Gaster Moses _ Ilchester Lectures _ Greeko-slavonic Literature

8/6/2019 Gaster Moses _ Ilchester Lectures _ Greeko-slavonic Literature

1/248


2/248


3/248


4/248


5/248

GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATURE.


6/248


7/248

ILCHESTER LECTURESON

GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATUREAND ITS EELATION TO

THE FOLK-LORE OF EUROPE DURING THEMIDDLE AGES.

two Bppenfcfces an& flMates*

BY

, PH.D.

\

LONDON:TRUBNEK & CO., LUDGATE HILL.1887.

[All rights reserved.]


8/248

BALT.ANTYNE, HANSON AND CO.EDINBURGH AND LONDON


9/248

TOPROFESSOR G. I. ASCOLI

ANDPROFESSOR F. MIKLOSICH

ZTbts

GRATEFULLY DEDICATED.


10/248


11/248

PEEFACE.

THE purpose of these Mchester Lectures, deliveredat Oxford in the spring of 1886, is to show, on asmall scale, the importance of the Slavonic lite-rature in the literary history of modern Europe,and likewise to call attention to the vast materials,hitherto untouched, which are preserved in theliterature andfolk-lore of the Slavonic nations.In treating of the religious and popular litera-

ture, I confined myself to the most important textsand immediate sources. My references to autho-rities it would be very easy greatly to increase.In another work, however, I contemplate the

publication of all the Slavonic texts belongingto the apocryphal literature, in the form of anEnglish translation, with copious notes andintroductions.


12/248

viii PREFACE.In two appendices I have traced both the

origin and history of the " Bible Historiale " andof the Glagolitic Alphabet from a wholly newpoint of view.

Finally, I take great pleasure in expressing myheartiest thanks to the Trustees of the IlchesterFund for honouring me with the invitation todeliver these lectures at the far-famed Universityof Oxford. I value the honour all the more, asI had just arrived in England, an exile, banishedby the Government from my native country ofRoumania.I wish also especially to thank Mr. I. Abrahams,

who kindly assisted me in reading the proofs.M. VASTER.

London, March 1887.


13/248

CONTENTS.

i.

INTRODUCTION : VARIOUS THEORIES OF THE ORIGIN OF FOLK-LORETHE GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATURE ... I

II.

THE BOGOMILISM : ITS SPREAD AND INFLUENCE THE APO-CRYPHA OF THE OLD TESTAMENT 15

III.THE APOCRYPHA OF THE NEW TESTAMENT ANTICHRIST

LIVES OF THE SAINTS THE LETTER FROM HEAVEN ANDTHE FLAGELLANTS THE " GOLUBINAYA KNIGA " . . 45

IV.EXORCISMS AND SPELLS 75

V.ROMANTIC LITERATURE FOURTH CRUSADE ALEXANDER

TROJAN WAR DIGENIS 89YI.

APOLOGUES AND FABLES BARLAAM AND JOSAPHAT THEWISE AKIR AND SYNTIPAS IOQ


14/248

CONTENTS.

VII.THE SLAVONIC PEOPLES IN THE BALKAN PENINSULA ORIGIN

OF THE SLAVONIC LITERATURE CYRILL AND METHOD . 125

APPENDIX A.THE BIBLE HISTORIALE AND THE BIBLE OF THE POOR . 147

APPENDIX B.THE ORIGIN OF THE GLAGOLITIC ALPHABET . . . 209


15/248

I.

INTRODUCTION: VARIOUS THEORIES OF THEORIGIN OF FOLK-LORE. THE GREEKO-SLAVON1C LITERATURE.


16/248


17/248

I.

To watch the rise of new nationalities or of newliteratures is, without doubt, one of the mostinteresting spectacles ; it is to see before one's eyesscattered elements being built up into a livingorganism, with all the marks of a characteristicindividuality.

Such aprocess

of development isoften presented to our gaze, though at a distance,when we seek to follow out the progress which oneor other branch of culture has made in order toarrive at the form in which we at present havethem, as, for example, the origin of language, ofwriting, of civilisation. The same problem whichsuch questions offer is likewise presented to us bythe rise of any literature, in so far as it throws lighton the modern poetic constructions of civilisednations. The question whether it is mechanicalmixture or organic assimilation meets us at thevery outset. Hence the investigation of sources isa characteristic of our critical age. We are chieflyinterested in finding out what are the elementswhich the literary artist finds given to him, andwhich he proceeds to organise into a higher unity.


18/248

4 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERA TURE."What is the part played by the unconscious poeticactivity of the people ? what that of the con-scious art of the poet ? Nay, we must proceedfarther, and raise the question, which has hithertobeen considered unnecessary : How far have thepeople any creative imaginative power ? Do thepeoples create independently of one another poeticproducts derived immediately from the influenceof surrounding Nature ? And how far can weassume this creative impulse in modern times 1The investigations which we include under the

name of Folk-lore have had their beginning quiterecently, and have, therefore, undergone consider-able modifications and changes. It is the meritof the Eomantic school in Germany, which arose atthe end of the preceding century, to have directedattention to the hitherto neglected literature of thecommon people. Herder was the first to collectthe folk-songs of many nations. Clemens and Bren-tano made collections of the German folk-songs, asBishop Percy had done in his " Eeliques of AncientEnglish Poetry." Thence they turned to other pro-ducts of the popular imagination, especially to thefairy tales, then the sagas and legends, proverbs,riddles, and superstitions. First in these inves-tigations, both in time and importance, were thebrothers Grimm, to whom Germany owes so much.Hand in hand with the collection went the explora-tion of the popular literature, which had thus passed


19/248

INTRODUCTION. 5from the nursery and the chimney-corner into thestudy of the scholar. Grimm, the creator ofGerman mythology, is likewise the founder ofthe school which we may term the Mythological.According to this school, traces of the archaicNorthern mythology have been preserved in thefairy tales and in the whole of folk-lore. The oldgods and goddesses, dislodged from their thrones,have still survived in the form of demons, ghosts,elves, dwarfs, &c. ; and the remarkable similarity ofthe fairy tales of all nations is explained on theassumption that their mythologies were originallyidentical.By means of investigations into the Vedas, espe-

cially at the hands of Kuhn, a view of the ancientmythology was taken up which regards it as anincorporation of natural phenomena. The namesof these phenomena, Dyaus, Varuna, &c., wereaccepted as gods and worshipped. Thus manymythological words have been shown to be meta-phorical expressions for the sun, the moon, theclouds, and the rain. This having been shown forHindu mythology, the method was then applied toGreek and Northern mythology, although the cir-cumstances were here quite different ; for amongthe Greek divinities were to be found many notof Aryan origin, as Aphrodite the Syrian Militta( = Moledta, the generatrix), or Herakles thePhoenician Melkart. The problem is still more


20/248

6 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERATURE.difficult in the case of the Northern mythology,which is of comparatively much later date, atany rate as regards its appearance in a writtenform. The fairy tales being now only obscurerelics of the mythology, they must be explicablein the same manner, and must likewise be ex-plained as SUD, moon, and cloud myths. So, too,all the superstitions, customs, and generally thewhole popular thought in all its manifold mani-festations. All these, so far as they could notbe connected with the dogmatical religion, werereferred to the same mythological origin. Then,according to this view, the poets absorbed it fromthe people and developed it. This is the mostwide-spread and most popular view of the originof folk-lore, especially that of Europe.To this I append another theory, which, from

a chronological point of" view, is the latest, but theprinciple of which is closely connected with theformer. The most outspoken representative ofthis theory is Mr. A. Lang. He also considersfairy tales and customs as an ancient inheritanceof every nation, further maintaining that theyare nearly related to the mythology. So far thistheory goes hand in hand with the Mythological ;but the difference between the two is, that, accord-ing to this view, which I term Prehistorical, bothmyths and fairy tales as well as customs, are notthe outcome of etymological speculations and the


21/248

INTRODUCTION. 7embodiment of natural phenomena, but the relicsof a primitive state of savagery.The proofs adduced in support of this Prehis-

torical theory are analogies and comparisons withsimilar, or what are presumed to be similar, talesand beliefs current among primitive tribes anduncultured nations of the far East. This analogybetween them is thus explained as the result ofa similar intellectual development, where the oneretained the primitive form better and clearer thanthe other, and these tales are only like the flint-stone chips covered by a later stratum of culture.

But in the same way as our modern philologydoes not allow us to compare directly French orEnglish with Sanskrit or Zend, but retraces stepby step the history of their evolution, in the sameway can we not compare our tales and customsdirectly with those belonging to a tribe far distantin time and in space, of which we neither knowthe age nor the connection, where many links inthe chain are missing, if there is a chain at all.

This theory rests, then, like the Mythological,upon the presumption that all that we call now-a-days folk-lore is of hoar antiquity, and the genuineproperty of every nation. Both will be, therefore,shaken to their foundations if we succeed by acloser inquiry to prove that it is often the resultof a long development ; that it is relatively modern,and that the similarity between the European and


22/248

8 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERATURE.the primitive and tribal folk-lore is a deceptiveone, or ought to be explained in quite anotherway.

