christ says to the Father) that they recognize you as rightly God yourself and him whom you sent – Jesus Christ. […] Resurrectio ad vitam ex fide. Ioannis. VIII. This is the will of the Father, that whoever sees the Son and believes in him has eternal life and I will resurrect him on the last day13 .

11 Cf.: “W Tobie, Panie, nadzieję mam, / wszystko dufanie pokładam. / Tak nie będąc pohańbiony, / używając Twej obrony. / Wyzwól mię z swojej lutości / od wszelakiej niebezpieczności. / Nachyl ku mnie ucha Twego, / a zbaw człowieka grzesznego. / Bądź ty, Panie, ma obrona, / boć moja rzecz jest stracona. / Wszakeś obiecał wysłuchać, / człowieka w smętku pocieszać. / Na tym świecie, mocny Panie, / prowadź i daj wychowanie. / Niech słynie Twe imię święte / prze dobrodziejstwa sowite. / Wyzwól z sidł nieprzyjacielskich, / gdyż mie szczycisz czasów wszelkich. / Niech obaczą możność Twoję, / a nas wielkie miłowanie. / Tobie poruczam, Boże mój, / ducha, ciało i żywot swój. / Sprawuj Ty mnie, sługę swego, / aż do żywota wiecznego. Amen” (Wirzbięta: 1575, D4 r.-v.). 12 Maciej Wirzbięta published the following polemical texts against the Polish Brethren: Mercurius sive de Trinitate (1563) by Jakub Górski, O jedności boskiej nierozdzielnej przeciwko wieku dzisiejszego błędom a bluźnirstwom ariańskim nowo wskrzeszonym nauka i obrona z szczyrygo słowa Bożego (1566) by Jakub Niemojewski, O uznaniu Pana Boga wszechmogącego troje kazanie (1564), Collatio in qua aperte demonstratur blasphemia Gregorii Brzezinensis (1564), Colloquium Piotrkowskie, to jest rozmowa, którą mieli wyznawce prawdziwej wiary staradawnej o Panu Bodze w Trojcy jedynym z stroną przeciwną w Piotrkowie w Sejm Roku przesz. 1565 (1566) by Stanisław Sarnicki. Wirzbięta himself wrote the dedication letter to Stanisław Myszkowski and published the text with the Polish translation of the Hozeasz Prorok (1567). The letter contained critical comments on the doctrine of the Polish Brethren (cf. Wojtkowska-Maksymik: 2017, 90–97). 13 “Fide vitam aeternam haberi animus primum discat. To jest żywot wieczny (Krystus tak ku Ojcu mówi), aby uznali Ciebie samego Boga prawego i któregoś posłał – Jezusa Krystusa. […] Resurrectio ad vitam ex fide. Ioannis. VIII. Ta jest wola Ojca, aby wszelki, który widzi Syna a wierzy weń, ma żywot wieczny, a wskrzeszę go w ostatni dzień” (Wirzbięta: 1575, C8 v.-D1 r.).

Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575)

Mediator Christus. I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me alone. If anyone has sinned, we have an intercessor with the Father – Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the atonement for our sins14 . Quomodo Deus dilexit nos. Ioan. III. God loved the world so, that he gave his only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in him should not perish, but that he might have eternal life15 .

In turn, the first part contains invocations to the Holy Spirit, because “in this Spirit [one can] understand the truth and with his kind consolation one will always rejoice”16 . In conclusion, the Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis christianae is a kind of primer of the basic principles of learning Latin and Polish, but the work could also – depending on the user – perform the function of: 1) a primer, 2) a prayer book (both during quiet prayers at home and during a church service), 3) extracts from selected biblical books, 4) a set of rules useful for a preceptor or a parent, 5) a textbook of good behavior, and the last part of the book, based mainly on the sentences taken from the Book of Kohelet or the Book of Proverbs indicates such a purpose17 . Some passages in this part take the form of ready, very general rules, for example: “Do not love sleeping” (“Nie miłuj spania”), “You will not be a slanderer or a gossipmonger among people” (“Nie będziesz potwarca ani szczebietliwym między ludem”), “In wordiness there will be no sin” (“W wielomówieniu nie będzie grzechu”), “Let not any hideous speech come from your mouth” (“Wszelka mowa szkarada z ust waszych niech nie pochodzi”), “Turn away your countenance from the adopted woman” (“Odwróć oblicze twe od niewiasty przybranej”) , “Watch yourself so that your heart is not burdened with gluttony and drunkenness” (“Pilnujcie o sobie, by snadź nie obciążyły sie serca wasze obżarstwem i opilstwem”), “Walk in the spirit, and do not exercise the lusts of the flesh” (“W duchu chodźcie, a pożądliwości ciała nie wykonywajcie”)18 . Their presence certainly made it easier to memorize the rules for both the teacher and the student. Finally, it needs to be mentioned that the didactic purpose of the work was dictated by the care of Wirzbięta for the fate of

14 “Mediator Christus. Jam jest droga, prawda i żywot. Nikt nie przychodzi do Ojca jedno przez mię. Jeśli kto zgrzeszy, orędownika mamy u Ojca – Jezusa Krystusa sprawiedliwego, a on jest ubłaganie ze grzechy nasze” (Wirzbięta: 1575, C8 r.). 15 “Quomodo Deus dilexit nos. Ioan. III. Tak Bóg umiłował świat, że Syna swego jednorodzonego dał, aby wszelki, który wierzy weń, nie zginął, ale żeby miał żywot wieczny” (Wirzbięta: 1575, D1 r.-v.). 16 “w tymże Duchu [można – M. W.-M.] prawdę rozumieć i jego łaskawym pocieszeniem zawżdy się weselić” (Wirzbięta: 1575, A6 v.-A7 r.). 17 On the different functions of devotional texts on the example of prayer books cf. Borkowska: 1999, 263–269. Borkowska also writes about the role in the process of ‘democratising religion’ and spreading piety (cf. Borkowska: 1999, 51–52). 18 Wirzbięta: 1575, F1 r.-F3 v.

207

208

Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw)

the young: an individual inclined to evil and sin should receive the best education possible. Only an upbringing in love and respect for the elderly and in fear could be an effective antidote to sin (“As the human soul is inclined to evil, therefore a yoke of piety must be imposed on it from a young age” / “Quoniam animus humanus pronus est ad malum, ideo statim ab adolescentia, imponendum est illi iugum pietatis”)19 . Devotional practices connected with participation in the liturgy, daily, silent prayers, and with reading the Old and New Testament books quoted in Latin and Polish served as reminders of one’s duties. The habit of certain activities, first carried out under the tutelage of the teacher, was – in a broader perspective – to guarantee salvation and eternal life.

Illustration 1: Title page of the 1575 edition of Elementaria…

19 “Ponieważ dusza ludzka skłonna jest do zła, dlatego już od młodości nałożyć nań trzeba jarzmo pobożności. / Quoniam animus humanus pronus est ad malum, ideo statim ab adolescentia, imponendum est illi iugum pietatis” (Wirzbięta: 1575, C7 r.).

Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575)

Illustration 2: Elementaria…, fol. A2 –A4

Bibliography Primary Sources Wirzbięta, Maciej (1575), Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae, Cracoviae: Matthias Wirzbięta. Wirzbięta, Maciej (1989), Gospodarstwo dla młodych a nowotnych gospodarzów, teraz znowu na ten Nowy Rok poprawione i rozszyrzone, Jacek Sokolski (ed.), Wrocław: Ossolineum.

Secondary Sources Augustyniak, Urszula (1994), Konfesja sandomierska. Wstęp historyczny, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper. Borkowska, Urszula (1999), Królewskie modlitewniki. Studium z kultury religijnej epoki Jagiellonów (XV i początek XVI w.), Lublin: Towarzystwo Naukowe Katolickiego Uniwersytetu Lubelskiego.

209

210

Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik (University of Warsaw)

Butterworth, Charles A. (1953), The English Primers (1529–1545). Their Publication and Connection with the English Bible and the Reformation in England, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Devereux, James A. (1968), The Primers and the Prayer Book Collects, Huntington Library Quarterly 32, 1. Długosz-Kurczabowa, Krystyna (1995), Wstęp, in: Krystyna Długosz-Kurczabowa (ed.), Konfesja sandomierska, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper. Górski, Karol (1929), Grzegorz Paweł z Brzezin. Monografia z dziejów polskiej literatury arjańskiej XVI wieku, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności. Halecki, Oskar (1915), Zgoda sandomierska 1570 r. Jej geneza i znaczenie w dziejach reformacji polskiej za Zygmunta Augusta, Kraków: Gebethner i Wolff. Karpiński, Adam (2007), Renesans, Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. Kawecka-Gryczowa, Alodia (1974), Wstęp, in: Alodia Kawecka-Gryczowa (ed.), Polonia Typographica Saeculi Sedecimi. Tłocznie polskie XVI stulecia. Monografie i podobizny zasobów drukarskich, vol. IX: Maciej Wirzbięta (Kraków 1555/7–1605), fig. 416–475, Wrocław: Ossolineum. — (1981), Wstęp, in: Alodia Kawecka-Gryczowa (ed.), Polonia Typographica Saeculi Sedecimi. Tłocznie polskie XVI stulecia. Monografie i podobizny zasobów drukarskich, vol. XI: Maciej i Paweł Wirzbiętowie (Kraków 1555/7–1609), fig. 521–570, Wrocław: Ossolineum. — (1983), Maciej Wirzbięta, in: Alodia Kawecka-Gryczowa (ed.), Drukarze dawnej Polski od XV do XVIII wieku, vol. 1: Małopolska, part 1: Wiek XV–XVI, Wrocław: Ossolineum. Korzo, Margarita A. (2012), Jeszcze raz w sprawie nieznanego tłumaczenia Jana Kalwina w Polsce, Odrodzenie i Reformacja w Polsce, 56. — (2015), O tekstach religijnych w XVI-wiecznych elementarzach polskich, Pamiętnik Literacki, 106. — (2016), “Elementa Pverilis Institutionis” (Kraków 1692) – przyczynek do historii elementarzy polskich, Biblioteka, 20 (29). Kulas, Joanna (2014), Odrzucony obraz. “Tablica Cebesa” w literaturze polskiej XVI wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IBL – Stowarzyszenie “Pro Cultura Litteraria”. Lehmann, Jerzy (1937), Konfesja sandomierska na tle innych konfesji w Polsce XVI w., Warszawa. Piekarski, Kazimierz (1932), Książka w Polsce XV i XVI wieku, in: Kultura staropolska, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności. Pilarczyk, Franciszek (2001), Biblia w elementarzach staropolskich, in: Tadeusz Jaworski/ Wiesław Pyżewicz (ed.), Nowy Testament w dziejach i kulturze Europy. 450 rocznica przekładu Nowego Testamentu przez Mikołaja Jakubicę na język dolnołużycki, Zielona Góra: Uniwersytet Zielonogórski. — (2003), Elementarze polskie od ich XVI-wiecznych początków do II wojny światowej: próba monografii księgoznawczej, Zielona Góra: Oficyna Wydawnicza UZ. Ptaśnik, Jan (1921), Księgarze-różnowiercy w Krakowie w XVI wieku, Reformacja w Polsce 1.

Can Devotion be Taught? Elementaria institutio Latini sermonis et pietatis Christianae (1575)

— (1922), Cracovia impressorum XV et XVI saeculorum, Leopoli: sumptibus Instituti Ossoliniani. Schrage, Wolfgang (1974), Zur Ethik der neutesamentlichen Haustafeln, New Testament Studies 21, 1. Ślękowa, Ludwika (2007), Utwory Mikołaja Reja w wydaniach Macieja Wirzbięty, in: Jacek Sokolski/Marcin Cieński/Anna Kochan (ed.), Mikołaj Rej w pięćsetlecie urodzin. Studia literaturoznawcze, Wrocław: Oficyna Wydawnicza ATUT – Wrocławskie Wydawnictwo Oświatowe. Stankiewicz, Elżbieta (1971), Maciej Wirzbięta – wydawca Reja, in: Tadeusz Bieńkowski/ Janusz Pelc/Krystyna Pisarkowa (ed.), Mikołaj Rej w czterechsetlecie śmierci, Wrocław: Ossolineum. Winiarska-Górska, Izabela (2015), Staropolskie ewangelickie katechizmy i kancjonały jako książki formacyjne, in: Dariusz Chemperek (ed.), Ewangelicyzm reformowany w pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej. Dialog z Europą i wybory aksjologiczne w świetle literatury i piśmiennictwa XVI–XVII wieku, Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. — (2016), Tablice domowe, czyli “ekonomia” w katechizmach ewangelickich z XVI i XVII w., in: Monika Krajewska/Joanna Kulwicka-Kamińska/Arleta Szulc (ed.), Święte księgi judaizmu, chrześcijaństwa i islamu w słowiańskim kręgu kulturowym. Prace dedykowane Profesorowi Czesławowi Łapicowi, vol. 3, Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Mikołaja Kopernika. Wojtkowska-Maksymik, Marta (2017), Źródła i sposób ujęcia kwestii kobiecej godności w “O ślachetności a zacności płci niewieściej” Macieja Wirzbięty, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Sub Lupa.

211

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries of Medicalization in 16th Century Poland–Lithuania1

Without question this story ought to begin with two interconnected events which took place on Low Sunday, April 17, 1583, in Venice and in Lublin: in Venice, the most important Polish and Lithuanian soul reclaimed from Protestant ranks, Duke Mikołaj Krzysztof Radziwiłł “Sierotka” [the Orphan] (1549–1616), boarded a ship along with his escort and set off on a voyage along the Adriatic coast to reach Jerusalem and Egypt (Kempa: 2000, 119); thanks to the efforts of Jesuits, Radziwiłł’s account of this journey became the most recognizable literary emblem of a penitential pilgrimage in the region in the seventeenth century2 . On the same day, it appears, in St Michael’s church in Lublin, a public apostasy took place of Gaspar (Kasper) Wilkowski (d. after 1608), a future physician to Radziwiłł “Sierotka”: the young man left the Anti-Trinitarian community where he had grown up and matured, by publicly adopting the Catholic faith3 . One of the reasons for Radziwiłł’s pilgrimage was repentance and hope to recover from his illness. Today we can only wonder whether Wilkowski then knew about his future employment as the prince’s physician. Such a possibility cannot be excluded, although in the sixteenth century we find many examples of physicians and their patients belonging to opposing faiths; it is obvious, however, that in the second half of the sixteenth century the Jesuits of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were highly concerned with a growing network of “heretic physicians” while suffering a shortage of trained Catholic medical practitioners.

1 Research for this paper was made possible by funding from the Research Council of Lithuania (LMTLT), agreement No S-MIP-20-6. 2 The book is rightly considered the most widely circulated work of a Lithuanian author in early modern Europe; its Latin text prepared in epistolary form by Jesuit Tomasz Treter (Thomas Treterus, 1547–1610) was issued for the first time in Braunsberg in 1601 as Hierosolymitana peregrinatio Illustrissimi Domini Nicolai Christophori Radziwill (Georgium Schonfels: 1601), subsequent editions came out in 1614, 1753, 1756. The German version of the work was published twice (1603, 1609) in Germany. The Polish version prepared by Andrzej Wargocki was printed even more extensively (from 1607 in the seventeenth century there were further five reprinted editions); in 1787, the first Russian edition came out in Petersburg. 3 For a balanced discussion of the date of this public event see Hanusiewicz-Lavallee: 2018, 97.

214

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Another element that sheds more light on the relations between Catholicism and heterodoxy in the 1580s and the first conversions of radical evangelicals to Catholicism are three letters – written in Poland in April 1583 – by Gaspar’s AntiTrinitarian father, Balcer Wilkowski, the Apostolic Nuncio Alberto Bolognetti, and a Jesuit, Antonio Possevino. They prove that the opposing groups that became active in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, represented respectively by the Jesuits of the counter-reformation era and the early Socinians, caused a certain amount of tension, which also affected the process of medicalization in the land. In this article, I am going to discuss the response of Polish-Lithuanian Jesuits to the network of heterodox physicians that emerged in the country in the second half of the sixteenth century, and reflect on why it was a physician that came to be their first victory in the camp of heterodoxy.

Illustration 1: Jan Niemojewski, Ukazanie, iż Kościół rzymski papieski nie jest apostolski…, Kraków 1584.

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

1.

Apostasy and its Testimony

On 19 April 1583, Balcer Wilkowski, a member of the Lublin community of the radical evangelical Polish Brethren, wrote a dramatic letter to his son, which was later featured in Jan Niemojewski’s (c. 1526–1598) tract titled A Demonstration that the Roman Church is neither Apostolic, nor Holy, nor One, nor Universal (1584). The letter condemned the sudden conversion to Catholicism of Gaspar Wilkowski, the author’s son and a physician, publicly announced two days before. The father proclaimed his son lost to him unless he returned to the path of the holy truth, which he had abandoned whilst tempted by the evil spirit: O Panie zastępów, Boże izraelski, Boże i Ojcze Pana mojego, Jezusa Chrystusa, Boże i Ojcze mój dobrotliwy i prawdziwy, jeśliże ja z innymi nie wypłacze u ciebie tego straconego syna, czemużeś nie rozkazał żywotowi zawrzeć się o nim, aby był martwym wyszedł z niego, a byłby był szczęśliwszym. Czemuż go w pieluszkach świnie nie zjadły, a nie miałbym był takiej żałości po nim. Czemużeś go raczej w młodości jego nie zabił, jakoś i Mikołaja syna mego zabił, o którym cale ufam i wierzę, że go w onym zacnym a błogosławionym niebie twoim ujźrzę i oglądam. Czemużeś mu się siebie samego i swego namilejszego, a jedynego Syna z hojnymi skarbami niebieskimi tajemnic wiecznego żywota zwierzył, miałeś-li mu to ku jego upadkowi i zginieniu odjąć? A mój nieszczęśliwy nakład, którym o nim czynił, aby był ku chwale Pana Boga mego, a jaką gorzkość mi się obrócił. O, wolałbym teraz, aby był świnie pasł (Wilkowski: 1959, 465). Oh Mighty Lord, God of Israel, God and Father of Jesus Christ who is my Lord, my good and true God and Father, if I cannot pray that you return this lost son to me, then why did you not order the womb to close so he emerged from it dead and happier in being so. Why was he not devoured by pigs whilst in his diapers, making me grieve him forever less. Why did you not strike him dead in his youth, as you did my son Mikołaj, whom I hope and believe that I will meet in your venerable and blessed heaven? Why did you trust him with your, and your beloved and only Son’s, ample heavenly secrets of eternal life, if you had to take them away from him in his decline and demise? How bitter have become my ill-fated efforts that I made in honour of my Lord God. Oh, I wish now he had turned a swineherd instead.

The father’s dramatic plea did nothing to alter the son’s choice. Six months later, in the autumn of 1583 (Wilkowski’s dedication of his book to Stephen Báthory, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, was signed on November 1), the Vilnius Jesuit printing house, most likely funded by Duke Mikołaj Krzysztof Radziwiłł “Sierotka”, published the apostate’s tract titled Przyczyny nawrócenia do wiary powszechney od sekt nowokrzczeńców samosateńskich [The Causes of the Conversion to the

215

216

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Universal Faith from the Anabaptist Samosatene Sects] (Wilkowski: 1583). The son dispatched a copy with a handwritten inscription to his father as a reply to his letter condemning his conversion4 .

Illustration 2: List Balcera Wilkowskiego, ojca, do Kaspra Wilkowskiego…

This story bears eloquent testimony to the importance of religious identity in sixteenth-century life. The documented religious conflict between close family members is a rare piece of evidence in the history of Lithuania and Poland, known for their multi-confessional landscape in the Reformation era. In the community regarded as a beacon of religious harmony in Europe, Wilkowski’s conversion stands out for having provoked an open rather than domestic polemic between the father and the son, which was full of Christian rhetoric and implications5 .

4 The copy containing this inscription is kept at the Czartoryski Library in Kraków (Calma: 2014, 590). 5 See the latest interpretations of the rhetorical figures evoked in the Balcer and Gaspar Wilkowski polemic: Luszczynska: 2018, 1–19. In this paper, the author demonstrates how Wilkowski the father

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

Wilkowski’s Przyczyny was the first tract justifying apostasy from Protestantism to be published in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (further referred to as GDL), its purpose being to provide a personal example in a bid to advocate the return to the path of Catholicism. The nature of the book and the context surrounding it testify that it was aimed at a broad readership as part of the intensive efforts by the Jesuits in the Stephen Báthory era to re-Catholicise the population. Actions were being taken to involve Evangelicals from different social circles in this process so that their first-hand testimony would reveal the Reformation’s errors more forcefully. Albeit marginal, yet undergoing consolidation by Fausto Sozzini and others who shared his ideas, the Anti-Trinitarian movement was one of the strongest intellectually challenging forces for the Society of Jesus; it is therefore in this community that the Jesuits would focus their efforts to seek out potential converts. In addition to the tract by Hieronim Powodowski (1543–1613) – preacher at the court of Stephen Báthory – titled Wędzidło na Bluźnierstwa i Sprośne Błędy Nowych Aryjanów [Curbing the Blasphemies and abominable fallacies of the New Arians] published in Poznań in 1582, Wilkowski’s piece was among the first texts written in Polish against the Anti-Trinitarians6 , who at that time went by different names7 .

deployed the Parable of the Prodigal Son to express his reaction to his son’s apostasy. Gaspar Wilkowski countered the Parable of the Prodigal Son with the one about the wayward sheep. See also Buožytė: 2018, 142–160. 6 The expansion of Anti-Trinitarianism on the territory of Poland and Lithuania had entered its third decade since Piotr of Goniądz made the first official statement criticising the dogma of the Trinity at the Evangelical synod in January 1556. 7 All names given by the adversaries to the Evangelicals engaged in the criticism of the Trinity and Anabaptist practices were eponymous in character. The most popular terms were derived from the anthroponyms of Arius and Paul of Samosata. Due to their practice of adult baptism they would also be referred to as rebaptists (Polish: nowokrzczeńcy).

217

218

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Illustration 3: Przyczyny nawrócenia do wiary powszechnej…, Wilno 1583.

Gaspar Wilkowski’s tract has repeatedly come under scrutiny in historical studies. Mirosław Korolko (1970, 246–251) regarded it as a spiritual confession of a convert; Lech Szczucki (1960, 160–162) considered it in the context of criticism against Marcin Czechowic (c. 1532–1613), leader of the Lublin Anti-Trinitarians. Sławomir Baczewski (2005, 78) was right in his observation that Korolko’s critique was not correct, because in this voluminous work spanning 250 pages Wilkowski addressed

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

the reasons for his conversion on only seven pages, offering a very meagre reflection on his inner experiences. Wilkowski’s tract bears no resemblance, either in its form or content, to Augustine of Hippo’s iconic confession about his apostasy from heresy. The book offers little insight into the author’s spiritual development, which makes the title that identifies the book as dealing with the ‘reasons for conversion’ somewhat misleading: the tract focuses on criticising Anti-Trinitarianism, Socinianism, and Protestantism in general and the promotion of the counter-Reformation. Przyczyny are preceded by two forewords: a Latin dedication to King Stephen Báthory, who promoted the Jesuit expansion in the country, and the Foreword addressed to Anabaptist communities written in Polish (Przedmowa do Zborów Nowokrzczeńskich), as well as two extended parts (books). Wilkowski defended the apostasy as his own personal choice. In the Foreword, he addressed his brothers and sisters in faith who had condemned the conversion, referring to his act as a choice of the freedom of conscience, something the Evangelists would defend first and foremost in their own right. The author called his former community’s radical stance on his decision ‘Inquisition-like’: Gdy kto religiją, albo sektą pierwszą porzuci: ma li być za zbiega i za zdrajcę Judasza (jakim wy mnie macie) poczytan? I rzecz jest godna i przystojna sprawy z nim żadnej nie mieć? Wyrzucić go i Szatanowi oddać? Nie pozdrawiać, ani mu ręki (jako mnie którzy z was nie chcieli) dawać? (Przedmowa do Zborow Nowokrzczeńskich). Should he who abandons a religion or a sect be considered a traitor, a good-for-nothing Judas that you consider me to be? Should there be any decency and honour in refusing to have any business with him? Casting him out and giving him to Satan? Refusing to greet him or shake his hand, as some of you refuse to do in my case?

While regarding his being so ostracised by the Socinian community as an indecent thing to do, Wilkowski stressed that he was not trying to infringe on the religious freedom of others and compared the condemnation of his choice of faith to an attempt to take away his honour: Ale nie zabijamy (powiecie) nikogo, i waszej Bracia Luteryjani i Kalwinistowie też pierwej nie zabijali, ani palili o wiarę. Niech tak będzie iżbyście i wy mogli mnie związać, i zabić, a wżdy tego nie czynicie: aza to nie sroższa, gdybyście ze mną sprawy mieć nie chcieli i poćciwość odięli […]? You will say you never kill anyone, and your Lutheran and Calvinist brethren did not use to kill or burn anyone at the stake because of their faith either. After all, you could have

219

220

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

arrested me or killed me, but you did not; yet isn’t it even more cruel of you to refuse to have any business with me and take away my honour […]?

Wilkowski highlighted the propagandist purpose of his work, reminding the reader that there were many people converting to the Universal (Roman Catholic) Church, while those who would bear witness to this process were few (Wilkowski: 1583, A1r). The main point the new apostate made in the tract was to criticise the Polish and Lithuanian Anti-Trinitarian leaders such as Szymon Budny, Marcin Czechowic, Jan Niemojewski, and the European and national Reformation doctrines in general. In addition to this publication, soon after his conversion Wilkowski published two more works: a Polish translation of Rationes Decem [Ten Reasons] by the English Jesuit Edmund Campion, which was issued in Vilnius in 1584 (Calma: 2013, 237–244; Calma: 2013a, 79–90; Calma: 2014, 589–606; Calma, Rzegocka: 2013, 367–380), and Desiderosus, Albo ścieżka do Miłości Bożej [Desiderosus, or the Path to Divine Love] – the Polish version of the Spanish devotional novel Espill de la Vida Religiosa that was popular throughout Europe – published in Kraków in 1589 (Gwioździk: 2011, 161–172). These translations by Wilkowski were localised with a significant degree of licence, and fall into the category of popular devotional reads.

2.

Away from Italian Heterodoxy

In the second half of the sixteenth century, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth stood out with its splintered forms of Western Christianity. Alongside the Roman Church it was home to the magisterial Protestant, Lutheran and Reformed churches and the Czech Unity of the Brethren. The region of Transylvania, linked to Poland and the GDL by the historical bond of the Jagiellonian dynasty, and in 1576–1586 by the figure of the Transylvanian Prince Báthory, the elected ruler of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, was also a centre of the Anti-Trinitarian movement. In the 1570s and 1580s, the Catholic Church was actively applying counter-Reformation measures and pursuing the policy of re-Catholicisation, being well aware of the established Lutheran and Helvetian doctrines as well as the principles of subordinate tritheism propagated by European and national figures such as the Padua University Professor Matteo Gribaldi Moffa (c. 1505–1564) and his student Piotr of Goniądz (c. 1530–1573), who had been propagating the said principles in Poland and Lithuania. Catholics had their job cut out for them trying to grasp the details of the doctrine of early Socinianism. An important role in the formation of the new Anti-Trinitarian hermeneutics was played by Italian dissidents, a native of Siena Lelio Sozzini (1525–1562) and his nephew Fausto Sozzini

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

(1539–1604) – the European heterodox leader in the second half of the sixteenth century and a Kraków resident since 1579. Socinianism found a friendly environment that allowed it to flourish amidst the radical Polish and Lithuanian Evangelicals who wanted to fulfil the ideals of the Reformation – which they believed had been betrayed by their brethren, Evangelical Lutherans and Reformers – by bringing back the true teaching of Christ. Published in Transylvania in 1568, Brevis Explicatio in Primum Ioannis Caput by Lelio Sozzini and Explicatio Primi Capitis Ioannis by Fausto Sozzini were the first fundamental texts that laid the groundwork for the new hermeneutics to serve as a pillar of ideological support for Socinianism in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (for more about the principles of Socinian hermeneutics, see Marchetti: 1999); the Polish version of Fausto Sozzini’s tract, Wykład na Pirwszą Kapitulę Jana Swiętego Ewangelijej by Grzegorz Paweł, was published in the same year (1568). The heterodox doctrine and social views were not homogeneous, and any efforts to consolidate the movement were impeded by the priority being assigned to one’s personal relation with the Scriptures, the perception that the doctrine cannot prevail over a Christian’s conscience. Many institutional and dogmatic aspects of the Church were considered secondary to salvation. However, the so-called Budneism (named after its leader Szymon Budny, c. 1530–c. 1593), a movement considered more radical from the doctrinal point of view, eventually succumbed to the more moderate Socinianism that actualised the principles of Christian ethics and personal conscience and expanded its teaching through a series of theological tracts. The active core of the early Socinian community in Poland and Lithuania was centred around Italian exiles who were unable to operate in the West in the second half of the sixteenth century. On 23 April 1583, Apostolic Nuncio Alberto Bolognetti (1538–1585), who successfully pursued a counter-reformation policy as he resided at Stephen Báthory’s court and was on a first-name basis with his fellow nationals active in Fausto Sozzini’s circle operating from Kraków, described them in great detail in his letter to Cardinal Giacomo Savelli (1523–1587). Helpless to acknowledge the unique charisma of the community’s leader Fausto Sozzini and his influence on his fellow-thinkers, Bolognetti was unable to define their religious beliefs with any degree of precision, describing them as members of some sect or another (see e.g. A. Bolognetti to G. Sabello, 23/4/1583, Kraków; Bolognetti: 1583, 257). Socinians did not attach much significance to the institutional model of the Church and they stood out amongst the Reformation forces in Lithuania and Poland with their individualism and utopian quest for a true Christian lifestyle, and their criticism of the rich and powerful simulacrum Christ. This is clearly conveyed in Balcer Wilkowski’s letter to his son. Gaspar Wilkowski, who was raised in this environment and knew its figures of authority, was brought up as an educated and promising member of the Socinian community. In the autumn of

221

222

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

1580 he and Fausto Sozzini attended a Protestant synod in Lewartów, where the Anti-Trinitarians engaged in a debate with the Reformers (Szczotka: 1935–1936, 32), and in his letter to Jan Balcerowicz (d. 1620) of January 1581, Sozzini sent his regards to Wilkowski (Socyn: 1959, 58). This made the latter’s sudden apostasy followed by the sharp criticism of his former companions even more surprising, both to his father and to the entire community. The opposition, i.e. the Catholics and the Magisterial Protestants, were right to perceive the Italian exiles as the main driving force behind the spread of heresy in the Commonwealth (for more on this, see e.g. Hein: 1974; Firpo: 1977; Pociūtė: 2008). In his Orthodoxa Fidei Confessio (1566), a tract aimed at defending the traditional Trinity doctrine, the Bishop of Kiev, Nicolaus Pac, who later converted to Lutheranism, was the first to draw a direct link between Italian heretics and the emergence of heterodoxy in Poland and Lithuania (Pociūtė: 2017, 185–203). The Catholic hierarchy employed a plethora of measures – such as the 1564 Parczew edict that prohibited any activity of foreign heretics in the land – to obstruct the process of Italian dissidents gaining a toehold in the country. Nonetheless, this process went on, and on taking up residence in Poland in 1579, Fausto Sozzini became the hub of a consolidated Italian and local heterodox community In an effort to entrench themselves in a religiously adverse environment, the Italian and local heterodox community closed ranks in a national network of family and economic ties (Prokop: 2011, 525–554). Eventually, this became yet another pretext for zero tolerance for Italian ‘heretics’, which, as we know, finally culminated in physical attacks on the community’s leader Sozzini, who had to leave Kraków as a result. The Italian heretic-driven threat to Christianity was also highlighted in the work of Wilkowski the convert. He pointed to having grown up amidst the ‘Lutheran heresy’ and linked his increasingly radical views with his experience in Italy, which he had been encouraged to visit by Simon Ronenberg, Stanisław Lutomirski, and Jan Mączyński8 . Wilkowski admitted it was in Italy that his conscience had been led astray the most9 : Do tego stąd mi przyszło. Za powodem Symona Ronenberka, aptekarza Krakówskiego (bom ja o tym sam ani pomyślał i zrazu to za rzecz sumnieniu i żywotowi doczesnemu,

8 All those figures that Wilkowski wrote about – the Kraków pharmacist Simon Ronemberg (Ronenberg, d. 1598–1604), the active Reformation figure Stanisław Lutomirski (1520–1575), the famous lexicographer Jan Mączyński (c. 1520–1587) who had been working at the court of Mikołaj Radziwiłł “the Black” until the nobleman’s death – were involved in the Anti-Trinitarian movement. 9 The timing of Wilkowski’s stay in Italy and the likely place of his medical studies are not known as yet. In the sixteenth century, Anabaptism and Anti-Trinitarianism were the most widespread in the Republic of Venice. Prior to that, Wilkowski may have studied in Frankfurt (Wotschke: 1929, 235).

