The Footsteps of Israel: Understanding Jews in Anglo-Saxon England

T H E F O O TS T E P S O F I S RA E L THE FOOTSTEPS OF ISRAEL Understanding Jews in Anglo-Saxon England Andrew P. S...

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T H E F O O TS T E P S O F I S RA E L

THE FOOTSTEPS OF ISRAEL

Understanding Jews in Anglo-Saxon England

Andrew P. Scheil

T H E U N IV E R S I T Y O F M I C H I GA N P R E S S Ann Arbor

Copyright © by the University of Michigan 2004 All rights reserved Published in the United States of America by The University of Michigan Press Manufactured in the United States of America @ Printed on acid-free paper 2007

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No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher. A CIP catalt�q record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Scheil, Andrew P. I 9 6 8 The footsteps o f Israel : understanding Jews in Anglo-Saxon England / Andrew P. Scheil. p . em. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN o-472-I I 4 o 8 -5 (cloth : alk. paper) 2. English literature r. Judaism-Controversial literature-History and criticism. Old English, ca. 4 5 0- I I Oo -History and criticism . 3 · Antisemitism in literature . 4 . Judaism (Christian theology)-History of doctrines-Middle Ages, 6oo- I 5 oo. 5· Judaism in literature. 6. Jews in literature . 7· Bede, the Venerable, Saint, 673 - 7 3 s -Views on Judaism. I. Title . 2004 BM5 8 5 . S 2 6 5 2 6 1 . 2'6'094209 0 2 I - dc22 "The Poems of Our Climate from The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens, copyright I 9 54 by Wallace Stevens and renewed I 9 8 2 by Holly Stevens. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc.

Acknowledgments

his study saw its earliest form as a small unit on JElfric and the Jews written for a quite different dissertation project under the supervi sion of David Townsend at the University of Toronto . David was an ideal supervisor, and I owe a great deal to him as well as my other instructors in Toronto, including G . E . Bentley, Jr. , Alan Bewell, Patri cia Eberle, Peter Heyworth, Michael Herren, Heather Jackson, David Klausner, and Jill Levenson. I would like to thank most importantly Roberta Frank ( Yale University) for all her support over the years . Scott Westrem ( City University of New York [ CUNY ] ) , Ian Mc Dougall ( University of Toronto ) , and Suzanne Al(bari ( University of Toronto ) were perspicacious and diligent members of the dissertation defense committee . As the expanded version of the project took shape after my years in Toronto, it benefited from my participation in two National Endow ment for the Humanities (NEH ) programs . The first was a summer seminar at the State University of New York ( S UNY) Stony Brook in I 9 9 6 on "Absence and Presence : The Jew in Early English Literature," where the ideas were encouraged by Director Stephen Spector and the other members of the seminar, especially Alfred David and Seymour Kleinberg; I am doubly in debt to Steve Spector, who turned out to be one of the readers of the manuscript for the University of Michigan Press . He and the other reader ( Louise Mirrer, City University of New