Indeed, the Mythological theory, and in this waythe Prehistorical too, received a severe blow fromanother, which I term the Theory of Migration.

Benfey, in his celebrated introduction to thePantchatantra, applied first this theory to thegreatest part of European folk-tales, tracing themto their Oriental origin and proving their compara-tively recent date. They passed, as he shows, fromnation to nation, very often in written form, andfrom this passed to the people, among whom theywere assimilated more and more to the peculiari-ties of each nation. The same contents received adifferent and a national form.*

The folk-tales have now no longer claim to beconsidered as mythological, and the influence towhich they owed their origin was quite the oppositeof this. For the most part, they became the commonproperty of the European nations through literarytransmission. This has been proved, further, formany modern fairy tales. Thus Boccaccio's taleof " Griseldis " has been followed till it became afairy tale. Thus, too, the story of Genevieve, ori-

* In a remarkable essay Professor Max Miiller has carried out the sameline of thought, and has shown the travels of an Eastern tale through anumber of literatures, till it reached Lafontaine, and followed its tracesstep by step till the story becomes more and more Europeanised andnationalised.


23/248

INTRODUCTION. 9ginally a miracle of the Holy Virgin, has likewisebecome a fairy tale. Examples of this might beeasily multiplied, showing clearly the influence ofwritten literature on oral tradition.

Proceeding a step farther, we may apply thistheory of migration, or better, this Historical theory,not only to the fairy tales to which it was confined,but also to the other branches of popular literature,like sagas, legends, adventures, and superstitions,and finally to the Northern mythology itself. Can-not the foreign and literary origin of this be proved?Are all those marvellous tales and fabulous beingsoriginally European ? Is the naive poetic world ofthe common folk filled with superstitions, creeds,and legends regarding the most unnatural and un-expected events as the most ordinary things inthe world, the remainder and residue of an old,forgotten mythology, and of a more ancient state ofsavagery ? or have they been brought on the crestof a mighty wave of culture to the furthermostshores of Europe, and thus form one stratum in allthe peoples of Europe ? Can we not in this wayexplain their similarity to one another ?The very advance of our spiritual and imagina-

tive life hides from us any direct vision of thisdevelopment. Much has been destroyed, and wemust deal with the remainder as with a palimpsest.We have to take in hand some decomposing prin-ciple which shall remove the more recent writing


24/248

io GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERATURE.and enable us to decipher the faded relics of theolder signs. But that which eludes our grasp inthe West of Europe is offered to us in rich pro-fusion by the East, especially the South-East, withits own peculiar culture. The Greeko-Slavic worldhas remained in nearly the same condition asEurope was when it was ruled solely by Chris-tian thought and by Christian civilisation alone.While the West has advanced farther, the Greeko-Slavic world has remained at this point, and accord-ingly its literature is to us of peculiar interest, asit enables us to observe accurately the processby which a written literature, generally of foreignorigin, influences oral folk-literature. We see thealien element accepted and assimilated, the popularimagination gradually enriched. We can then ob-serve the reaction of this latter on poetic genius,which takes in the feelings and thoughts of thepeople, and expresses them in elevated and elevat-ing artistic form.

I term the body of literature with which I con-template dealing the Greeko-Slavonic, because itis confined to works translated from the Greek intoSlavic tongues, and where we have, therefore, theliterary sources beyond any doubt.

Bulgaria, as we shall see in the short historicalsketch with which I conclude this work, was, after astruggle for centuries, incorporated into Byzantium,and the influence of Greek, already great, became


25/248

INTRODUCTION. 11the sole influence for two centuries. The wholeliterature was modelled after the Greek, and evenlater, after independence had been secured under theAsenides, Greek retained much of its power. Thusarose the literature which we term for this reasonGreeko-Slavonic.

This literature is not only that of the Bulgarians,but is also the Church literature of the Servians,Croatians, Koumanians, and Eussians ; and it beganearly to spread over these lands. The Old Slavoniantongue in which it is written has remained the holyor Church language of these lands up to the presentday, except in Koumania, where it was supersededin the seventeenth century by the vernacular.Thus this literature, together with the Greek,offers the counterpart of the Latin civilisation,favoured in a far higher degree, as this was, bysocial and political circumstances.

Besides the interest which this literature affordsus, as I have sketched out above, as regards folk-lore and the history of civilisation, it also givesmaterial of no small critical worth for dealing withGreek, and especially Middle Greek literature.Many a work of the Byzantine period has beenpreserved for us in an improved form because itwas early translated into Slavonic. Modern science,both in profane and in ecclesiastical history, hasbegun to make use of these Slavonic texts for criticalpurposes as yet only in a sporadic manner, as


26/248

12 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.both the extent of this literature and its languagehave prevented access to foreign investigators.

I select from the whole field of Greeko-Slavonicliterature, not the dogmatical, but rather that por-tion which shows a living course of development,and brings before our eyes an example of the pro-cess by which the spiritual wealth of a people isincreased. By this means the clue will be given usto many an imaginative product which we meetwith in folk-lore, and which we have hitherto re-garded as the peculiar property of the people, or asthe survival of earlier mythological conceptions.Investigation into these matters is only in itsinfancy, and we have first to settle the facts, if wedo not wish to lose ourselves in the field of vaguehypotheses. It is, therefore, the heretical andpoetical literature that will engage our attention,likewise derived from -the Greek, yet powerfullyinfluencing not alone the Bulgarians, but also allthe other nations who came in contact^ with theOld Slavonian language and literature. Manytraces will be seen in the mediaeval literature ofWestern Europe, and I hope to be able to provethat the religious literature was the most importantfactor in this branch of the development of Euro-pean civilisation, and that the influence of the OldSlavonian literature was just as important and deci-sive towards the "West as it was towards the East.The results at which we shall arrive will accordingly


27/248

INTRODUCTION. 13permit of an application to the whole literature ofthe Middle Ages, in which many points will appearunder an entirely new light.

The fantastic and imaginative apocryphal litera-ture, the romances and epics, the didactic fables,were touched by wide religious movements inBulgaria, and have exercised a deep influence onthe imagination of the nations. Folk-lore aroseout of a written literature, whose traces we meetwith in saga and romance, in religious and epicpoems, in riddles and tales, and even in popularbeliefs, customs, and habits. In the following pagesI shall attempt to sketch this literature in a briefoutline, devoting the greatest attention to the mostconspicuous points, as well as to those least knownin Western Europe. Within the circle of our inves-tigations we shall thus include the Apocrypha ofthe Old and New Testament, the literature ofhistory, legend, and amulets, and lastly, the litera-ture of the fable, as it was transformed from litera-ture into folk-lore.


28/248


29/248

II.

THE BOGOMILISM; ITS SPREAD AND INFLU-ENCE. THE APOCRYPHA OF THE OLDTESTAMENT.


30/248


31/248

II.

THE BOGOMILISM; ITS SPREAD AND INFLU-ENCE. THE APOCRYPHA OF THE OLDTESTAMENT.


32/248


33/248

IT.

AT the same time with the culmination of the Bul-garian power and the Bulgarian literature (whichI shall portray at the end of these lectures) begana powerful religious movement, which was accom-panied by results of far-reaching consequence. Irefer to the heretical movement known under thename of Bogomilism, which ruled Bulgaria for notless than five centuries, and left indelible traces inthe spiritual life of the Slavonic nations.A more thorough - going investigation of thismovement in its spread throughout Europe leadsus to still more astonishing results. We comeacross traces of it everywhere, and a good partof the religious literature which later on becamefolk-literature may be traced back to the influ-ence of these heretical sects. Even the romancesof chivalry, when divested of their trappings, showthemselves as Oriental tales that have found theirway (always a long way, and often a dark one)through many intermediaries to the place wherethey are now found.As this view of mine is more or less novel, I will

permit myself to enter into it in some detail. This


34/248

i8 GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATURE.is the more permissible as we are dealing at thesame time with the earliest and least altered literaryremains of the Slavonic literature upon which I amcalled to lecture, and these form besides the greaterpart of it.At the time of the conversion of the Bulgarians to

Christianity, there were to be found at the Bulgariancourt ambassadors or missionaries from the Pauli-cians or Manichseans of Asia Minor. In additionto these there were a number of Jews, who had alsocome to convert the people to their belief, whilethey were still hesitating about Christianity. ThePaulicians had settled in Thrace at an earlier date.The Emperor Constantine Copronymos transporteda large number of them in the eighth century fromAsia Minor, and thus at the same time transplantedthe seed of Manichseism in the modified form intro-duced by Constantine of Samosata. The success ofthese Paulicians, as they termed themselves, wasvery great, and in the tenth century they had theresix churches. This religious movement attainedto particular importance through the appearance ofthe priest (Popa) Jeremiah (c. 940), who called him-self Bogo-mil, i.e., Theo-philus, like the disciple ofSt. Paul. After him his followers termed them-selves Bogomili, and Bogomilism kept a foremostplace in the history of the Balkan peninsula formany centuries. In Bulgaria itself it became sopowerful in a short time, that councils were fre-