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

niebezpieczną miał), potem i za radą dwu zacnych tejże sekty mężow: P. Stanisława Lutomierskiego i Jana Mączyńskiego, i za pozwoleniem rodziców moich byłem we Włoszech, gdzie folgując barziej zdrowiu, a wiarując się niebezpieczeństwa, takem sumnienie swoje daleko zawiódł, żem pewnej nadzieje o zbawieniu żadną miarą, mieć nie mógł. A nacięższy to był grzech, którym ja sobie przeciwko sumnieniu i przeciwko Duchowi Świętemu być rozumiał. Że ja za to mając i od Ducha Świętego w tym się być wyuczonym i upewnionym wierząc, iż ofiara Nowego Testamentu, co mszą żydowskim językiem zową, jest iste od dyjabła przez Antychrysta, papieża rzymskiego, wynalezione i wymyślone bałwochwalstwo. A ciało prawdziwe Pana Jezu Krysta (któremu z wielkiej tego miłośći upodobało się tak z oblubienicą swoją do skończenia świata być i z nią przemieszkiwać, i ciało onej swoje za grzechy jej wydane, i krew wylaną na pokarm i napój, i ofiarę Bogu Ojcu swemu dawać) bałwanem i innymi strasznemi bluźnierskimi nazwiski nazywałem, i tym być mocno trzymałem. Jednak bywałem przy mszej i klękałem przed Ciałem Bożym dla niebeśpieczeństwa, choć to za bałwochwalstwo mając. Co jako mię (dziwna rzecz) wróciwszy się do Polski aż do wesołego przystania do Domu Bożego, do kościoła prawdziwego trapiło, każdy, kto kiedy iskierki tego ognia w sobie czuł, dobrze rozumie (Wilkowski: 1959, 558–559). This is what happened to me. Urged by Simon Ronenberg, a Kraków pharmacist (for I myself never thought about it and at first considered it to be dangerous for my conscience and my temporal life), and later having listened to the advice of two men from the Sect, Mr Stanisław Lutomierski and Jan Mączyński, and having obtained my parents’ permission, I was in Italy, where I led my conscience so far astray, all the while placing my health at risk and myself in danger, so that I had absolutely no hope of rescue whatsoever. And my sin against my conscience and the Holy Ghost was the gravest. Strong in my belief that I was inspired by the Holy Ghost, I thought that the New Testament sacrifice which the Jews call the Mass was idolatry devised and spread by the Devil through the Antichrist pope in Rome. And the true flesh of the Lord Jesus Christ (given away out of his immense love to be with his loved ones until the end of the world and the blood spilled for our sins given to us as food and drink, so making his sacrifice to God the Father) I thought to be an idol and cursed it terribly, and held on to my beliefs strongly. Yet, just to be safe, I would attend masses and would get on my knees in front of God’s flesh, even though I called it idolatry. This (strangely) would worry me, after returning to Poland until I joyously joined the House of God – the true Church; as will be easy to understand for anyone who has ever felt the sparks of that fire.

223

224

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

3.

The Benefits of Conversion

There is no doubt that Wilkowski’s apostasy had a direct connection to the Jesuits who regarded spreading news of conversions a key propagandist tool. The historian of the Society of Jesus Stanisław Załęski (1843–1908), also pointed to Wilkowski’s conversion as the first fruit of the labour of the Jesuits, who were getting established in Lublin – a hotbed of heresy – in September 1581 (Załęski: 1905, 339–340). He linked Wilkowski’s conversion with the outcome of the Jesuit–Anti-Trinitarian debate in Lublin in late 158110 . In fact, Wilkowski’s conversion was the achievement of the Jesuit Marcin Laterna (1552–1598), father confessor to King Stephen Báthory. The Apostolic Nuncio Bolognetti reported Laterna’s accomplishment to the Papal Secretary of State Tollomeo Gallio on 28 May, 1583 (Bolognetti: 1583, 325). After obtaining from the Nuncio permission to read prohibited books, Wilkowski was transferred to Vilnius for a spiritual retreat and to prepare a polemic against the heretics. Due to many social implications, rights, and privileges, confessional identity had its weight in the multi-confessional Lithuania of the second half of the sixteenth century. Contrary to multi-confessional Transylvania of the period, no Protestant church enjoyed the status of an official state religion or even had an established name of its denomination in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth; they all considered themselves true Christian communities and sought to have rights equal to those of the Roman church. The Commonwealth’s religious groups spawned by the Reformation vied for the legitimisation of their Christian identity, driving the secular government to take note of the fact that the country’s Christendom, traditionally consisting only of the Eastern church and its Western counterpart, had de facto lost its homogeneity. To prevent religious upheaval that had been observed in several of the Western states, the Commonwealth passed the act of the Warsaw Confederation 1573, declaring equality and peace among different Christian faiths. In 1576, the country came under the rule of Stephen Báthory, a Hungarian Catholic, but despite his sincere support for the Jesuit expansion, he pursued a diplomatic policy of the freedom of conscience towards other faiths. The problem of the essence of Christianity, however, was left unsolved and the question of the Christianity of different churches and their ability to claim equal rights remained on the table. The predominant Christian denominations had not renounced their claims to being the sole true church either, and were actively competing amongst themselves.

10 The debate on the issues of the divinity of Christ and the holiness of the Roman Church was attended by Jesuits Stanisław Warszewicki (c. 1529–1591) and Justus Rabas (1543–1612), and the leaders of the Lublin brethren, Marcin Czechowic and Jakub Niemojewski.

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

Even though the Jesuits who started to appear in Poland and Lithuania in the 1560s were engaged in an active polemic with Protestants of all persuasions, the major versions of Protestantism with the deepest roots in the land succeeded in anchoring their Christian identity in Poland and Lithuania by the end of the sixteenth century. From their very inception, the communities would do all they could to defend their identity. As the heterodox trends were gathering steam in the second half of the sixteenth century, the Lutherans and the Reformers would actively rely on criticising heterodoxy as a tool to consolidate their Christian prestige. In the opinion of Andreas Volanus, leader of the Reformers in Lithuania (cf. Daugirdas: 2008), the followers of heterodoxy – a fledgling offshoot of the Reformers – with their Trinitarian controversy were leading the country towards an abyss (Pociūtė: 2017, 283). The important common ground in the form of defence of the Trinity doctrine had a mitigating effect on the confrontation between the Evangelicals and the Roman church. This position was openly declared in the said tract by Nicolaus Pac, Orthodoxa Fidei Confessio, aiming to highlight the unity of the magisterial trends of Protestantism and the Catholic Church on the Trinity and to define these denominations as being Christian and orthodox. In his book, Pac was arguing that Anti-Trinitarians represented ideas that were secular and profane rather than religious, thus promoting a dangerous philosophy that was non-Christian in character. This stance placed the followers of heterodoxy outside the boundaries of Christianity. The endorsement by the Lithuanian Reformers of the conventional Trinity and distancing themselves from heterodoxy as declared in their synods and publications, increased the chances for the Evangelicals to get a bigger foothold in their own right. Nuncio Bolognetti, too, admitted in the said letter that Lithuanian heretics (Evangelicals) were already breaking free from their insane deviations, something that found confirmation in their rally in the dominion of the Vilnius Palatine Mikołaj Radziwiłł “the Red” in the autumn of 1582, where they spent days discussing the origins of Christ. The Nuncio pointed out that, despite being the ‘Devil’s servants’, Lithuanian Calvinists finally lost their tolerance for the wickedness of their opponents, the Anti-Trinitarians (A. Bolognetti to G. Sabello, 23/4/1583, Bolognetti: 1583, 260). The followers of heterodoxy had an enemy who was even more powerful than the Protestants, who had risen to fight Anti-Trinitarianism, namely the Jesuits, who had launched a wide campaign of the re-Catholicization of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth during Stephen Báthory’s reign. With their intensive expansion of the network of colleges launched in 1565 – a project unprecedented on a national scale, one of its products being the promotion of the Vilnius Jesuit College to the rank of an Academy (University) in 1579 – the Jesuits and the counter-Reformation forces quickly developed into a growing and dominant religious power. Led by Piotr Skarga (1536–1612), the first rector of the Vilnius Academy, the Jesuits engaged in active propaganda and initiatives aimed at promoting conversions. Members

225

226

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

of the Jesuit elite in the region, such as Antonio Possevino (1533/1534–1611) and the provincial superior of Polish Jesuits, Giovanni Paolo Campana (1540–1592), to name a few, became actively involved in re-Catholicising endeavours. A significant part in the policy of fighting heresy was played by the Apostolic Nuncios to Poland – Giovanni Andrea Caligari (1527–1594 or later), appointed to this office in December 1577, and Alberto Bolognetti (1538–1585), a Nuncio from April 1581 onwards. The Jesuits designed conversions in the country just as they orchestrated the re-Catholicising of Protestant Livonia, through the Union of Brest between the Orthodox Church in the GDL and Rome, which was brought to fruition in the late sixteenth century, and even the utopian draft of a union between the Principality of Muscovy and the Roman Church (Pociūtė: 2016, 87–120). Jesuits were actively engaging with every Italian exile in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Transylvania: Giorgio Biandrata, Giovanni Michele Bruto, Agostino Doni, Giulio Pace, Prospero Provana, Francesco Pucci, Fausto Sozzini and others. ‘The heretics’ who operated close to the ruler were under constant attention as well. The Jesuit propaganda was diplomatic in nature: the converts were being lured with privileges and gifts, promises of better jobs, security, consolidation of personal prestige, and in the case of homesick Italian dissidents, with a guarantee of reprieve from Inquisition processes11 . The Jesuits kept books of conversions, and to boost their performance sought active involvement of the apostates and converts themselves in various good deeds, including public testimonies of their experience. The fact that Wilkowski’s conversion was the outcome of active Jesuit propaganda that stoked the opportunistic interests of the apostate rather than of his own spiritual growth is evidenced by two factors: his employment in the well-paid position of physician at the court of the GDL’s largest political figure right after the conversion, and the reasons behind his conversion disclosed in the letter of Wilkowski’s father. To reward him for his conversion, the Jesuits actively sought to procure for Wilkowski a comfortable job as a physician. The Jesuit Stanisław Warszewicki corresponded on this matter with the Bishop of Kujawy Hieronim Rozrażewski. On 11 March 1584, the bishop confirmed that he had accepted Wilkowski at his court; he informed Warszewicki about his arrival in 4 May, 1584. However a month later, on 11 June, the bishop announced with regret that Wilkowski and his relatives were leaving his court due to urgent family matters, and, most importantly, because of his wish to stay with the members of the Jesuit Congregation (Korespondencja, 109; Hanusiewicz-Lavallee: 2018, 109). It is quite likely that the return of Radziwiłł “Sierotka” from his pilgrimage on 29 May had contributed to that decision. In the summer of 1583, Possevino urged Nuncio Bolognetti to persuade the ruler

11 The negotiations are evidenced in the correspondence between the Jesuits of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and those of Transylvania in that period.

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

to dispatch Wilkowski to work as a physician at the Transylvanian court as an ‘antidote’ to Giorgio Biandrata (d. 1588), leader of the early Socinian network and long-time former physician to the Jagiellonian family, later to become physician to Stephen Báthory, who had established himself in Transylvania (A. Possevino to A. Bolognetti, 20/7/1583, Bolognetti: 1583, 414). Yet Wilkowski was given a much quieter position: he became physician at the court of Duke Mikołaj Krzysztof Radziwiłł, patron number one of the GDL’s counter-Reformation and the Jesuit movement in Lithuania, and apparently held that position until his very death (Kempa: 2000, 205). Radziwiłł “Sierotka”, the oldest son of the Reformation leader, Mikołaj Radziwiłł “the Black” (1515–1565), was the first prominent Lithuanian magnate to convert to Catholicism. The Apostolic See saw the return of the young Radziwiłł, who had been raised a Protestant, to the Roman Church as a major victory, because this conversion spelled withdrawal from the Reformation of himself and of the largest branch of the GDL noble family12 . From 1567 until his death, Radziwiłł “Sierotka” was one of the main supporters and patrons of the counterReformation and of the Jesuit expansion in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, purging his entourage of Evangelicals without remorse. The Duke paid a huge salary to his convert physician Wilkowski: a staggering 900 red złoty (Ragauskienė: 2017, 289). This was above what even the highlypaid medics at the ruler’s court were paid: the salary of Niccolò Buccella, head physician to Stephen Báthory, was 600 red złoty. Wilkowski’s father, too, was aware of these controversies around his son’s service at the Duke’s court. In the letter to his son, Balcer Wilkowski mooted two main sins that had led his son astray, causing him to choose a dominant confession with a higher degree of prestige: pride and greed. The father pointed out that his son praesumptuosus did more than just pour scorn upon his spiritual teachers: by having a “heart that was too greedy for money and quick enrichment” (“serce nazbyt chciwe do pieniędzy i do zbogacenia prędko”), he betrayed the spirit of the Evangel and the true – wretched, poor – Christ (“Chrystus ubogi”). The father employed this image following the concept of the early Socinianism that placed the poor Christ in contrast to a Christ who was rich and bathed in the glory of the world – the Christ that, according to Biandrata and other Socinians, was praised by the Roman Church13 . Balcer

12 The Apostolic See had failed in its bid, through Nuncio Luigi Lippomano, to re-convert Radziwiłł “the Black” to Catholicism in 1556. Quite the opposite happened: after Lippomano’s bid, Radziwiłł “the Black” issued a manifesto (1556) condemning the Catholic Church and the Papal institution as the kingdom of the Antichrist and declaring the establishment of the True Church of Christ in Lithuania. For more about this, see Pociūtė: 2015, 57–108. 13 The juxtaposition of the simulacra of a wretched, poor Christ and a rich Christ, was emphasised in one of the most renowned Anti-Trinitarian works, De falsa et vera unius Dei, Filii et Spiritus Sancti cognitione (1567), one of its contributors being Giorgio Biandrata.

227

228

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Wilkowski implored his son to turn around, reminding him that the ideals of the carnal man had no place in Christian life: spomnij jeśli i on nieszczęśliwy apostoł Iskaryjot, który Pana swego zdradził i uciekł do nieprzyjaciół jego chcąc się od nich wspomóc i zbogacić, w co mu się ona jego zła chęć obróciła, także i sam ze złym sumnieniem zapłatę grzechu, śmierć straszliwą odniósł (Wilkowski: 1959, 464). reflect on the unfortunate Apostle Iscariot, he who betrayed our Lord and defected to his enemies expecting payment from them to get rich, and what his evil desire led him to, for he himself, with his unclean conscience and payment in sin, died a horrible death.

Filled with biblical allusions from the Old and the New Testament, the father’s letter to his son carried a warning that if one scorns the spiritual bread, the earthly bread turns into death; his son, who had fallen in with slaves of wealth, was facing the divine punishment of becoming a dog who is devouring his own vomit or a pig returning to its mud, without any sympathy and with nothing but remorse: Nie najdziesz też tam, nędzniku, innej pociechy, tylko cielesną, a obietnicę bogactw cielesnych, obietnicę sławy świata tego, przy których miasto pociechy desperacyja i złe sumnienie (Wilkowski: 1959, 466). There, you scoundrel, will discover no other comfort but that of the flesh and a promise of earthly wealth, a promise of this world’s glory; and with that, instead of receiving consolation, you will only earn despair and an unclean conscience.

In the foreword to Anabaptists of his Przyczyny, the convert son denied the accusations of having defected under the care of Radziwiłł “Sierotka”, reminding the reader that he had observed greed – absent from the teachings of all religions – among the former brethren as well.

4.

Heretic Physicians and the Jesuit Efforts to Catholicise the Medical Scene

The story of Wilkowski’s apostasy bears testimony to the importance of people’s confession in daily religious life in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the sixteenth century just as it sheds a light on the broader contexts of social history, in this case – the field where religious and medical practices intersect. It was no accident that the first Socinian apostate and propagandist of conversion won over

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

by the Jesuits was a learned physician. Jesuits of the province of Poland were highly concerned about the predominance of ‘Arian physicians’ in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Transylvania in the second half of the sixteenth century, where Poland-Lithuania’s Jesuits were also conducting an expansive mission14 . Upon his return from Transylvania to Poland in the same April of 1583, Jesuit Antonio Possevino came to the conclusion that it was physicians who were the main culprits behind Transylvania’s plunge into the blight of ‘Arianism’: Trovai anco un medico heretico che già si era attacato co’l principe giovinetto di Transilvania, et questo per opera dei medici heretici del Re. Io ne ragionai con Sua Maestà, poiché per questa via de’medici tutta la Transilvania è caduta in arianismo et in perniciosissime heresie (A. Possevino to the Cardinal of Como [Tolomeo Gallio], 17/4/1583, Bolognetti: 1583, 239–240). I met yet another heretic physician established at the court of the young Transylvanian prince; it was all thanks to the King’s heretic physicians. I spoke about this with His Highness [Stephen Báthory], for it was physicians who have led Transylvania down the road of Arianism and the most horrendous of heresies.

Possevino made his generalisation when spurred by another Italian physician, Marcello Squarcialupi (1538–1592), who held a strong position at the Transylvanian court, next to Giorgio Biandrata who had been working there for years. After he received an offer to work in Transylvania (thanks to Biandrata’s brokering), he arrived in Alba Iulia in December 1579 (Madonia: 1994, 154–155). Transylvania’s prince at the time was Sigismund Báthory (1572–1613), adolescent son of Stephen Báthory’s brother Kristóf Báthory (1530–1581). Sigismund was being educated by (mostly Italian) Jesuits. The Jesuit envoy’s conclusion that the expansion of Socinianism in the region had a lot to do with physicians was grounded on more than just the situation in Transylvania. In the Jesuits’ opinion, the situation was even worse in the Polish and Lithuanian entourage of the ruler Stephen Báthory himself, for all of the main physicians of the Catholic ruler were Italian followers of heterodoxy. By a confluence of different circumstances, Italian physicians were among the most active academics and intellectuals involved in the Evangelical movement. Historiography has established a lot of links between the boom of medicine in the

14 In 1541–1691 Transylvania was, to some extent, an independent principality. Born in the region, Poland’s King Stephen Báthory looked after Transylvania throughout his reign in the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth and had political plans of returning to Transylvania’s throne, liberating Hungary and restoring the kingdom.

229

230

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

sixteenth century and the Reformation; the phenomenon of Protestants prevailing among medics is still the subject of ongoing academic polemic. The fact that medical studies were the most advanced at Italian universities in the early modern times resulted in the domination of Italian physicians at the courts of sixteenth-century European rulers and aristocrats. In turn, this phenomenon was a factor in the wider process of Italinising the European aristocracy. Due to the growing public demand for physicians, Italian medics enjoyed a high degree of popularity and would hold high-ranking offices at European courts. As intellectuals, or rather medical philosophers, thanks to the close-knit unity between philosophical and medical studies in Italy, Italian physicians became actively involved in the so-called Respublica Medicorum of the sixteenth century, medics maintaining close contacts through a wide network of correspondence. In the second half of the century, the so-called phenomenon of ‘Arian physicians’ emerged in this community (see Pociūtė: 2019, 37–41). Many of the ‘Arian physicians’ were tied to the medical school of Padua, one of the most prestigious centres for medical studies in 16th century Europe, based in the Republic of Venice, where active hubs of Anabaptism and Anti-Trinitarianism were wont to spread. From the midsixteenth century, they fell victim to persecution by the Inquisition, which was founded in Italy in 1542. This resulted in the mass emigration of heterodox physicians, its routes going all the way to the eastern territories of Christian Europe. Even though increasingly pushed further into the sidelines and marginalised by both orthodox Protestant forces and the Jesuits just as the processes of confessionalisation were gathering momentum in the mid-sixteenth century, they still enjoyed a certain guarantee of security afforded to them by their prestigious role as physicians. There were many other reasons why heterodox physicians enjoyed certain prestige in the second half of the sixteenth century. The growing demand for learned physicians was ignored by the Jesuits whose educational system was far removed from medicine, their universities offering no medical studies at all (Ganss: 1954, 44–51; Wellie: 2003, 26–43; Sanders: 2014, 76–101). Ignatius Loyola forbade the study of medicine by members of the order in his Constitutions (1558), which stipulated that Jesuit schools would not offer medical and legal studies and Jesuits would not engage in such studies, disciplines that were remote from the Jesuit goals of acting in the name of the greater honour and glory of God: Medicinae et Legum studium ut a nostro Instituto magis remotum in Universitatibus Societatis vel non tractabitur, vel saltem ipsa Societas per se oneris non suscipiet (Constitutiones: 1583, 55; 43).

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

The study of Medicine and Law shall not be engaged in within the Universities of our Society; or at least the Society shall not take that duty upon itself, as being remote from our Institute.

The main aim of this prohibition was to prevent Jesuits from practising as physicians as well as using medical (anatomical) material in teaching (Edwards: 2012). Only pharmacists and infirmarians – medical practitioners who had nothing to do with learned medicine – would be allowed to do business in Jesuit communities. The exclusion of medical studies from the Jesuit educational system was the product of the Jesuits’ principal stance of regarding theology as the pinnacle of science and keeping their science of the soul away from the tendencies of the ‘medicalization of the soul’ (pneumatology) that emerged in early modern natural philosophy. In that way, the Jesuits built their educational system as an alternative to the Italian model (that of the Bologna and Padua universities), where the university curricula rested mainly on law and medicine and where philosophical disciplines constituted the preparatory level of medical studies. The Jesuits developed their university as a hierarchical structure with theology at the top and the other subjects cascading down as its prerequisites. The goal of the Jesuit college network was theology and unity of teaching across Jesuit schools, using standard subjects for that purpose. The studies of philosophy, the arts, logic, and mathematics were subordinated to theology: philosophy was supposed to prepare students to the understanding of scholastic theology and pastoral work. To achieve those goals, both censorship, in the form of a list of banned books, and an elaborate system of principles, Ratio Studiorum, were employed. While Protestant scholastics was correlated with anatomical material, the Jesuit educational system did not offer medical studies and tried to avoid bringing the fields of medicine and theology closer together at all, by banning anatomical or medical reasoning from the process of teaching philosophy and theology15 . These principles were also codified in the 1591 and 1599 editions of Ratio Studiorum. Starting with the first university inaugurated in Messina (Sicily) in 1548, there were 245 Jesuit schools at the close of the sixteenth century, their number tripling to reach almost 800 in the eighteenth century (Wellie: 2003, 31). Even though this educational project was unparalleled in Europe at the time, medicine was being ignored at Jesuit schools on a systematic scale. During Loyola’s lifetime, the Jesuits did not establish any medical schools at all, with just two cases of medical (and legal) studies encountered in the sixteenth century in Jesuit educational centres:

15 This principle eventually proved increasingly difficult for the Jesuits to follow: interest in anatomy began to show at European and Poland-Lithuania Jesuit schools in the seventeenth century (see e.g. Plečkaitis: 1975, 162–179).

231

232

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

a small medical school at the Pont à Mousson University (est. 1572) in France, where medical studies were launched at the end of the sixteenth century for the benefit of Duke Lorain, following a process of negotiations with the order and the promise that law and medicine would be taught by seculars, and the Gandia Jesuit school in Spain, where the medical studies were formal, theoretical rather than practical. The Jesuit elders were sceptical about these two cases, considering them a threat to morals and the faith16 . Under the same set of principles, no option of medical studies was endorsed at the Vilnius Jesuit Academy, neither at the time of its inception in 1579 nor later, when every effort (including the King’s decree) was made to this end in the seventeenth century. Consequently, the corps of learned physicians in Poland and Lithuania in the sixteenth century consisted of three groups of people: local graduates from the Kraków University, not renowned for the quality of its medical studies at the time; local residents with medical diplomas from foreign (mainly Italian) universities; and foreign physicians. All of these groups remained small in numbers, as learned physicians were in short supply due to the growing demand on the national scale. This was something to which the ruler, Stephen Báthory, himself testified: in his response to the Jesuits’ incessant reproach for using the services of heretic physicians, he said that good Catholic doctors were hard to find and that they were keeping away from the country, choosing one scudo in Italy over ten in Poland ([…] essi vogliono piuttosto uno scudo in Italia che dieci in Polonia; A. Possevino to the Cardinal of Como [Tolomeo Gallio], 17/4/1583, Bolognetti: 1583, 239).

5.

Heterodox Physicians at the Court of Stephen Báthory and the Rise of the Learned Medics Controversy

The definite leader of the heterodox physician network in Transylvania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was Giorgio Biandrata of Piedmont (for more on his activities in Poland-Lithuania see Pociūtė: 2017, 157–183). Doctor to Poland’s Queen Bona Sforza since 1540, in 1545–1552 he lived in Transylvania and worked as the court physician to Isabella Jagiellon Zápolya, Queen of Hungary and daughter of Bona Sforza and Sigismund the Old, who became a widow in 1540, earning immense trust of the entire Jagiellonian dynasty and its entourage. The circumstances relating to Biandrata’s early religious identity are unknown: his Anti-Trinitarian beliefs might have possibly started to sprout during the period of his residence in

16 Located in Francesco de Borja’s domain and promoted by the Pope to the rank of a university at its own request back in 1547, the Gandia College failed to develope and did not offer actual lectures; neither is it considered the first Jesuit university (Grendler: 2018, 43).

