Adrian “Cool Papa” Murdoch turns us on to an exhibit in Istanbul that gives “mind-blowing reconstructions” of the sights of ancient Byzantium. Adrian is author of several excellent histories, including The Last Pagan: Julian the Apostate and the Death of the Ancient World and The Last Roman: Romulus Augustulus and the Decline of the West, both of which I read and enjoyed during my Christmas travels. I promise a full review in the months ahead.
Year: 2007
Marian Monument
In 1950, when Pope Pius XII promulgated the dogma of the Assumption of Mary, the Anglican scholar R. L. P Milburn scoffed that “something has been solemnly stated as assured historical fact that has no other strictly historical basis even pretended than a Coptic romance.”
Now, Stephen J. Shoemaker of the University of Oregon has returned to the sources for Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary’s Dormition and Assumption, a hefty study of the ancient traditions regarding the end of the Virgin Mary’s earthly life. He takes full advantage of what he calls “the efflorescence of diverse traditions, both narrative and liturgical, all celebrating the Virgin’s departure from this world.” Not only does he provide exhaustive and technical analysis of the patristic paper trail, he mines the archeological record, too, to describe the relics of popular Marian devotion of the early Church. The book concludes with a fifty-page anthology of primary Marian material from the age of the Fathers — full texts, not just excerpts — including works from the Ethiopian, Syriac, Greek, Latin, and (yes) Coptic traditions.
The book is a demanding read, but rewarding. Both Catholics and Protestants should appreciate an historical study not refracted through the lens of the Reformation or Counter-Reformation. Shoemaker’s own religious affiliation is nowhere apparent in this study, as he trains the same critical faculties upon both the ancient texts and recent Vatican pronouncements.
This paperback is actually the second edition — the first appeared in 2003 — but it’s the first to come within the price range of mere mortals. Shoemaker’s study should be required reading for anyone who professes Marian doctrine and anyone interested in the faith of the Fathers.
The Lord’s Baptism
For today’s feast day, Jeff Ziegler of Ziegler A List points us to St. Thomas Aquinas, who provides a veritable anthology of the Fathers. If you don’t get enough from St. Thomas, get yourself a copy of Kilian McDonnell’s The Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan: The Trinitarian and Cosmic Order of Salvation.
Good Book, Great Exhibit
My colleague David Scott and I drove down to D.C. last Thursday and snuck into the Smithsonian’s Sackler Gallery just before the men in uniform shut the doors on the exhibit In the Beginning: Bibles before the Year 1000. I wish I had gone earlier, so that I could urge you, too, to go. There were far more items — and far more important items — than I had expected.
There were samples from most major finds and important collections — the Nag Hammadi library, the Dead Sea Scrolls, St. Catherine’s at Mount Sinai, Oxyrynchus, and the Cairo Geniza. These are the manuscripts you read about in the footnotes and the critical editions. Some of the earliest examples were just scrawled verses on papyrus that had been sifted from 2,000-year-old trash. My favorite display featured a chunk of wood on which someone had carved a seemingly random series of Bible verses in Coptic, perhaps as a handwriting exercise. There were manuscripts in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Arabic, Armenian, and other languages, some of them lavishly illustrated with icons or decorative script.
What most impressed me was how the early Christians treated the sacred text. To them it was clearly a sacred object, often a liturgical object, so the Bible was richly decorated with gems and precious metals, and the inks themselves sometimes cost a small fortune. I could have camped in those rooms for days just soaking in the fine artistry.
The good news is that the Smithsonian has preserved a permanent record of the exhibit in a gorgeous (and relatively inexpensive) coffee-table volume with useful commentary by several scholars — and heaping helpings of the Church Fathers. (I must raise a complaint about the binding, however, as it came unstuck in delivery.) The book is worth having. After a few pages, you’ll see why this exhibit set new attendance records for the Smithsonian.
The exhibit was remarkably sensitive to the eucharistic milieu of the early Church. Some of the books on display were not Bibles per se, but lectionaries and sacramentaries. And here’s a line worth keeping from the catalog: “the Christian Bible as a whole was the cumulative result of the reading habits of Christian communities in their liturgical gatherings.” We find that idea in Justin and Irenaeus and ever afterward. Sacrament and Scriptures are mutually illuminating. That’s why the Mass has always comprised two liturgies: Word and Eucharist.