35/248

BOGOMILISM. 19quently assembled at Sofia to oppose its heresies.But all these efforts were in vain. Bogomilism hadtaken too deep a root in the heart of the people ;its power could not be destroyed. This movementspread even farther, Thrace became the cradle ofan analogous movement throughout Europe. Theapostles

of Bogomilism carried their creed first tothe coast of the Adriatic, then to Italy, whence themovement spread to Germany and Southern France,and even as far as England, where at Oxford in thetwelfth century a council was summoned by HenryII. to take steps to eradicate a new kind of heresywhich had made its appearance in London andYork. Under different names we find practicallythe same heretical sects from the tenth to the thir-teenth century in the following places : In Bul-garia, Macedonia, and even on the Black Sea, andin Russia towards the east : in the West, in Italy,especially in Lombardy, Mantua, Verona, Treviso,Bergamo, Milan, Piacenza,Ferrara, Bologna, Faenza,and Orvieto ; in France, throughout the south, butalso in Paris, Orleans, Rheims, and Brittany; andin Belgium and Holland, and over the whole basinof the Rhine Metz, Strassburg, Cologne, Bonn,Triers, and G-oslar. We have already referred toEngland.* It is clear that this movement was alasting one, and could not have been without en-during influence.

* Wesselofsky, Solomon i Kitovras, St. Petersburg, 1872, p. 142 seq.


36/248

20 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERATURE.These sectarians called themselves simply " Good

People," " Good Christians," " Christian Poor ; " byothers they were named Bogomils, Manicliceans,Paulicians, Patarenes in Italy, Kathars in France'and Germany (whence the German Ketzer), andlikewise Bulgarians (whence the French Boulgres,Bougre). All this shows that they everywhereretained relations with their spiritual fatherland,and that the leaders of the movement in Bulgariawere recognised by them as authorities. Thus, inthe year 1167, Nikita, the bishop of the Bogomilsof Constantinople, issued a summons for a councilof the French Kathars to be held in Toulouse.A survey of their doctrines also shows the sameunity of belief among them. Their fundamentalprinciple was Oriental dualism as developed byMani. It is still undecided whether and how farBuddhist influences we're also at work. This worldthey regarded as the work of Satanael, i.e., ofSatan-God, who is a fallen angel. The misery ofthis world is therefore his work, as he fightsagainst the good and tries to destroy everything.But redemption had come with Christ ; the OldCovenant, which Adam had made with Satanael,had been broken by Christ. But only the Bogo-mils or Kathars (i.e., Pure Ones) are the truefollowers of His teaching, and man could onlyattain to holiness by entering their communion,and by this means he could save his soul from


37/248

BOGOMILISM. 21farther transmigration through human bodies ;for metempsychosis formed part of their belief.They therefore laid upon themselves all kinds ofmortifications, and their leaders and old men livedas ascetics. On the other hand, they threw overthe doctrines of the dominant Church, based theirfaith more upon the Holy "Writ, excluded thecross from their religious symbols, and advocatedfreedom from the domination of the CatholicChurch and of the nobility. Eschatology formedalso a favourite topic of theirs the theory of theLast Things. Thus the two extremes of creationand destruction, beginning and end, cosmogonyand eschatology, the fall and the redemption,formed the chief subjects of their thought, andlikewise the chief contents of their preaching.

Their views about an evil principle found readyacceptance among the serfs, while their antagonis-tic attitude towards the Church and the nobilitymade them acceptable to the opponents of bothinstitutions. If we add that they propagated theirdoctrines chiefly and solely in the vernacular lan-guages, and that they clothed their views in theguise of fantastic and poetic tales, we can thenform some idea of the deep impression their doc-trines must have made. This is confirmed byhistory when it speaks of a crusade against theAlbigenses and of one against the Bosnian heretics,to which the whole of Christendom had to be


38/248

22 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.summoned by the Pope. And yet it was notcompletely stamped out ; we find an echo of themovement in the Flagellants and the Hussites.Europe had been shaken to its very depths by theCrusades just before, and by this means the soilhad been prepared for this new heretical move-ment.Now in the literature of this period we notice

a remarkable transformation. The old epic songsof the cycle of Charlemagne gave way to newpoems filled with adventure and imagination; songsand sagas free from the fetters of space and timemake their appearance ; a whole cycle of popularreligious literature arises. Can all this be acci-dental and without any relation to the hereticalmovement ? Hitherto investigators, with but fewexceptions, have not thought of any connectionbetween the two.

But a careful examination of the chief elementsof their origin shows us that in most of them wehave only the disguised figures of other w^ell-known pieces. Merlin and Arthur, as well asMarculph and Saturn, are no other than Solomonand Asmodeus. In the saga of the Holy Grail wehave echoes of Oriental tales. And more ; the sameinfluence is found in folk-songs and in popularmanners and customs. The mediaeval belief inSatan, with its outcome, witchcraft, as we shudderto see it in the protocols of the Inquisition, is the


39/248

BOGOMILISM. 23child of the dualism of the Kathars and Bogomils.Here \ve find the rule of Satanael on earth as akind of counterpart of the rule of God in heaven.It was but a short step to worship him, so as toobtain favour with him, or, on the other hand, tomake amulets as a protection against his power.The literary activity of the Bogomils was indeed

by no means slight. Popa Jeremiah himself is saidto have written much, e.g., the "Legend of theCross," " How Christ became Pope," &c. But thechief use was made of the Apocryphal writings,which were translated from the Greek, or ratherrevised in a sense corresponding to their wishes.They were even very well read in the HolyScriptures, and at one time their bishop in Bul-garia boasted that there was not a single oneamong his 4000 disciples who did not know theScriptures by heart. Now it is a very remarkablefact that the earliest translations of the Bible intothe vernacular languages, especially into Frenchand Italian, were not made from the Latin Vulgate,but without doubt from the Greek, or from one ofthe translations derived from it. In all probabilitythey came from the Kathars, and were possiblytranslated from the Slavonian. And, in fact, wecan easily explain this ; for every religious reformbegins with the study of the Bible; and again,these sects could only influence the common peopleby means of the vernacular. \Ye may now go a


40/248

24 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.step farther, and ask what kind of Bible was itwhich they used ? Did they confine themselvesto the simple translation of the text, or did theyrather adorn and amplify it so as to suit theirviews and to make it more pleasant and accessibleto the people whom they wished to convert ?From the earliest times, as soon as the Bible hadbecome the Book, /car e^o^v, the source of all faithand knowledge, the naive readers could not remainsatisfied with its plain contents, often incomplete,and at times seemingly contradictory. Many ofits stories were too short, many names merelymentioned in the Bible : on these points piouscuriosity needed to be satisfied. The reader wouldask : How did Adam plough the earth, for hecould have no knowledge of that art? How didCain know about death, and how did his parentsbury Abel, for previously there had been neitherdeath nor burial ? Again, what is meant by sayingthat God took Enoch ? What was the punishmentof Cain ? Who was Melchisedek, and why was hecalled a priest ? Such questions could be askedad infinitum. As a consequence, a number oflegends arose already in earliest times, intended tofill these lacunae and find answers to all these ques-tions. These form the Apocryphal Literature,which only became of practical importance whenit was adapted by heretical sects to their ownneeds. These tales were often of a poetic cast,


41/248

BIBLE-HISTORIA LE. 25derived from the popular taste and glowing imagi-nation, which made them most suitable for a widecirculation among the people. The heretics alteredvarious points in them in agreement with theviews which they professed. And since theseApocrypha were represented as the work of Biblicalpersonages, the doctrines and sayings put in theirmouths gained additional influence. For thisreason the Apocrypha were particularly favouredby all sects, whereas the Orthodox Church oftencondemned them, as in the well-known DecretaGelasii, the lists of Athanasius and Nicephorus.

It is thus by no means surprising that we findthe greater part of these Apocrypha in the OldSlavonian literature of the Bogomils, and for themost part with very slight alterations, which in-creases their value for critical purposes. Some ofthese are even attributed to Popa Jeremiah himself,among them the "Legend of the Cross," as Ihave already mentioned. As we shall see, how-ever, he merely altered older Apocrypha to accordwith his views.

The original sources of this literature, which tra-velled through Europe and left permanent tracesof its influence on literature, poetry, painting, andsculpture, are Greek texts, which came to Con-stantinople from the East and passed on thence tothe Bogomils. A second source, equally Oriental inits origin, was supplied by Jewish legends, found in


42/248

26 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.the Haggadical writings, and in particular in a bookcalled SepJier Hayashar. This book, which hasthe title of a work quoted in the Bible (Joshua x.13), is a kind of Biblical history, wherein Genesisand Exodus are completed by numerous ancientlegends, which are mostly incorporated withoutalteration. Thus the Biblical history becomes aBiblical romance ; truth and fiction are inextri-cably mixed, and form together a complete Bibleadapted to pious readers. It did not, however,prevent separate sections existing in independentform as, for example, the story of Abraham andMmrod, the struggles of the sons of Jacob withthe inhabitants of Palestine, the legends of thebirth and death of Moses, &c., &c.