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

Transylvania. After Isabella had left the country for political reasons, he returned in the summer of 1552 to the region of Veneto in Italy (where he had practices in Mestre, Pavia, Padua), home to Italy’s main centres of heterodoxy – at the Padua University with Matteo Gribaldi Moffa in the lead, at the Collegia Vicentina in Vicenza, and elsewhere (for more on Vicenza’s religious heterodox network, see Stella: 1996, 24–27). These movements suffered a heavy blow with the second wave of Inquisition trials targeting the Anabaptists in the Republic of Venice that started in 1555. Biandrata emigrated to the Calvinist Geneva in 1556, but when he did not approve of the increase in Reformed Trinitarian orthodoxy and refused to sign the confession of faith presented to him in May 1558, he and a group of his fellow-thinkers had to move on. In November 1558, Biandrata was already part of the court of Duke Mikołaj Radziwiłł “the Black”, leader of the Reformation in Lithuania, where he met the visiting Lelio Sozzini, emissary of the Swiss Reformers and founder of early Socinian hermeneutics (Sozzini: 1986, 276–277). These Italians made a critical impact on the Duke’s religious views. Until his very death, Radziwiłł “the Black” supported Biandrata’s soon-to-emerge critique of the conventional concept of Trinity. The Duke referred to Biandrata as his close friend and tried to make Calvin – who publicly, in the second edition of his Commentarii in Acta Apostolorum (1560), called the Italian physician a heretic worse than Francesco Stancaro (Stancaro deterior) – to see the error of his ways. The Lithuanian Reformation leader’s attitude caused long-lasting displeasure in Calvin and the Swiss churches, and in his death-bed letter of 1564 Calvin condemned the Christian (Evangelical) Church of Vilnius as immature and prone to heresy (Pociūtė: 2017, 158–177). Soon after, both the Lithuanian Evangelical Church and its Polish counterpart split up and from 1565 were operating as churches of the Little Brethren, distancing themselves from the traditional doctrine of the Trinity, as per Biandrata’s advice. With the growing hostility towards heterodoxy and the Apostolic Nuncio Giovanni Francesco Commendone’s campaign against foreign heretics in Poland and Lithuania, Biandrata again left for Alba Iulia in 1563 on the invitation from Sigismund Zápolya, son of Isabella Jagiellon and ruler of Transylvania. In Transylvania he engaged in religious work on a vast scale and became a founder and leader of the country’s Unitarian Church. Despite the upheavals in Transylvania’s religious history, until his very death on 16 May 1558 Biandrata consciously supported the consolidation and expansion of the Italian dissident network in Transylvania as well as in Poland and Lithuania, after having spent twenty-five years as physician to Catholic rulers – the Jagiellon family and later Stephen Báthory (an office that he held despite residing in Transylvania). A close friend of Lelio, and later of Fausto Sozzini, Biandrata had also consolidated the Socinian community with the help of the latter, by inhibiting some of the radical strands of Anti-Trinitarianism (Da-

233

234

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

vidism and Budneism) in the region17 . While in Transylvania, Biandrata maintained a lively correspondence with Lithuania and Poland, which testifies to his immense prestige among Socinians there, which he enjoyed into his old age. Biandrata oversaw the expansion of Socinianism in the region and helped other Italian dissidents become established there: basically, the entire medical corps at the court of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth’s ruler, Stephen Báthory, was the product of Biandrata’s policy. When Báthory was still Duke of Transylvania, in 1574 the court physician’s office was given to Niccolò Buccella (d. 1599) of Padua (Stella: 1962; Pociūtė: 2018). Raised in the Anabaptist tradition of Venice and Moravia and imprisoned in Venice during an Inquisition trial in 1562–1564, Buccella escaped death by renouncing heresy and performing an act of contrition, yet he never really abandoned his faith. After he was released from prison, Buccella spent nearly ten years trying to establish himself at the university of Padua, his hometown. Even though the university’s German students had been hiring him as Padua’s number one anatomist for years, not only was he not given the post of professor – a position he coveted so much – but he remained under close observation as well. Having become aware of another pending arrest, Buccella left Padua on 11 July 1574 with an invitation (procured by Biandrata) of the duke of Transylvania Stephen Báthory. Soon after Buccella’s departure, on 14 August 1574, the Inquisition Court in Venice issued an anathema on him. After Báthory’s ascension to the throne of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth in 1576, Buccella held the prestigious office of physicus regius until the ruler’s demise in December 1586 and even managed to keep this position under Sigismund Vasa. Buccella was a rare example of the highly successful assimilation of an Italian dissident in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: he did not start a family of his own, yet he helped his brother and sister with their families to settle and become naturalised in Poland and Lithuania, just as he lent a hand to a number of his companions from his young days in Padua in getting started in Poland and Lithuania. He became one of Fausto Sozzini’s closest friends and one of his financial benefactors. Sozzini came to live in Kraków in 1579. Until the end of his life, Buccella remained faithful to his religious views that had taken shape in his hometown of Padua and became even stronger in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth’s landscape of early Socinianism. After Stephen Báthory had become the ruler of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the royal court began enlarging the corps of physicians who could look after the king’s health on a daily basis and also follow him on war campaigns. Báthory successfully conducted a war against Moscovy and needed more surgeons with practitical experience able to work in the military; besides, for fear of getting

17 Originally coined by Ferenc Dávid, who operated in Transylvania, and Simon Budny, who worked in Lithuania; these terms feature in the Socinian historiography of the seventeenth century.

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

poisoned, he kept strengthening his own medical personnel. Soon an invitation to Bathory’s court was issued to Fabiano Nifo, another follower of the Venetian heterodoxy tradition and graduate of Padua’s medical school and grandson of the philosopher and physician Agostino Nifo. He had spent several years in Paris and since 1567 had been trying to find a place for himself – without much success – in Switzerland. When he received an offer to move to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in July 1577, he was quick to make up his mind and began working with Buccella. After his excellent performance in battles near Gdańsk, Nifo, just like Buccella, was given a huge salary of 600 florins. It is possible that Nifo had met Buccella in Padua, where the latter had been trying to get a job with the university since 1572. When Buccella was released from prison in 1574 and was looking for work in Padua, on 26 October 1575 Nifo was given the Second Chair of Practical Medicine (medicina practica in secundo loco) in Padua. In January 1576, someone filed a complaint against Nifo and he was arrested by the Inquisition. However, he managed to escape. Having settled in Vienna, he became involved in circles close to the imperial physician Johannes Crato von Craftheim but soon received an invitation to work at Bathory’s court. Yet Nifo, with his turbulent temper, only spent about eighteen months in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth without securing a successful career for himself. In 1578, after criticising a treatment plan for Urban da Ripa at Bathory’s court as proposed by Buccella, Nifo lost his position and found refuge in England in 1579 (Firpo: 1959; Cacamo: 1970, 234–236; Palumbo, Nifo). In September 1578, Marcello Squarcialupi, a physician from Piombino and graduate of Pisa University who had emigrated from Italy to Grigioni in Switzerland in 1565–1566 to become involved in early Socinianism, ended up in Kraków in search of a steady job with better pay. Squarcialupi did not make it in Kraków, yet with the help of Buccella and Biandrata he was posted to Transylvania’s court, going there in December 1579. He spent a rather successful period of his life in Alba Iulia, where he stayed until the spring of 1585, keeping in touch with Biandrata, who also lived there, and with the Socinians in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: Fausto Sozzini himself as well as Buccella. Finally, Stephen Báthory’s court became a place of employment for yet another Italian physician, Simone Simoni (1532–1602), graduate of the medical school of Padua and a prominent historical figure of Protestantism, who soon engaged in an incisive polemic with his heterodox peers. Thanks to his connections with influential personas, in late 1582 Simoni was appointed Bathory’s physician, a position he held for four years until the ruler’s death. Prior to his arrival at Báthory’s court, Simoni had already converted to Catholicism – a year before Wilkowski. Simoni was known to simulate and switch faiths, as a tool for his professional advancement (Madonia: 1980; Madonia: 1988; Verdigi: 1997). An exile since 1564, Simoni had to flee from Geneva in 1567 because of disobeying the Reformers’ discipline and being suspected of Anti-Trinitarianism. Having spent some time in

235

236

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Paris and Heidelberg, Simoni converted to Lutheranism, which helped him become established at Leipzig University, where he held his position for a staggering twelve years, all the while maintaining ties with Swiss Reformers, who in turn suspected him of being a tritheist. Simoni’s relationships with Polish and Transylvanian Antitrinitarians eventually drove the Reformers to finally cut ties with him. During his tenure at Leipzig University, Simoni was popular with Polish and Lithuanian students. In 1570, he made contact with the Radziwiłł dukes who visited there, becoming acquainted with three orphaned sons of Duke Mikołaj Radziwiłł “the Black” – Jerzy, Albrycht, and Stanisław, the care of whose education was in the hands of their eldest brother, Mikołaj Krzysztof “Sierotka”, who had returned from Italy in 1567. Even though Simoni flourished as a physician and author of a number of philosophical and medical texts in Leipzig, in 1581 he refused to sign a document of loyalty to Lutheranism presented to the University’s professors and was therefore forced to leave Saxony. After he had found out that Simoni had betrayed both the Swiss Reformers and the Lutherans, Theodor Beza (2000, 51) wrote his famous verdict in his letter to Rudolf Gwalther, saying that Simoni “does not have any God other than Aristotle” (“nec alium Deum habet quam Aristotelicum“). With his connections Simoni was able to find a temporary position at the imperial court of Rudolf II in Prague; however, for want of better security guarantees, in February 1582 he surrendered to the care of the Jesuits, reverted to Catholicism, and took a pledge to cooperate in their counter-Reformation work18 . It was roughly at that time that Simoni received an invitation, through his fellow countryman Buccella (who most probably knew nothing about Simoni’s conversion), from Stephen Báthory to join the royal medical corps19 . In December 1582 he left Breslau for the ruler’s court in Kraków and assumed a physician’s post there. Hardly had Simoni started his service when he began to clash with Buccella, belittling the latter’s prestige. Roman Catholics were persistent in their efforts to eradicate ‘Arian’ physicians from Bathory’s entourage. In a provincial Synod that took place in Warsaw in 1582, the king was given a set of conditions to integrate the Church with the life and jurisdiction of the state to the maximum extent possible, banish all heretics from the state, and so on. During meetings, the king would be asked to expel persons of a different faith from his court and entourage (A. Bolognetti to the Cardinal of Como, 20/9/1582, Warsaw, Bolognetti: 1581–1582, 495).

18 Subsequent correspondence shows that the Jesuits had doubts about the sincerity of Simoni’s conversion. 19 Simoni received his invitation from Buccella in the summer of 1582. See Buccella’s letter to Simoni (2/7/1582), which Simoni later published in his Responsum ad Refutationem.

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

Nel medesimo proposito messi in consideratione a Sua Maestà quanti mali effetti possano seguire dall’havere essa presso di sè persone heretiche et tanto favorite; al che rispose la Maestà Sua, allegando in alcuni l’essere militari, et non professori di lettere; in altri l’essempio, con dire che anco altri prencipi cattolici sono soliti haver medici heretici, come che quella professione porti seco minor scandalo; et con questa occasione lodò assai il Bucella suo medico quanto a tutte l’altre parti. Et pregand’io S. Mtà che vedesse almeno di ridurlo, disse che, se bene non era sua professione il parlare di theologia, nondimeno s’era forzato di ridurlo di nuovo alla fede cattolica, argomentando dall’antichità, dalla successione continovata di tante sommi pontefici, dalla santità de gli scrittori cattolici et da i miracoli da loro fatti, ma che esso si mostrava duro, et che non haveva Sua Maestà anco potuto conoscere di che seta egli si fosse (A. Bolognetti to the Cardinal of Como, 20/9/1582, Warsaw, Bolognetti: 1581–1582, 496). A suggestion was made for His Highness to think about the bad consequences that the heretics in the care of his immediate entourage could have. He replied that some of them were warriors and not professors of philosophy and the arts. Besides, it was customary for other Catholic rulers to have heretic physicians as well. He used the occasion to praise his doctor Buccella and his various skills. And when asked to try to convert him, he replied that despite the fact that Buccella’s profession had nothing to do with theological speculation, he had made an effort to convert the physician to the Catholic faith using as an argument the old tradition, the continuing heredity of the papal rule, and the holiness of Catholic authors and their miracles; yet the man had remained adamant, and the ruler had failed to understand what sect he belonged to.

Both Nuncio Bolognetti and the Jesuits in the circles close to Báthory were always looking for an opportunity to meet with the ruler’s physicians to engage in conversion propaganda. They would offer personal favours in exchange for conversion. Bolognetti focused on Buccella a lot, yet the latter was very resilient and eventually started avoiding the Nuncio: Hebbi io a’questi giorni un poco di speranza della conversione di questo Bucella, la quale edificherebbe qui grandamente, perciò che il Sr. Alamani, maestro di cucina di S. Mtà, mi disse haver fatto giudicio dale sue parole ch’egli mi confirirebbe volentieri le risolutioni della vita sua. Onde conveni con P. Laterna d’invitarlo una mattina per farne prova, ma la prova fu tale ch’io perdei quasi affatto ogni speranza; egli disse cose mostruosissime, et finalmente poi si scusò di non haver dormito ancora, come soleva sempre il doppo magnare, et non poter senza questo parlar di cose serie. These days, I have been putting some hope in having a conversation with that Buccella, for Mr Alamani, His Highness’ chef, has passed it on to me that the latter would gladly

237

238

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

share his thoughts about life. Therefore, one day Father Laterna and I invited him to talk, but his response was such that I lost any kind of hope almost immediately: he spoke the most terrible things, albeit he did apologise later saying he had not had a nap after his meal the way he was used to, and therefore was unable to talk about anything serious.

In their efforts to convert Biandrata, who wanted to see the end of his life in Italy, the Jesuits were giving him hope of protection from Inquisition trials in his homeland. The Jesuits who worked in Báthory’s native Transylvania would emphasise that the heretics were reluctant to talk on religious matters20 , yet they still hope to convert both Biandrata and Squarcialupi. On 7 February 1584, Giovanni Paolo Campana wrote to Possevino that Squarcialupi and Biandrata had given him a verbal and written confession of their faith, although not in a sacramental form, and that he was looking forward towards further signs of their conversion (G.P. Campana to A. Possevino, 7/2/1584, Gyulaféhervár, Documenta Romana: 1581–1586, 375). Catholicising learned physicians was not an easy process: younger and careerminded figures were more susceptible to persuasion. With Catholic medical practitioners thin on the ground, the Jesuits themselves had to resort to the services of experienced ‘heretic’ physicians. In May and June 1581, the Principal of Cluj Jesuit College, Jakub Wujek, wrote in his letters to Nuncio Giovanni Andrea Caligari and Claudio Acquaviva that Biandrata (pessimum haereticum) and Squarcialupi (alterum haereticum) had been entrusted with the treatment of Brother Lodovico Odescalchi, mentor of the young Transylvanian duke (J. Wujek to G.A. Caligari, 29/5/1581; J. Wujek to Claudio Acquaviva, 1581/6/02, Documenta Romana: 1967, 20; 27). On 10 January 1582, Jesuit János Leleszi also wrote to Claudio Acquaviva that Jesuits were being treated by Biandrata and Squarcialupi (J. Leleszi to C. Acquaviva, 10/1/1582, Gyulaféhérvar, Documenta Romana: 1967, 96). Vilnius Jesuits had to go and see Buccella on multiple occasions. Details to that effect can be found in the notes of Szymon Niklewicz (c. 1571–1632), Jesuit father who later became the principal of the Vilnius Academy (Katilienė, Jovaiša: 2019, 214). The concentration of Italian heterodox physicians in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Transylvania drove converted physicians to become involved in religious propaganda just as it sparked a number of natural-science and medical polemics in the region. This phenomenon had its confessional reasons as well: the first polemic was launched by Simone Simoni, who had moved to the Jesuit camp. In early 1584 in Vilnius, Simoni published his Commentariola Medica et Physica, a tract against Marcello Squarcialupi, which is considered the first scholarly medical work 20 See, e.g.: Jakub Wujek to G.A. Caligari, 29/5/1581, Koloszvar; János Leleszi to Claudio Acquaviva, 1582/1/10, Gyulaféhervár (Documenta Romana: 1581–1586, 20; 96). It was reported that Jesuit fathers would gladly employ the services of Squarcialupi and Biandrata, but none of them would talk to them on religious matters.

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

to be published in the Duchy of Lithuania. Truth be told, the Jesuits were upset by Simoni after his promise of cooperation, engaging in medical rather than religious disputes: after he got his hands on this tract by the ex-heretic convert, which was so incisive that his “ears turned red” (“offende l’orecchie”), Tommaso Natale urged that instead of writing medical texts the author should engage in some Christian work (T. Natale to A. Possevino 19/4/1584, Bolognetti: 1584, 189). Even though leaders of Respublica Medicorum, Crato von Krafftheim and Theodor Zwinger encouraged Squarcialupi in their letters to avoid responding to the tract, he still published a reply titled Simonis Simonii Lucensis primus triumphus de Marcello Squarcialupo in Kolozsvár (Transylvania) in 1584. Soon Simoni opposed Squarcialupi with another text, this one titled Simonius Supplex ad Incomparabilem Virum (Kraków, 1585). The barrage of medical texts between Stephen Báthory’s two physicians increased with the ruler’s death in Grodno castle in December 1586. Although Buccella and Simoni had begun to clash right after Simoni arrived at Báthory’s court when the king was still alive, the abrupt demise of the ruler pushed them towards a final confrontation (Spilczyński: 1977; Szczucki: 2006). During its course, Simoni published four tracts criticising the mistakes of the ‘Arian physician’ Buccella. Buccella fired back with three texts against his opponent (Madonia: 1988). With the conflict between Simoni and Buccella escalating, Squarcialupi seized the opportunity to step in with his own criticism of Simoni, publishing Simonis Simoni Lucensis, Primum Romani, tum Calviniani, Deinde Lutherani, Denuo Romani, Sempre Autem Athei Summa Religio in Kraków in 1588, in which he exposed Simoni as a godless man.

Afterword The apostasy of Socinian physician Gaspar Wilkowski and the propagandist activity for conversion that followed (1583) were closely related not only to religious fragmentation in Stephen Báthory’s Poland and Lithuania, but also to the insufficient number of Catholic learned physicians in the region. This phenomenon was driven by the spread of heterodox ideas amidst Italian physicians and their exile to eastern and central Europe in the second half of the sixteenth century. The network of Italian physicians in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (and Transylvania) was inspired and headed by Giorgio Biandrata, who first came to work at the court of the region’s rulers back in 1540. The shortage of learned Catholic medical practitioners made it easier for heterodox physicians to become entrenched in the region. The Jesuits, who had greatly expanded their presence in Poland-Lithuania and had isolated their educational system from learned medicine, were anxious about the established position of ‘Arian physicians’ in the society and in the entourage of King Stephen Báthory himself. In an effort to check the expansion of non-Catholic physicians, the Jesuits pursued active personal propaganda with regard to ‘heretic physicians’.

239

240

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Gaspar Wilkowski – their first victory – was offered a well-paid postat the court of Mikołaj Krzysztof Radziwiłł “Sierotka”, patron of the counter-Reformation and the dominant political figure of the period in the GDL, in exchange for his apostasy and its propagandist effects. The presence of heterodox physicians and the tensions between heterodoxy and orthodoxy in the second half of the sixteenth century also led to the first early modern scholarly medical polemics between the exiles, which, in addition to their professional aspects, also had a confessional background.

Bibliography Primary Sources Bèze de, Théodore (2000), Correspondance, Alain Dufour/Béatrice Nicollie/Hervé Genton (ed.), Genève: Droz, vol. 22. Bolognetti, Alberto (1581–1582), Alberto Bolognetti nuntii apostolici in Polonia epistolae et acta 1581–1585. Pars I: 1581–1582. A Ludovico Boratyński P.M. collecta. Edidit Edward Kuntze, Czesław Nanke (Monumenta Poloniae Vaticana 5), Cracoviae: Sumptibus Academiae Polonae Litterarum et Scientiarum, 1923–1933. — (1583), Alberto Bolognetti nuntii apostolici in Polonia epistolae et acta 1581–1585. Pars II: 1583. Edidit Edward Kuntze (Monumenta Poloniae Vaticana 5), Cracoviae: Sumptibus Academiae Polonae Litterarum et Scientiarum, 1938. — (1584), Alberto Bolognetti Nuntii Apostolici in Polonia epistollarum et actorum. Pars III, Fasc. I (M. Jan.–Jun. 1584). Edidit Edward Kuntze (Monumenta Poloniae Vaticana 7), Kraków: Nakładem Polskiej Akademii Umiejętności, 1939–1948. Constitutiones Societatis Iesu, Anno 1558. Reprinted from the Original Edition with An Appendix Containing a Translation, and Several Important Documents, London: J.G. and P. Rivingston, 1838. Documenta Romana Historiae Societatis Iesu in Regnis olim corona Hungarica unitis, vol. 3, 1581–1586. Edidit Ladislaus Lukás S.I., Romae: Typogr. Pont. Univ. Gregorianae, 1967. Korespondencja Hieronima Rozrażewskiego, vol. 2: 2 VII 1582 – 1600, Paweł Czaplewski (ed.), Toruń: Nakładem Towarzystwa Naukowego w Toruniu, 1939–1947. Niemojewski, Jan (1584), Ukazanie, iż Kościół rzymski papieski nie jest apostolski, áni swięty, áni ieden, áni powszechny Przytym odpowiedź na potwarzy doktora Wilkowskiego, którymi zbór Pana Chrystusow zelżyć i ohydzić chce, zmyślając sobie niesprawiedliwe przyczyny swego niepobożnego i nieporządnego odstania, Kraków: Aleksy Rodecki. Pac, Mikołaj (2013), Orthodoxa fidei confessio de una eademque Dei Patris, Filii, et Spiritus Sancti divinitate, ac tribus personis, tam è scriptura, quam vetustissimis Ecclesiae doctoribus summa collecta. Regiomonti Borussiae in officina Iohannis Daubmanni, Anno D. 1566, in Irene Dingel (ed.), Antitrinitarische Streitigkeiten. Die triteistische Phase

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

(1560–1568), zusammengestellt und bearbeitet von Kęstutis Daugirdas (Controversia et Confessio 9), Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 346–416. Socyn, Faust (1959), Listy, Ludwik Chmaj (ed.), vol. 1, Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. Sozzini, Lelio (1986), Opere, a cura di Antonio Rotondò, Firenze: Olschki. Wilkowski, Balcer (1959), List Balcera Wilkowskiego, ojca, do Kaspra Wilkowskiego, doktora, syna swego, do papiestwa przepadłego, in: Lech Szczucki/Janusz Tazbir (ed.), Literatura ariańska w Polsce XVI wieku: antologia, Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza, 461–471. Wilkowski, Kasper (1583), Przycżyny Nawrocenia do wiary Powszechney od Sekt Nowokrzczeńcow Samosateńskich Kaspara Wilkowskiego Medyka Lubelskiego, w Wilnie, Nakładem i pracą samego K.W. — (1959), Przyczyny nawrócenia do wiary powszechnej 1583, in: Lech Szczucki/Janusz Tazbir (ed.), Literatura ariańska w Polsce XVI wieku: antologia, Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza, 557–577.

Secondary Sources Baczewski, Sławomir (2005), Literackie świadectwo konwersji – sprawa Kaspra Wilkowskiego, Anales Universitatis Mariae Curie-Skłodowska, Sectio FF, 23, 75–90. Baldini, Ugo (1992), Legem impone subactis: studi su filosofia e scienza dei Gesuiti in Italia, 1540–1632, Roma: Bulzoni. Buožytė, Eleonora (2018), Kodėl vystyklėliuose jo kiaulės nesurijo: Balcerio Wilkowskio laiškas sūnui (1584), Literatūra 60, 1, 142–160. Caccamo, Domenico (1970), Eretici italiani in Moravia, Polonia, Transilvania (1558–1611). Studi e documenti, Firenze/Chicago: Sansoni. Calma, Clarinda E. (2013), Piotr Skarga tłumaczem nowoczesnym? Polski i angielski przekład “Rationes decem” Edmunda Campiona – próba porównania, Acta Universitatis Lodziensis. Folia Litteraria Polonica 3, 237–244. — (2013a), Edmund Campion’s “Rationes Decem”: A Survey of Campion’s Books in Polish Libraries, Religious and Sacred Poetry: An International Quarterly of Religion, Culture and Education 1, 1, 79–90. — (2014), Communicating Across Communities: Explicitation in Gaspar Wilkowski’s Polish Translation of Edmund Campion’s “Rationes Decem”, Journal of Jesuit Studies 1, 589–606. Calma, Clarinda E./Rzegocka, Jolanta (2013), O nazywaniu rzeczy po imieniu: Wileńskie tłumaczenia dzieł Edmunda Campiona SJ, Senoji Lietuvos literatūra 35–36, 367–380. Daugirdas, Kęstutis (2008), Andreas Volanus und die Reformation im Groβfürstentum Litauen, Mainz: Philipp von Zabern. Edwards, Michael (2012), Body, Soul and Anatomy in Late Aristotelian Psychology, in: Gideon Manning (ed.), Matter and Form in Early Modern Science and Philosophy, Leiden/ Boston: Brill, 33–76.

241

242

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Firpo, Massimo (1959), La Chiesa italiana di Londra nel Cinquecento, in: Ginevra e l’Italia, a cura di Delio Cantimori et al, Firenze: Sansoni, 381–391. — (1977), Antitrinitari nell’Europa orientale del Cinquecento. Nuovi testi di Szymon Budny, Niccolò Paruta e Iacopo Paleologo, Firenze: La Nuova Italia. Ganss, George E. (1954), Saint Ignatius’ Idea of a Jesuit University; A Study in the History of Catholic Education, Including Part Four of the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus, Milwaukee. Grendler, Paul (2018), Jesuit Schools and Universities in Europe, 1548–1773, Leiden: Brill. Gwioździk, Jolanta (2011), “Desiderosus”, czyli o pobożnych staraniach księcia Mikołaja Krzysztofa Radziwiłła, Rocznik Biblioteki Narodowej 41, 161–172. Hanusiewicz-Lavallee, Mirosława (2018), “Rozum mój w poimanie wezmę”. Sceptycyzm fideistyczny w świadectwie konwersji Kaspra Wilkowskiego, Pamiętnik Literacki CIX, 4, 97–110. Hein, Lorenz (1974), Italienische protestanten und ihr Einfluss auf die Reformation in Polen wärend der beiden Jahrzehnte von dem Sandomier Konsens (1570), Leiden: Brill. Katilienė, Irena/Jovaiša, Liudas (2019), In angulo cum libello: asmeninės istorijos pėdsakai Lietuvos jėzuitų užrašų knygelėse, Senoji Lietuvos literatūra 47, 196–220. Kempa, Tomasz (2000), Mikołaj Krzystof Radziwiłł Sierotka (1549–1616), Wojewoda Wileński, Warszawa: Semper. Korolko, Mirosław (1970), Refleksje o literaturze konwersyjnej w Polsce, in: Janusz Pelc (ed.), Wiek XVII–kontrreformacja–barok. Prace z historii kultury, Wrocław: Ossolineum, 246–251. Luszczynska, Magdalena (2018), From the Prodigal Son to the Last Judgement: Arian Parables of Conversion to Catholicism, Journal of Religion in Europe 11, 1, 1–19. Madonia, Claudio (1980), Simone Simoni da Lucca, Rinascimento XX, 161–197. — (1988), Simone Simoni, in: Bibliotheca dissidentium. Répertoire des non-conformistes religieux des seizième et dix-septième siècles, édité par André Séguenny, t. IX, Baden Baden & Bouxwiller: Valentin Koerner, 25–110. Madonia, Claudio (1994), Marcello Squarcialupi, in: André Séguenny (ed.), Bibliotheca dissidentium. Répertoire des non-conformistes religieux des seizième et dix-septième siècles, vol. XVI, Baden Baden & Bouxwiller: Valentin Koerner, 154–155. Marchetti, Valerio (1999), I simulacri delle parole e il lavoro dell’eresia. Ricerca sulle origini del socinianesimo, Bologna: Cisec. Palumbo, Margherita, Nifo Fabio, in: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, http://www. treccani.it/enciclopedia/fabio-nifo. Plečkaitis, Romanas (1975), Feodalizmo laikotarpio filosofija Lietuvoje, Vilnius: Mintis. Pociūtė, Dainora (2008), Maištininių katedros, Ankstyvoji reformacija ir lietuvių-italų evangelikų ryšiai, Vilnius: Versus Aureus. — (2015), Radvilas “the Black”’s Answer to Nuncio Lippomano (1556): Manifesto of the Establishment of the Lithuanian Evangelical Church and the Reformation’, in: Dainora Pociūtė (ed.), Du laiškai: popiežiaus nuncijaus Luigi Lippomano ir kunigaikščio Mikalo-

Converting Physicians: The Apostasy of Socinian Gaspar Wilkowski and the Confessional Boundaries

jus Radvilo Juodojo polemika (1556) / Two Letters: a Controversy between Apostolic Nuncio Luigi Lippomano and Duke Nicolaus Radvilas “the Black” (1556), A Study, Facsimile, a New Edition with Commentaries and Translation into Lithuanian (Monumenta Reformationis Lithuanicae 2), 57–108. — (2016), Vilniaus tėvas, Vytauto ipedinis: jezuitu edukacine strategija Stepono Batoro laikais ir valdovo ivaizdis amžininku literaturoje, in: Guido Mongini/Claudio Ferlain et al. (ed.), Nuo apaštalu iki kankiniu: Jezaus draugijos reprezentavimo modeliai nuo pat pradžiu iki uždraudimo, Vilnius: Versus aureus, 87–120. — (2017), Nematomos tikrovės šviesa: Reformacijos Lietuvoje asmenybės ir idėjos, Vilnius: Vilniaus universiteto leidykla. — (2017 a), L’arginamento dell’eterodossia riformata nel Granducato di Lituania e in Polonia: il trattato Orthodoxa fidei confessio di Mikołaj Pac, PL.IT / rassegna italiana di argomenti polachi 8, 5–21. — (2018), «Fa una setta da sé»: Niccolò Buccella e la tradizione dell’antitrinitarismo veneto nell’esilio polacco-lituano, in: Antonella Barzazi/Michela Catto/Dainora Pociūtė (ed.), Eretici e dissidenti tra Europa occidentale e orientale (Secoli XVI–XVIII), Padova: Padova University Press, 35–58. — (2019), Eterodossia e medicina nella prima età moderna. I «medici ariani» alla corte di Stefano Báthory, Rivista di Storia del Cristianesimo 16/1, 37–61. Prokop, Krzysztof R. (2011), Faust Socyn w Igołomii (przyczynek do dziejów antagonizmów religijnych w Polsce końca XVI w.), in: Iwona Hofman/Wojciech Maguś (ed.), Przez Kresy i historię po obrzeża polityki. Profesorowi Marcelemu Kosmanowi w półwiecze pracy naukowej, vol. 1, Toruń: Wydawnictwo Adam Marszałek, 525–554. Ragauskienė, Raimonda (2017), Mirties nugalėti nepavyko: Biržų ir Dubingių kunigaikščių Radvilų biologinė istorija (XV a. pabaiga – XVII a.), Vilnius: Lietuvos edukologijos universiteto leidykla. Rotondò, Antonio, Biandrata, Giovanni Giorgio, in: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 10, https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/, 257–264. Sanders, Christoph (2014), Medical Topics in the “De anima” Commentary of Coimbra (1598) and the Jesuits’ Attitude towards Medicine in Education and Natural Philosophy, Early Science and Medicine 19, 76–101. Spilczyński, Stanisław (1977), Sprzeczności renesansowej medycyny w świetle polemiki Simoniusza z Buccellą po zgonie Króla Stefana Batorego, Archiwum Historii Medycyny XL, 291–297. Stella, Aldo (1962), Intorno al medico padovano Nicolò Buccella Anabattista del ‘500. Estratto dale Memorie della Accademia Patavina di SS. LL. AA.: Classe di Scienze Morali, Lettere ed Arti., vol. LXXIV (1961–1962), Padova: Societa Cooperativa Tipografica. — (1996), Dall’anabattismo Veneto al “sozialevangelismus” dei fratelli hutteriti e all’illuminismo religioso sociniano, Roma: Herder Editrice e Libreria. Szczotka, Stanisław (1935–1936), Synody arian polskich. Od założenia Rakowa do wygnania z kraju (1569–1662), Reformacja w Polsce 7–8, 21–100.

