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Results (14)
Parina, Elena, “A Welsh version of Visio Pauli: its Latin source and the translator’s contribution”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 28 (2017): 155–186.
abstract:
This article undertakes a comparative analysis of the Middle Welsh version of Visio Pauli transmitted in Oxford Jesus College MS. 119 in relation to its Latin analogues. According to Silverstein’s stemmatic approach, the Latin text behind the Welsh translation belonged to Group D in Dwyerʼs more recent classification ; it shows many characteristics of this group, but also lacks some significant markers. Following Jirouškováʼs alternative classification, the underlying Latin text as it can be reconstructed on the basis of the Welsh version, belongs to her C-group and has some features of the C3 group, but more parallels to C1 texts. On the basis of a number of features shared by all Welsh versions and a small group of Latin texts in manuscripts C5/L7/L8 (belonging to C1 and D respectively), there are good reasons to argue that the original of the Welsh text was fairly close to them. The results of the comparison also allow to identify changes that the Latin text underwent in the course of the translation, with the caveat that the immediate source of the translation is not available. The most important changes are additions of formulae that can be explained as stylistic devices and some adaptions of content for the sake of the new Welsh audience.
Ó Dochartaigh, Caitríona, “Homiletic texts and the transmission of eschatological apocrypha in a medieval Irish context”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 23 (2012): 141–153.
abstract:
Within the corpus of extant vernacular medieval Irish sermons, the dominance of eschatological themes borrowed from apocrypha is striking. This raises the question whether this phenomenon is accidental or symptomatic of Irish preaching in the period. The answer may lie in the early medieval Latin collections of homilies which demonstrate affiliations with Insular material. Three eschatological apocrypha which were particularly popular in medieval Ireland and England were chosen as test cases to investigate the nature of this influence : ‘The Three Utterances’, ‘The Apocalypse of Thomas’ and ‘The Seven Heavens’ apocryphon. The interrelated manuscript sources in which these texts survive are discussed, as well as the possible context of their dissemination.
Beyers, Rita, “La Règle de Marie: caractère littéraire et inspiration monastique”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 22 (2011): 49–86.
abstract:
Chapter 6 of Pseudo-Matthew contains the famous description of Mary’s life in the Temple of Jerusalem between the ages of three and fourteen. The description is typical of the Latin tradition of the Protevangelium of James and the version found in Pseudo-Matthew is an adaptation of an earlier description, traces of which are preserved in the Irish Liber Flavus Fergusiorum. Mary is said to have introduced a rule of life for herself, which is, traditionally, regarded as a reference to the Rule of Benedict, and, at the same time, as giving a terminus a quo for dating the Pseudo-Matthew, i.e. after the middle of the sixth century. This paper analyses chapter 6 in light of the early monastic rules and argues that, despite the undeniable monastic overtones, it cannot be read as an evocation of real monastic life. Rather than being rooted in the great monastic experience of the early Middle Ages, the description is to be considered a literary portrait. The portrait of Mary’s ascetic life sketched by Ambrose in his De virginibus 2, 2, 6-19 appears to be an appropriate model.
Mac Gearailt, Uáitéar, “The Middle Irish homily Scéla laí brátha”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 20 (2009): 83–114.
abstract:
Scéla laí brátha (“Tidings of the day of judgement”) is a Middle Irish homily on the day of judgement. It relates how the righteous will be welcomed to heaven and sinners will be banished to hell. It attributes these “tidings” to Jesus Christ, who uttered them shortly before His passion (Iss e ro ráid na scéla sa gair bic ríana chésad, LU 2309), and quotes from the gospel of Matthew, who wrote them down as he heard them from the lips of his master (iss é ro scrib 7 ro lesaig na scela so lathi bratha. mar rochúala a bélaib a mágistrech, LU 2315). Matth. 25:32-45 ff. is cited almost verbatim in the opening section, but thereafter the Irish homilist launches into descriptions of the fourfold division of souls on the day of judgement, the torments of hell, and the rewards of heaven.
Carey, John, “In tenga bithnua and the days of Creation”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 18 (2007): 231–246.
abstract:
The medieval Irish cosmological treatise In tengua bithnua, a work evidently based on a lost apocalypse, is structured as an exposition of the six days of creation. Source analysis indicates that this structure is a secondary feature of the text, and that the creatures and natural phenomena arranged within it reflect the intellectual culture of the British Isles in the seventh and eighth centuries.
Lambert, Pierre-Yves, “La compilation irlandaise de la ‘Vengeance du sang du Christ’ (Dígail fola Críst). État des recherches”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 15 (2004): 235–258.
Pettorelli, Jean-Pierre, “Essai sur la structure primitive de la Vie d’Adam et Ève”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 14 (2003): 237–256.
abstract:
The question of the original structure of the Life of Adam and Eve, sole literary work at the origin of all already known versions, stays under debate. The synoptic study of the different forms of the narration at the critical spot where all versions meet, that is at the beginning of the Greek Life, leads to the following hypothesis : the absence in the Greek Life of the first part of the apocryphon present in other versions comes from the editor's will to ignore it. Two converging arguments could explain this position: the narration, meant for liturgical purposes, fits better in a shorter form, and this shortening avoids the theologically doubtful exegesis of Eve's first temptation by Satan.La question de la structure originelle de la Vie d'Adam et Ève, æuvre littéraire unique à l'origine de toutes les formes connues de l'apocryphe, reste discutée. L'étude synoptique de ces différentes formes dans le lieu critique où toutes les versions se retrouvent, c'est-à-dire au début de la Vie grecque, conduit à l'hypothèse selon laquelle l'ignorance par celle-ci de la première partie de l'apocryphe transmise dans les autres versions, découle de la volonté de son rédacteur. Deux motifs concordants pourraient expliquer cette décision : le récit, destiné alors à l'assemblée liturgique, s'y insérait plus facilement sous une forme réduite et cette réduction permettait d'ignorer une exégèse de la première tentation d'Ève par Satan devenue théologiquement suspecte.