Precisely the same thing we have before us in theOld Slavonian literature of the Bogomils. We havespecial Apocryphal writings attributed to variouspersonages ; we have also though this has beenhitherto unknown an Old Slavonian Bible-story,in which all these legends form one whole, andwhich enjoyed enormous popularity and wide-spreadcirculation. This Bible-story, called Palcea (i.e.,IlaXata AiaQ^Krf), may have been originally copiedfrom a Greek model, but in its existent and per-haps extended form it contains several legendswhich are almost literally translated from theSepher Hayashar. This Palcea belongs probablyto the tenth century, and is thus several centuries


43/248

OLD TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 27older than the corresponding works in Germanyand France. These are independent of Comestor'swork Historia Scliolastica, which, as I may incident-ally remark, usurped later on the name of the BibliaHistoriale. The Speculum Historiale of St. Vin-cent of Beauvais is likewise a kind of Bible-story.Neither of these have hitherto been satisfactorilytraced to their origin. It is only natural to assumethat, like the earliest translations of the Bible,these Bible-stories may have been derived fromthe heretical sects, especially as these Bible-storieswould find an even easier access to the peopleowing to their legendary and poetic form. It is,of course, also possible that they were afterwardsrevised and freed from their heretical elements.A few traces of these still remain, e.g., a cosmogonyvarying in order and in details from that of Gene-sis. Other details confirming this view must behere omitted, as I devote a special chapter to amore close inquiry into the origin and the sourcesof these Bible-histories.* I must content myselfhere with these short hints and revert to the storyBible as it appears in Slavonic literature.As I have already remarked, this contains anumber of Old Testament Apocrypha, to which itis confined. Instead of going through them all, Iwill select some of them of special importance fortheir wide-spread or deep influence, and follow

* Appendix A.


44/248

28 GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATURE.these through the stages of their development tillthey become part and parcel of the popular mind.I reserve the Apocrypha of the New Testament forthe next chapter, as they present peculiar features,and form a transition to the literature of amulets.

Looking to the cosmogony,"" we find that itpresents an unusual form. On the first day Godcreated heaven and earth ; on the second, sun,moon, and stars ; on the third, paradise ; on thefourth, the sea; on the fifth, birds and beasts; onthe sixth, Adam; and on the seventh God breathedinto him the breath of life. It is, as it were, acounterpart of St. Basil's Hexaemeron, whichattempted to explain the creation according tothe Bible. The fallen angels then occupy a largespace, but I must here pass them over, as they douot offer anything special, and the legend neverexisted as a separate Apocryphon.

Of still greater length and of far wider import-ance are the legends which deal with the creationof man, his fall, repentance, and death. Themind of Christendom has always laid great weightupon all this, in order to reach its scheme ofredemption, to which everything in the Biblicalstories had to refer, as the goal of human fate.Beginning and end of the process had to be com-bined, and the pious required a prophetic glimpseof the final redemption while dealing with the

* Tihonravov, Pamjatniki otreEennoi russkoi literatury, St. Petersburg,Moscau, 1863, ii. p. 443 seq.


45/248

OLD TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 29beginning of sin. This association of ideas, per-ceiving in the Biblical history a religious drama,where the restoration of the fallen humanity isforeshadowed in the Old Testament and fulfilled inthe New Testament, is an essential characteristic ofthis heretical literature, to which I will revert,and which I hope will give us the key for theorigin of the mediaeval Biblia Historiale, and inconnection with it the " Bible of the Poor."Hence the extent and number of apocryphaltales dealing with this episode. These receivedvarious names, such as Historia Adce et Evce, orthe "Legend of the Cross/' or the "Pilgrimage ofSeth to Heaven." In Slavonic we have, in thefirst place, the creation of man told in the favouriteform of question and answer, as we find it fre-quently in the Middle Ages, especially in the so-called Lucidarius. In a fifteenth-century copy ofthis Slavonic text

*we read as follows :" Question. What holds up the earth ?" Answer. The water.

" Question. And what the water ?" Answer. A mighty rock." Question. And what the mighty rock ?" Answer. Four golden fishes (whales)." Question. And what the fishes ?" Ansiver. A stream of fire." Question, And what holds the fire ?

* Tihonravov, 1.1.


46/248

30 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERATURE." Answer. A fire double as hot." Question. And what holds up this fire ?"Answer. An iron tree, which was the first thing

created, and its roots are supported by God."Then comes the cosmogony, which we have given,

only it is in the form of question and answer, whichcontinue as follows :

" Question. How did God create Adam ?"Answer. Out of eight things: earth, sea, stone,

wind, sun, thought, the speed of the angels, andfinally from the Holy Ghost."

This is made clearer in another MS, of the sameage. "The body is made out of earth, the bloodfrom the sea, the eyes from the sun, the thoughtsfrom the clouds, the bones of stone, the breathfrom the wind, fertility from fire, and the livingspirit out of God Himself." *

Both of these accounts have now-a-days becomethe common property of the people among all theSlavonic nations. These as well as the Eoumaniansrepeat them in their songs, creeds, and in theirreligious ideas, and I might quote innumerableexamples if I dared linger over this point. Evento the present day the people explain an earth-quake as a movement of the fish on which theearth rests. Even in the popular recitations atRoumanian weddings.the origin of man is describedexactly in the same way as the above.

* Pypin, Ocferku literaturnoi istorii starinyhu povestei, St. Petersburg,1858, p. 140.


47/248

ADAM AND EVE. 31The tree on which the earth stands is of Oriental

origin, and occurs again in Northern mythology inthe form of the Ygdrasil. There we find a parallelaccount of the creation of man, but in invertedorder : the giant Ymir creates the world out of hisown limbs, the sea out of his own blood, the moun-tains out of his bones, the rocks out of his teeth,the heavens out of his skull, the clouds out of hishumour, and the trees out of his hair.* A corre-sponding cosmogony is to be found among theManichseans,t according to whom the world wascreated out of the first man, the Urmensch of theGermans, the Adam Kadmon of the Jews. Italso occurs in popular Russian literature, in thecelebrated Golubinaya Kniga, in which the mostheterogeneous elements have been combined intoan epic whole, and which may be regarded as theoutcome of a whole cycle of apocryphal stories. Iwill therefore give it complete in a literal transla-tion at the end of the treatment of the apocryphalliterature.

After Adam and Eve had been created by God,they were tempted by Satan in the form of asnake with a woman's head ; they fell into sin, andwere driven out of Paradise. All this, togetherwith their repentance and their contract withSatan, forms the so-called " Confession of Eve"

* Grimm, Germ. Mythology, ed. iv., p. 464 seq.t Flugel, Mani, p. 87 seq., and the annotations.


48/248

32 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERA TURE.(Ispovedanye Evyne), which is also an introductionto the "Legend of the Cross," and indeed representsa peculiar treatment of it. Its contents are plainlydualistic, which settles its origin without difficulty.Slightly condensed, it runs as follows : *"Eve tells her children that when God hadcreated everything, all things stood under her rule,and no beast dared to touch her. But then camethe Devil in the form of a bright angel and tried toseduce her. She repulsed him, and then came theserpent as a bright angel and offered her the for-bidden fruit. She trusted in the serpent, as favouredby God, and ate, and gave some to Adam. Imme-diately the leaves fell from all the trees except thefig-tree. Then God drove them from Paradise. TheArchangel loil interceded for Adam and Eve invain. They stood for a fortnight before the gatesof Paradise, and then bad to leave in order to findsomething to eat, but they found only thistles. Sothey returned to Paradise, and Adam complainedof the good fortune which he had lost, and beggedGod to give him at least a flower as a remembranceof it. God therefore sent to him incense (ladan andliban). At their further request, God sent themthe Archangel loil, and he gave them the seventhpart of Paradise for them to work in ; at the sametime he sent all the animals out of Paradise, andgave them to Adam. Adam, however, had scarcely

* Gaster, Literatura populara romana, Bucuresti, 1883, p. 271 seq.