243

244

Dainora Pociūtė (Vilnius University)

Szczucki, Lech (1962), Marcin Czechowic, 1532–1613. Studium z dziejów antytrynitaryzmu polskiego XVI w., Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. — (2006), U źródeł legendy o otruciu Stefana Batorego, in: idem, Humaniści, heretycy, inkwizytorzy. Studia z dziejów kultury XVI i XVII wieku, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności, 189–196. Verdigi, Mariano (1997), Simone Simoni: filosofo e medico nel ‘500, Lucca: Maria Pacini Fazzi Editore’. Welie, Jos V.M. (2003), Ignatius of Loyola on Medical Education: Or, Should Today’s Jesuits Continue to Run Health Sciences Schools?, Early Science and Medicine 8, 26–43. Wotschke, Theodor (1929), Polnische Studenten In Frankfurt, Jahrbücher für Kultur und Geschichte der Slaven, Neue Folge, Bd. 5, H. 2, 228–244. Załęski, Stanisław (1905), Jezuici w Polsce, vol. 4, part 1, Kraków: Drukarnia W.L. Anczyca.

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania. Konstantinas Sirvydas’ Postil as One of the Main Achievements of the Times1

Highly popular Protestant postils were the first postillographic works in Europe. The names of their most eminent authors are widely known: Martin Luther, Philip Melanchthon, Anton Corvin, Johann Spangenberg. Postils served as a way to spread and define new teachings. Catholic postils were almost as popular as the Protestant collections. The rising popularity of Reformational postils brought about some significant reaction: from the 1520s, the number of German Catholic postils significantly increased and almost equalled Protestant postils in the number of titles and editions. The same tendencies of preaching art formation could be observed in Lithuania. The first Protestant postils written in Lithuanian emerged in Lithuania Minor at the end of the sixteenth century. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the first Catholic postils appeared on the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL) as a response towards Protestant postils and the ideas mentioned in them. In this study, an attempt will be made to present the first stage of the development of Lithuanian postillography, looking for analogies of this genre developed in other European countries, first of all in Poland and Germany, which affected the first Lithuanian preaching works. More attention will be paid to the first original postil written in Lithuanian and published in the early seventeenth century in Vilnius.

1.

Protestant postils in Lithuania Minor

The first known Lithuanian collection of homilies was the handwritten Wolfenbüttel Postil (1573–1574; WP) for the liturgical year. Its author is unknown. Only one copy of it, dated 1573, has survived, presumably authored by Jonas Bylaukis, a pastor from Jurbarkas (Lithuania Minor). The collection of homilies was found in the library of Duke Augustus in Wolfenbüttel in the 19th century. It is not an original piece 1 The article was prepared as part of the project “Tekst religijny jako źródło komunikacji międzykulturowej”, financed by NAWA (the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange), No. PJP/PON/2021/ 1/00005/U/DRAFT/00001.

246

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

but rather a compendium of different postils that had been earlier translated from Latin. This presumption is backed up by the title page of the manuscript, listing nine names of theologians2 and bearing fragments from the works used in the postil, quotations taken from them and paraphrased works of ancient writers, Church Fathers, renowned theologians, and medieval historians. The Postil is the first florilegium written in the spirit of Latin European evangelical Lutheran homiletics in Lithuanian culture and is a persuasive witness of the spread of Reformation ideas in Lithuanian circles as early as in the sixteenth century (Gelumbeckaitė: 2009, 66). However, it does not mean that the entire text of the homilies consists solely of translations – the Postil has some original fragments as well. According to the custom of the period, the sources used were not quoted word-for-word, and homilies were adapted to the needs of the specific user. During the translation, the source text could be either improved or made more relevant by using repetitions. As a result, the Postil also features entire textual fragments describing lifestyle, customs and traditions, and Lithuanian mythological creatures (Gelumbeckaitė: 2008)3 . Baltramiejus Vilentas4 was another preacher of Protestant homilies with a great contribution to the Lithuanian writing of the sixteenth century. He was known for his endeavours to publish Mažvydas’ written legacy and to continue the work of preparing Lithuanian religious books that Mažvydas had started5 . Being primarily 2 On the title page, the names of nine theologians were provided – Niels Hemmingsen (lat. Nicolaus Hemmingius, 1513–1600, Danish theologian), Antonius Corvin (1501–1553), Johannes Spangenberg (1484–1550), Martin Luther (1483–1546), Philip Melanchthon (1497–1560), Johannes Brenz (1499–1570), Leonhard Culmann (1498–1562), Arsatius Seehofer (around 1505–1545) and Jodocasa Willichijus (1501–1552) – with a note also others, among them – Daniel Greser (1504–1591). Release dates for these works – Postilla seu enarratio Euangeliorum by Hemmingsen (1562, Wittenberg: Johann Krafft d. Ä.), Enarratio breuis et orthodoxa Euangeliorum Dominicalium & Festorum aliquot by Greser (1567, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Braubach) – testify that they were known in Little Lithuania almost immediately after their release (Gelumbeckaitė: 2009: 67). 3 Online critical edition of the postil: http://titus.uni-frankfurt.de/curric/postille.htm [accessed on 01.12.2021]. 4 Vilentas came from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, probably attended the school of Abraham Kulvec (Abraomas Kulvietis) in Vilnius (Zinkevičius: 1988, 59). Invited by Prince Albrecht to Königsberg, he studied at the University of Königsberg. Although from 1553 he was a pastor of the church of St Nicholas in Steindam, all Lithuanian communities in Königsberg were under his care. He performed these duties for forty years until his death. He saw the need to prepare books with religious content, in correspondence with his priestly service. 5 In 1547, Mažvydas composed and published the first Lithuanian book, Katekizmo prasti žodžiai [Simple words of catechism]. It includes the primer, a short catechism based on the Polish catechisms of Jan Seklucjan (1545) and Jan Małecki (1546); “Instructions for the hosts”, translated from the catechism of J. Willich (1542); eleven songs with sheet music, mostly translated from the Polish songbook by Jan Seklucjan and Jerzy Zabłocki. In the preface the author woes that compatriots are still stuck in the mistakes of darkness, they do not know the basic prayers, and worship the old gods (Jackiewicz: 2005, 152).

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

a translator, he did not leave any original oeuvre. He spent ten years translating fragments from the New Testament (NT) that were in 1579 published as Gospels and Letters (Evangelijos bei Epistolos, EE). Enchridion (E) appeared in print later, and was based on the German catechism by Martin Luther. Nonetheless, he was most renowned for his translation of the Holy Scripture. Vilentas is considered to be the author of the first Lithuanian translation of the Gospels. Zigmas Zinkevičius argues that in translating the Gospels, Vilentas relied on Luther’s German translation, as well as on Latin, Greek, and Polish texts. Fragments of these Gospels had been circulating in Lithuania Minor until the published translation of the entire NT. These texts were widely used by priests practicing in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and only Daukša, Morkūnas, Sirvydas, and Jaknavičius contributed to the new translations. Following the example that Vilentas gave with his Gospel, Jonas Bretkūnas wrote a postil of his own as well. Vilentas understood the need to prepare homilies for believers in the Lithuanian language; therefore, in 1581, he began translating the German postil by Veit Dietrich into Lithuanian6 . Although this work took several years, he only managed to translate the part of the homilies covering the period from Advent to the fifth Sunday after Trinity Sunday. After Vilentas’ death, his wife continued his work of translating the postil. She approached Duke Georg Friedrich asking him to assign more workforce to the translation, pledging to give the handwritten version of the translation to them. However, the translation was, in all likeliness, never continued, and the manuscript has still not been found (Aleknavičienė: 2009, 140–142; cf. Lebedys: 1972, 78–86). Another well-known collection of homilies in Lithuanian is the Postil Tatai esti Triumpas ir Prastas Ischguldimas Euangeliu by Jonas Bretkūnas7 . It was written in 6 Veit Dietrich (Vitus Diterichus, Vitus Theodorus, Vitus Theodoricus, 1506–1549) – German theologian, supporter of Luther, author of religious books (Real-Encyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche […] herausgegeben von Dr. Herzog […] Dritter Band […] Stuttgart und Hamburg, Rudolf Beffer, 1855, 389–393). 7 Jonas Bretkūnas, like Vilentas, studied in Königsberg, so he knew Vilentas personally. At that time Jan Seklucjan also worked in Königsberg, so both authors followed his work. Continuing his studies in Wittenberg, Bretkūnas attended classes with Professor F. Melanchthon. Immediately after the death of Vilentas in 1587, Bretkūnas was appointed in his place and served as priest until 1602. He preached in Polish and Lithuanian. From 1579, he began to translate the Bible into Lithuanian, which he completed in 1590. The largest part of the Bible Bretkūnas translated from Luther’s German translation, while the Gospel of Luke (he started the translation from it) was translated from Latin. He most likely also used Polish translations. Bretkūnas could not publish his work for financial reasons, and adding to that problem, the translation was checked by a special commission over a period of ten years. The Bretkūnas Bible, which was of great importance for Lithuanian literature, was not widely used, the translation remaining in manuscript version to this day. Attempts are currently being made to transliterate this great work (the text has a multi-layer structure, containing the commission’s corrections and comments) and publish it in print.

247

248

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

1589 and published in Königsberg two years later, in 1591. This is a work that was written on the basis of the author’s own homilies and pieces published by other prominent Protestant theologians. This collection is touched upon by Kazimierz Kolbuszewski in his publication on the Polish postil writings of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Referring to the information contained in the Latin introduction to the Postil, he claims that “[w]hen writing his postil, Bretkūnas generously used other authors’ work, which makes his oeuvre similar to the German compendia of homilies in both form and content. The content is redolent of Lutheranism and its structure reflects the written work of Melanchthon” (Kolbuszewski: 1921, 186)8 . The postil’s publication output was as large as 1,000 copies, which shows a real need for published works of this type in Lithuanian. About thirty copies of Bretkūnas’ homilies have survived to this day, ten of which are kept in different Lithuanian libraries, and the rest can be found in other European countries (Aleknavičienė: 2004, 63–68; Aleknavičienė: 2005). Three copies of the postil are to be found in Kraków libraries. One of them was deposited there by Karol Estreicher himself, the other two copies used to be a part of private collections – those of the noble House of Czartoryski in Puławy and the House of Czapski in Stanków (Aleknavičienė: 2007, 57–98). Individual copies of the postil are also available in different Ukrainian, Russian, Czech, and German libraries (Vladimirovas: 1979, 357); one copy has recently been found in Yerevan (Aleknavičienė, Rekštytė: 2013, 113–140). In Lithuanian literature, the postil is considered to be the first original piece of work (Zinkevičius: 1988, 66–67). Written in a simple, down-to-earth style, it was aimed at ordinary, hardworking people who often lived in poverty. The text contains numerous folk expressions, proverbs and sayings from the vernacular. Jurgis Lebedys, a prominent researcher of the Lithuanian language, reckons that Bretkūnas enriched the standard Lithuanian language, which was then just taking shape, by adding to it words and sayings from colloquial speech forms and the popular vernacular (Lebedys: 1977, 105), applying new means of artistic expression, such as anaphoric repetitions and synonyms. However, the scholar also observes that sometimes the use of synonyms appears to be pointless, random, and sometimes pleonastic. The postil is also rich in rhetorical questions and addresses to the reader. So, on the one hand, the oeuvre stands out in its folk and naturalistic character, on the other hand, there are visible attempts to apply the underlying laws of rhetoric by using stylistic figures that are aimed at persuading the listener of the rightness of the word that is being spoken. The mentioned features of the postil demonstrate the originality of the style of the homily (Lebedys: 1977, 106).

8 If not stated otherwise all translations are by the Author of this article.

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

Illustration 1: Jonas Bretkūnas, Postilla Tatai esti Triumpas ir Prastas Ischguldimas Euangeliu, Königsberg 1591.

249

250

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

2.

The beginnings of postillography in the GDL

The beginning of postillography in the GDL can be traced back to the seventeenth century. The Catholic postil of Jakub Wujek translated from Polish into Lithuanian by Mikalojus Daukša, and the Protestant postil of Mikołaj Rej, translated in the print house of Jakub Markowicz, were among the earliest books of homiletic character. It seems that these two works, included in the major Polish achievements of the times, had a definite influence on the formation of this literary style in the GDL, served as examples for original postillographic texts, and contributed to the development of Lithuanian religious style. The Protestant postil by Mikołaj Rej was written in 1557 and published in Vilnius by Morkūnas’ printing house as Postilla Polska. This postil is the Simple Narrative of Sundays’ Gospels and Solemn Festivals (R1594). That was the fifth edition of the postil, which was generally the Lithuanian translation, published in 1600 as Postilla Lietuwiszka (MP). That was a sort of a comeback to the 1599 postil by Mikalojus Daukša, which in its own right was a translation of the Catholic Little Postil by Jakub Wujek. This edition of the postil soon became quite popular. It was published by Morkūnas (Polish: Jakub Markowicz), but the translator is not known. However, it is thought that Melchior Pietkiewicz might have contributed to the translation of the postil. Apart from the translated parts, the postil features some original fragments in Lithuanian – these are the foreword to the reader and the prayers. The edition has numerous mistakes, which shows a rushed effort to publish it with no particular regard to the language. The text contains a lot of Polish interference and even literal translations of complete sentences. These are the reasons why this text is considered a failure and also quite possibly why it never became as popular as Rej’s original homilies in Poland. It could be added that contrary to the followers of the Roman Catholic Church, Protestants did not translate religious texts into Lithuanian. Researchers of old Lithuanian literature even tend to believe that Protestant publishers had little, if anything, to do with the formation of Standard Lithuanian (Lebedys: 1977, 79). Of all the Catholic postils written for priests and for personal reading, the most popular piece of work in Poland was the collection of homilies by Wujek. The homilies featured in it were primarily aimed at repudiating the truths of faith that Rej declared in his own postil. In this regard, the Lesser Postil (WPCmn) was particularly famous, and was later re-issued and translated into other languages. Its first translations were into Czech (Litomyśl 1592; Prague 1629; Kolbuszewski: 1921, 116) and German (this translation was mentioned by Brückner: 1945; Estreicher, however, was not aware of it). Roughly at the same time, the Lithuanian translation of the postil by Daukša appeared – it was published in 1599 by the printing house of Vilnius Academy under the title of Poſtilla Catholicka Tái eſt: Iżguldimas Ewangeliu

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

kiekwienos Nedelos ir ſwętes per wiſſús metús (DP)9 . Most probably, Daukša realised the important role it performed in fighting heresy. Quite possibly, he met Wujek in person while holding different positions at Vilnius College in 1578–1579, because the postil that Daukša had translated and the one written by Wujek served the same purpose – both of them were written to spread the divine truth and to combat the theses of Protestantism. In terms of language and the national ideas that it proliferated, the piece by Daukša played an important role in Lithuanian culture as well. Daukša always saw his high regard for language as one of the main aims of his life. Ledesma’s Catechism and Postil, which he translated, were considered to be the most important contributions to Lithuanian writings published in Lithuania in the sixteenth century. Only the original homilies by Sirvydas, which appeared in the seventeenth century, could compete with them. Daukša started his work as a preacher and writer with the support of Merkelis Giedraitis, then the Bishop of Samogitia. With Giedraitis assuming his important position as pastor, the Samogitian diocese appeared to be split into two branches of faith: Catholicism and Protestantism. Therefore, his activity was not limited to spreading the Catholic faith. Giedraitis’ work in Samogitia is often called the second christening of the region – he cherished the Lithuanian culture, national language, educated a number of Lithuanian priests who disseminated the word of God in Lithuanian. He was particularly fond of Daukša’s vast interest in and profound knowledge of the Lithuanian language, as well as his relation to the “common” people. Both priests maintained close ties of cooperation for almost three decades, and it was thanks to Giedraitis’ patronage that Daukša’s most important oeuvre saw the light of day (Jovaišas, Ulčinaitė: 2003, 199). Daukša’s translation of the Little Postil is believed to be an opus of high stylistic value. The exceptional significance of this piece of work stems from the ample additions that the author wove into the translation, richly enhancing the text of Wujek’s postil. These insertions and the translation alike are permeated with expressions and imagery that Daukša – just like Bretkūnas – drew from the vernacular. Lebedys, a researcher of Daukša’s work (Lebedys: 1977, 73–74; idem: 1963), argues that the Lithuanian preacher enriched the predominant intellectualism of Wujek’s postil with elements of sentimentality, and the descriptions and explanations that he weaved into the text make it clearer to understand. The ample (and, contrary to what Bretkūnas did, deliberate) use of synonyms and words with similar meaning renders the text more concrete. On the other hand, the structure of sentences lacks originality and typical Lithuanian sentence construction is not common.

9 Digital copy of the postil is available online: http://seniejirastai.lki.lt/db.php?source=2 [accessed on 14.10.2021].

251

252

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Daukša’s postil became a kind of a benchmark of the Lithuanian language and exerted a high degree of influence on the texts that were emerging at the time. It was an example to follow not only because of its language, but also for the religious terminology it offered. Despite the abundant loanwords that were still in use (which is a rather natural thing when it comes to translated texts), Daukša used some Lithuanian terms denoting religious concepts. Abstract vocabulary was used to convey philosophical content. Daukša also succeeded in translating excerpts from the NT. The Evangelic pericopes translated by him were inserted into other editions. As a result, Daukša can certainly be called a translator of biblical texts. His works were used in the GDL for years to come (Lebedys: 1977, 80).

3.

Gospel Points (1629, 1644), the postil of the Jesuit priest Konstantinas Sirvydas

The first printed original postil of the Jesuit priest Konstantinas Sirvydas10 , Gospel Points, written in Lithuanian and translated into Polish, was an important event in Lithuanian preaching history. Its first part was published in 1629, and the second one as late as in 1644. The critical edition of the postil, issued in 2015–2016 (Vasiliauskienė, Rutkovska: 2015a; 2015b; 2016), makes it possible to analyse it, together with its structure, in more detail, as well as to define its type in the context of other works, well known in the history of preaching tradition in Europe.

10 Konstantinas Sirvydas (1580–1631) taught positive theology at the Vilnius Academy and served as a preacher in the church of St John. During a period of ten years (1610–1611; 1613–1623) he preached in Lithuanian, and in 1617–1618 and 1623–1624 – in Polish in the church of St Casimir. He immortalized his vast knowledge in the scriptures. The most important of them are the Dictionarium trium linguarum, which was published in around 1620, reprinted several times after that, and the postil Sermon Points. Konstantinas Sirvydas was considered one of the best Lithuanian language experts of his day.

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

Illustration 2: Konstantinas Sirvydas, Punkty kazań…, Vilnius 1644.

This postil was written in the spirit of the Jesuits’ general theological and educational activities, which assigned preaching a significant role. The emphasis on preaching was evident in the writings of the Jesuit order’s first Superior Generals, which included special regulations and recommendations for preachers. These regulations were used in the education of students from the Jesuit colleges. According to the Jesuits, homilies had to play a converting role, be based on the

253

254

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Bible and the oeuvre of the Church Fathers and preached in national languages (Panuś: 2001, 188–198). The analyses carried out show that Sirvydas’ postil meets all these requirements. The homilies of this Lithuanian preacher had to serve the dissemination of the Catholic religion, teach Lithuanian and help Lithuanian priests compose their individual homilies. Sirvydas homilies only included theses based on the quotations of the Bible, as well as arguments from other theological sources defending the Catholic Church. The author was mainly concerned with conveying the content in Lithuanian; the translation into Polish is almost word-for-word and the layer of Latin is more intensive than in other postillic works of that period. Sirvydas homilies are also characteristic in their independent composition and content. 3.1 A postil’s structure and purpose Sirvydas’ postil is a piece of literature which is very typical of its epoch, having its own characteristic critical apparatus. Laid out in two columns, the text is preceded by a biblical pericope11 and includes marginal notes. Sirvydas wrote his homilies as summaries. This method is quite original and seems to have been developed by the author himself. It is known that summaries (disposals) were obligatory in the postils of that time and were provided at the end of every homily. These laconic inscriptions, although disclosing content, were provided in numbered lists. Setting out his homilies in points, Sirvydas provided a slightly different form: his summaries are more detailed and the main presented idea is usually explained, supported and illustrated with biblical quotations, the quotations of church authorities, philosophers or classical literary works. He also notes that the summaries can be individually developed and completed by priests and can serve various purposes. It should be recalled that accessible and understandable preaching was of primary importance for Sirvydas. The necessity to convert people to Catholicism was the most important and urgent task as more and more believers were converting to Protestantism and the common people were still Pagan. Therefore, Sirvydas aimed to write in a concise and clear way, understandable to ordinary readers who would lack the ability (or willingness) to read complicated reflections. Moreover, the testimonies of that period (especially of end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth centuries) show that short postils, which were also known to Sirvydas, were the most popular and useful. He had possibly seen the popularity of

11 Biblical pericopes in Lithuanian and Polish come from the “Gospel and epistols” – a handbook edition prepared by Jan Jachnowicz, based on the early translations of the Holy Bible into Polish done by Jakub Wujek and translations of the biblical pericopes into Lithuanian included in the postulate of Mikalojus Daukša (Vasiliauskienė, Rutkovska: 2018, 323–327).

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

the Lesser Postil (Postylla mniejsza) of Jakub Wujek, translated by Mikalojus Daukša and had probably copied this concise form of writing. Sirvydas’ postil, according to the author himself, was first of all to serve the need of priests in their pastoral work. Its aim was to comment on homilies, help priests in their understanding of the Bible and encourage them to reflect on and interpret the Bible. Therefore, Sirvydas is not only the author, whose homilies have to be repeated and followed, but also of the teacher and preacher, who perfectly understands that good homilies should be adapted to the needs and cognitive abilities of the listeners, touch topical social issues, and answer complex life problems, the solution of which particularly needs faith. This particular aim of the postil is proved by the fact that priests received a work which could continuously serve many generations. The laconic character of the text and numerous abbreviations, etc. caused no difficulties, and their completion with the text from the Bible did not cause any major problems for any theologian. Summarised thoughts could be developed in an original way, relevant at a certain time and in certain surroundings. 3.2 Indices and marginal notes Sirvydas’ Postil is popular and didactic in nature, yet it also contains indices which are more characteristic of so-called educational postils, aimed at priests and educated people. Latin indices in a postil must have guaranteed its universality and made its content available far beyond state borders, and this must have been why they were written in Latin. The Latin language used in the postil makes it unique among other Polish written oeuvres from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, in which both the indices and marginal notes were written in Polish. The polonisation of biblical abbreviations has been observed in Polish religious writing since the issue of the Brest Bible in 1563; marginal notes in Jakub Wujek’s Bible and his postils were also written in Polish (Winiarska-Górska: 2013). The first Lithuanian postils lack consistency in such inscriptions. In Morkūnas’ postil, they are written in Lithuanian, though Latin is commonly retained in noting the books of the Bible. The notes in Daukša’s postil are similar: although the comments and text notes are written in Lithuanian, biblical abbreviations are provided in Latin12 . Biblical abbreviations in Bretkūnas’ Postil are written in Latin.

12 Marginals in Daukša’s postil were discussed in the article by B. Maskuliūnas and B. Jankauskas (2012, 54–59). The authors distinguished three groups of footnotes: glosses, rubrics, and scholia. This is the first and only elaboration of marginals occurring in Lithuanian postils.

255

256

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Illustration 3 and 4: Konstantinas Sirvydas Gospel Points, indices and marginal notes.

3.3 References to the Bible Bible quotations make up one fourth of the text and are mainly word-for-word. The analysis of the quotational level structure of Sirvydas’ Gospel Points shows that the author refers to various places of the Bible text and all the Books of the Bible are well known to him. However, in his argumentation, Sirvydas uses several sources. The author refers to the Old Testament mainly quoting the Book of Isaiah and the Book of Psalms. Referring to the New Testament, the author primarily supports his arguments with the Gospels According to Matthew and John and the Apostolic Letters. There are slightly more references to the New Testament than to the Old Testament; and this choice of quotations shows the Christological character of his homilies. Repetitive quotations in the Gospel Points play an important role. The author’s most commonly repeated quotations come from his preferred books: the mentioned Book of Isaiah, Psalter, Gospels and Apostolic Letters. Such additional emphasising strengthens certain biblical topics and the author’s position becomes even clearer. Sirvydas’ theology is obviously Christological. If single quotations support the author’s thesis, recurrent verses make up a certain motif and, when used in different contexts, are also commented on in a slightly different manner. It makes their content deeper. The author emphasises the main concepts and threads of the quotation through the repetitive fragments of the same verse in one gospel point, placing these pats of the text next to each other. The usage of such stylistic means proves the fact that such manipulation of the quotation in

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

the author’s text is one of the main sources of Sirvydas persuasion (Rutkovska: 2016, 72–76). Konrad Górski analysed the way of citing the Bible in Mikołaj Rej’s homilies. The scholar was interested in the Biblical pericopes and quotations present in the postil’s text. Having carried out a detailed analysis, he came to the conclusion that the Gospel pericopes were typical paraphrases full of interpretations and deviations from the original, and Rej’s attitude towards the Biblical text in the quotational layer was even more independent and imprecise than in the translation of the pericopes. The scholar even accuses Rej of “a distortion of the main idea due to misunderstanding or taking some words out of context” (Górski: 1959, 47–48). Another famous orator, Piotr Skarga, also used many biblical quotations, which can be observed in the Kazania sejmowe [Sejm Sermons] despite the fact that they had no typically homiletic character13 . He translated the Bible excerpts himself, not quoting any of the existing translations. Other source-text quotations are secondhand, especially taken from Bellarmine and Baronius. The author must have used the Latin text, which can be proved by Latin marginal notes (Skarga: 1995, lxxxiv). In his preface to Postilla Catholica, Jakub Wujek defined the method of quoting Patristic and contemporary authors as quoting and using. The assumption can thus be made that he used different ways of quoting the Bible. The quotational layer in Wujek’s postils has not been analysed in detail14 . Only the sources used in Wujek’s homilies have been discussed (Bieńkowska: 1998, 27–52). Sirvydas takes the Bible references very seriously, the Bible quotations being exact and the references to different Books of the Bible provided in the margin. The references to the Bible, present in the text, have the character of allusion, paraphrase and word-for-word quotations. The last mentioned make up the major part of the Gospel Points text. It could probably be associated with the author’s didactical aims and his strive to compose a Postil, the points of which would serve as an example for Lithuanian priests’ individual homilies and the usage of quotations in Lithuanian during the sermons.

13 Skarga also wrote sermons which are more genre-specific, and his Kazania na niedziele i święta are sometimes called a postil (Komorowska: 2015). To this day, however, we have no critical edition of those works or even studies discussing the ways of recalling biblical and parabiblical sources in those texts. 14 Recently, however, many studies devoted to the Polish postylography of this period have been published. The comparison of Wujek’s postil to the one of Rej (including the methods of marking quotations) is discussed by Jerzy Starnawski (1996). Łukasz Cybulski (2014; 2019) researched self-quotes in the postiles of Jakub Wujek. Magdalena Kuran (2007) wrote about the manner of expressing persuasion in J. Wujek’s Catholic Postils, while Iwona Rak-Poks (2019) examined the literary publishing framework of the Polish postylography of the sixteenth century.