Kaestli, Jean-Daniel, “Le Protévangile de Jacques dans l’homélie Inquirendum est pour la fête de la nativité de Marie”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 12 (2001): 99–153.
abstract:
This article is part of a research on the Latin transmission of the Protevangelium Jacobi. It contains a critical edition and a French translation of the homily Inquirendum est, composed for the feast of the Nativity of Mary. The text transmits the first part of the Protevangelium Jacobi (ch. 1-8), within an homiletical framework. In three of the six manuscripts used for the edition, the homily belongs to a Carolingian sermonary, known as «homéliaire de Saint-Père de Chartres». It was originally composed as part of this sermonary, some time between 820 and 950, «in the British Isles or at some centre on the Continent where insular influence was apparent» (J. E. Cross). The author of the homily Inquirendum est used an expanded version of the Protevangelium Jacobi (translation II). This translation is also represented by three other witnesses: the Paris manuscript, Sainte-Geneviève 2787 (PJlatG); the Latin Infancy Gospels published by M. R. James (JAr et JHer, Arundel and Hereford forms of the «J compilation»); the Irish Infancy narrative of the Liber Flavus Fergusiorum (InfLFF). Some expansions of the original narrative are extant in all these texts (translation IIa), for example the story of the miraculous revelation of Mary’s name (PJ 5,2). The homily shares some others peculiarities only with JAr-JHer and/or InfLFF (translation IIb), for example the amplification of Joachim’s instruction to his shepherds (PJ 4,3). Apart from these «traditional» elements, the present study points out to the «redactional» features of the homily (omitted, rewritten and added passages). The author is particularly concerned with the fact that Mary’s parents conceived her in a natural way.
Faerber, Robert, “La Lettre du Christ tombée du ciel en anglais ancien: les sermons Napier 43–44”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 12 (2001): 173–210.
abstract:
The Letter from Heaven on the observance of the Lord’s Day exists in a number of Old English versions. One of them is particularly interesting because of its origin and its composition. It is not actually a version of the Letter. Its source is a (non extant) sermon by a Yorkshire itinerant preacher named Pehtred, living in the 830s, based on the visions and prophecies of an Irish monk, Niall, of the same period, predicting great disasters if men do not observe the Lord’s Day according to the prescriptions of the Sunday Letter. The Latin source of this Letter is also the source of the Irish Cáin Domnaig (the Sunday Law). The English text exists in two independent versions in manuscripts of the XIth century. It was probably composed in the second half of the Xth century. It reproduces Pehtred’s sermon, incorporating a number of original elements, such as the idea of the Sunday respite for the damned by making the distinction between those who are in purgatory and those in hell.
Pettorelli, Jean-Pierre, “La Vie latine d’Adam et Ève: analyse de la tradition manuscrite”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 10 (1999): 195–296.
Ferreiro, Alberto, “Simon Magus: the patristic-medieval traditions and historiography”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 7 (1996): 147–166.
abstract:
Simon Magus, who is known from the Acts of the Apostles (8 :9-24), the Actus Petri cum Simone (Acts of Peter), and the Passio Sanctorum Apostolorum Petri et Pauli (passio), was used metaphorically and typologically by the Church to censure immoral behavior; doctrinal heresy, and magic and witchcraft. We also witness from the Early Christian era to the end of the Middle Ages the emergence of traditions about Simon Magus that are primarily based upon canonical and apocryphal texts and those that are wholly independent of these sources. The intent of this article is to provide an overview of the traditions, the research done up to now, and the work that remains to be carried out on Simon Magus.
Faerber, Robert, “Deux homélies de Pâques en anglais ancien”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 6 (1995): 93–126.
abstract:
A French translation with notes and commentaries of two Old-English Easter homilies probably from the middle of the Xth century, copied in manuscripts of the end of the Xth and the Xlth centuries. They combine thematically in an original way the theme of the Harrowing of Hell and the theme of the Judgement. No direct Latin source has yet been found for either. The Harrowing sections belong to the general tradition of the Acts of Pilate, but do not derive from them directly. That in the first one especially contains elements unknown elsewhere, such as the long speeches of Adam and Eve to the Lord, but found in other Old-English texts of the IXth century and even before. The Judgement sections are in the tradition of the Apocalypse of Thomas (see R. FAERBER, ‘L'Apocalypse de Thomas en vieil-angiais’, Apocrypha 4 (1993), p.125-139). Both homilies are probably original compositions, with a Hiberno-English background.
McNamara, Martin, “Midrash, apocrypha, culture medium and development of doctrine: some facts in quest of a terminology”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 6 (1995): 127–164.
abstract:
Midrash has been traditionally regarded as something specifically Jewish and rabbinic, but later as a reality found already in the Hebrew Scriptures and present also in New Testament writings. In this essay the more recent debates regarding the nature of midrash are examined in the larger context of inner-biblical exegesis and against the background of canonical process. Some midrash-type features or techniques are examined and these are seen to be found also in apocryphal and traditional Christian commentary literature. In the light of this there is a consideration of the reflection on the afterlife in Irish apocrypha and Irish theological treatises.
Bauckham, Richard, “The apocalypse of the Seven Heavens: the Latin version”, Apocrypha: International Journal of Apocryphal Literatures 4 (1994): 141–176.
Reprinted in The fate of the dead (1998): 304–331.
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