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ACKN OWL E D GMENTS VI

York) pushed me to make the book accessible to as broad a readership as possible; I am grateful for their help . The second program took place in 1 999 when I was a participant in Paul Szarmach's NEH Summer Institute on Anglo-Saxon England at Western Michigan University. I would like to thank the faculty and fellow students of that seminar, including Professor Szarmach himself, Katherine O'Brien O'Keefe, George Brown, Simon Keynes, Timothy Graham, Catherine Karkov, Nicole Discenza, Alex Bmce, Jana Schulman, and William Nelles. My thanks to the National Endowment for the Humanities for its support. Other friends and colleagues who have read portions or commented on oral versions of the argument include : Malcolm Godden, Drew Jones, Haruko Momma, Jennifer Neville, Joaquin Martinez Pizzaro, Mary Ramsey, Fred C. Robinson, and the members of the Harvard Medieval Doctoral Conference . Karl F. Morrison was my mentor as an undergraduate at Rutgers University, and his influence is apparent in these pages . Nicholas Howe and Daniel Donoghue have been friends, intellectual models, and important sources of advice and solace over the past few years . Portions of the book were delivered to audiences at the Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance Studies (SUNY Binghamton) , the International Congress on Medieval Studies ( Kalamazoo, Michigan ) , the meeting of the International Society of Anglo-Saxonists ( ISAS ) ( University of Notre Dame, 1 9 99 ) , The Humanities Institute ( S UNY Stony Brook), and the Harvard Medieval Doctoral Conference . The libraries of the University of Toronto, the University of Rochester, S UNY Stony Brook, Trinity College ( Hartford) , Yale University, West ern Michigan University, Ohio State University, Brown University, and Harvard University have, at one time or another in my peripatetic post graduate-school wanderings, opened the door to their resources . My current colleagues and students in the History and Literature program at Harvard University have made the final preparation of the book a rewarding pleasure . At the University of Michigan Press Christopher Collins and Sarah Mann have been a delight. It is a pleasure to acknowl edge the support of the Medieval Academy in the form of a travel subvention to attend the 1 999 ISAS meeting, and to acknowledge the permission of Cambridge University Press to use portions of my article "Anti-Judaism in JElfric's Lives of Saints'' ASE 2 8 ( 1 999 ) : 6 5 - 8 6 . All errors that remain are my own responsibility. The man who began this book in Toronto in the mid-nineties is

Acknowledgments Vll

almost unrecognizable now, in all important ways, through the abiding love of Katherine West Scheil . When I try to express my debt to her in words, I can find in my heart, like Gabriel Conroy, only lame and useless ones. Instead, the best evidence for the moments of our life together is our young sons, William and David. This book is for all three of you.

Contents

Abbreviations Introduction

xi

I

PA RT O N E B E D E , THE J E W S , A N D THE E X E G E T I CA L IMAGINAT I O N

Introduction

23

Chapter One : Bede and Hate

30

Chapter Two : Bede and Love

66

PA RT TW O THE P O P ULUS ISRAHEL-M E TA P HO R , IMAG E , E X E M P L UM

Introduction: Excursus on Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica Chapter Three : The Populus Israhel Tradition

III

Chapter Four : The Populus Israhel Tradition in Britain PA RT THR E E J E W S , F U RY A N D THE B O D Y

Introduction

IOI

I9 5

Chapter Five : Anti- Judaic Rhetoric in the Vercelli and Blickling Manuscripts 204

I43

CONTENTS X

Chapter Six : Anti-Judaism and Somatic Fiction

240

PA RT F O U R LE L F R I C , A N T I - J U D A I S M A N D T H E T E N TH C E N T U RY

Introduction

28 5

Chapter Seven: JElfric's De populo Israhel Chapter Eight: JElfric's Maccabees Conclusion Bibliography Index

3 65

33 I 34I

3I3

29 5

Abbreviations

ASE AS PR

Bosworth-Toller

CCSL CH I CH II CSASE CSEL EETS OS EETS ss ELN ES HE JEGP MGH

Anglo-Saxon England Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, ed. G. P. Krapp and E . V. K. Dobbie, 6 vols. (New York: Columbia University Press, I 9 3 I - 4 2 ) . An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, ed. J. Bosworth and T. N. Toller ( Oxford : Oxford University Press, I 8 9 8 ) ; Supplement by T. N. Toller ( Oxford: Clarendon Press, I 9 2 I ) ; Enlarged Addenda and Corrigenda to the Supplement by Alistair Campbell ( Oxford: Clarendon Press, I 9 7 2 ) . Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina lElfric, First Series of Catholic Homilies lElfric, Second Series of Catholic Homilies Cambridge Studies in Anglo-Saxon England Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum Early English Text Society, old series Early English Text Society, supplementary series English Language Notes English Studies Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica Journal ofEnglish and Germanic Philology Monumenta Germaniae Historica

A B B REVIATIONS Xll

MP

N&Q NCHOEL

Neophil NM PL PQ RES RS SP

SN

Modern Philology Notes and Queries Stanley B . Greenfield and Daniel Calder with Michael Lapidge, A New Critical History of Old English Literature ( New York: New York University Press, 1 9 8 6 ) . Neophilologus Neuphilologische Mitteilungen Patrologia Latina) ed. Migne Philological Quarterly Review ofEnglish Studies Rolls Series Studies in Philology Studia Neophilologica

Unless otherwise specified, all biblical quotations are from the Douay Rheims translation of the Vulgate, with minor modifications. Transla tions from Latin and Old English are my own unless otherwise speci fied. With all primary sources, I occasionally make minor textual modi fications such as repunctuation and expanding abbreviations .