49/248

ADAM AND EVE. 33begun to plough the earth, when Satan appearedand said, ' The earth is mine : Paradise andheaven belong to God. If you are willing to be-come mine, you may till the earth ; but if youwish to belong to God, go back to Paradise/Adam answered, ' The earth and the heavens areGod's.' The Devil said, ' Give me a written agree-ment that you are my property, and I will leaveyou/ And Adam said, ' I and my children be-long to Him whose is the earth/ Thereupon theDevil rejoiced, and broke a stone and wrote thisupon it. (Another variant makes Adam place hishand upon it, leaving a trace of it on the stone.)The Devil preserved this stone in the Jordan, andplaced four hundred devils to guard it. When theSaviour came, He placed Himself on this stonewhen He was baptized in the Jordan, and brokeit, so that the agreement between Adam and theDevil was at an end."Adam now went before the gates of Paradise

and cried and mourned ; at last he determined todo penance. Eve went to the river Tigris andstood in it forty days ; nevertheless the Devil triedto deceive her twice, once in the form of an angel,the other time in that of Adam. After the fortydays Adam came himself, who had done penance inthe Jordan, and removed her ; thus they were bothfreed from the Devil. Many years passed by ;Adam became ill ; his children assembled around


50/248

34 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERATURE.them and asked them what was the matter, forthey had never before seen anybody ill. Eve saidthat he had a longing for the fruits of Paradise,and that this was the cause of his illness. There-upon Seth determined to go to Paradise and bringsomething thence to satisfy his father. He camethere, and obtained from the angel a branch of thetree of which they had eaten. Adam recognisedthe tree, drew a deep sigh, and waved the branchround his head and died. Three angels withlights came to bury him. After these angels hadprayed for a long time, God received the soul ofAdam

graciously. Adam was then buried by Sethin the spot called Gherusia Plata. A voice calledout to Adam, ' Remember what I said to you :Earth thou art, and unto earth thou shalt re-turn/ The voice called out to the earth, ' Itis thine, and was formed from thee : to thee allthings return.' And Eve died six days after.Out of Adam's head a huge tree grew."

The source of this narrative is the so-calledApocalypse of Moses ;* but this does not containthe characteristic point of the contract betweenAdam and Satan, in which the dualistic principleis clearly expressed. Every single episode of thistale occurs again in varied form in popular litera-ture. The complaint of Adam is everywhere re-peated wherever this story reached in Bulgaria,

* Tischendorf, Apocalypses Apocryphse, Leipzig, 1866, pp. 1-32.


51/248

LEGEND OF THE CROSS. 35Servia, Roumania, and Russia. Curiously enough,the contract survived in nearly literal form in mostof the reproductions. A part of these popularsongs became star-songs, or, as they are called inEngland, Christmas carols. Iconography also madeuse of the legend, and Eiissian pilgrims often referto the stone on which Christ stood at His baptism.

In close connection with this legend stands the" Legend of the Cross," one of the most wide-spreadand celebrated of the Middle Ages. It is found inLatin MSS. of the twelfth century, and finds a placein Provengal, Italian, German, and English litera-ture. The legend in its simplest form is part of theapocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, and it has oftenbeen versified. References to it are to be found inDante. It was made the subject of a poem byGottfried and Viterbo, and of a drama by Cal-deron. It is, of course, accepted by the Bogomils,and attributed to Popa Jeremiah, their founder.In Old Slavonic it is still extant in two forms, ofwhich one is by Gregorius Theologus, the other by acertain Severian Gavalski. I will here give the ver-sion which comes nearest to the original Bogomilistform, and is more extensive than the parallels ofWestern Europe. In the Old Slavonian version thehistory of all the three crosses is given, whereas in theWest onlythat of the Saviour is dealtwith. Broughtinto proper order,* the legend runs as follows :* Cf. Wesselofsky, Razyskanija, St. Petersburg, 1883, x. pp. 367-424.


52/248

36 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERA TURE." When God created the world, only He and

Satanael were in existence. The latter stole someof all the seeds which God sowed in the earth, andplanted them in Paradise. Thereupon God drovehim out of Paradise, and Satanael became black.From the seeds he had planted rose a mighty treewith three branches ; one belonging to Adam, theother to Eve, and the third to God. At the Fall,Adam's branch fell into the Tigris, and was takenout therefrom ; Eve's was carried by the Flood to aplace called Merra. After the death of Adam, Sethkindled a perpetual fire in his memory by the sideof the tree, and placed wild beasts to guard it.When Lot sinned, Abraham set him as a penanceto bring three logs from the tree, to plant them andtend them with water, which he should bring inhis mouth. His sin would be forgiven when thelogs had grown. They grew into a mighty tree.Moses took the second root, and with it made sweetthe bitter waters of Marah. Both the trees werebrought to Jerusalem by King Solomon to be usedin the building of the Temple, but they could notbe adapted to that purpose. At times they weretoo short, at times too long. On one of them QueenSivila (i.e., of Sheba) sate and burnt herself, where-upon the trees were hidden in the Temple. It wason these trees that the two thieves were crucified,the good thief on Lot's, and the wicked one onEve's.


53/248

LEGEND OF THE CROSS. 37" Now Seth had brought a branch of the third

tree to his father, who made himself a crown out ofit, in which he was buried. Out of this grew awonderful tree, with three trunks that yet formedbut one. This tree was brought by the demons toSolomon, who by this means obtained possession ofAdam's skull, which was in the roots of the tree.This was so huge that a servant of Solomon oncetook refuge in it from a storm. Solomon orderedthe skull to be brought to Jerusalem, and to bestoned. This was the origin of the place calledLithostroton (also Golgotha). This tree also wasof no use for building purposes, and was taken up.'It became the Cross of the Saviour. When Christwas crucified on it, His blood fell through the rockupon the head lying beneath, thus freeing Adamfrom sin, and redeeming him."

This is the Slavonic form of the legend, and therecan be no doubt as to how it arose. The mentionof Satanael alone would prove its heretical origin,and still more the whole line of thought, so far asit is preserved after the orthodox revision that ithas undergone. It is only from the standpoint ofBogomilism, which rejected the cross, that we canexplain the planting of it being attributed to Sata-nael, or the trait that the demons brought it toJerusalem.

Of the other episodes I will only linger over thatrelating to Lot, which reminds us of Aaron's rod,


54/248

38 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.and which, in the form of a symbol of repentance,has spread so far. Who does not remember thesaga of Tannhauser, or the innumerable Slavonic,Koumanian, German, and French legends in whichthe blossoming tree is a sign of sin and for-giveness ? * Still more numerous are the legendsin which the appearance of blossoms on deadbranches is mentioned, though these are undoubt-edly derived from the Biblical story. Amongothers, I may mention a saga about Charlemagne,which is preserved in Turpin's Chronicle. Saintsinnumerable have performed the same miracle, andeven the beginning of Bohemian history is con-nected with a similar miracle.

I must pass over other apocryphal stories, andcan only refer to the rich embellishment which thestories of Cain, Laniech, Noah, and others received.Melchisedek, who is specially mentioned in theNew Testament, is represented by three Apocrypha,which aim at explaining his omission of the nameof his parents and his character as " priest ofGod." The best known is that translated fromthe Greek of Athanasius, which represents himmeeting Abraham in the beginning and beingselected as priest by the latter.A favourite theme was the life of Abraham, hisdestruction of the idols of Nineveh, his contestwith Nimrod, and so on up. to his death. With

* Gaster, I c.


55/248

LEGENDS OF ABRAHAM. 39regard to the last topic, we have in Slavonic litera-ture an Apocryphon which, so far as is at presentknown, has not been found in Greek, though therecan be no doubt that it originally existed in thatlanguage. It is there described how Abraham wastaken up into heaven, and saw there the judg-ment of men after death ; he returns to earth, andstruggles against death with all his might. Deathappears to him in an attractive form, and finallydeceives him into drinking his cup of poison.Founded on an earlier Oriental legend dealingwith the death of Moses, this Apocryphon forms amodel of a whole series of similar imaginativeproducts portraying the struggle between manand death, and the final victory of the latter.Almost all literatures present examples of this,especially in the form of folk-songs. In modernGreek, the conflict of the hero Aniketos (Kussian,Anika-voyn) or Digenis AJcritas with Charon andwith death forms the subject of such songs. Imay also remind you of the danses macabres ofthe Middle Ages, of Titian's celebrated picture,&c. The counterpart of this, the flight of thehero to the land of the immortals, is an equallywide-spread theme from Ireland to India. But wecannot linger here, nor even on the Testaments ofthe twelve sons of Jacob (of which we have aSlavonic translation of the fourteenth century, of im-portance for the criticism of the Greek text), nor at


56/248

40 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.tHe minor legends about Moses, but must pass onat once to the legends about Solomon, which are ofsuch importance in the history of literature.The Biblical accounts of the wisdom and riches

of Solomon, the visit of the Queen of Sheba, thebuilding of the Temple, and so on, caused him, evenin early times, to be made the hero of a wholecycle of legends, round which other stories andlegends, derived from various sources, crystallised.These in their turn underwent so many changesin their wanderings towards Europe, that it oftenrequires a special investigation before we canrecognise the original legend in its latest form. Iwill draw attention to two of the episodes, becauseone of them had great influence on Russian epicpoetry, and the other is connected with the sagaof Merlin and with Bertoldo. Let us begin withthe latter.*

"In order to build the Temple, Solomon triedto get Kitovras (i.e., Kentauros), the chief of thedemons, into his power. His general seized Kito-vras, bound him with a chain, on the links ofwhich the name of God was written, and broughthim to Jerusalem. They went straight on, but asthey would have destroyed the house of a widow ifthey had continued to do so, Kitovras broke one ofhis ribs in two in order to avoid it. He heard a manasking for shoes which should last seven years ; he

* Wesselofsky, Solom. i Kitovras, p. 209 seq.