257

258

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

3.4 References to other theological sources In his reflections, Sirvydas also quotes the works of famous theologians. The Church Fathers most commonly cited are St Thomas and St Augustine. In general, Sirvydas refers to twenty five authors. He is also well aware of the works of famous theologians and saints, prominent Protestants and Roman authors, including Barlaam and Josaphat, Saint Basil the Great, Berengar of Tours, Bernard of Clairvaux, Cicero, Lucius Annaeus Florus, Pope Gregory I (the Great), Hugh of Saint Victor, Saint Jerome, John Chrysostom, John Calvin, John the Merciful, Cyril of Alexandria, Pope Clement VI, Saint Lawrence, Martin Luther, Saint Martin of Tours, Saint Nicholas of Myra, Ovid, Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, Sulpicius Severus, Theophylact of Ohrid. The quotations are commonly indirect, therefore it might mean that Sirvydas used other authors’ texts, in this way providing solely well-known religious theses. However, long quotations from the works of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint Gregory the Great and Saint Basil the Great could point to the direct usage of some of the sources (Vasilaiuskienė, Rutkovska: 2016). The references to theological sources in Wujek’s Postilla Catholica vary significantly. This can be seen from two registers attached by him: the first has “a list of saints, ancient Greek and Latin Doctors, whose sermons have been collected” containing fifty five names and several decrees; another register has “new, but Catholic, Latin, Italian and German authors” and contains about sixty different sources including the catechisms, breviaries and compendia (Bieńkowska: 1998, 33–35). A comparison of the sources used in both the Gospel Points and Wujek’s Postilla shows that both Syrvidas and Wujek used similar theological sources, but in the former’s Postil their number is considerably lower, which can be explained by the popular character of his homilies and that the work was not as long. 3.5 The stylistic values of Sirvydas’ postil and the features of his worldview The language and style of Sirvydas’ homilies have not been researched yet. An introductory analysis of the stylistic characteristics of his works carried out by Darius Kuolys (1987, 138–148), Viktorija Vaitkevičiūtė (2013, 256–281), and Aurelija Mykolaitytė (2018, 109–118) presents him as an original Baroque author, breaking tradition and writing in a new way which were closer to literary texts than previous church homilies. Sirvydas’ stylistic originality is present in his new, modern way of composing homilies. He rejected the normative rhetorical requirements of the previous epoch and used a rather free structure instead. His Gospel Points could be defined as a literary work, close to a philosophical miniature. The language of the Gospel Points is different from Renaissance works, the main aim of which was to render the preaching in an allegorical and visual way.

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

The studies on how Sirvydas interprets the Holy Scripture and biblical characters present him as a thinker-humanist, often siding with common people. This is visible in the way this Lithuanian preacher portrays the Virgin Mary (Rutkovska: 2020, 120–148). Sirvydas particularly highlights the following features: the free will of the Virgin Mary, the constant juxtaposition of the divine and human origin of Christ and the human and divine origin of his mother. In the course of his reflections, Sirvydas also notices common people, gives them spiritual protection, elevates positive human qualities, and opens the path to faith and holiness for everyone. The earlier research carried out by Darius Kuolys can support this claim concerning the special role of man and the humanity of God. Kuolys presented Sirvydas’ image of man who is free, both in his thinking and fighting. Identifying him with the figure of David, the researcher pointed out that a human being in Sirvydas’ sermons is “a created in the likeness of god”, gifted with hope, love and other spiritual assets, and urges everyone to learn and nurture their human “precious” characteristics (Kuolys: 1987, 143). He contrasts this image with that of a person described in Bretkūnas’ postil, someone who is presented as a character deprived of free will, the ability to act, fully devoted to God, “seeing the misery of this world in the light of eternal bliss” (Kuolys: 1987, 147–148). We can thus claim that the image of the Virgin Mary in Sirvydas’ postil is the expression of his more general views, and his religious identity that also distinguishes him from the Lithuanian preaching of those times. It is also something that distinguishes him in comparison with Polish postillography of that period. The best Polish examples from the “Marian Sermons” (Mazurkiewicz: 2014) do not present such a clear picture of the Virgin Mary’s free will and the image of free human beings.

Conclusion An overview of all the homilies (both those printed and handwritten) that appeared in Lithuania Minor or throughout the GDL in the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth century can lead to certain inferences regarding the formation of the homiletics tradition in Lithuania. Its first stage of development included heavy reliance on examples of Latin homilies that were widely known in Europe. Protestant homilies were being written primarily on the basis of German texts, whereas Catholic homilies rested on the best of the period’s work written in Polish. Therefore, the history of the formation of the Lithuanian language can be said to have involved many processes typical of a number of other European languages with a longer history of writing. The Polish language can be a case in point here. The first Polish postils were translations and originated mainly on the basis of collections of earlier Czech and German homilies. However, Polish, having had contact with languages that had evolved further, had tremendous importance and resulted in a

259

260

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

higher degree of precision and intellectualisation, providing a stronger basis for its general norms and standardisation. In turn, this close linguistic interaction was first of all the product of the translation of biblical texts from their original language and para-biblical oeuvre from other European languages in which it was written. The original Sirvydas postil, published in the first half of the seventeenth century, marks a new stage in the development of Lithuanian postillography. A textual analysis indicates that in his Gospel Points Sirvydas came up with original solutions and did not only follow the examples of already existing Lithuanian and well-known foreign homilies. His sermons are unique due to their very personal composition and independent content. Hopefully, further research based on the critical edition of his homilies will bring interesting and impressive conclusions.

Bibliography Aleknavičienė, Ona (2004), Nebibliografinė Jono Bretkūno Postilė (1591): Vlado Daumanto egzempliorius, Archivum Lithuanicum 6, 63–86 — (2005), Jono Bretkūno postilė. Studija, faksimilė ir kompaktinė plokštelė, parengė Ona Aleknavičienė, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos instituto leidykla. — (2007), Jono Bretkūno “Postilės” (1591) sklaidos istorija: egzemplioriai Krokuvoje, Archivum Lithuanicum 9, 57–98. — (2009), Pirmasis Baltramiejaus Vilento Enchiridiono leidimas: terminus ad quem – 1572–ieji, Archivum Lithuanicum 11, 125–162. Aleknavičienė, Ona/Rekštytė, Ieva (2013), Jono Bretkūno Postilė (1591): nuo Lietuvių literatūros draugijos Tilžėje iki Matenadarano Jerevane, Archivum Lithuanicum 15, 113–140. Bieńkowska, Danuta (1998), Jak Jakub Wujek “Pismo święte” na język polski przekładał. O warsztacie tłumacza i technice przez niego stosowanej, Bobolanum 9, 27–52. Brücner, Aleksander (1945), Dzieje kultury polskiej, Łódź: Książka i Wiedza. Cybulski, Łukasz (2014), Kilka uwag o technice tworzenia kazań na marginesie postylli Jakuba Wujka, in: Krzysztof Koehler/Łukasz Cybulski (ed.), Retoryka Towarzystwa Jezusowego i jej konteksty, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Kardynała Stefana Wyszyńskiego. — (2019), Interpretation in the 16th century Polish Bible Exegesis, in: Joanna PietrzakThébault (ed.), Word of God, words of men. Translations, inspirations, transmissions of the Bible in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the Renaissance, Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage. Gelumbeckaitė, Jolanta (ed.) (2008), Die litauische Wolfenbütteler Postille von 1573, Faksimile, kritische Edition und textkritischer Apparat 1–2, hrsg. von Jolanta Gelumbeckaitė, Wolfenbütteler Forschungen 118, 1–2, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag in Kommission.

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

— (2009), Wolfenbüttelio postilė (1573) kaip seniausia lietuviška antikos, viduramžių ir renesanso autorių antologija, Literatūra 51(3), 66–80. Górski, K[onrad] (1959), Bibla a sprawy biblijne w Postylli M. Reja, in: Konrad Górski, Z historii i teorii literatury, Wrocław: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, 7–60. Jackiewicz, Mieczysław (2005), Leksykon kultury litewskiej, Warszawa: Exlibris. Jovaišas, Albinas/Ulčinaitė, Eugenija (2003), Lietuvių literatūros istorija. XIII–XVIII amžius, Vilnius: Lietuvių literatūros ir tautosakos institutas. Kolbuszewski, Kazimierz (1921), Postyllografia polska XVI i XVII wieku, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności. Komorowska, Magdalena (2015), Kształt edytorski postylli polskich XVI i XVII wieku – w poszukiwaniu staropolskich konwencji wydawniczych, Terminus 17, 317–367. Kuolys, Darius (1987), “Dvi tikrybi turi tiesa…” J. Bretkūnas ir K. Sirvydas kultūros stilių kaitoje, Pergalė 6, 138–148. Kuran, Magdalena (2007), Retoryka jako narzędzie perswazji w postyllografii polskiej XVI wieku (na przykładzie “Postylli katolicznej” Jakuba Wujka), Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego. Lebedys, Jurgis (1963), Mikalojus Daukša, Vilnius: Valstybinė grožinės literatūros leidykla. — (1976), Lietuvių kalba XVII–XVIII a. viešajame gyvenime, Vilnius: Mokslas. — (1977), Senoji lietuvių literatūra, Vilnius: Mokslas. Maskuliūnas, Bronius/Jankauskas Benas (2012), Mikalojaus Daukšos postiles marginalijos, in: Jaunųjų mokslininkų darbai, nr. 3 (36), Šiauliai: VšĮ Šiaulių universiteto leidykla, 54–59. Mykolaitytė, Aurelija (2008), Barokiškieji K. Sirvydo “Punktų sakymų” ornamentai, in: Baltské jazyky v promĕnách metod, Brno: Masarykova universita, 109–118. Panuś, Kazimierz (2001), Zarys historii kaznodziejstwa w kościele katolickim, part II. Kaznodziejstwo w Polsce. Od średniowiecza do baroku, Kraków: Wydawnictwo M. Rak-Poks, Iwona (2019), Literacka rama wydawnicza w polskich postyllach z wieku XVI. Wybrane problemy, Katowice: Uniwersytet Śląski w Katowicach. Rutkovska, Kristina (2016), Konstantino Sirvydo “Punktai sakymų” – XVII amžiaus pirmosios pusės lietuvių ir lenkų kultūros paminklas = “Punkty kazań” Konstantego Szyrwida – zabytek piśmiennictwa litewskiego i polskiego z pierwszej połowy XVII wieku, Vilnius: LKI. — (2020), Švč. Mergelės Marijos kulto atspindžiai Konstantino Sirvydo “Punktuose sakymų”, in: Senoji Lietuvos literatūra, Vilnius: LLTI, 120–148. — (2013), O tekście polskim “Punktów Kazań” Konstantego Szyrwida, in: Zita Šimėnaitė (ed.), Leksikografija ir leksikologija 3. Konstantino Sirvydo darbai ir jo epocha, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas, 206–228. Skarga, Piotr (1995), Kazania Sejmowe, Janusz Tazbir/Mirosław Korolko (ed.), Warszawa/ Kraków: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich.

261

262

Kristina Rutkovska (Vilnius University, The Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic)

Starnawski, Jerzy (1996), Postylla Wujka wobec Postylli Reja, in: Starnawski Jerzy, Wieki średnie i wiek renesansowy. Studia, Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego, 154–182. Vaitkevičiūtė, Viktorija (2013), Konstantino Sirvydo Punktai sakymų: Baroko pamokslo ypatumai, in: Zita Šimėnaitė (ed.), Leksikografija ir leksikologija 3. Konstantino Sirvydo darbai ir jo epocha, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas, 256–281 Vasiliauskienė, Virginija (2013), Citatos ir jų identifikavimo būdai Konstantino Sirvydo “Punktuose sakymų”, Art History & Criticism 9, 15–29. Vasiliauskienė, Virginija/Rutkovska, Kristina (ed.) (2015a), Konstantinas Sirvydas. Punktai sakymų nuo advento iki Gavėnios. – Konstanty Szyrwid. Punkty kazań od Adwentu do Postu. Kritinis leidimas, Vilnius: LKI. — (ed.) (2015b), Konstantinas Sirvydas. Punktai sakymų Gavėniai. – Konstanty Szyrwid. Punkty kazań na Wielki Post. Kritinis leidimas, Vilnius: LKI. — (2016), Konstantino Sirvydo Punktai sakymų. Rengimo principai. Rodyklės. Šaltiniai, Vilnius: LKI. — (2018), Konstantinas Sirvydas: a Preacher and a Translator of the Bible, in: Joanna PietrzakThébault (ed.), Word of God, words of men. Translations, inspirations, transmissions of the Bible in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the Renaissance, Gotingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 317–348. Vladimirovas, Levas (1979), Knygos istorija. Senovė. Viduramžiai. Renesansas. XVI–XVII amžius, Vilnius: Mokslas. Winiarska-Górska, Izabela (2013), Zasady edycji tekstów w Przeglądarce wersetów równoległych szesnastowiecznych przekładów Ewangelii, Szesnastowieczne przekłady Ewangelii – portal internetowy, edycja tekstów dawnych i opracowania, http://www.ewangelie.uw.edu.pl/materialy.php. Zinkevičius, Zigmas (1988), Lietuvių kalbos istorija III. Senųjų raštų kalba, Vilnius: Mokslas.

Abbreviations BP

DK DP

Postilla tatai esti Trumpas ir Prastas Ischguldimas Euangeliu sakamuiu Baszniczoie Krikschczionischkoie nůg Weliku ik Aduento. Per Jana Bretkuna Lietuvos Plebona Karaliaucziuie Prusůsu. Isspausta Karaliaucziuie Jurgio Osterbergero. Meta Pono 1591. KATHECHISMAS ARBA MOKSLAS KIEKWIENAM KRIKSZCZIONI PRIWALVS. PARASZITAS PER D. IAKVBA LEDESMA Theologa Societatis IESV. Poſtilla CATHOLICKA. Tái eſt: Iǯguldimas Ewangeliu kiekwienos Nedelos ir ßwętes per wiſſús metús. Per Kúnigą MIKALOIV DAVKSZA Kanonîką Médnikų / i łukißko pergûldita. Su walá ir dałâidimu wîreuſiuiu. W Wilniui / Drukârnioi Akadêmios SOCIETATIS IESV, A. D. 1599.

The Beginnings of Postillography in Lithuania

E

[Baltramiejus Vilentas,] ENCHIRIDION Catechifmas maßas / del pafpalitu Plebonu ir Kojnadiju / Wokifchku ließuwiu parafchits per Daktara Martina Luthera. O ifch Wokifchka ließuwia ant Lietuwifchka pilnai ir wiernai pergulditas / per Baltramieju Willentha Plebona Karalaucjuie ant Schteindama. Ifchfpauftas Karalaucjui per Iurgi Ofterbergera / Metu Diewa M.D.LXXIX. EE [Baltramiejus Vilentas,] Euangelias bei Epiftolas / Nedeliu ir fchwentuju dienofu fkaitomofias / Baßnicjofu Chrikfcjonifchkofu / pilnai ir wiernai pergulditas ant Lietuwifchka Sjodji a / per Baltramieju Willenta / Plebona Karalaucjui ant Schteindama. Priegtam / ant gala priedeta jra Hiftoria apie muka ir fmerti Wiefchpaties mufu Iefaus Chriftaus pagal kieturiu Euangeliftu. Ifchfpauftas Karalaucjui per Iurgi Ofterbergera / Metu M. D. LXXIX. MP Postilla lietvwiszka, tátáy est Ižguldimás prástás ewángeliu ant kožnos nedelios ir szwentes per wisus metus, kurios págal buda sená bážnicžioy Diewá est skáitomos, Wilnivy: per Jokubą Morkuną tárną kunigáykszcžia […] Krysztáfa Rádiwiła wáiwádos Wilniaus : [S. Mitkevičiūtės–Vnučkienės lėšomis]. PK I PVNKTY KAZAŃ od Adwentu áǯ do Postu / Litewskim ięzykiem, z wytłumáczeniem ná Polskie PRZEZ Kśiędzá KONSTANTEGO SZYRWIDA / Theologá Societatis IESV / Z DOZWOLENIEM STARSZYCH wydáne. W WILNIE W Drukárni Akádemiey Societatis IESV / ROKU M. DC. XXIX [1620]. PK II PUNKTY KAZAŃ NA POST WIELKI Ięʒykiem Litewſkiem Przez W. X. CONSTANTEGO SZYRWIDA Theologá Societatis IESV nápiſáne. á Teraʒ ná Polſki Ięʒyk prʒetłumacʒone / y oboiem do Druku podáne. Zá pozwoleniem Stárßych. W Wilnie / W Drukàrni Akdemii Societatis IESV. Roku Páńskiego, 1644. R1594 Postilla POLSKA To jest Wykład prosty Ewangelii niedzielnych y świąt uroczystych, które wedle zwyczaju dawnego w Kościele Bożym czytane bywają. Teraz znowa z wielką pilnością y uważnym przeyrzeniem wydana […] W Wilnie, u Jakuba Markowicza, Roku Pańskiego 1594. WP ISCHGVLDIMAS EVANGELIV PER WISVS METVS, SVRINKTAS DALIMIS ISCHDAVGIA PASTILLV., TAI EST ISCH PASTILLAS NICVLAI HEMINGY ‹←HE=MINGI›, ANTONY CORVINI, IOANNIS SPANGENBERGI, MARTINI LVTHERI, PHILIPPI MELANTHONIS, IOANNIS BRENTY, ARSATY, SCHOPER, LEONARDI KVLMĀNI IODOCY WILICHI IR ISCH KITV.. WPCMn Postilla Catholiczna Mnieysza To jest Krotkie Kazánia, ábo Wykłády świętych Ewángeliy […] Ná dwie Częśći rozdźieloná […] Przez O. Jákubá Wuyká […] W Poznániu, Roku Páńskiego. MDLXXXII.

263

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

1.

Jakub Wujek: Defeating Heresy with Its Own Weapons

At the end of the year 1573, a large volume of Jakub Wujek’s sermons appeared in print in Cracow under the title Postilla catholica. The title page included information that the author was a doctor as well as a theologian of the Jesuit order, and that his lectures on the Gospels for Sundays and festivals conformed to the teachings of the “one true catholic – that is, universal – Church” (“prawdziwego Kościoła […] powszechnego”). Moreover, the very title made it clear that the book was written in Polish in a way comprehensible to the common man (Wujek: 1573, A1r). Paired with stressing the clarity of argumentation presented in a vernacular language, the emphasis on the scholarly background and the unimpeachable orthodoxy of the preacher did not stem only from the drive to gain purchasers and readers. The preface to the book, addressed to the Bishop of Poznań, Adam Konarski, and dated to 16 November 1573, provides corroborating evidence in support of this claim (Wujek: 1573, A4r-A6r). In it, Jakub Wujek, at that time rector of the newly established Jesuit college in Poznań (Kuźmina: 2004, 65–92), expressed his deepest concern with the disease causing havoc to the Church in those “deplorable times” (“nieszczęsnych czasach”), investigated its causes, and identified remedies. The disease manifested itself both in errors, heresies, and acts of blasphemy, and in the propensity of the ignorant to discuss the problems of faith and “things divine” (“rzeczach Boskich”), a phenomenon which in itself fueled the above-mentioned offences. The disease put people’s souls in mortal danger which Wujek represented allegorically with the picture of a labyrinth. Trapped inside and wandering helplessly around were all those who failed to follow the thread of the Roman Church’s teachings. According to the Jesuit theologian, the cause of such a state of affairs was the proliferation of religious books written in Polish. Heretical “catechisms, prayers, and treatises” (“katechizmy, modlitwy i traktaty”), or indeed collections of sermons published in the vernacular, were supposed to stimulate feverish discussions about faith among readers ignorant of the seriousness, depth, and intricacies of theology. Furthermore, the widespread fascination with novelties was, on its part, a deterrent to the Catholic pulpit and only encouraged Reformers to publish their works. Unbridled by the authority of the Church, devoid of the tutelage and censorship

266

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

of theologians, they themselves were, Wujek argued, educating the uneducated while being completely unaware of their own ignorance. The secret behind their effectiveness was not in their erudition, but in their use of the Polish language. In the eyes of the Jesuit, remedies for the disease were to be found in the Church’s most remote past. It was in the times when the followers of the Arian heresy introduced a custom, until then unheard of, according to which they spread their teachings in the form of newly written chants, that St John Chrysostom followed in their footsteps in order to salvage the purity of faith. He confronted the Arian chants with his own, which were even more artistically perfect, more ornamental, and yet still orthodox. A clever use made of the heretics’ own idea, which first led to a disease that infected the Church, eventually turned out to be a salutary cure. It was precisely for this reason that Jakub Wujek, following the example of St John Chrysostom which he thus described, wrote a Catholic postil in Polish. The apostles of the Reformation had already, as he pointed out, published several Polish postils a few years before in order to present the “worthless figments” of Luther and Calvin “to simple people” as the “sincere” and “clear word of God”1 . And although four collections of Evangelical sermons written in Polish appeared in print in the years 1556–1557 (Maciuszko: 1987, 29–116; Jurkowlaniec: 2020), the Jesuit theologian singled out but one from among them, namely the work of Mikołaj Rej (Kolbuszewski: 1921, 109–110, 116, 120; Starnawski: 1996). With the aim of elucidating the gravity of the danger, he first remarked that he had seen with his own eyes heretical postils in the houses of not only townspeople or of the nobility, but also priests “in villages and towns” (“po wsiach […] i po miasteczkach”), who even used dissident texts to preach sermons. He then went on to add that Rej’s postil was, in particular, incredibly effective in spreading the ideas of the Reformation, as it was characterized by a certain courtliness and beauty of the Polish language. These qualities were, nevertheless, not linked by Wujek to the individual style of the recently deceased author, counted among the most widely celebrated writers of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth of that time. Conversely, he considered them to be but a peculiarity of the deceptive manner in which heretics wrote their works. After all, they themselves, according to St Paul, “by good wordes and faire speeches deceiue the hearts of the simple” (Rom 16:18)2 . And since the arch-heretic Rej was by no means an educated theologian, the postil written by the Jesuit imitator of

1 “[…] mają oni od kilkunaście, jesli nie od kilkudziesiąt lat kilka postyl swoich językiem polskim napisanych, acz i tych niezgodnych, w ktorych marne wymysły Luterowe albo Kalwinowe i owszem one stare błędy Ariuszowe, Wigilancjuszowe, Berengariuszowe, Husowe, Wiklefowe i innych mistrzow podobnych, przeszłych wiekow w Kościele potępione, prostym ludziom udawają za szczere a jasne słowo Boże” (Wujek: 1573, A5r). 2 The Newe Testament of our Lord and Sauiour Iesus Christ. Newly translated out of the originall Greeke […]. London, by Robert Barker, 1611 [KJV], k. Q1r.

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

St John Chrysostom hastened to stress, on the title page, both the orthodoxy and the erudition of Dr Jakub Wujek. Simultaneously, however, – and in a similar way to some Evangelical books of sermons – it emphasized the crystalline clarity of argumentation, the use of the vernacular, and the “common man” (“pospolitego człowieka”) for whom it was tailored (Cybulski: 2013, 140–144; cf. Rak-Poks: 2019, 101–111).

2.

The Toruń Riots and the New Life of Dambrowski’s Postil

Some one hundred and fifty years later, the fate of this struggle, in which Polish postils played a considerable role, was already sealed. Efraim Oloff, a Lutheran preacher and scholar, had very much experienced this in person, when he was forced to flee from Toruń to the Duchy of Prussia in 1724. Charges were pressed against him in a notorious trial held after the Jesuits sued the city in response to the events earlier that year during which clashes between Catholic and Evangelical youth burst into open riots, leading not only to plundering the Jesuit church and convent, but also to desecrating the altar as well as some images of the Mother of God and of the saints (Gastpary: 1969; Salmonowicz: 2005). Accused of writing a scathingly satirical pamphlet directed against the Jesuits and the faith of the Roman Church, Oloff preferred not to appear before the court. Although the derisive anonymous text was put on the convent’s gate only a day after the riots (Kujot: 1895, 216–217), it seemed most reasonable to avoid a trial in which two Lutheran mayors were sentenced to death alongside twelve Lutheran participants in the clashes. And since the sentence obliged the Evangelicals, among other things, to return the church of Saint Mary the Virgin to the Order of St Francis as well as to submit all of the prints due to be published in Toruń for the approval of Catholic censorship (Kujot: 1895, 285–287), it constituted an undeniable proof of the Catholic Church’s victory over the Reformation in the lands of the Commonwealth. Although Efraim Ollof, sentenced in absentia to banishment from Toruń, managed, in the same year 1724, to gain a royal promise of safe conduct, he could not have the slightest doubt that in the city to which he was about to return, a recent domination of the Lutheran community had been replaced by humiliation and the fear of the future brought about by it. As a preacher of the word of God, he felt responsible for both his followers and all his Polish co-religionists. As a scholar devoted to the study of the history of religious writing, he shared, however, Wujek’s opinion regarding the great influence of books of sermons written in the vernacular, the reason for which he achieved, in 1728, a reedition of Samuel Dambrowski’s postil printed originally in the years 1620–1621 in Toruń. This very work, at that time republished in Leipzig, was meant to console the ‘fearful hearts’ of the Luther-

267

268

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

ans, who found themselves in a “maelstrom of grievous […] oppression”, and to “support” them in their “faith”3 . Oloff justified the choice of this particular collection of sermons in two ways. Firstly, in the Preface, he outlined the historical background of postillography in the Commonwealth in order to bring to the fore the special value of the book authored by Dambrowski who “greatly pleased Poland […] upon the publication of his postil […] written both in exquisite Polish and with an excellent structure” (“osobliwie Polską […] ucieszył, wydawszy postyllę […] i w wyborniejszej polszczyźnie, i w porządku nadobnym”). The postil was, as the publisher stressed, gratefully received by the devoutly Catholic King Sigismund III Vasa’s own sister, the Swedish Princess Anna, who lived in Poland and was famous for both her erudition and affection for Lutheranism. The book was also applauded by the whole Evangelical Church, proof of the most profound admiration for the postil being the tradition, still very much alive in the eighteenth century, of reading out loud sermons collected therein every time the post of preacher was vacant in one of the churches. Finally, Oloff argued, Dambrowski’s sermons had always found passionate admirers among the pious and its eager readers recruited even from among the representatives of other denominations who could recognize “the Evangelical truth” (“prawdę ewanjelicką”) by means of its teachings (Oloff: 1728, )( 2r, )( 2v, )( 3v). Secondly, apart from reasoning typical of an expert on the history of religious writing, one specific argument proved particularly telling and significant for the very tradition of preaching. Although it was introduced by a remark that it was cited after a letter of “a certain erudite and pious man” (“pewnego uczonego i pobożnego męża”), the story told by Oloff was designed rather as a moral exemplum. And so, the story goes, Dambrowski’s Postil was stored in “a certain convent”, the name of which was “for various reasons” not directly indicated by the author of the Preface. “Once upon a time”, however, the fathers were possessed – “for a reason which I fail to understand”, Oloff added – by a religious “fever […] greater than ever before” and consequently threw the “heretical tome” into the fire. How deluded they were that they had had their retribution over the Lutheran work. It was only the next day that a servant found, among the ashes, the book completely unscathed by the flames. The writer used the story as an example of an evident sign of God’s providence exercised “over the Evangelical truth” and argued that the earthly fire could not devour the book that “had its beginnings […] in the celestial fire” with the aim of igniting in people’s hearts the love for the word of God4 .

3 “Przyjmiże tedy już, Czytelniku łaskawy, postyllę tę wdzięcznym sercem a chwal Boga, że i w tych ostatecznych czasach i zawieruchach ciężkich następujących ucisków zatrwożone serca nasze słowem swoim cieszyć i wiarę naszą wspierać nie omieszkiwa” (Oloff: 1728, )( 3v). 4 “Była, jako pewny uczony i pobożny mąż w liście do mnie pisze, w pewnym klasztorze, którego z różnych przyczyn mianować nie chcę, postylla Dambrowskiego naszego w zachowaniu długi czas, aż

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

There is more to this miraculous story of a book untouched by flames, narrated by Oloff as an explanation of the consolatory influence of Dambrowski’s postil upon his oppressed co-religionists, than a mere wish to comfort the hearts with a reference to a peculiar instance of God’s judgment, as St Gregory of Tours would use it while telling the tale of yet another miraculous event whereby a dispute between a Catholic deacon and an Arian presbyter was settled by means of heavenly intervention (Gregorius Turonensis: 1849, 777–778). It was only four years after the notorious riots in Toruń that this fragment of Oloff ’s Preface alluded to the disastrous events in which the Jesuit college and convent were plundered by the crowd. According to the testimonies of Catholic witnesses, a huge stake was piled in front of the building of the ransacked school, with some Evangelicals burning sacred images, a picture of the Annunciation, and a statue of the immaculate Virgin Mary (Kujot: 1895, 213–214). It should appear clearly to the reader that, when Oloff, who was himself accused of wrongdoing by the Jesuit order and sentenced in absentia, suggested that he feared to reveal the name of the convent, he probably meant the Jesuit one. And when he alluded to unclear reasons behind the fathers’ decision to wreak their vengeance upon Dambrowski’s book by throwing it into a fire, it could be inferred that a reference was being made to their desire to retaliate for the culmination of the Toruń riots. A scholar and preacher from Toruń, Oloff was acutely aware of the fact that hard times had come for the Lutherans in the Commonwealth and strived to provide his co-religionists with new copies of the postil which he presented both as a triedand-true means of spreading the “evangelical truth” – employed effectively over the past century – and as a remedy for the humiliating wound dealt freshly in the clashes with the Jesuits, a remedy, above all, enlightened by God’s providence. As time went by, the accuracy of Oloff ’s choice to republish this particular work as well as his perfect recognition of the book’s impact were validated by history: Samuel Dambrowki’s sermons saw numerous reeditions until the end of the nineteenth century and were widely read until the second half of the twentieth century, helping to preserve the Augsburg Confession among Polish people and protecting Polish

czasu jednego – nie wiem, z jakiej okazyi – panów religiosów większa niż kiedyś zawzięła gorączka czy żarliwość w religii, że zawołano nad postyllą Dambrowskiego: «Niech nam ten predykant dziś w piecu zapali!». Wrzuciwszy postyllę Dambrowskiego w sam płomień i tak dobrze się, jak myśleli, nad heretycką księgą pomściwszy, odeszli. Na jutrzejszy dzień, gdy piecuch ma zapalać, znalazł księgę całą i nienaruszoną w popiele leżącą. Zawoła z podziwieniem, że się ogień księgi nic nie jął, i pokazuje, że całkowita. Tak księgę tę, która z niebieskiego ognia swój wzięła początek, ziemski ten pożar nie miał zniszczyć, a raczej oziębłe w miłości ku słowu Bożemu miała rozgrzać serca. Nie szerzymy się tu tym, ale na chwałę prowidencyi Pańskiej, która się nad prawdą ewanjelicką pokazuje, zamilczyć tego nie godzi się nam” (Oloff: 1728, )( 3v).