Introduction

My lyre is turned to mourning, and my pipe to the voice of those who weep .

To divine the tme, the latent sense , you need to be of the elect, of the institution. Outsiders must content themselves with the manifest, and pay a supreme penalty for doing so. -Frank Kermode, Genesis of Secrecy Who can distinguish darkness from the soul? -Yeats, "A Dialogue of Self and Soul"

n the

first chapter ofJohn's gospel, the disciple Philip invites his friend Nathanael to enter the service ofJesus ofNazareth, to which Nathan ael sarcastically replies, "Can any thing of good come from Nazareth?" ( John I :4 6 ) . Nevertheless, he becomes a faithful follower after Christ hails him as "an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile" ( John I :4 7). In his exegetical exposition of this scene, the Venerable Bede ( 673-73 5 C.E . ) notes that Jesus had seen Nathanael previously under a fig tree, before Philip called him; this is glossed as the "electione spiritalis Israhel, id est, populi Christiani" [choosing of the spiritual Israel, that is, the

I

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 2

Christian people] ( Homeliae I . I 7 . 20 3 - 4 ) . 1 In response to Nathanael's good fortune, Bede exclaims joyfully: quam magna nobis quoque qui de gentibus ad fidem uenimus in hac sententia nostri redemptoris spes aperitur salutis ! Si enim uere Israhelita est qui doli nescius incedit, iam perdidere Iudaei nomen Israhelitarum quamuis carnaliter de Israhel quotquot doloso corde a simplicitate patriarchae sui degenerauerunt, et adsciti sumus ipsi in semen Israhelitarum qui quamlibet aliis de nationibus genus carnis habentes fide tamen ueritatis et munditia corporis ac mentis vestigia sequimur Israhel. ( Homeliae I . I 7 . I 72- 8 o ) 0

[ O h what a great hope of salvation i s opened by this statement of our Redeemer to those of us who have come to the faith from the gentiles! For if he is truly an Israelite who walks as one ignorant of deceit, the Jews, although physically descended from Israel, already lost the name of lsraelites, as many have by their deceitful hearts degenerated from the simplicity of their patriarch. And we have been admitted among the descendents of the Israelites, since, although according to the flesh we have our origin from other nations, nevertheless by the faith of truth and by purity of the body and mind, we follow in the footsteps of Israel. ] The vestigia Israhel) "the footsteps of Israel" : Bede uses this phrase elsewhere in his corpus, and it calls to mind his well-known description of his own work as following in the vestigia patrum ( "the footsteps of I . Cf. also Bede's De Tabernaculo I . 2 3 6- 4 o : "Cuncta haec quae dominus sibi a priore populo ad bciendum sanctuarium materialiter offerri praecepit nos quoque qui spiritales fi lii Israhel . . . esse desideramus spiritali intellegentia de bemus offere" [All these things that the Lord directed to be offered to him in a material bshion f()r the making of a sanctuary by the people of earlier times should also be offered with spiritual understanding by us who desire to be the spiritual children ofisradj ; emphasis mine . References to Bede's works are by short title and parentl1etical reference: De Tabernaculo, by book and line numbers; De Templo, by book and line numbers; De temporum ratione, by page and line numbers; Explanatio Apoca�vpsis, by volume and column number in the PL; Expositio Actuum Apostolorum, by chapter and verse of Acts, and line numbers of commentary; Historia Ecclesiastica, by book, chapter, and page num ber of Latin text (translations from facing page ) ; Homeliae, by book, homily, and line num bers; In Epistolas VII Catholicas, by page and line numbers; In Genesim, by book and line numbers; In Habacuc, by line numbers; In Regttm XXX Q;taestiones, by question number and line numbers; In I Samuhelem, by book and line numbers; In Tobiam, by chapter and verse of Tobit, and line numbers of commentary; Retractatio in Actus Apostolorum, by chapter and verse of Acts, and line numbers of commentary.