57/248

LEGENDS OF SOLOMON. 41burst out laughing. He sees a prophet ; he laughsagain. He sees a wedding ; he weeps. Finally,he guides a drunkard the right way. Whenbrought before Solomon, he casts at his feet a rodfour feet in length. He explains to Solomon thatthe bird Nogot possesses the worm Shamir, bywhich stones can be split without the aid of iron,the use of which was forbidden in the Temple.He then explained what had happened. He hadlaughed at the buyer of shoes, because he had onlyseven days to live. The prophet stood over atreasure, and promised good luck to other peoplewhen he could not tell his own. The newlymarried bride would die in three days ; and thedrunkard was a just man, of whom it was said inheaven that he was worthy of protection. Therod gave the length of the grave which wouldreceive Solomon at his death, though he was nowso ambitious of power."This remarkable tale is originally Talmudical,where the demon is called Ashmedai, here Kitovras,from the Greek Kentauros. The story occurs ina German form under the name of Solomon andMarkolph, and develops into a mere dialoguebetween a king and a sharp-witted but vulgarman. Between the two we have the saga ofMerlin, in which Merlin plays the part of Ashmedai-Kitovras ; for he is brought before King Arthur,goes through the same exploits on the way, and


58/248

42 GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATURE.explains them during the interview.^ We have,further, the dialogue between Ben Sira and Nebu-Jcadnezar, and in a later form, in Anglo-Latin,a dialogue between Saturn and Marolph, and astill later development in Bertoldo, the well-knownItalian chapbook.

Still more like a romance is the other specificallySlavonic story of Solomon and Kitovras or Solomonand POT. This runs as follows : Kitovras hears ofthe beauty of Solomon's wife, and sends a magicianto bewitch her. He succeeds, and brings her toKitovras. Solomon comes in disguise, after he hadarrayed his army dressed in three uniforms beforethe city. His wife recognises him and delivershim up to Kitovras, who orders him to be hanged.Solomon begs as a last favour that the trumpetsbe blown three times, as he is a king. At thissignal his army advances in its battalions, red,white, and black (explained by Solomon as fire,clouds, and devils). They kill Kitovras and hispeople, and likewise the faithless wife. This tale,either in whole or in part, has passed almost literallyinto all the popular literatures of these peoples,and out of it stories and tales, and especially epicsongs, have been made. I mention only Eoland,who blows three times his trumpet, &c.

Less important are the legends of the destructionof Jerusalem and the seventy years' sleep of Abed-* Ellis, Early English Metrical Romances, ed. Halliwell, 1848, p. 31 set}.


59/248

THE BABYLONIAN KINGDOM. 43melekli. He afterwards receives Jeremiah when hereturns from exile with his people ; Jeremiah, seeinga heavenly vision, announces the coming of theMessiah, whereupon he is stoned by the people.The story, which is only to be found in Slavonic,modern Greek, Eoumanian, and ^Ethiopic, seemsalso to be one of the old apocryphal legends, whichhave hitherto been regarded as lost.

Finally, we may refer to the legend of the Baby-lonian kingdom, in which a king orders the image ofa dragon to be placed on all objects. As a punish-ment God causes all these dragons to spring intolife and devour the

people, while round the city animmense snake coiled itself. There is the graveof Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and thencethe messenger of the Emperor Leo brings a crownsent by these saints.^ That Babylon was the homeof dragons and basilisks was a wide-spread beliefduring the Middle Ages, and of this I might adducemany examples. I mention here only Sir JohnMandeville.

Out of all these and other smaller elementswas compiled the Slavonic Bible-story, which exer-cised so important an influence on the popularimagination.

* Wesselofsky, Archiv f. Slav. Philologie, ii. I, 2, and Zametki, StPetersburg, 1883, i. pp. 9-14.


60/248


61/248

III.

THE APOCRYPHA OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, ANTI-CHRIST. LIVES OF THE SAINTS. THE LETTERFROM HEAVEN AND THE FLAGELLANTS. THE"GOLUBINAYA KNIGA."


62/248


63/248

III.

Pious curiosity, that is, the wish to fill up thelacunae presented by the Biblical relations, was alsothe principal cause that led to the origination ofthe Apocrypha of the New Testament, especially thewritings commonly known as Apocryphal Gospels.As Mr. Cowper says in his introduction to the

English translation, " Men were curious to knowmore than the Canonical Gospels contained. Frag-mentary stories or traditions were abroad relatingto Joseph and Mary and their families, to the birthand infancy, the trial and crucifixion of Jesus, toPilate, Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus, and soon. How

pleasantif all these fragments

could berendered complete, and especially if the silence ofthe four Gospels could be supplemented ! Thewish was not a barren one, and from time to timewritings appeared professing to supply the infor-mation which was wanted. Some of these writ-ings may be considered introductory to the evan-gelical narratives, others as appendices, but all assupplementary in one way or another. Josephand Mary were no longer the obscure individualsthe Gospels have left them ; the incarnation, birth,


64/248

48 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.and early life of Jesus no more remained imper-fectly recorded ; the last days of Christ's 'earthlylife were set forth with wondrous minuteness ofdetail ; the space between the death and resurrec-tion of the Saviour was filled up with particularsof what happened in the unseen world, as well asat Jerusalem and elsewhere. Pilate was pursuedinto every nook and corner ; all he did and saidwas noted down, and the steps of the Nemesiswhich hunted him beyond the very grave werediligently traced."No question that these writings were largelyused by heretical sects, which sought support fromApostolical or Divine authorities. So we find aGospel ascribed to Nicodemus, another even toMarcian, the head of the Gnostics, &c. Thesebooks were used to support various doctrines andopinions concerning Christ, Mary, the resurrection,and so forth.The Apocrypha of the New Testament makeindeed their appearance very early in Slavonicliterature, as well as elsewhere, but under some-what different circumstances to those of the OldTestament. While the latter were more or lessinserted into the actual text of the Bible, the otherApocrypha found no place in the actual text of thebody of the New Testament, and had, as it were,an independent existence. This fact is connectedwith the circumstance that the Bogomils, as well


65/248

ATEW TESTAMENT APOORYPHA . 49as at an earlier date the Gnostics and Manichseans,were opposed more or less to the Old Testament. Itsonly value was as an announcement and prepara-tion for the New Testament. Interpolations andexpansions were therefore permitted in the former.Their relation to the New Testament was quitedifferent, since it was the foundation of their creed,and as such enjoyed special sanctity. It did not,however, prevent numerous legends of Christ, ofthe Holy Virgin, and of the Apostles to be circulatedand modified in accordance with the desires andviews of the heretics. On the contrary, the holycharacter attributed to this pseudo-epigraphicalliterature raised its value and made it fitting forthe propagation of those views.As is well known, the Apostle John, the authorof the Apocalypse, which answered so well to theirsystem, was the Beloved Apostle of the Bogomils,and many a book and revelation is ascribed to himThe Gospel of St. John was especially worshipped,and we will see farther on another book containingthe fundamental belief of the Bogomils ascribed alsoto St. John. Incidentally I will mention here theKnights Templars and the Knights of St. John, bothlater accused of heresy, as well as the Freemasons,who all took their oath on the Gospel of St. Johnand had a special feast of St. John. The GermanJohannisminne may also be brought into connectionwith this, being till now not satisfactorily explained.


66/248

50 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.The Bogomils attributed, further, a number of

apocryphal tales to the Apostle Paul, as well as tothe Holy Virgin, or, better, accepted and changedthem.A peculiarity of nearly all these was that theydealt with eschatological questions. While the OldTestament, as enlarged by the means I have de-scribed, answered the inquiring or curious mindswith regard to the creation of the world, of man,or the origin of evil, the Apocrypha of the NewTestament solved the problem of the fate of manafter death, and thus completed the drama of re-demption. These writings included descriptionsof heaven and hell, and gave instructions how toreach the former or how to avoid the eternal firesof the latter.