269

270

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

Lutherans from germanization (Kolbuszewski: 1921, 215–220; Maciuszko: 1987, 189–196, 202–206; Przymuszała: 2003; Pawelec: 2007).

3.

The Sweetened Poison, Or Dambrowski’s Writings in the Eyes of His Polemicists

In autumn 1573, when the rector of the newly established Jesuit college in Poznań composed the preface for his Catholic postil, the war that the Roman Church had waged against the Reformation in Poland entered – owing to the activity of the Jesuit order – a decisive stage (cf. Kriegseisen: 2010, 533–575). Dr Jakub Wujek himself contributed to the victory of Catholicism mostly as an imitator of St John Chrysostom whose example he had cited in his book. He then dedicated himself to painstaking work on numerous Polish texts and even translated the Bible into the vernacular (Kuźmina: 2004). However, as it turned out at the very beginning of the seventeenth century, the college in Poznań played an important role in this campaign not only thanks to its high teaching quality, so typical of the Jesuit education system. It was Catholic students who, in the years 1606, 1614, and 1616, led the riots during which one Lutheran church and two others, belonging to the Czech Unity of the Brethren, were devasted, pillaged, burnt, and eventually levelled (Łukaszewicz, 139–156). Meanwhile, in 1600, young Samuel Dambrowski, educated in Toruń, Königsberg, and Wittenberg, was appointed to the post of Evangelical preacher in Poznań. He could not have disappointed the hopes set in him by his superiors, since they nominated him as the superintendent of the diocese of Greater Poland. He combined preaching the word of God with writing, an endeavour which resulted in a prayer book called A Cure for the Soul (Lekarstwo duszne) published in 1611 along with a manual Upon Attending the Sick (Sprawa przy chorym) (Oloff: 1728, )( 2v- )( 3r; Voisè-Maćkiewicz: 1964, 4–5). Scathing criticism with which the champions of the Catholic faith responded to that book may attest to the impression it made upon them, the prime example being the New Year’s Offering, or, an Antidote to the Poison of the New Quack Rev. Samuel […], the Preacher (Kolenda abo Lekarstwo na truciznę nowego cyrulika iks Samuela […] predykanta5 , 1613) (Nowak: 1968, 62–70), written with the “sharp pen” (“ostrym piórem”) of Mikołaj Aleksander Ramułt who repeatedly wished Dambrowski death by hanging and advised the burning of his book (Ramułt: 1968, 263, 268, 266). Given the standards of religious polemics, it was by no means an unusual threat, and yet the case of the Evangelical

5 It should be added here that in Polish title an abbreviation “x. (ks.)” for “xiądz (ksiądz)” (priest) is written as “ix (iks)” to emphasise that a Lutheran preacher has no right to use the title of a Catholic clergyman (Nowak: 1968, 65–67).

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

church in Poznań, burnt in 1614, bears witness to the fact that the conflict involved more than just words. The growing danger forced Samuel Dambrowski to accept, in 1615, the position of Lutheran preacher in Vilnius as well as the post of the superintendent of Lithuania and Samogitia. In 1620 and 1621, helped financially by the starost of Varėna (Orania) Piotr Nonhart, he published his most important and biggest work—The Christian Postil (Postylla chrześcijańska) in five parts (Oloff: 1728, )( 3r- )( 3v; Voisè-Maćkiewicz: 1964, 5–10). Together with a prayer book titled Hortulus Animae For the Use of Women and Men (Raj duszny białogłowski i męski) and published two years later, also in Toruń, Dambrowski’s postil triggered an immediate reaction of the Catholics who responded with two satirical texts printed in 1624 in Vilnius by the local Jesuit press: the anonymous Secret Council, or, Several Instances of Samuel Dambrowski’s Deviance (Tajemna rada abo Exorbitantiae niektore Samuela Dambrowskiego) and An Account and Supplication of the Vilnius Saxon Evangelical Church to Martin Luther (Relacyja a oraz suplika zboru wileńskiego saskiego do hern Martyna Lutra), published anonymously, but authored by a Jesuit scholar, Jan Chądzyński (Nowak: 1968, 70–87). Once again, among ruthless, savagely derisive, and grotesque attacks befitting the interdenominational war fought with satires and pasquils, there appeared wishes for an imminent death, addressed directly to the Lutheran clergyman, wishes which, as it was about to turn out in the near future, came true in 1625 (Anonim: 1968, 277–278; Chądzyński: 1968, 300, 302–303). Dambrowski’s early demise deprived the Evangelical Church in the Commonwealth of an indefatigable and effective preacher and writer. His prayer books and, above all, his postil continued, however, to strengthen the morale of his coreligionists, with some Catholics themselves equally mesmerized by Dambrowki’s powerful style. Efraim Oloff was not the only one to attest to this fact a century later. A careful examination of the three above-mentioned satires may lead to the same conclusion. As Mikołaj Ramułt had already pointed out, Dambrowski’s Cure for the Soul captivated its readers not only with its beautiful and pious language, but also with the sweetness of its “healthy [that is, Catholic] teaching” (“zdrowej nauki”). The protestant author, Ramułt claimed, relied upon it in order to deceive the common man incapable of recognizing the dogmas of the Evangelical confession, and therefore to conceal the “poison” (“truciznę”) of its teachings (Ramułt: 1613, 1, 19). Directed against Dambrowski’s Postil and Hortulus Animae, the anonymous Secret Council attempted to convince the reader, somewhat perversely, that both of these books would be surely condemned by the Lutheran universities in Königsberg and Wittenberg (Anonim: 1968, 280). The author appropriated, it was argued, the Catholic practices of confession, the Rorate Mass and the cult of the saints (Anonim: 1968, 272–273, 280–283, 285). Chądzyński’s Account repeated these accusations (Chądzyński: 1968, 295, 302–303). The anonymous author of the Secret Council insisted, moreover, that one of the main characteristics of Dambrowski’s delusive

271

272

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

style was relying upon plagiarism. He was therefore thought to have introduced into his Hortulus Animae numerous excerpts taken from doctors of the Church, and yet to have simultaneously omitted every passage which could prove discordant with Evangelical teachings. The Catholic polemicist pointed, with scholarly precision, towards several fragments left out from Augustine’s Confessions as evidence to support his claims (Anonim: 1968, 284–285). According to his accusations, the same held true for Dambrowski’s Postil. The sermon on the life of St Adalbert of Prague, for instance, was unmasked as containing as many as fourteen lies, and supposedly included numerous passages stolen from Piotr Skarga’s Lives of the Saints (Anonim: 1968, 283). However, a comparative analysis of Skarga’s Life of St Adalbert and Dambrowski’s homily does not confirm the assertions that the latter plagiarized the Lives, an incredibly popular work at that time, written originally for the purpose of fortifying the cult of the saints and strengthening the Catholic faith (Dambrowski: 1772, 134–138; Skarga: 1700, 295–301). The very fact that the anonymous critic accused Dambrowski of lying numerous times proves, on the other hand, that he did not fail to recognize the straightforward polemical intentions of the Lutheran author who, as Chądzyński put it in his Account, had nearly considered St Adalbert and St Stanislaus his co-religionists (Chądzyński: 1968, 295). Indeed, Dambrowski claimed that the piety of St Adalbert was so pure and congruent with the Holy Writ as to transform him, “had he risen from the dead” (“gdyby miał zmartwychwstać”), into a supporter of the Evangelical cause. This particular argument was in itself a response to a lengthy passage included in the sermon on the life of St Adalbert written by Jakub Wujek for his Postil. By means of the rhetorical device of prosopopoeia, Wujek spoke as St Adalbert (martyred in the tenth century) and directed an impassioned and angry speech to the Poles bewitched by the apostles of the Reformation (Wujek: 1575, 153–154). The oration was preceded by a speculation what the saint would do if he “were to rise from the dead” (“by teraz zmartwychwstał”) and saw with horror the multitude of Protestant denominations in Poland. And although the accusation of “plagiarizing” (“kradzieży”) passages from popular Jesuit texts did not match the facts in this case, it is apparent that Dambrowski had carefully studied one of them.

4.

Dambrowski’s Passion of Christ as Evidence of Transformations in Lutheran Theology

In the Preface to his Cure for the Soul, Dambrowski insisted that he composed it not for his own glory or praise, but for the poor who, plagued by diseases of both the body and the soul, thirsted for God’s consolation. In order to stress his own humility and eagerness to serve and fulfil his vocation as a preacher, Dambrowski formulated a confession based upon St Paul’s words: “But God forbid that I should glory, save

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Gal 6:14) (Dambrowski: 1880, XII). While launching his attack upon Dambrowski’s Cure, Mikołaj Ramułt focused particularly upon this statement and accused the Evangelical author of hypocrisy. Inspired by the teachings of St Paul, a clergyman should, he argued, follow the tortuous path of mortifying his flesh, of despising both bodily and worldly desires rather than accept the carnal way of marriage, procreation, and care for his wife and offspring (Ramułt: 1613, 9–12). It is worth stressing, however, that Dambrowski’s declaration did not refer to his eagerness to mortify his flesh, but to the effectiveness with which he was ready to spread the word of Christ, since the Cross was considered the only source of Holy Scripture, and therefore the only way to fully understand the word of God, as Dr Martin Luther had famously claimed in November 1515 when he advised preachers to teach but one thing – the wisdom of the Cross (Luther: 1883, 52). At that time, upon lecturing on the Epistle to the Romans at the University of Wittenberg, Luther added that the ability to understand the ways of God could only be perfected in the process of “contemplating the wounds of Christ”, for this is what he considered “the most sublime theology” (Luther: 1938, 400). In April 1519, when he created a brief guide to contemplating the passion of Christ, Luther assured his followers that meditation on the Saviour’s suffering is the purest among all pious practices, because it regenerates people in a way similar to baptism (Luther: 1884, 139). Since Luther himself and other champions of the Reformation strongly opposed the tradition of Passion piety, deep-rooted and most widespread among believers, they assigned a crucial role to sermons on the Passion of Christ in their postils. In sixteenth-century Polish postils both the Catholics and the Protestants taught about the Crucifixion, devised rules for contemplating Christ’s sufferings, and by no means abstained from participating in violent polemics. Samuel Dambrowski, who included a long Passion, or, the Story of the Suffering and Death of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ (Pasyja, to jest Historyja o męce i śmierci Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa) in his collection of sermons, was no exception (Dambrowski: 1772, 345–418). He did not focus, however, on the rules of meditation and consistently refrained from directing critical remarks against religious practices observed on Good Friday in the Roman Church, while Luther, on the other hand, condemned and fought against them together with all forms of commemoration of Christ’s Passion that involved vivid demonstrations staged as if the beholders were directly witnessing those dramatic events. Direct demonstrations were aimed at encouraging believers to suffer together with Christ, although he himself, Luther stressed, admonished the women of Jerusalem for lamenting his sufferings, and urged them to weep for themselves and their children (Luke 23:28). In Catholicism, suffering together with the tortured Saviour should result in repentance, reciprocity with which Christ approached the love of a sinner, and eventually conversion, yet Luther’s

273

274

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

rejection of this idea led him to renounce the rich tradition of metaphorizing the scenes of the Passion by means of the language of the Song of Songs. And although the model of Passion meditation put forward by Luther was widely propagated by Polish Evangelical writings published in the course of the sixteenth century, Dambrowski’s sermons on the Passion of Christ contained – quite contrarily – exhortations to visualize Jesus’ sufferings and to feel compassion for him as well as love metaphors borrowed from the Song of Songs (Stępień: 2017). This is not to say, however, that the Polish author deviated from Luther’s teachings. In fact, at the end of the sixteenth century, some Evangelical texts printed in Europe, such as Martin Moller’s Mysterium magnum (1595) or Philipp Nicolai’s Frewden Spiegel des ewigen Lebens (1559), had already heralded a turn within Lutheran theology towards Medieval mysticism and the language in which the love for God was depicted as a mystical union between two lovers (Elferen: 2009, 151–224). In 1611, Dr Johann Gerhard, who with time rose to prominence as the greatest theologian of the Augsburg Confession in the seventeenth century, argued that meditational practices centred upon the events of the Passion were in fact St Paul’s invention, just like the tradition of teaching about Christ’s sufferings in such a way as to make the listeners believe that they could witness it directly. While establishing a connection between the Song of Songs and the practices of Passion meditation, Gerhard appealed to the authority of Luther (Gerhard: 1611, br-bv). At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Passion piety of the Evangelicals drew closer to the Passion piety of the Catholics, reviving two traditions completely rejected by Luther: the concept of visualization through meditation as well as the use of love metaphors which inspired believers’ compassion for their crucified and suffering Lover (Stępień: 2017, 197–200).

5.

Lutheran Passion Sermons Sweetened with Catholic Teachings

In his Passion, Dambrowski followed in the footsteps of Moller and Gerhard, and yet simultaneously avoided any polemical remarks directed against the traditions of the Roman Church. It was precisely for this reason that his sermons could be – according to Oloff’s account – fully approved by the whole Evangelical Church in the Commonwealth. At the same time, they incited the concern of Catholic shepherds of souls who were both mindful of St Paul’s warnings about the heretics “by good words and fair speeches deceiving the hearts of the simple” (Rom 16:18) and were well aware of the fact that the ignorant may be easily led astray by the “poison” of Lutheran teachings “sweetened” (“ocukrowaną”) “with healthy [Catholic] teachings” (“zdrową nauką”), according to Ramułt’s accusations (Ramułt: 1613, 1, 19). The phenomenon whereby Roman and Evangelical traditions of Passion piety were brought closer together was already apparent in the Preface to Dambrowski’s

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

sermons on Christ’s sufferings and death. The author followed Luther’s recommendations regarding the way in which a preacher should make believers aware of the fundamental difference between the martyrdom of Christ and the tortures and torments of Christian martyrs (Dambrowski: 1772, 345; Luther: 1574, 186r, 189v). A similar statement may be, however, found as early as in one of the most popular medieval treatises on meditation, written by a fourteenth-century German Carthusian, Ludolph of Saxony, who claimed that Christ’s sufferings surpassed the sum of all the torments suffered by the martyrs altogether (Ludolphus de Saxonia: 1642, 573). Dambrowski depicted the Passion as the “city of ultimate refuge” (“miasto ostatecznej ucieczki”) “from the wrath of God” (“przed gniewem Bożym”), patterned on the “cities of refuge” from the biblical Book of Numbers (Num 35:10–28), and quoted a passage from one of Bernard of Clairvaux’s sermons on the Song of Songs (Dambrowski: 1772, 346). Moreover, the analogy between the five wounds of the crucified Christ and the “cities of refuge” had been already drawn by Valerius Herberger of Freustadt (Wschowa), nicknamed “the little Luther”, whose sermons might have inspired Dambrowski, at least according to Oloff’s claims (Herberger: 1721, 289; Herberger: 1678, 229, 272; Oloff: 1764, 52). Nevertheless, this analogy had been, as Johan Gerhard very perceptively remarked, already known to the theologians in the olden times (Gerhard: 1865, 132; cf. Antonius Patavinus: 1979, 456). Referring to quotes taken from St Augustine, St Bernard of Clairvaux, and the twelfth-century French Benedictine Radulphe, Dambrowski advised his readers to consider Christ’s Passion as a pharmacy full of miraculous medicines and cures (Dambrowski: 1772, 346). In doing so, he mirrored one of the best known Franciscan treatises on meditation written in the Middle Ages, the Stimulus amoris by James of Milan (Ps.-Bonaventura: 1502, VIIr). In this part of the Preface, Luther’s teachings were not referenced directly, except for a mention of the five holy wounds of the resurrected Christ which, seen by a believer, should fortify his or her faith and serve as a reminder of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross by which he redeemed the sins of mankind before God the Father. The image of the Passion as medication was, nevertheless, deeply rooted in one of the verses taken from the Book of Isaiah and played a decisive role in Luther’s staurology: “But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed” (Isa 53:5). In fact, at the time when the Postil was printed, the image of Christ as a pharmacist began to spread in Lutheran iconography in connection with Herberger’s treatise titled Jesus omnium medicorum Princeps et Dominus (1618) (Krafft: 2009). Finally, Dambrowski encouraged the reader to interpret the Passion as a school of wisdom, a reference to the appeal voiced equally by Ludolph of Saxony in his treatise and by some Evangelical sermons on the Passion (Ludolphus de Saxonia:

275

276

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

1642, 3, 571; Spangenberg: 1564, B7v-B8r; Mathesius: 1577, 9r). Upon preaching on the lessons that could be drawn from the Saviour’s sufferings and death, the author briefly summarized the most important points of Luther’s teachings on the reasons for the blood sacrifice made by the Son of God. Dambrowski then concluded his preliminary remarks on the benefits of contemplating the Passion by first painting a picture of the banner of the cross (linked erroneously to St Gregory the Great instead of St Bernard of Clairvaux) and subsequently quoting yet another passage from St Bernard’s commentary on the Song of Songs (Dambrowski: 1772, 347). The title page of the first (Toruń) edition of the Postil resembled – perhaps intentionally – the title page of Piotr Skarga’s Sermons published in Cracow by the press of Andrzej Piotrkowczyk (Voisè-Maćkiewicz: 1964, 14–17). If a Catholic reader, unaware of the theological differences between the two denominations, were to read the Passion included in Dambrowski’s collection, s/he would not encounter any clear indications of its Lutheranism. And yet did the preacher, accused of ‘plagiarizing’ popular Jesuit texts by the author of the Secret Council, restrict himself in his sermons only to following the path of the new Evangelical theology that affirmed the rich heritage of medieval meditational practices, visualization of the Passion through meditation, and the eagerness for using love metaphors? According to the subtitle of Dambrowski’s Passion, its purpose was to present the “story of Jesus Christ’s […] sufferings and death” (“o męce i śmierci […] Jezusa Chrystusa”), based upon the accounts of the Four Evangelists and divided – together with explanations of the events which accompanied the narrative – into seven parts (Dambrowski: 1772, 345). This way of arranging the text was not inspired by the Lutheran tradition of teaching about the Crucifixion, as Luther’s HousePostil narrated the story in six sections, whereas a postil written by Johannes Gigas – in four (Luther: 1574, 183r; Gigas: 1571, 211v). In two other Passions, written by Cyricus Spangenberg and Kasper Franck respectively, Christ’s sufferings were presented in eight parts (Spangenberg: 1564, C4r-C4v; Franck: 1577, (:)3r-(:)3v). Melchior Neukirch and Johann Gerhard decided to divide the story of the Saviour’s Passion into five stages (Neukirch: 1590, 16r-17r; Gerhard: 1611, b2r). In Valerius Herberger’s Wholehearted Postil (Herzpostille) it was covered in four divisions (Herberger: 1721, 291). It was therefore somewhere else that Dambrowski looked for a model composition for his written contemplation of Christ’s Passion. It appears that Catholic polemicists who accused Dambrowski of plagiarizing Jesuit texts failed to notice that the very title of his book was almost identical to the title of Jakub Wujek’s Passion first published in 1582 in Poznań by Jan Wolrab the Elder and included as a supplement to the Lesser Catholic Postil (Postylla katoliczna mniejsza), yet another book written by the indefatigable Jesuit for the edification of the “poor clergy” (“ubogich kapłanach”) and the “common man” (“pospolitym człowieku”) (Wujek: 1582, ):(1r). This was precisely the source of Dambrowski’s idea to divide the story

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

of Christ’s sufferings into seven parts as well as the source of the text constituting the seven subsequent segments of his narrative based upon the four Gospels. Dambrowski reproduced almost verbatim some passages of Wujek’s Passion such as the appeals to suffer together with Christ (Dambrowski: 1772, 352; Wujek: 1582, 12; Dambrowski: 1772, 354; Wujek: 1582, 15), exhortations to mourn over one’s own sins which led to the Redeemer’s sufferings (Dambrowski: 1772, 354; Wujek: 1582, 15), encouragement to consider for whom Jesus endured humiliation and wrongdoing (Dambrowski: 1772, 369; Wujek: 1582, 25), and even incentives to contemplate the details of the Passion pictured in the narrative (Dambrowski: 1772, 388; Wujek: 1582, 39).

6.

How Jakub Wujek Became an Ally of Polish Lutherans

The discovery that Jakub Wujek’s Passion was an important source for Dambrowski’s Passion allows us to realize that some fifty years after the Jesuit had adopted St John Chrysostom’s method of fighting heretics, history had come full circle. In the early 1570s, Wujek’s goal was to fight against the influence of the Postil published by Mikołaj Rej, and to do so by means of imitating all the elements of his opponent’s style that he considered the most compelling. In the early 1620s, Samuel Dambrowski, Rej’s worthy successor, preached the “Evangelical truth” (“prawdę ewanjelicką”) not only by emulating these characteristics of the Jesuits’ language that ensured the popularity of their works, but also by embracing the whole narrative framework whereby the story of the Passion was presented in Wujek’s Lesser Postil, or even by directly quoting certain passages from Wujek’s sermons. If one can argue that the reason for the unparalleled popularity of Dambrowski’s book was the way in which he narrated the story of Christ’s Passion, one could also claim, somewhat paradoxically, that it was Jakub Wujek himself, the arch-Catholic enemy of the Reformation, who contributed to the preservation of the Lutheran community in Poland. Recognizing the connections between the works of both authors results in a number of other questions. In what way did the Evangelical author appropriate the original text written by the Jesuit theologian? What did he retain, what was omitted, and what appeared to him as a stimulus for his non-obvious polemic? Was Wujek’s Passion the only Catholic text that served as a source for Dambrowski’s postil? Was his way of fighting against the Roman Church Dambrowski’s own secret invention or was it a more widespread tactic adopted by Protestant preachers in the Commonwealth? These and many other questions may constitute, after all, source material for a new story. Translated by Albert Kozik

277

278

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

Bibliography Primary Sources Anonim (1968), Tajemna rada abo Exorbitantiae niektore Samuela Dambrowskiego, in: Zbigniew Nowak, Kontrreformacyjna satyra obyczajowa w Polsce XVII wieku, Gdańsk: Gdańskie Towarzystwo Naukowe, 269–288. Antonius Patavinus (1979), Sermones dominicales et festivi […], vol. 2: Sermones dominicales et Mariani, Beniamino Costa/Leonardo Frasson/Ioanne Luisetto/Paolo Marangon (ed.), Padova: Messaggero. Chądzyński, Jan (1968), Relacyja a oraz suplika zboru wileńskiego saskiego do hern Martyna Lutra, in: Zbigniew Nowak, Kontrreformacyjna satyra obyczajowa w Polsce XVII wieku, Gdańsk: Gdańskie Towarzystwo Naukowe, 289–305. Dambrowski, Samuel (1728), Kazania albo Wykłady porządne świętych Ewanjelij niedzielnych przez cały rok, Lipsk: Krzysztof Bernat Breitkopf. — (1772), Kazania albo Wykłady porządne świętych Ewanjelij świątecznych tudzież i innych świętych […] przez cały rok […], Brzeg: Jan Ernest Tramp. — (1880), Lekarstwo duszne w chorobie, Wilhelm Altmann (ed.), Syców (Wartenberg): E. Heinze. Franck, Caspar (1577), Passion: Das Leyden unnd Sterben unsers Herren Iesu Christi […], Ingolstatt: David Sartorius. Gerhard, Johann (1611), Erklährung der Historien des Leidens unnd Sterbens unsers Herrn Christi Jesu nach den vier Evangelisten, Jena: Tobias Steinman. — (1865), Loci theologici […], vol. 3, Berlin: Gustav Schlawitz. Gigas, Johannes (1571), Postilla der Sontags Evangelien und etlicher Festen durch das gantze Jar, Franckfurt an der Oder. Gregorius Turonensis (1849), Miraculorum libri duo, in: Jacques-Paul Migne (ed.), Patrologiae cursus completus: Series Latina, Paris: Petit-Montrouge 71, 705–828. Herberger, Valerius (1678), De Jesu, Scripturae nucleo & medulla, Magnalia Dei, das ist: Die grossen Thaten Gottes […], vol. 2, Leipzig: Johann Fritzsche. — (1721), Hertz-Postilla für alle Sonntags-Evangelia und […] gewöhnliche Feyrtags Texte […], vol. 1, Leipzig: Gleditsch. Kujot, Stanisław (1895), Dokumenta odnoszące się do sprawy toruńskiej z r. 1724, Roczniki Towarzystwa Przyjaciół Nauk Poznańskiego 21, 175–334. Ludolphus de Saxonia (1642), Vita Domini nostri Iesu Christi […], Lyon: Ioannes Caffin & Franciscus Plaignard. Luther, Martin (1574), Postylla domowa, to jest Kazania na Ewangelie niedzielne i przedniejsze święta […], pilnie i wiernie też przełożone przez Hieronima Małeckiego, Królewiec: Daubmann. — (1883), Werke, Kritische Gesamtausgabe, vol. 1, Weimar: Hermann Böhlau. — (1884), Werke, Kritische Gesamtausgabe, vol. 2, Weimar: Hermann Böhlau.

Samuel Dambrowski’s Postil and Its Connection with the Evangelical and Catholic Tradition of Passion Piety

— (1938), Werke, Kritische Gesamtausgabe, vol. 56, Weimar: Hermann Böhlau. Mathesius, Johann (1577), Fastenpredigten: Darin die gantze Historien des Leidens und Sterbens unsers Herrn Jesu Christi, Nürnberg: Katharina Gerlachin und Johanns vom Berg Erben. Neukirch, Melchior (1590), Historia der Passion unsers lieben Herrn und Heilands Jesu Christi […] aus der Predigten […] doctoris Martini Chemnitii […] zusammen gezogen, Wolfenbüttel: Konrad Horn. Oloff, Efraim (1728), Przedmowa, in: Samuel Dambrowski, Kazania albo Wykłady porządne świętych Ewanjelij niedzielnych przez cały rok, Lipsk: Krzysztof Bernat Breitkopf, )( 2r- )( 3v. — (1764), Beyträge zu der pohlnischen Weltlichen, Kirchen und Gelahrtengeschichte, vol. 1, Danzig: Daniel Meisner. Ps.-Bonaventura (1502), Stimulus divini amoris […], Köln: Martin de Verden. Ramułt, Mikołaj Aleksander (1613), Kolenda abo Lekarstwo na truciznę nowego cyrulika iks Samuela […] predykanta, Poznań: Jan Wolrab. — (1968), Kolenda abo Lekarstwo na truciznę nowego cyrulika iks Samuela […] predykanta, in: Zbigniew Nowak, Kontrreformacyjna satyra obyczajowa w Polsce XVII wieku, Gdańsk: Gdańskie Towarzystwo Naukowe, 260–268. Skarga, Piotr (1700), Żywotów świętych 1 część […], Poznań: Drukarnia Kolegium Societatis Jesu. Spangenberg, Cyriacus (1564), Passio: Vom Leiden und Sterben unsers Herrn […] Jesu Christi […], Eisleben: Urban Gaubisch. Wujek, Jakub (1573), Postilla catholica, to jest Kazania na kożdą niedzielę i na kożde święto przez cały rok, według wykładu samego prawdziwego Kościoła świętego powszechnego, dla pospolitego człowieka teraz nowo a prosto językiem polskim napisana, Kraków: Mateusz Siebeneicher. — (1575), Postylle katolicznej część 3, w ktorej sie zamykają Kazania na święta Panny Maryjej, apostołow, męczennikow i innych świętych […] przez cały rok […], Kraków: Mateusz Siebeneicher. — (1582), Pasja, to jest Historyja męki i śmierci Pana naszego Jezusa Chrystusa ze czterech Ewangelistow krotko zebrana i na siedm części i z wykłady swymi rozdzielona, in: Jakub Wujek, Postylle katolicznej mniejszej część wtora […], Poznań: Jan Wolrab.

Secondary Sources Cybulski, Łukasz (2013): Dwie postylle Jakuba Wujka czy jedna? Problem korespondencji tekstów, in: Zofia Głombiowska (ed.), Studia Classica et Neolatina, vol. 10: Inter textus: Między tekstami, Gdańsk: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego, 140–152. Elferen, Isabella van (2009), Mystical Love in the German Baroque: Theology, Poetry, Music, Lanham, Maryland – Toronto – Plymouth: Scarecrow Press.