Thanks to the Smithsonian for showing us the beauty of the Word inspired, as rendered by the Church at prayer.
Happy Epiphany!
The McGregors of KVSS and I spent some time talking about this weekend’s feast and its roots in the early Church. Junior has posted an audio file (scroll down to the bottom of the “Talks” page) to enhance your celebration. Kris McGregor will be joining Scott Hahn and me for our pilgrimage to Rome. Maybe you can come, too?
Motherly MP3
In case you’ve forgotten, today’s the feast of St. Syncletica of the Egyptian desert. KVSS radio marked the occasion by interviewing me, and then posting the first (of I hope many) segments on Mothers of the Church. You’ll find the audio file at their site for now and eventually at this site as well.
If you want to read St. Syncletica, try The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, where she plays a starring role, and also the new edition of my Fathers of the Church, which now includes Mothers as well.
Found Poetry
Adrian Murdoch fills us in on the Chrisitan poet Sedulius.
Judas: The Wright Stuff
In his new book Judas and the Gospel of Jesus, N.T. Wright — the Anglican bishop of Durham and renowned New Testament scholar — puts the recently discovered Gospel of Judas in its historical contexts. Just as important as the context in which it was written, he observes, is the context in which it was published. Thus he scrutinizes the ancient text itself, but also the positive spin it received from celebrity scholars like Elaine Pagels, Bart Ehrman, and Marvin Meyer. The original author of the Judas text intended it to be a subversion of orthodox Christianity, and his modern interpreters would like him to succeed at long last. With brevity, clarity, and grace, Wright conveys the peculiar significance of this Judas text. Along the way, he teaches us much about the ancient Christians, their discontents, and ours.
Potions of Sterility
A couple of days ago, Kathimerini, Greece’s “international English-language newspaper, posted The Wines and Herbs in the Land of Pan, a feature story that touches upon the medicinal potions of antiquity. Included in the discussion are contraceptives and abortifacients, which the Fathers consistently condemn (as do their heirs in the Catholic Church today). Rodney Stark studies the documentary and archeological record in chapter 5 of his book The Rise of Christianity, and even includes a photograph of an abortionist’s surgical tools, unearthed at Pompeii. The Christian notion of chastity — which included opposition to contraception — immediately set the Church’s doctrine apart from all its pagan rivals. Moreover, Christian fertility contributed to the Church’s growth over those early centuries, while pagan sexual practices surely helped to carry out Rome’s slow cultural suicide.
Christians did not waver in this matter until the twentieth century. The Protestant Reformers — Luther, Calvin, and Wesley — univocally opposed birth control and abortion.
There are many good web resources on the subject. See here, here, here, and here.
For a fascinating book-length treatment of the subject, see my friend Pat Riley’s book Civilizing Sex: On Chastity and the Common Good.
Thumbs Up from Thumos
Mr. T of Thumos kindly reviewed my book The Grail Code.
Feast of Basil (with Gregory, not Garlic)
Happy feast of Saints Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen! You’ll find some great links on Gregory here. You’ll find an audio file of Yours Truly babbling about both men here (scroll down to St. Basil).
For affordable, accessible reading, try these, one and all:
• On The Human Condition: St Basil the Great.
• St. Basil the Great on the Holy Spirit.
• On God and Man: The Theological Poetry of st Gregory of Nazianzus.
And, of course, you’ll meet both men in the pages of my book The Fathers of the Church.
UPDATE: The awesome Jeff Ziegler of Ziegler A List adds the following web resources:
— Catholic Encyclopedia: St. Basil the Great.
— The Rule of St. Basil.
— St. Gregory Nazianzen.
— Ven. John Henry Newman on SS. Basil and Gregory (from a work written in 1833, in his Anglican days).
— Pierre Subleyras, “Mass of St. Basil” (1743).
Mother of God
Playing Catch-Up
Just returned from the family’s annual ramble around the state, and I found a mailbox full of good news and links. Among the notes:
• A regular visitor to our commboxes, a young man, sent us a goodbye note, as he’s enetered a monastery in Lebanon. Father Abbot says he may be sent abroad to study patristics. Pray!
• Phil is blogging on Eusebius and Church history. And he’s posted his second Patristics Roundup.
• Adrian Murdoch, whose books I’m currently devouring, has posted a mini-carnival that includes good patristic links.