There is now a great difference between theApocrypha of the New Testament and those of theOld, especially as regards those with which I amdealing. The Apocrypha of the Old Testamentgradually make their way among the people, but inthe process often lose their name. Their contentsare preserved, episodes out of them are freely modi-fied, and they thus pass, as it were, into the veryblood of the people. Being assimilated by thepeople, they form a basis for further poetic expres-sion, while the Apocrypha of the New Testament,attributed to holy personages, who are actuallyworshipped and form a part of the religious creed,


67/248

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 5!are preserved, with slight alterations, in a distinctbook form. They are never incorporated into thebody of the Holy Scriptures, but have themselvestheir own holiness. The very names given to themendow them with a kind of sanctity.Of greater popularity, and of greater importance

for the literature and civilisation of the world isthe " Gospel of Nicodemus," especially through itslegend of the cross, already mentioned, and above allby the " Descent of Christ to Hell," which is theredescribed by two eye-witnesses from hell. We havepresented to us the approach of the Saviour, thebursting open of the gates of bell,. and the liberationof all souls, from Adam downwards. It also con-tains wonderful details of the trial of Christ beforePilate and of His passion. There is scarcely aEuropean language into which this Gospel has notbeen translated. The Latin translations are veryearly, and were inserted by Jacobus a Yoraginein his Historia Lombardica, or " Golden Le-gend," a name of which Longfellow made use. Itdoes not come within our scope to follow thework through all the literatures of the world. Iwill content myself with referring to the Anglo-Saxon translation which was printed at Oxford in1698, though this had been preceded by an Englishone in 1507. The well-known "Passion plays"are based on this Gospel, and the influence of its" Descent to Hell " is proved by the many imita-


68/248

52 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.tions, including those of Dante and St. Patrick. Itis true that classical literature had its " Descents toHades," but at the time when this literature appearsthe influence of the classical models may well bedoubted. Many references in Dante show clearlythat he was acquainted with the " Gospel of Nico-demus." In Slavonic literature, besides the textitself, we have many reminiscences of it among thepopular literature. The " Descent to Hell " itselfgave rise to a remarkable imitation, " The Descentof the Holy Virgin," and it is easy to imagine theinfluence it would have on the popular fancy,especially as it was from the beginning regardedas the clue to the mysterious life after death, andtherefore gave an opportunity of entering into allpossible torments, while the original Gospel onlyspoke of a place of wailing and gnashing of teeth.It is not at all surprising that we meet with thisin versified form when the popular songs deal withman's soul after death. In Koumania it plays agreat part in the so-called wakes for the dead, i.e.,in the songs sung by the side of the corpse.On the other hand, the story has become quite apopular and largely circulated book, and is calledalso " Letter of the Mother of God," as a paralleland counterpart to another " Letter of God " Him-self, both of which I shall shortly examine.

In close connection with the " Descent to Hell "is another apocryphal writing attributed to St. Paul,


69/248

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 53which is likewise of great antiquity. This dealsparticularly with the condition of the soul at themoment of death, with the severance of the soulfrom the earth, and with the way it must go toreach heaven or hell. This too was a theme likelyto rouse curiosity, and its treatment would be wel-come to pious believers.The first support for the contrast between the

deaths of the righteous and the unrighteous is tobe found in the Bible, where it is said, " It cameto pass that the beggar died, and was carried byangels into Abraham's bosom." This was repeatedabout innumerable saints, as St. Barbara, St. Paulthe Hermit, &c. But the clear contrast betweenrighteous and unrighteous is to be found in a re-markable manner in the writings of Mani, thefounder of the sect of Manichseans, who has a specialchapter on the point, almost in exactly the samewords. * The same picture is frequently repeatedin religious and mystical tracts, in burial and othersermons, and in other moral writings intended toinfluence the imagination of men by this means.We thus find it even at the present day in folk-books, as in the so-called " Mirror of Human Life "in French, t

Especially noteworthy are, further, the stations orposts through which the soul has to pass before itreaches heaven. These are guarded by the demons

* Of. Fltigel, Mani, pp. 100-101. f Nisard, ii. 29.


70/248

54 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERA TURE.of human passions, which demand their rights fromthe soul. This idea arose first in Egypt, it occurs inthe "Book of Enoch," &c., and the early Fathers ofthe Church concerned themselves greatly with thisquestion. We meet with it also among the Mani-chaeans, and very often among the moral writingsintended for popular reading. Several visions of thesaints repeat it, St. Macarius and others, that of St.Basil the younger at the greatest length. The ideatook root in popular songs, and especially in popularsuperstitions : songs at wakes wish that the departedmay come safely through the " stations " of heaven.Many ceremonies connected with burial may betraced back to these tales of the fate of man afterdeath. Most remarkable of all, this description,combined with that of hell, has given the materialfor the Russian block-book of the last judgment ofthe world. A careful comparison between pictureand tale brings out clearly the connection of the two.This may be traced farther back, as the Russian wasoriginally South Slavonic or Byzantine, and servedas frescoes in church. The picture is rightly to becalled " The Last Judgment of the Soul after Death :its Reward and Punishment," for this is all of thelast judgment to be found in it.

I have perhaps lingered too long over this Apoca-lypse, and must pass on to the legend in which thesame Macarius plays the principal part, namely, hisjourney to Paradise. This was a harder task. The


71/248

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 55Apostle Paul, it is true, saw Paradise in his Apoca-lypse, but he speaks little of it. It seems as if onlythe sorrows of men can make eloquent and can bedepicted, but not their happiness ; so he tells verylittle about this, and what little he does say failedto find its way into the mind of the people. Otherssought to find Paradise, but they only saw it fromafar, and could not come near to it. This was thecase with Alexander of Macedon in the Alexandreis,and this too happened to St. Macarius, whose apocry-phal tale is entirely taken from the work of Pseudo-Callisthenes. Happiness is not granted to man inthis life !Among those questions which have moved men's

souls, and still move them, is then the question ofthe end of all things. When and how will the endof the world come ? It is true the Apocalypse ofSt. John had given an answer to this, and depictedin glowing colours the approach of Antichrist, thesigns of the world's end, and the last judgment.

It is sufficiently well known how these thoughtsinterested not alone the Christian, but also theJewish and Pagan worlds. This description of theburning up of the world is especially emphasisedin the religion of Zoroaster. We meet with it tooin Mani, as well as in Teutonic mythology, whereit plays a principal part. I do not, of course,propose to pursue these ideas farther. I willcontent myself with remarking that St. Jerome


72/248

56 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.has a similar description of the signs which are toprecede the last judgment. So, too, the Vener-able Bede, and after him a crowd of ecclesiasticalwriters.

The deep impression made upon the mind of theSlavonic peoples by the idea of Antichrist as thetype of the godless is proved by a number of sagas,songs, fairy tales, and superstitions. The saga ofGog and Magog is connected with it. This is anepisode of the Alexandreis, in which it is told howAlexander had shut up fifteen nations under moun-tains near the Caucasus. These peoples will appearat the time of Antichrist and do all manner ofcruel deeds. Exactly similar to this is a legendof South Russia. The legend of Antichrist andof the last judgment often appear in the Russianpicture or block books (Lubocnija Kartinki), whichconstitute so large a part of Russian folk-lore.Owing to the popularity of the subject, whichroused the terror of the people, many descriptionswere naturally put into circulation ; among themtwo celebrated ones, attributed respectively toHyppolitus and Methodius of Patara. Both arewell known in early Slavonic literature, and areoften repeated in later adaptations.

Besides this Apocrypha, which had so great aninfluence, many other Apocryphal tales were earlytranslated into Slavonic, especially the apocry-phal Acts of the Apostles, of Peter, Andrew, and


73/248

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 57Kufinus, and those were especially preferred whichwere most rich in miracles, and were thus bestassured of a favourable reception among the people.

Lives of the saints were also translated, espe-cially those which were full of wonders, like thatof St. Theodore Tiron, who slew a dragon in aforest and afterwards became a martyr, or likethat of St. George, who made the Devil speak ina statue of Apollo and drove him out of it. Espe-cial favourites were the hermits, like the settlersof the Thebais in Egypt, St. Anthony, St. SimonStylites, St. Macarius, whom we have frequentlymentioned, then St. Nicholas of Myra, and otherswhose names are legion.

In equal favour were the romantic lives whichmore or less resembled fairy tales without theirfantastic elaboration. For example, the life ofSt. Alexius, the man of God, St. Eustachius, andso many others, who passed through so many mar-vellous adventures before they obtained the crownof happiness or martyrdom.

I have named these lives because we can provetheir influence on the popular literature. Theheroic deeds of the one in knightly encounters withmonsters and demons, or the struggles of anotherwith the passions, have raised a loud response in theharp-strings of popular poetry, and their deedsresound in many a folk-song, in which now onenow the other is particularly emphasised.


74/248

58 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.Closer inquiry into the process of this transition

from tales into ballads and from ballads intolyrics will lead to many an unexpected result.Thus we can show that the name of the persondisappears gradually, and a personal song, if wemay so term it, is changed into a general imper-sonal one. Thus, to give an example, there is inthe Life of St. Josaphat, which I shall have todeal with later on, a song describing how heflees into the desert to his teacher, and gives upriches, happiness, and splendour. Now we canactually show how this song in this form changedgradually in Bulgaria, Roumania, and Eussia intoa song of the stranger, i.e., of a man who bemoansall that he has left behind in his home. Manymore examples might be given of this kind inpopular literature showing this transition : thesubject remains, but *the personal accessories dis-appear. I must, however, return to the Apocry-phal literature.