279

280

Paweł Stępień (University of Warsaw)

Gastpary, Woldemar (1969), Sprawa toruńska w roku 1724, Warszawa: Chrześcijańska Akademia Teologiczna. Jurkowlaniec, Grażyna (2020), Postylle Arsatiusa Seehofera i Antona Corvinusa w przekładzie Eustachego Trepki: Addenda et corrigenda do badań nad początkami postyllografii w języku polskim, Terminus 22 (54), 5–21. Kolbuszewski, Kazimierz (1921), Postyllografia polska XVI i XVII wieku, Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności. Krafft, Fritz (2009), Das weitverbreitete Andachtsbild ‘Christus als Apotheker’: Eine aus Schlesien initiierte Visualisierung der Theologia medicinalis, Jahrbuch der Schlesischen Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität zu Breslau 50, 215–260. Kriegseisen, Wojciech (2010), Stosunki wyznaniowe w relacjach państwo-kościół między reformacją a oświeceniem (Rzesza Niemiecka – Niderlandy Północne – Rzeczpospolita polsko-litewska), Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper. Kuźmina, Dariusz (2004), Jakub Wujek (1541–1597): Pisarz, tłumacz i misjonarz, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Stowarzyszenia Bibliotekarzy Polskich. Łukaszewicz, Józef (1832), Wiadomość historyczna o dyssydentach w mieście Poznaniu w XVI i XVII wieku, Poznań: F.A. Pompejusz i Spółka. Maciuszko, Janusz T. (1987), Ewangelicka postyllografia polska XVI–XVIII wieku: Charakterystyka – analiza porównawcza – recepcja, Warszawa: Chrześcijańska Akademia Teologiczna. Nowak, Zbigniew (1968), Kontrreformacyjna satyra obyczajowa w Polsce XVII wieku, Gdańsk: Gdańskie Towarzystwo Naukowe. Pawelec, Mariusz (2007), Recepcja kazań Samuela Dambrowskiego na Śląsku (XVII–XX w.), Studia Śląskie 66, 11–38. Przymuszała, Lidia (2003), Struktura i pragmatyka “Postylli” Samuela Dambrowskiego, Opole: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Opolskiego. Rak-Poks, Iwona (2019), Literacka rama wydawnicza w polskich postyllach z wieku XVI: wybrane problemy. Praca doktorska. Katowice: Uniwersytet Śląski. https://fbc.pionier. net.pl/details/nhn1R49. Salmonowicz, Stanisław (2005), Tumult toruński 1724 r. i jego mitologia, in: idem, W staropolskim Toruniu (XVI–XVIII w.): Studia i szkice, 74–105. Starnawski, Jerzy (1996), “Postylla” Wujka wobec “Postylli” Reja, in: idem, Wieki średnie i wiek renesansowy: Studia, Łodź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łodzkiego, 154–182. Stępień, Paweł (2017), Zbawcza wartość krzyża: O źródłach luterańskiej pobożności pasyjnej w Rzeczypospolitej XVI–XVII wieku, in: Katarzyna Meller (ed.), Kultura Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej w dialogu z Europą: Hermeneutyka wartości, vol. 8: Luteranizm w kulturze Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej, Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 164–200. Voisè-Maćkiewicz, Irena (1964), Materiał graficzny pierwszego wydania “Postylli” Samuela Dambrowskiego z roku 1620, Zeszyty Naukowe UMK w Toruniu, Nauki Humanistyczno-Społeczne 11: Nauka o książce 2, 3–59.

Notes on the Authors

Łukasz Cybulski – assistant professor at the Institute of Literary Studies, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw. He actively collaborates with the Centre for Philological Studies and Scholarly Editing and the Department of Medieval Studies within the Institute of Literary Research at the Polish Academy of Sciences. He is an associate member of The Centre for Creativity Research at Jagiellonian University, member of the editorial board of the Filologia XXI series, and the editorial secretary of Biblioteka Pisarzów Polskich. His research interests cover scholarly editing, 16thand 17th-century prose, early modern manuscript culture, and book history. Author of Krytyka tekstu na rozdrożach. Anglo-amerykańska teoria edytorstwa naukowego w drugiej połowie XX wieku [Textual criticism at the crossroads. The Anglo-American theory of scholarly editing in the second half of the 20th century], Warszawa 2017; Interpretation in the 16th Century Polish Bible Exegesis in: Word of God, words of men. Translations, inspirations, transmissions of the Bible in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the Renaissance, ed. Joanna Pietrzak-Thébault, Gottingen 2019; the Polish translation of The Fluid Text by J. Bryant: Płynny tekst. Teoria zmienności tekstów i edytorstwa w dobie książki i ekranu, Warszawa 2020. Agnieszka Czechowicz – born 1977; Associate professor at the Department of Old Polish Literature at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, author of the books: Różność w rzeczach. O wyobraźni pisarskiej Wacława Potockiego [Miscellany in Things. Wacław Potocki’s Writer’s Imagination] (Warszawa 2008); Wszytko to pod figurą. Studia o miejscu alegorii w poematach heroicznych XVII wieku [All These Things Happened in Figure. Essays on the Place of Allegory in 17th-century Heroic Poems] (Lublin 2015); and of a critical edition of Wacław Potocki’s Dyjalog o zmartwychwstaniu Pańskim [Dialogue on the Resurrection] (Lublin 2018). Her main areas of research: heroic poetry of the Baroque, its theory and transformations; the work of Wacław Potocki; the theory and practice of the allegorical interpretation of literary works. Mirosława Hanusiewicz-Lavallee – professor, head at the Department of Early Modern Polish Literature at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, an editor of the journal Roczniki Humanistyczne, and a member of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has published extensively on early modern Polish religious and love literature, but her recent research focuses on Polish-British literary links in the 16th–18th centuries and Jesuit translations. Her major publications include: Swiat podzielony. O poezji Sebastiana Grabowieckiego [A World Divided.

282

Notes on the Authors

On the Poetry of Sebastian Grabowiecki] (1994), Święte i zmysłowe w poezji religijnej polskiego baroku [The Sacred and the Sensuous in the Religious Poetry of the Polish Baroque. (1998); Piec stopni miłosci. O wyobrazni erotycznej w polskiej poezji barokowej [Five Degrees of Love. On Erotic Imagination in Polish Baroque poetry] (2004); W stronę Albionu. Studia z dziejów polsko-brytyjskich związków literackich w dobie wczesnonowożytnej [Towards Albion. Studies on the History of Polish-British Literary Links in the Early Modern Era] (2017); (ed.) Humanitas i christianitas w kulturze polskiej [Humanitas and Christianitas in Polish Culture] (2009); (ed.) Wśród krajów Północy. Kultura Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej wobec narodów germańskich, słowiańskich i naddunajskich: mapa spotkań, przestrzenie dialogu [Among the Countries of the North. The Culture of Poland-Lithuania vis à vis Germanic, Slavic and Danube Peoples: a Map of Encounters and Space for Dialogue] (2015); (ed.) W przestrzeni Południa. Kultura Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej wobec narodów romańskich: estetyka, prądy i style, konteksty kulturowe [In the Space of the South. The Culture of Poland-Lithuania vis à vis Romance Peoples: Aesthetics, Trends and Styles, Cultural Contexts] (2016). Gina Kavaliūnaitė – research worker at the Department of Baltic Studies, Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Baltic, Vilnius University. Her field of research includes the Old Lithuanian language and the history of Lithuanian Bible translation. Her major research project, extending over many years, is devoted to the 17th-century Calvinist Bible translation by Samuel Boguslaus Chylinski. This project, covering historical, philological and linguistic aspects, of the Chylinski Bible, focuses on the historical circumstances leading to the translation and its publication; the religious context determining Chylinski’s choice of translation sources and his translation technique; the editorial changes reflected in the manuscript of Chylinski’s New Testament and the rationale behind them; the linguistic aspects of Chylinski’s language as an important source for analysing Lithuanian historical grammar, etc. Kavaliūnaitė’s main editorial achievement is the three-volume Chylinski Bible series, the aim of which is to make latter’s translation accessible to the scholarly community together with its principal translation sources, and to place it in a historical and philological context (Vol. 1, Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija. Senasis Testamentas: Lietuviško vertimo ir olandiško originalo faksimilės = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski: Vetus Testamentum Lithuanicâ Lingvâ donatum a Samuelo Boguslao Chylinski. Unâ cum texto belgico, Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas 2008; Vol. 2, Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Biblija: Naujasis Testamentas Viešpaties mūsų Jėzaus Kristaus lietuvių kalba duotas Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski. Tomus 2: Novum Testamentum Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Lthvanicâ Linguâ donatum a Samuelo Boguslao Chylinski, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas, 2019, Vol. 3, Chylinskio Biblijos istorijos

Notes on the Authors

šaltiniai = Biblia Lithuanica Samueli Boguslai Chylinski. Tomus 3: Fontes ad Historiam Samueli Boguslai Chylinski Bibliae Lithuanicae Illustrandam, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas. 2015). In parallel with the preparation of this series she has also been working with a team of collaborators on a digital version of the Chylinski Bible as part of a multifunctional internet research tool. The first part of this project, the digitalized Chylinski New Testament, is now accessible at www.chylinskibible.flf.vu.lt. It will be followed by a similar research tool for the Chylinski Old Testament. Apart from her work on Chylinski, Gina Kavaliūnaitė has also published on broader aspects of the history of Lithuanian translations of the Bible, with special emphasis on confessional differences underlying the choice of translation techniques, and on the textual relationships between the successive Lithuanian Bibles between the 16th and 19th centuries. Her linguistic research includes a series of studies on the Old Lithuanian system of locative cases. Gina Kavaliūnaitė combines her scholarly activities with numerous organizational tasks. Since 2004, she has been one of the initiators and organizers of the annual Academia Grammaticorum Salensis summer schools of linguistics, held whereas since 2016 she has been head of a network of academic cooperation aimed at coordinating and stimulating the teaching of, and research on, the Baltic languages. Wiesław Pawlak – alumnus and currently professor at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin; literary historian, author of works on Polish early modern literature with special focus on religious and Neo-Latin literature. His works include: Koncept w polskich kazaniach barokowych [Concept in Polish Baroque Sermons], Lublin, Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL 2005; De eruditione comparanda in humanioribus. Studia z dziejów erudycji humanistycznej w XVII wieku [De eruditione comparanda in humanioribus. Studies on the History of Humanistic Erudition in the 17th Century], Lublin, Wydawnictwo KUL, 2012; Z dziejów pojęcia “humanitas” (do XVII wieku) [On the History of the Term Humanitas (up to the 17th Century)], in: Humanitas. Projekty antropologii humanistycznej, cz. 1: Paradygmaty – tradycje – profile historyczne [Humanitas. Humanist Anthropological Projects, Part 1: Paradigms – Traditions – Historical Profiles], ed. A. Nowicka-Jeżowa, Warszawa 2009–2010, pp. 165–204; Erudycja humanistyczna w literaturze religijnej XVII wieku [Humanistic Erudition in 17th-century Religious Literature], in: Humanitas i christianitas w kulturze polskiej [Humanitas and christianitas in Polish Culture], ed. M. Hanusiewicz-Lavallee, Warszawa 2009, pp. 223–265; Barbara quae fuerant regna latina fiunt. Polsko-niemieckie związki kulturalne w perspektywie neolatynistyki [Barbara quae fuerant regna latina fiunt. Polish-German Cultural Relations from the Neo-Latin Perspective], in: Wśród krajów Północy. Kultura Pierwszej Rzeczypospolitej wobec narodów germańskich, słowiańskich i naddunajskich: mapa spotkań, przestrzenie dialogu [Among the Countries of the North. The Culture of the Pol-

283

284

Notes on the Authors

ish–Lithuanian Commonwealth vis à vis Germanic, Slavic and Danube Peoples: a Map of Meeting Places and Spaces for Dialogue], ed. M. Hanusiewicz-Lavallee, Warszawa 2015, pp. 320–336; Teoria kaznodziejstwa w Polsce wobec reformy trydenckiej (do połowy XVII wieku). Rekonesans [The Theory of Sermon Composition in Face of the Council of Trent Reforms (up to the Mid-17th Century). A Reconnaissance], in: Formowanie kultury katolickiej w dobie potrydenckiej. Powszechność i narodowość katolicyzmu polskiego [The Forming of Catholic Culture in the Post-Trentian Era], ed. J. Dąbkowska-Kujko, Warszawa 2016, pp. 435–496; Roland Desmarests’ “Aloisiae Gonzagae ad Ladislaum Poloniae Regem sponsum proficiscentis propempticum”. A Contribution to the History of Polish-French Cultural Links in the 17th Century, in: PL.IT / Rassegna Italiana di Argomenti Polacchi 8 (2017), pp. 22–37. Dainora Pociūtė – Professor in early modern intellectual history, Renaissance and Baroque literature, and the history of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation at Vilnius University. More recently, she has become increasingly interested in the activities of Italian religious dissidents in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Poland, and in the origins of early Protestant thought. After her research studies in the archives and libraries in Italy and other European countries those interests have been summarised in Rebellious Cathedrals. Early Reformation and the Contacts between Lithuanian and Italian Evangelicals (2008) as well as in the critical publications of Monumenta Reformationis Lithuanicae (vol. 1–2, 2011, 2015) where the Italian origins of the Lithuanian Reformation have been analysed in a broad intellectual context. In her latest monograph Light of Things Not Seen: the Champions and Ideas of the Reformation in Lithuania (2017; second edition in Italian: La Riforma in Lituania 2021), the most notable participants of the Reformation, their ideas and the general course of this historical process in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania have all been analyzed. Radosław Rusnak – born 1978, assistant professor at the Institute of Polish Literature, University of Warsaw specialising in Polish literature of the Renaissance and Baroque, publisher, translator, author of: “Seneca noster”. Studium o dawnych przekładach tragedii Seneki Młodszego [“Seneca noster”. A Study of Old Polish Translations of Seneca the Younger’s Tragedies] (Warszawa 2009), and “Elegii księg czworo” Jana Kochanowskiego – w poszukiwaniu formuły zbioru [Jan Kochanowski’s “Four Books of Elegies” – in Search of a Formula for the Collection] (Warszawa 2019). His academic interests include the links between Old Polish literature and the antiquity, the works of Jan Kochanowski, and the old art of translation. Kristina Rutkovska – Professor at the Institute of Languages and Cultures of the Baltic Region, University of Vilnius. Her research interests include ethnolinguis-

Notes on the Authors

tics, dialectology and the history of language. She has been researching the Polish language in Lithuania for over twenty years and has published over eighty articles. She has co-authored several books devoted to issues such as borderland identity, multiculturalism in language, Lithuanian and East Slavic interference in Polish, and lexical Lithuanisms. Together with Virginija Vasiliauskienė, she prepared a critical edition of Konstanty Szyrwid’s bilingual Roman Catholic postil Punkty kazań [Sermon Points]. Her latest monograph – “Punkty kazań” Konstantego Szyrwida – zabytek piśmiennictwa litewskiego i polskiego z pierwszej połowy XVII wieku [Konstantinas Sirvydas’ “Sermon Points”: An Outstanding Example of Lithuanian and Polish Writing from the First Half of the 17th Century], Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos Institutas, 2016 – is focused on multilingualism in the diachronic aspect, and on discovering mutual language influences at various levels of the text. Paweł Stępień (1969) – professor at the Faculty of “Artes Liberales”, University of Warsaw. Research areas: old Polish literary works as a microcosm of culture; old Polish literature in the context of philosophy and theology, especially medieval religious literature in the context of theology, aesthetics and poetics; Polish poetry of the 20th century and its relation to old Polish culture. Books (selected): Zadanie. “Chaskiel” Tadeusza Różewicza [The Task. “Chaskiel” by Tadeusz Różewicz], Warszawa 2017; Wizja Polikarpa. Średniowieczne dialogi człowieka ze śmiercią [The Poliqarp Vision. The Mediaeval Dialogues between Man and Death], eds. Andrzej Dąbrówka and Paweł Stępień, Warszawa 2014; Śmiech w czasach ostatecznych. Tematyka religijna w “Figlikach” Mikołaja Reja [Laughter in the End Times. Religious Themes in “Figliki” by Mikołaj Rej], Warszawa 2013; “Kazania świętokrzyskie”. Nowa edycja. Nowe propozycje badawcze [“The Holy Cross Sermons”. A New Edition. New Research Proposals], ed. Paweł Stępień in collaboration with Halina Tchórzewska-Kabata, Izabela Winiarska-Górska, Warszawa 2009; Stanisław Falkowski, Paweł Stępień, Ciężkie norwidy. Subiektywny przewodnik po literaturze polskiej [Hard Norwids. A Subjective Guide to the History of Polish Literature], Warszawa 2009. Marta Wojtkowska-Maksymik – assistant professor at the Institute of Polish Literature, Warsaw University. She is currently a member of the editorial board of two journals: Odrodzenie i Reformacja w Polsce [The Renaissance and Reformation in Poland] and Prace Filologiczne. Literaturoznawstwo [Philological Studies. Literary Research]. Her field of research includes Polish-Italian cultural links in the Renaissance, neo-Platonic influences of Polish early modern literature, the issue of female dignity, Polish translations of Ariosto, Tasso, and Castiglione in the 16th and 17th centuries. She is the author of the monographs: “Gentiluomo cortigiano” i “dworzanin polski”. Dyskusja o doskonałości człowieka i jej humanistyczne źródła w “Il Libro del Cortigiano” Baldassarra Castiglionego i w “Dworzaninie polskim” Łukasza Górnickiego [“Gentiluomo cortigiano” and “dworzanin polski”. A discus-

285

286

Notes on the Authors

sion on Human Perfection in “Libro del Cortigiano” by Baldassarre Castiglione and “Dworzanin polski” by Łukasz Górnicki], Warszawa 2007; Źródła i sposób ujęcia kwestii kobiecej godności w “O ślachetności a zacności płci niewieściej” Macieja Wirzbięty [The Sources and Method of Presenting the Issue of Women’s Dignity in “O ślachetności a zacności płci niewieściej” by Maciej Wirzbięta], Warszawa 2017. Since 2016 she has been co-editor of the book series “Dawna Literatura Włoska. Studia i Źródła” [Early Modern Italian Literature. Studies and Literary Sources]. She has recently published the Polish translations of “Amintas” by Torquato Tasso (Warszawa, 2017) and “Pastor fido” by G.B. Guarini (Warszawa, 2018).

Index of Names

A Acquaviva, Claudio 22, 174, 238 Agrippa, Heinrich Cornelius 202 Aleknavičienė, Ona 247, 248, 260 Ališauskas, Vytautas 167 Aliulis, Vaclovas 142, 144, 166 Altmann, Wilhelm 278 Anacreonte 40 Andrysowicz, Łazarz 33 Anisson, Laurentius 192 Antonius Patavinus 278 Aresio, Paolo 177, 192 Ariosto, Ludovico 28 Aristotle 236 Arius 217 Artomiusz, Piotr 15, 32 Ashmole, Elias 154 Auerbach, Erich 112, 119 Augustine, saint 75, 76, 84, 107, 112, 115, 117, 177, 178, 189, 258, 272, 275 Axer, Jerzy 46, 57, 61 Ayre, Michael Broun 154, 167 B Babicz, Sergiusz 16, 33 Backvis, Claude 172, 195 Baczewski, Sławomir 218, 241 Baglione, Luca 178 Balcerowicz, Jan 222 Baldini, Ugo 241 Baranowicz, Lazar 20, 23 Barbieri, Edoardo 196 Barclay, John 9 Barker, Robert 166, 266 Barlaam 258 Baronas, Darius 67, 98

Baronius, Caesar 257 Bartas du, Guillaume Salluste 26, 32 Bartoli, Danielo 190, 192 Bartoszewski, Walenty 17, 32 Basil the Great, saint 258 Báthory, Kristóf 229 Báthory, Stephen, King of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth 215, 217, 219–221, 224, 225, 227, 229, 232–239, 243 Bayley, Peter 174, 195 Bayly, Lewis 32 Bazylik, Cyprian 24 Bednarz, Mieczysław 66, 98 Beffer, Rudolf 247 Bellarmine, Robert 257 Bełch, Stanisław 98 Berengar of Tours 258 Berg Erben vom, Johanns 279 Bernard of Clairvaux 115, 258, 275, 276 Bernat, Krzysztof 278, 279 Bèze de, Théodore 236, 240 Bezzenberger, Adalbert 142, 167 Białobocki, Jan 19 Białobrzeski, Marcin 185 Bianchini, Geminiano 193 Biandrata, Giovanni Giorgio 226, 227, 229, 232–235, 238, 239, 243 Bidelli, Giovanni Battista 192 Bieńkowska, Danuta 71, 90, 98, 257, 258, 260 Bieńkowski, Tadeusz 211 Binkytė, Eleonora 168 Birckmann, Arnold 193

288

Index of Names

Birkowski, Fabian 179, 185–187, 192, 194, 200 Biržiška, Mykolas 153, 167 Biržiška, Vaclovas 142, 150, 167 Błoński, Jan 28, 33 Bobowski, Mikołaj 17, 33 Bochinus, Andrea 195 Boer, Wietse de 174, 195 Bogusławski, Jan 108, 119 Böhlau, Hermann 278, 279 Bohuszewicz, Paweł 128, 129, 138 Boiardo, Matteo 28 Bolesławiusz, Klemens 19, 109, 118 Bolognetti, Alberto 214, 221, 224–227, 229, 232, 236, 237, 239, 240 Bonaventure 115 Boratyński, Ludovico 240 Borgia, Francis, saint 176 Boromeusz, Karol 174, 192, 196, 199, 200 Borowski, Władysław 97 Borzymowski, Jan the Elder 141, 147–149, 151, 153, 161–164 Borzymowski, Jan the Younger 146, 147, 151, 152, 163, 164 Botero, Giovanni 176 Botto, Margherita 196 Boyle, Robert 154, 167 Brahmer, Mieczysław 28, 34 Braubach, Peter 246 Braunmüller, Kurt 38 Breitkopf, Krzysztof Bernat 278, 279 Bretkūnas, Jonas 99, 141, 145, 148, 160–164, 247, 248, 251, 255, 259, 261 Brogi Bercoff, Giovanna 36 Brückner, Aleksander 114, 118, 250 Bruckner, Matilda Tomaryn 127, 129, 133, 139 Bruto, Giovanni Michele 226 Bryant, John 124, 133, 139, 281 Brzegowy, Tadeusz 52, 61 Brzeżewski, Samuel 70, 98

Brzostowski, Konstanty Kazimierz 150 Brzozowski, Mieczysław 107, 119, 179, 180, 184, 188, 195 Buccella, Niccolò 227, 234–239, 243 Buchanan, George 28 Buchwald-Pelcowa, Paulina 10, 61 Budny, Szymon 39, 220, 221, 234, 242 Budzik, Stanisław 66, 98 Bullinger, Heinrich 201 Buožytė, Eleonora 217, 241 Busby, Keith 127, 130, 139 Buszewicz, Elwira 27, 36, 41, 61, 62, 107, 119 Butterworth, Charles A. 205, 210 Buzzi, Franco 196 Bylaukis, Jonas 245 Bystroń, Jan 138 C Caccamo, Domenico 241 Caffin, Jonnes 278 Caligari, Giovanni Andrea 226, 238 Calma, Clarinda E. 216, 220, 241 Calvin, John 13, 16, 24, 34, 36, 201, 203, 233, 258, 266 Campana, Giovanni Paolo 226, 238 Campensis, Johannes 42 Campion, Edmund 220, 241 Cantimori, Delio 242 Caplan, Harry 176, 195 Carbone, Ludovicus 177, 192 Casimir, saint 95, 252 Castiglione, Baldassare 285 Catto, Michela 243 Caussin, Nicolas 177 Cecilia, saint 18 Cerquiglini, Bernard 133, 135, 139 Cervini, Marcello 176 Chądzyński, Jan 271, 272, 278 Chemperek, Dariusz 23, 34, 36, 37, 211 Chmaj, Ludwik 241

Index of Names

Chodkiewicz, Jan Hieronimowicz 202 Chodkiewicz, Krystyna 202 Chodyński, Zeno 182, 183, 185, 192 Chrétien de Troyes 126, 139 Chróścicki, Juliusz Antoni 197 Chylinski, Samuel Boguslaus 141, 144–146, 148, 152, 162, 164–168, 282, 283 Chynczewska-Hennel, Teresa 12, 34 Ciapiński, Wasyl 25 Cieklinski, Piotr 18 Cieński, Marcin 211 Ciesielski, Tomasz 35 Cillario, Graziella 196 Ciotti, Giovanni Battista 194 Citavičiūtė, Liucija, 142, 167 Clement VI, pope 258 Commendone, Giovanni Francesco 233 Contarini, Gaspar 172, 196 Corrigan, John 200 Corvinus, Antonius 245, 246 Craftheim von, Johannes Crato 235 Cristoforo da Padova 176 Culmann, Leonhard 246 Cummings, Brian 10, 29, 34 Curie-Skłodowska, Maria 241 Cybulski, Łukasz 8, 65, 89, 95, 98, 122, 124, 125, 132, 139, 141, 185, 195, 257, 260, 267, 279, 281 Cyril of Alexandria 258 Cytowska, Maria 46, 57, 61, 172, 195 Čyžas, Teodoras 168 Czaplewski, Paweł 240 Czapski (family) 248 Czaradzki, Grzegorz 27 Czartoryski (family) 115, 118, 216, 248 Czechowic, Marcin 25, 218, 220, 224, 244 Czechowicz, Agnieszka 19, 34, 105, 119, 281 Czerwiński, Franciszek 192

D Dambrowski, Samuel 267–279 Dankwart, Bartłomiej Baltazar 188, 190, 191, 193 Danysz, Antoni 133, 139 Daugirdas, Kęstutis 225, 241 Daukšienė, Ona 67, 90, 98 Dauksza, Mikołaj = Daukša, Mikalojus 66, 68, 69, 72, 73, 89, 92, 96, 99, 247, 250–252, 254, 255, 261 David, biblical 12, 20–22, 25, 28, 30, 34, 40, 41, 94, 109, 116, 160, 189, 194, 259, 278 Dávid, Ferenc 234 David, Jan 22 Dąbkowska-Kujko, Justyna 37, 62, 199, 284 Dąbrówka, Andrzej 122, 124, 139, 285 Deborah, biblical 90 Demen, Herman 195 Demosthenes 189 Derewiecki, Marek 100 Devereux, James A. 205, 210 Dingel, Irene 240 Długosz-Kurczabowa, Krystyna 201, 210 Dods, Marcus 192 Doktorek, Łukasz 184 Domaniewski, Józef 25 Domański, Juliusz 172, 196 Doni, Agostino 226 Dowgird, Samuel 26 Drob, Janusz 179, 196 Drzewiecki, Hieronim 21 Dufour, Alain 240 Dybek, Dariusz 71, 98 Dyrness, William A. 13, 34 E Edwards, Michael 175, 196, 231, 241 Edwards, Otis Carl Jr 175, 196, 231, 241 Elferen, Isabella van 274, 279

289

290

Index of Names

Engel, Gabriel 156, 167 Erasmus of Rotterdam 172, 198 Estella de, Diego 176 Esther, biblical 57–59, 90 Estreicher, Karol 65, 98, 248, 250 Eusebius 55 F Fabricius, Georg 24 Falkowski, Stanisław 285 Fallek, Wilhelm 41, 61 Febbo, Monica 36 Fehr, Johann Richard 149 Fengler, Maria 38 Ferlain, Claudio 243 Ferraresi, Gisella 38 Fijałkowski, Paweł 15, 34 Filipczak-Kocur, Anna 35 Filipiak, Marian 62 Firpo, Massimo 222, 235, 242 Fogelweder, Stanisław 40, 41, 44 Franck, Caspar 276, 278 Frąckiewicz-Radzymiński, Stefan 151 Frederick I of Prussia, king 148, 149, 155 Fritzsche, Johann 278 Fumaroli, Marc 173, 175, 176, 178, 196 Fyodorov, Ivan 25 G Gacka Dorota 122, 124, 139 Galatowski, Joannicy 29 Gallio, Tollomeo 224, 229, 232 Gałuszka, Tomasz 124, 139 Ganss, George E. 230, 242 Gapski, Henryk 196 Garwolczyk, Maciej 194 Gastpary, Woldemar 267, 280 Gaubisch, Urban 279 Gaunt, Simon 127, 139 Gawiński, Jan 29 Gawłowski, Szymon 27

Gelumbeckaitė, Jolanta 65, 99, 246, 260 Genton, Hervé 240 Gerhard, Johann 274–276, 278 Gerlachin, Katharina 279 Giedraitis, Juozapas Arnulfas = Giedroyć, Józef Arnulf 143, 164, 166 Giedraitis, Merkelis 251 Gierdwil, Karol 147 Gigas, Johannes 276, 278 Giombi, Samuele 171, 172, 174, 175, 177, 196 Giunti, Bernardo 194 Giustiniani, Paolo 172, 193 Glazer, Aleksandra 117, 119 Gleason, Elisabeth G. 172, 196 Gliściński, Jan 110, 119 Głombiowska, Zofia 42, 61, 279 Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus 280 Gordon, Bruce 14, 34 Gorzkowski, Albert 61, 119 Gotfryd, Jan 62 Góralski, Wojciech 174, 196 Górnicki, Łukasz 202, 285, 286 Górski, Karol 67, 99, 201, 206, 210, 257, 261 Górski, Konrad 67, 99, 201, 206, 210, 257, 261 Grabowiecki, Sebastian 18, 29, 282 Graciotti, Sante 41, 44, 61 Gradowski, Michał 54, 61 Green, Lawrence D. 176, 196 Gregorius Turonensis 269, 278 Gregory I the Great, pope 258 Gregory of Nazianzus, saint 115 Gregory of Tours 115, 269 Grendler, Paul 232, 242 Greser, Daniel 246 Gręźlikowski, Janusz 172, 196 Grimbert, Joan Tasker 139 Grochowski, Stanisław 18, 22, 32 Gruchała, Janusz Stanisław 33, 119

Index of Names

Grużewski, Bolesław 149, 150, 167 Gryson, Roger 60 Grzebień, Ludwik 66, 99 Grzegorz Paweł z Brzezin 201, 206, 210 Grzegorzewska, Małgorzata 38 Grześkowiak, Radosław 22, 23, 34, 119 Grzybek, Stanisław 55, 61 Guarini, Giovanni Battista 286 Gurowski, Rafał 28 Guzowski, Piotr 166 Gwalther, Rudolf 236 Gwioździk, Jolanta 220, 242 H Halecki, Oskar 201, 210 Hans, Nicholas 153, 167 Hanusiewicz-Lavallee, Mirosława 61, 100, 119, 213, 226, 242, 281, 283 Headley, John M. 174, 196 Hein, Lorenz 222, 242 Hemmingsen, Niels 246 Herberger, Valerius 275, 276, 278 Hermann, Arthur 168, 278, 279 Hernas, Czesław 37, 100, 106, 120 Hertz, Iobus 194, 278 Hey-Stawicki, Michał 13 Hochenleutner, Gelasius 190, 193 Hofman, Iwona 243 Hohenzollern, Albrecht, Duke of Prussia 28, 48 Holvoet, Axel 141 Homer 40 Horace 27, 40, 43 Horn, Konrad 279 Hosea, biblical 206 Hosius, Stanislaus = Hozjusz, Stanisław 17, 33, 185 Houghton, L.B.T. 26, 34 Howden of, John 19 Hudon, William V. 172, 196 Hugh of Saint Victor 258

Hugo, Herman 22 Hünefeldt, Andrzej 32, 33 Hunter, Michael 154 Huot, Sylvia 126, 130, 139 I Ianino, Ludovico 192 Ignatius of Loyola, saint 190, 192, 244 Illyricus, Matthias Flacius 24 Isaiah, biblical 45, 51–54, 76, 82, 110, 189, 256, 275 Ivan of Vishnia 12 Ivinskis, Zenonas 67, 99 J Jablonski, Daniel Ernst 149 Jabłonowski, Jan Stanisław 20, 33 Jabłoński, Mieczysław 180, 182, 184, 196 Jachnowicz, Jan 65, 254 Jackiewicz, Mieczysław 246 Jadwiga, queen of Poland 15 Jael, biblical 90 Jagiellon (dynasty) 227, 233 Jagiellon Zápolya, Isabella 232 Jagiełło, Władysław, king of Poland 15 Jagodyński, Stanisław Serafin 17, 18 Jaknavičius, Jonas 65, 247 Jakóbczyk-Gola, Aleksandra 62 Jankauskas, Benas 255 Jankowski, Augustyn 97 Januszowski, Jan 119 Jaworski, Stefan 23 Jaworski, Tadeusz 23, 35, 210 Jedin, Hubert 171, 172, 191, 196 Jehoshaphat, king, biblical 205 Jennings, Margaret 172, 197 Jeremiah II, Patriarch of Constantinople 15 Jerome, saint 42, 52–55, 188, 258 Jesse, biblical 71, 76, 90, 91 Jobert, Ambroise 179, 197

291

292

Index of Names

Jöcher, Christian Gottlieb 142, 155, 167 John Chrysostom, saint 91, 160, 188, 258, 266, 270, 277 John of the Cross, saint 21 John Paul II, pope 281, 283 John the Merciful 258 John, saint, Evangelist 9, 19, 21, 32, 33, 38, 48, 49, 61, 79, 82, 88, 91, 110, 139, 154, 160, 164, 173, 175, 188, 191, 196, 198, 200, 203, 252, 256, 258, 266, 270, 277, 281, 283 Josaphat, biblical 258 Josephus, biblical 115 Jovaiša, Liudas 150, 167, 238, 242 Jovaišas, Albinas 251 Judas, biblical 106, 113, 116, 219 Jurkowlaniec, Grażyna 266, 280 K Kacprzak, Marta M. 14, 34, 172, 197 Kakareko, Andrzej 180, 197 Kamykowski, Łukasz 119 Kanior, Marian 15, 35 Kapuścińska, Anna 22, 35 Karcan, Ioanes 193 Kardasz, Monika 32 Karmanowski, Olbrycht 29, 34 Karnkowski, Stanisław 185 Karpiński, Adam 33, 201, 210 Karpluk, Maria 99 Kasprzak-Obrębska, Halina 117, 120 Katilienė, Irena 238, 242 Kavaliūnaitė, Gina 144, 166, 167, 282, 283 Kawecka-Gryczowa, Alodia 10, 35, 201–203, 210 Kay, Sarah 139 Kazańczuk, Mariusz 122, 124, 139 Kazlauskas, Jonas 142, 168 Keferstein, Halina 23, 35 Kempa, Tomasz 16, 35, 213, 227, 242 Kempinius, Szymon 32

Kessler, Stephan 165 Kiefer Lewalski, Barbara 35 Kilcoyne, Francis P. 172, 197 King, Henry H. 21, 40, 42, 73, 74, 85, 88, 129, 142, 143, 148, 149, 152, 155, 157, 159–161, 176, 195, 215, 219, 224, 229, 232, 239, 268 Kiszka, Jan 10 Klein, Daniel 156, 160, 168 Kleinhans, Robertr G. 172, 197 Kliszko, Zenon A. 183, 197 Kłoczowski, Jerzy 10, 35, 179, 191, 197 Knape, Joachim 176, 197 Kneidel, Gregory 177, 197 Kochan, Anna 211 Kochanowska, Anna 47 Kochanowska, Orsola 57, 59 Kochanowski, Jan 20, 27, 28, 37, 39–52, 54–62, 132, 284 Kochanowski, Piotr 27 Kochowski, Wespazjan 19, 29, 30, 33, 71 Koehler, Krzysztof 98, 260 Kojałowicz, Kazimierz Wijuk 193, 198 Kolb, Robert 13, 35 Kolbus, Elżbieta 119 Kolbuszewski, Kazimierz 185, 197, 248, 250, 266, 270, 280 Komorowska, Magdalena 185, 192, 197, 257 Kopeć, Józef Jerzy 106, 120 Kopiec, Jan 172, 197 Korolko, Mirosław 17, 35, 179, 185, 197, 218, 242, 261 Korzo, Margarita A. 201, 203, 204, 210 Kostkiewiczowa, Teresa 114, 120 Kościesza Żaba, Jan 22 Kowalczyk, Monika 19, 35, 108, 111, 120 Kozak, Barbara 20, 35 Kozik, Albert 277 Krafft, Fritz 275, 280 Krafft, Johann 246

Index of Names

Krafftheim von, Crato 239 Kraiński, Jan Krzysztof 145, 152 Krajewska, Monika 211 Kriegseisen, Wojciech 11, 35, 270, 280 Kroll, Walter 22, 23, 35 Krueger, Roberta L. 139 Krzywy, Roman 43, 61, 119 Krzyżanowski, Julian 43, 61, 126, 127, 132, 138, 140 Kucała, Marian 70, 99 Kuczyńska, Marzanna 20, 34, 35, 37 Kudzinowski, Czesław 97 Kugel, James L. 23, 35 Kuikius, Burchardus 192 Kujot, Stanisław 267, 269, 278 Kukulski, Leszek 103, 120 Kulas, Joanna 202, 210 Kulvec, Abraham 246 Kulwicka-Kamińska, Joanna 211 Kuntze, Edward 240 Kuolys, Darius 94, 99, 258, 259 Kupisz, Kazimierz 43, 61 Kuran, Magdalena 172, 180, 185, 188, 197, 257 Kurschat, Friedrich 142, 168 Kurzeniecki, Marcin 28 Kuźmina, Dariusz 182, 197, 265, 270, 280 L Lacki, Aleksander Teodor 22 Lacy, Norris J. 139 Lasocińska, Estera 62, 63 Laterna, Marcin 18, 109, 118, 224, 237, 238 Laurentin, Rene 68, 99 Lawrence, saint 258 Lebedys, Jurgis 89, 99, 247, 248, 250–252 Ledesma, Jakub 251 Lehmann, Jerzy 202, 210 Leitgeber, Jaroslaus 193 Leleszi, János 238

Leo X, pope 172 Leopolita, Jan Wuchaliusz 21, 44 Leszczynska, Anna 25 Leszczyński (family) 10 Leszczyński, Rafał 25, 26 Levinston (Scottish alderman) 153 Liberiusz, Jacek 116, 118 Librowski, Stanisław 172, 198 Lichański, Jakub Zdzisław 188, 198 Liedke, Marzena 166 Lippomano, Luigi 227, 242 Lipski, Samuel 146, 147, 163 Liu, Yin 129, 140 Llewellyn, Kathleen M. 26, 35 Louis of Granada 21, 29, 176, 178, 185, 200 Lubelczyk, Jakub 12, 25, 33, 40 Lubieniecki, Stanisław 12 Lubomirski, Stanisław Herakliusz 20, 28–31, 33, 38 Lucan 115 Lucius Annaeus Florus 258 Lukás, Ladislaus 240 Luke, saint, Evangelist 12, 20, 47, 79–81, 110, 163, 273 Lukšaitė, Ingė 146, 150, 153, 155, 162, 168 Luszczynska, Magdalena 216, 242 Luther, Martin 20, 24, 29, 35, 156, 160, 161, 164, 197, 204, 245–247, 258, 266, 271, 273–276, 278 Lutomirski, Stanisław 222 Luzvic, Étienne 22 Ł Łach, Stanisław 62 Łaszkiewicz, Hubert 34 Łopatecki, Karol 106, 120 Łubieński, Maciej 182 Łukarska, Beata 70, 99 Łukaszewicz, Józef 150, 153, 168, 270, 280 Łużny, Ryszard 20, 35

293

294

Index of Names

M Maciejowski, Bernard 184, 193 Maciuszko, Janusz T. 185, 198, 266, 270, 280 Mack, Peter 132, 140, 172, 177, 198 Madonia, Claudio 229, 235, 239, 242 Magnus, Albertus 91 Maguś, Wojciech 243 Makowski, Adam 194 Małecki, Jan 246 Manasseh, king, biblical 205 Manning, Gideon 241 Mantuan the, Battista 16 Marchetti, Valerio 221, 242 Marcus Tullius Cicero 13, 56, 60, 188, 189, 258 Marczuk, Barbara 26, 36 Marinelli, Luigi 20, 36 Marino, Giambattista 28 Mark, saint, Evangelist 110 Markowicz, Jakub 250, 263 Martin of Tours, saint 258 Martynas, Liudvikas Rėza 144, 160, 167 Martz, Louis L. 22, 36 Mary, Saint Virgin 12, 15, 19, 27, 65–97, 116, 191, 205, 259, 267, 269 Masen, Jacob 20 Masluk, Vitalij Petrovic 20, 36 Mathesius, Johann 276, 279 Matthew, saint, Evangelist 11, 21, 47, 48, 73, 110, 256 May, Thomas 32, 71, 184, 224, 226, 233, 238 Mayenowa, Maria Renata 46, 57, 61 Mazurkiewicz, Roman 19, 27, 33, 36, 67, 90, 94, 95, 97, 99, 259 Mažvydas, Martynas 143, 144, 160, 246 Mączyński, Jan 222, 223 Meisner, Daniel 279 Melanchthon, Philip 13, 16, 24, 245–248 Melito of Sardis 108

Meller, Katarzyna 12, 25, 36, 37, 280 Metternich, Wilhelm 118 Meursius, Ioannes 192, 193 Miaskowski, Kasper 18, 27, 29, 109, 118 Micah, biblical 51–54, 109 Michalski, Maciej 15, 139 Michalski, Sergiusz 36 Michałowska, Teresa 17, 36, 122–126, 128, 129, 132–134, 136, 138, 140 Michelini, Guido 156, 168 Mieleszko, Mikołaj 22 Migdał, Jolanta 94, 99 Migne, Jacques-Paul 278 Mikołaj Rej 39 Mikołaj z Wilkowiecka 185–187, 194, 200 Mikoś, Michał Jacek 61 Millet, Olivier 13, 16, 36 Minwid, Mikołaj 145–148, 152 Minwid, Samuel 152 Miotk, Marek 118, 120 Miriam, the prophetess, biblical 90 Missal, Roman 18 Miszalska, Jadwiga 16, 36 Młodzianowski, Tomasz 179 Modlińska-Piekarz, Angelika 24, 36 Moffa, Matteo Gribaldi 220, 233 Mohila, Pierre 197 Mohyla, Peter 20 Mongini, Guido 243 Monkiewicz, Stanisław 146, 147, 163 Müllerowa, Lidia 197 Montagu, Henry 32 Montenay de, Georgette 23 Montusiewicz, Ryszard 133, 140 Morkūnas, Jokūbas 148, 162, 163, 166, 247, 250, 255 Morsztyn, Hieronim 23, 29, 137 Morsztyn, Jan Andrzej 29 Morsztyn, Zbigniew 23 Moser, Michael 12, 36 Moses, biblical 51

Index of Names

Mouchel, Christian 177, 198 Murczyński, Andrzej 176, 194 Murphy, James Jerome 176, 196, 198 Mykolaitytė, Aurelija 258 Myszkowski, Piotr 40 Myszkowski, Stanisław 206 N Nadolski, Andrzej 54, 61 Nanke, Czesław 240 Napiórkowski, Celestyn 66, 68, 92, 99, 196 Nargielewicz, Tomasz 121–129, 131–138 Nasiorowski, Sławomir 183, 198 Natale, Tommaso 239 Naumow, Aleksander 25, 37 Naunynas, Job 142 Negrov, Alexander I. 25, 37 Neukirch, Melchior 276, 279 Neumayr, Maximilian 177, 198 Newman, Jane O. 119 Nicholas of Myra, saint 258 Nicholas, saint 153, 167, 246, 258 Nichols, Stephen 137, 140 Nicollie, Béatrice 240 Niedźwiedź, Jakub 8, 133, 137, 140 Niegalewski, Walenty 25 Niekraszewicz-Korotkaja, Żanna 198 Niemojewski, Jakub 201, 206, 224 Niemojewski, Jan 215, 220, 240 Niezabitowski, Stanisław 152 Nieznanowski, Stefan 19, 37, 89, 90, 94, 99 Nifo, Agostino 235 Nifo, Fabiano = Nifo, Fabio 235, 242 Niklewicz, Szymon 238 Noah, biblical 43, 44, 90, 109, 112 Nowak, Zbigniew 270, 278–280 Nowicka-Jeżowa, Alina 28, 35, 37, 61, 62, 106, 118, 120, 283 Nutius, Philippus 119

O Oates, John Cloud Trewinard 154, 168 Obremski, Krzysztof 30, 37 Odescalchi, Lodovico 238 Odymalski, Walenty 27 Okoń, Jan 120 Oleśnicka, Zofia 12, 20, 33 Oloff, Efraim 267–271, 274, 275, 279 Opec, Baltazar 39 Origen of Alexandria 188 Ostaszewska, Danuta 94, 99 Ostrogski, Konstanty Wasyl 10, 16, 25 Otwinowska, Barbara 61, 140 Otwinowski, Erazm 12, 21, 25, 33, 38, 39 Otwinowski, Walerian 21 Ó Ó hAnnrachain, Tadhg

10, 37

P Pac, Mikołaj 222, 225, 240, 243 Pace, Giulio 226 Pacini Fazzi, Maria 244 Paleologo, Iacopo 242 Palionis, Jonas 142, 168 Palumbo, Margherita 235, 242 Panigarola, Francesco 176, 177, 194 Panuś, Kazimierz 67, 89, 97, 99, 119, 175, 179, 186, 199, 254 Papczyński, Stanisław 115, 118, 120 Paruta, Niccolò 242 Paterson, Jan 147, 148, 153, 154 Paul III, pope 172 Paul IV, pope 47 Paul of Samosata 217 Paul, saint 87, 172, 188, 217, 242, 266, 272, 274, 278, 281, 283 Pavlyshyn, Marko 36 Pawelec, Mariusz 270, 280

295

296

Index of Names

Pawlak, Wiesław 33, 62, 63, 65, 89, 90, 95, 100, 106, 107, 117, 118, 120, 133, 140, 171, 179, 199, 283 Pelc, Janusz 23, 37, 41, 45, 46, 61, 62, 135, 140, 211, 242 Peppmüller, Robert 167 Perpinyá, Pedro Juan 178 Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca) 16 Philo of Alexandria 23 Piekarski, Kazimierz 202, 210 Piela, Michał 172, 199 Pietkiewicz, Melchior 39, 250 Pietrzak-Thébault, Joanna 98, 260, 262, 281 Piętka, Ryszard Roman 118, 120 Pilarczyk, Franciszek 203, 204, 210 Piotr of Goniądz 217, 220 Piotrkowczyk, Andrzej 118, 192–195, 276 Pisarkowa, Krystyna 211 Plaignard, Franciscus 278 Plato 42, 189 Platt, Dobrosława 180, 199 Plečkaitis, Romanas 231, 242 Plezia, Marian 54, 62 Plokhy, Serhii 36 Plutarch 115 Pociej, Adam Hipacy 16, 37 Pociūtė, Dainora 222, 225–227, 230, 232, 234, 242, 284 Pole, Reginald 172 Polotski, Symeon 20, 29 Pompejusz F.A. 280 Possevino, Antonio 27, 214, 226, 229, 232, 238, 239 Poter, James I. 119 Potesta, Felix 112, 118 Potocki, Wacław 19, 26, 30, 103–118, 281 Powodowski, Hieronim 185, 217 Poźniak, Piotr 33 Prall, Dorothea 61 Prejs, Marek 19, 28, 37, 44, 62

Prokop, Krzysztof Rafał 222, 243 Provana, Prospero 226 Przymuszała, Lidia 270, 280 Przypkowski, Samuel 21 Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite 258 Ptaśnik, Jan 201, 210 Ptolemy II Philadelphus 160 Publius Ovidius Naso 258 Pucci, Francesco 226 Puente de la, Luis 115 Pyżewicz, Wiesław 210 Q Quandt, Johann Jakob 142, 167, 168 Quirini, Pietro 172, 193 R Rachel, biblical 90, 108 Račiūnaitė, Tojana 67, 100 Radyszewśkyj, Rostysław 20, 37 Radziwiłł (family) 10, 26 Radziwiłł, Albrycht 236 Radziwiłł, Jerzy 183, 236 Radziwiłł, Mikołaj Czarny (“the Black”) 222, 227, 233, 236 Radziwiłł, Mikołaj Krzysztof Sierotka (“the Orphan”) 213, 215, 226–228, 236, 240, 242 Radziwiłł, Mikołaj Rudy (“the Red”) 225 Radziwiłł, prince Mikołaj 28 Radziwiłł, princess Luise Charlotte 148 Radziwiłł, Stanisław 236 Radziwiłłowa z d. Szydłowiecka, Elżbieta 42 Radziwiłłowa, księżna Katarzyna 23 Ragauskienė, Raimonda 227, 243 Rak-Poks, Iwona 257, 267, 280 Ramułt, Mikołaj Aleksander 270, 271, 273, 274, 279 Ramza (Ramsay), Thomas 147, 148, 153 Range, Jochen D. 165

Index of Names

Ranke von, Leopold 62 Ratti, Achille 192 Rebecca, biblical 90 Rebentisch, Christoph 142 Rechowicz, Marian 119, 195, 199 Regulus, Wojciech 118, 194 Reiner, Johann E. 171, 199 Reitelaitis, Jonas 142, 168 Rej, Mikołaj 14, 24, 39, 40, 185, 201, 202, 211, 250, 257, 266, 277, 285 Rekštytė, Ieva 248 Rekuć, Jerzy 149 Reussner, familly 156–158 Rhesa, Johannes 141, 160, 168 Rhesa, Ludwig 141, 160, 168 Ribadeneira de, Pedro 173 Riley, Mark 32 Ripa da, Urban 235 Rodecki, Aleksy 240 Romanowski, Andrzej 13, 37 Ronenberg, Simon 222, 223 Rotondò, Antonio 241, 243 Rozenberg, Reinhold 142 Rozrażewski, Hieronim 226 Rożniatowski, Abraham 19, 109, 119 Różewicz, Tadeusz 285 Rudolf II, Roman Emperor 236 Ruhig, Philip 142 Rusiecki, Marian 182, 199 Rusnak, Radosław 26, 37, 41, 45, 48, 62, 284 Rutkovska, Kristina 8, 89, 92, 95, 98, 100, 141, 199, 252, 254, 257–259, 284 Rutkowska, Joanna 71, 100, 188 Rybiński, Maciej 24, 25, 33 Rychlewicz, Bazyli 186, 194 Rychłowski, Franciszek 179 Ryczek, Wojciech 188, 189, 194, 199 Rysiński, Salomon 25 Rytel, Jadwiga 44, 62 Rzegocka, Jolanta 220, 241

S Saganiak, Magdalena 120 Sales de, Francis, saint 174, 194 Salmonowicz, Stanisław 267, 280 Salwa, Piotr 36 Sambor, Jadwiga 99 Sancroft, William 148, 152, 154 Sanden von, Bernhard 141, 148, 151, 155, 158–160 Sanders, Christoph 230, 243 Sannazaro, Jacopo 26, 27 Šapokos, Adolfo 167 Sappho 40 Sara, biblical 90 Sarbiewski, Maciej Kazimierz 20, 27, 67, 89 Sarnicki, Stanisław 201, 206 Sartorius, David 194, 278 Savelli, Giacomo 221 Sawicki, Jakub 183, 185, 194 Sawicki, Stefan 62, 181–183 Saxonia de, Ludolphus 275, 278 Scharffenberger, Marci 33 Schedel, Krzysztof 194 Schedel, Mikołaj Aleksander 118, 194 Schlawitz, Gustav 278 Schneyer, Johannes Baptist 175, 199 Schütz, Werner 175, 199 Schrage, Wolfgang 204, 211 Schroeder, Henry Joseph 192 Schuster, Friedrich 142, 143, 148, 151, 156, 159–161, 168 Seehofer, Arsatius 246 Séguenny, André 242 Seklucjan, Jan 13, 24, 33, 204, 246, 247 Sengstock, Lazarus 160 Serejski, Marian Henryk 62 Seweryn of Luboml 188 Sęp Szarzyński, Mikołaj 21, 28, 33 Sforza, Bona, queen of Poland 232 Shell, Alison 12, 37

297

298

Index of Names

Shuger, Debora Kuller 176, 177, 179, 187, 191, 199 Siebeneicher, Mateusz 33, 279 Siemieńska, Róża 99 Sigismund II Augustus, king of Poland 40 Sigismund III Vasa, king of Poland 268 Sikora, Stefan 97 Simonetti, Manlio 110, 117, 120 Simoni, Simone 235, 236, 238, 239, 242, 244 Sirvydas, Konstantinas = Szyrwid, Konstanty 65, 68–70, 78–99, 188, 247, 251, 252, 254–262, 285 Siudy, Teofil 66, 100 Sixtus IV, pope 16 Skarbek, Jan 197 Skarga, Piotr 16, 33, 70, 97, 179, 185–187, 189, 194, 225, 241, 257, 272, 276, 279 Skaryna, Francysk 25 Skibiński, Tomasz 120 Skomin, Aleksander 147, 148, 154, 155 Skrodzki, Teodor 144 Skvireckas, Juozapas 143 Skwara, Marek 179, 200 Słomiński, Kasper 200 Słowiński, Jan Zbigniew 182, 185, 200 Smotrycki, Melecjusz 16, 37 Sobieski, Jan III, king of Poland 30 Sokolski, Jacek 209, 211 Sokołowski, Stanisław 108, 109, 119, 188–190, 194, 200 Solomon, biblical 25, 69, 71, 74, 75, 85, 90, 93, 189 Sozzini, Fausto 217, 220–222, 226, 233–235, 241, 243 Sozzini, Lelio 220, 221, 233, 241 Spangenberg, Cyriacus 245, 246, 276, 279 Spangenberg, Johann 245, 246, 276, 279 Spencer, John 154 Spilczyński, Stanisław 239, 243

Squarcialupi, Marcello 229, 235, 238, 239, 242 Stachowiak, Lech 55, 62 Stachowski, Franciszek Ksawery 200 Stang, Christian 142, 168 Stanislaus, saint 18 Stankiewicz, Elżbieta 201, 211 Stanula, Emil 119 Starnawski, Jerzy 45, 62, 257, 262, 266, 280 Starownik, Agata 42, 62 Starowolski, Szymon 179, 185–187, 194 Stefanicka, Krystyna 138 Steinman, Tobias 278 Stella, Aldo 98, 233, 234, 243 Stępień, Paweł 14, 20, 37, 61, 93, 94, 100, 274, 280, 285 Stręciwilk, Janina 106, 120 Studnicki, Wacław 149, 168 Suetonius 115 Sulpicius Severus 258 Surdokaitė, Gabija 100 Swieżawski, Stefan 100 Sylwiusz, Jakub 201 Symeon of Polotsk 23 Synowiec, Juliusz 51, 52, 62 Szczot, Monika 44, 62 Szczotka, Stanisław 222, 243 Szczucki, Lech 218, 239, 241, 244 Szeliga, Jan 118 Szulc, Arleta 211 Szymański, Bogdan 90, 100 Szymonowic, Szymon 39 Szyszkowski, Martinus 194 Ś Ślękowa, Ludwika 201, 211 Śmieszkowic, Balcer 118

Index of Names

T Tacitus 115 Tanselle, Thomas 124, 140 Tasso, Torquato 27, 28, 285, 286 Tauler, Johannes 115, 119 Taylor, Larissa Juliet 173, 175, 200 Tazbir, Janusz 241, 261 Tchórzewska-Kabata, Halina 285 Teresa of Avila, saint 21 Teusz, Leszek 28, 37, 110, 120 Theophylact of Ohrid 258 Thomas Aquinas, saint 55, 98, 100, 258 Tomaro, John 174, 196 Tomecka-Mirek, Anna 99 Tramp, Jan Ernest 278 Trecy, Krzysztof 201 Treter, Tomasz 213 Trinkaus, Charles 27, 38 Trzecieski, Andrzej 13, 14, 24, 33 Turner, James Grantham 129, 140 Twardowski, Kasper 21, 109, 119 U Ueding, Gert 197 Ulanowski, Bolesław 180, 181, 184, 195 Ulčinaitė Eugenija 133, 140, 251 Umińska-Tytoń, Elżbieta 71, 100 Urbański, Piotr 27, 38 Ursinus, Benjamin 155 V Vaen van, Otto 22 Vaišnora, Juozas 67, 100 Vaišnoras, Simonas 160 Vaitkevičiūtė, Viktorija 66, 100, 258 Valier, Agostino 176, 178, 195 Vasiliauskienė, Virginija 89, 98, 100, 252, 254, 262, 285 Veit, Dietrich 247 Veith, Joannes 193 Veith, Martinus 193

Veith, Philipus 193 Verden de, Martin 279 Verdigi, Mariano 235, 244 Vida, Marco Girolamo 26, 27 Vieira, António 176, 195 Vilentas, Baltramiejus 166, 246, 247, 263 Villavicente, Lorenzo 178 Vincůrková, Dorota 43, 62 Vladimirovas, Levas 248 Voisè-Maćkiewicz, Irena 270, 276, 280 Volanus, Andreas 225, 241 W Wadowski, Józef Jan 28 Walecki, Wacław 42 Walton, Brian 160 Ward, Jean 20, 38 Wargocki, Andrzej 213 Warszewicki, Stanisław 21, 224, 226 Waśniowski, Wojciech 19 Weber, Robert 60 Weintraub, Wiktor 44, 62 Weiss, Michael James 172, 200 Welie, Jos V.M. 244 Wereszczyński, Józef 183, 185 Westervelt, Benjamin Wood 175, 200 Wężyk, Jan 180, 195 Wiemer, Björn 12, 38 Wierix, Anton II 22 Wierzbicka-Trwoga, Krystyna 20, 38, 57, 63 Wierzbowski, Teodor 33 Wilczek, Piotr 25, 33, 38 Wilkowski, Balcer 214–216, 221, 227, 228, 241 Wilkowski, Gaspar 213, 215–218, 221, 239–241 Willent, Bartholomaeus 148, 160, 162–164 Willich, Jodocus 246 Wing, Betsy 139

299

300

Index of Names

Winiarska-Górska, Izabela 161, 169, 203, 204, 211, 255, 285 Wirzbięta, Maciej 201–211, 286 Wiśniowiecki, Michał 150 Wójcik, Walenty 180, 200 Wojewódka, Bernard 24 Wojtkowska-Maksymik, Marta 202, 203, 206, 211, 285 Wojtkowski, Julian 67, 70, 101 Wojtyska, Henryk Damian 63, 120, 174, 200 Wolrab, Jan 276, 279 Wołłowicz, Ostafi 89, 202 Wołłowicz, Teodora [Fiodora] 89, 202 Worczulanis, Barbara 23, 35 Woronczakowa, Lucyna 46, 57, 61 Wotschke, Theodor 222, 244 Woźniak, Ewa 98, 100 Wróbel, Walenty 40 Wujek, Jakub 39, 65, 68, 69, 71–78, 88–97, 161, 179, 185, 238, 250, 251, 254, 255, 257, 258, 260, 265–267, 270, 272, 276, 277, 279, 280 Wyszyński, Stefan 281

X Xerxes I, V century B.C.

58

Z Zabern von, Philipp 241 Zabłocki, Jerzy 246 Załęski, Stanisław 224, 244 Zápolya, Sigismund 233 Zarański, Jan 62 Zárate-Ruiz, Arturo 200 Zardin, Danilo 196 Zawadzki, Benedykt 186, 195 Zawicki, Jan 39 Zieliński, Zygmunt 200 Zimorowic, Józef Bartłomiej 18 Zinkevičius, Zigmas 246–248 Zorrilla, Alfonso 173, 198 Związek, Jan 185, 200 Zwinger, Theodor 239 Ż Żabicki, Zbigniew 62 Żelazko, Roman 186, 200 Żygulski, Zdzisław 54, 61 Żywczyński, Mieczysław 200