Before I treat of the complete books, I mustconsider a few fragmentary works which dealdirectly with the life of Christ. There is first theEvangelium Infantile, which is not all extant. Itoccurs in the dialogues of the three saints, Basil,John, and Chrysostom, and is nothing but a kindof Lucidarius. From this book many legendshave been preserved, and have been transplantedinto Christmas carols. Among these there is the


75/248

DESCENT OF THE HOLY VIRGIN. 59saga, well known elsewhere, of the sacred treeunder which the Holy Family rested in .the flightto Egypt. The tree bends low, that the Motherof God may the more easily pluck its fruit, andwhen the sun rises high up in heaven, it spreadsits branches out so as to shade the Holy Family.Parallel passages are easily to be found in Christmascarols, in songs, and even in iconographical descrip-tions of the flight to Egypt.

Passing over other fragmentary Gospels, thereis, further, the above-mentioned Gospel of Nicode-mus, preserved, as it seems, only in an abridgedand incomplete form in the Slavonic literature,'but which gave rise to the "Descent of the HolyVirgin." This is, besides, one of the oldest textsof Slavonic literature. The contents of it, takenfrom a copy of the twelfth century, run as fol-lows : *

" Once upon a time the Holy Virgin prayedto God on the Mount of Olives, and begged Himto send the Archangel Michael to show her thepunishments of men. Then came the Archangelwith a number of angels. And she asked him,' How many punishments are there, and are menreally punished ?' And he answered, 'There areinnumerable punishments ; ' and he ordered theAngel of the South to open hell. And she saw amultitude of men and women in great anguish.

* Tihonravov, ii. p. 23 seq.


76/248

60 GREEKO-SLA VONIC LITERA TURE.The angel explained to her that these were menwho had worshipped created things, as gods, sun,moon, and stars, and the Slavonic gods Trojan,Hors, Veles, and Perun, and they still hankeredafter evil ; therefore were they punished." Farther on she saw a thick darkness whichcovered the people. At her request this cloud dis-appeared for a moment. The punished ones couldnot see her, because they had seen no light for anendless time. The angel said that these were theywho had not believed in the Trinity nor in the HolyVirgin. She wept bitterly over them, and went ontowards the south, where there is a burning stream.In this men were lying, some completely immersed,others only partially. These were the dishonestand the cannibals, i.e., those who ruined others.At one place she saw men hanged upside down, andbeing gnawed by worms. These were the lovers ofgold and silver. Again, she saw women hangingby their teeth, and dragons coming out of theirmouths. These were they that listen at doors andthen tell lies. Thence the Holy Virgin went to theNorth. There she found a burning cloud in whichwere fiery beds, on which lay men and women.They had not got up on Sunday to go to church.In another place men sat on burning stools. Thesehad not stood up before the priests in church.Again the Holy Virgin looked and saw a mightyiron tree. On its boughs hung hooks with men


77/248

DESCENT OF THE HOLY VIRGIN. 61hanging by their tongues. These were those whohad caused enmity between man and man. Fartheron she sees a man being eaten by a bird with wingsand three heads. With one of these it covered hiseyes, with the other his mouth, so that he couldnot pray to God for mercy. This was a man whoknew the Scriptures but did not follow them.Then she sees the punishment of unworthy priests,who were careless in their duties or immoral intheir lives. At last she comes to a mighty streamof fire, which boils like the water in a kettle andtosses like the waves of the sea. Here were Jews,heathens, and renegade Christians, who had fallenfrom the true faith, and had served the Devil." Then the Holy Virgin arose and went to thethrone of God and begged for mercy for the soulsin torment. She called to her aid Moses the law-giver, Paul the apostle and spreader of the Epistles,and John the Evangelist, but all in vain. At lastshe begs Michael the Archangel and the choir ofangels to pray with her for mercy from God. Christtherefore descends, and when the tortured soulssee Him they pray to Him for mercy. Christthereupon assures them, at the request of HisMother, that their punishment shall be remittedfrom Green Thursday to Pentecost."

So far goes this fanciful description in an abridgedform. Similar descriptions, and much older eventhan the Gospel of Mcodemus, we meet in the old


78/248

62 GREEKO-SLA VON1C LITERA TURE.apocalyptical literature of the East. I mentionespecially that of the prophet Isaiah, and the oldPersian in the Arda-Viraf-Ndmeh. Here also apriest travels through hell and Paradise, and de-scribes at full length the punishments and the woeof hell. It is a question of special inquiry as tohow far our Apocalypse was subject to the influenceof the latter, with which it shows an undoubtedsimilarity.

Besides this, there is also, as I mentioned above,another eschatological story dealing with the pre-vious condition of the soul from the moment of itsdeparture from the body till it reaches heaven orhell. This Apocryphon is ascribed to the ApostlePaul, who saw it in an apocalyptical vision.

In the Slavonic literature it has been preservedin two forms, an abridged and shorter one, and anenlarged one, corresponding more closely to theGreek text, and treating not only of the departureof the soul, but also of the happiness of Paradiseand the torments of hell. This latter part, how-ever, has been rendered superfluous by the accountattributed to the Holy Virgin, and thus the firstpart formed a separate existence, in which the de-parture of the soul from the body is described asfollows: *

" On every day there appear before the throneof God the angels of good men who live piously,

* St. Novakovicf, Primeri Knjizevnostii jezika staroga i srpsko-slovens-koga, Belgrad, 1877, p. 437 seq. ; Tihonravov, ii. 40 seq.


79/248

APOCALYPSE OF ST. PAUL. 63and they bring their good deeds before God, full ofjoy and wonderment at the patient piety of man.Opposite to these appear the angels of bad men,crying bitterly, and they ask God why they shouldserve such men. But God answers that theyshould serve them as long as they lived, for perhapsthey might make them better. And the ApostlePaul begged of the angel that he might see the placeof the good and the bad souls. He was first takento hell, where he saw the wicked spirits who torturebad men ; they ruled the world and received thesouls of the wicked. Then he saw bright angels,who were the

.angelsof the good, and were alwaysready to receive their souls at the moment of death." The Apostle then looked down upon the earth,

and saw it surrounded by a fiery cloud. This con-sisted of the sins of the world mixed with prayers.He then desired to witness the death of a just manand of an unjust man. The angel bids him lookdown. He saw a just man and troops of brightnngels approaching him, and all the good deedshe had performed on earth. These all receive hissoul, and say to it three times, c Soul, soul, lookupon the body in which thou hast lived, for on theday of judgment thou shalt rejoin it.' This goeson for three days, then comes the man's angel andkisses the soul, and encourages it, for it has donethe will of God. It is then led up to heaven.On the way the soul has to pass many stations


80/248

64 GREEKO-SLAVONIC LITERATURE.of bad angels, who refer to its sins and attemptto drag it down. But the angel supports it, andthe soul reaches heaven unharmed, where it isgreeted and welcomed by innumerable hosts, tillfinally God places it in the fields of Paradise." Not so the soul of the sinner. This is takenin charge by the evil spirits. The guardian angelweeps and accompanies it to heaven, where Godrecalls its sins and condemns it to hell."

I have merely given a short sketch of the contentsof this apocalypse. This part is spun out at lengthin a similar vision which St. Macarius is said to havehad in the wilderness. This is the same Macariuswho had a vision of three dead men in the desert,which became the foundation of ihedanses macabres,which was so called, I suppose, after the name of thesame Macarius, altered to Macaire, Macabre.The next question after the end of man was

that of the end of the world. The /Apocalypseof St. John gave an answer to it, but this wastoo general for the pious and ascetic reader of theolden times, and thus another Apocalypse wasattributed to the same St. John, in which he is re-presented as asking questions and Christ as givinganswers about the end of all things. This book,called " Questions and Answers of St. John onMount Tabor," is of the more importance as itbecame a standard book of the Bogomils. It wastranslated in an early period by the Kathars of


81/248

APOCALYPSE OF ST. JOHN. 65Concorenzo from Slavonic into Latin, and is pre-served in a much expanded form in the Acts ofthe Inquisition at Carcassone, under the name ofSecretum Hsereticorum *de Concorenzio. Thereit is expressly mentioned, "portatum de Bulgariaa Nazario suo episcopo, plenum erroribus" * TheGreek original has been published by Tischendorf,and we possess Slavonic texts of the fifteenth andsixteenth centuries. The Latin text embraces be-ginning and end, and gives first a picture of theFall, and describes how Satan first came down to theearth. He found it resting on two fishes, and theseon water, clouds, and fire ; and then it is told howSatan created this world. It then speaks of bap-tism, and finally ends with the question of thesecond coming of Christ and the overthrow of thepower of Satan. This latter part forms the chiefcontents of the extant Slavonic text. Here wehave also the additio

Gaster Moses _ Ilchester Lectures _ Greeko-slavonic Literature

Documents

Transcript of Gaster Moses _ Ilchester Lectures _ Greeko-slavonic Literature