Introduction 3

the fathers" ) . 2 Both formulas bespeak a way of relating the past to the present, an understanding of those who have gone before, even as ground is broken for the road ahead and eyes trained upon the distant horizon of the future . In Anglo-Saxon England, a land without Jewish communities, "following in the footsteps of lsrael" encompasses a vari ety of Christian apprehensions of Judaism, ranging from vehement denunciation and rejection to subtle embrace .

The Footsteps of Israel takes as its subject the understanding of Jews and Judaism in pre-Conquest England. Absent from Anglo-Saxon England in any real physical sense, Jews were nevertheless present as imagina tive, textual constructs, manifest only in the distorted shadow cast by the Christian tradition. "Jews" and "Judaism" will thus stand ( sans quotation marks hereafter) for, in essence, a nexus of rhetorical effects, a variety of representational strategies built into the very structure of medieval Christianity. If "strategies," to what end? No simple or uni versal answer exists : Jews were a meditative vehicle for exegesis; an exemplum of the direction of God's shaping hand throughout history; a record of the divine patterns of the historical imagination; a subject for epic and elegy; an outlet for anger and rage; a dark, fearful image of the body; a useful political tool-all in all, a variform way of fashioning a Christian populus in England and continually redefining its nature . In Anglo-Saxon England, Jews and Judaism signify not image, but pro cess; not stable concept, but complex negotiation. Throughout The Footsteps of Israel I will be referring to "the dis course of anti-Judaism," "anti-Judaic rhetoric," and similar formula tions. I intend these shorthand expressions to designate a plurality of related practices . Averil Cameron performs the necessary qualifications in her definition of the term " Christian discourse" : "Rather than a single Christian discourse [in late antiquity] , there was rather a series of overlapping discourses always in a state of adaptation and adjustment, and always ready to absorb in a highly opportunistic manner whatever might be useful from secular rhetoric and vocabulary. 3 One fundamen2. On the "footsteps of the fathers" phrase in Bede see Meyvaert, "Bede the Scholar," 42; Bonner, "Becie and Medieval Civilization, " esp . 7 5 ; Davidse , "Sense of History," 6 5 5 - 5 6 . 3 . Cameron, Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire, 5 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 4

tal point will arise from this study: anti-Judaic discourse in Anglo Saxon England denotes a syncretic, flexible , mobile system of rhetoric; it is part and parcel of Christian discourse in the time and place under examination, but is not a monolithic construct. What we will be defining is one element in the vast system of assump tions about the world and humanity's place in it, held both consciously and unconsciously. Northrop Frye explains the function of literary representation in the great enclosing context of lived experience : "Man lives, not directly or nakedly in nature like the animals, but within a mythological universe, a body of assumptions and beliefs developed from his existential concerns. "4 Frye's "mythological universe," seen from a somewhat different perspective, could also describe the work ings of ideology: a set of assumptions, often held unconsciously, that mediate the individual's relationship to culture and its material impera tives . 5 Yet to define a study of this sort as simply or solely an exercise in ideology "debunking" is, I think, to miss the mark. To be sure, no other subject is better open to the argument that textual ideologies and their long-enduring afterlives have dark effects upon real human beings than a study of the discourse of anti-Judaism, as Gavin Langmuir's History> Religion> and Antisemitism so powerfully and movingly demonstrates . But the oft-imposing power of cultural traditions does not, I believe, in the end reduce all to a hopeless determinism . The Footsteps of Israel will work under the conviction that what Jameson calls the "priority of the political interpretation of literary texts" is not what he and so much contemporary criticism claim-whether explicitly articulated or held as a tacit assumption-namely that "the political perspective . . . [is] the absolute horizon of all reading and all interpretation . " 6 My added em phases are important: literature is surely, to cite with approval Jame son's phrase, "a socially symbolic act"; such acts must be defined, catalogued, arranged, interpreted-all noble acts of criticism and schol arship . Yet I cannot escape the strong evidence that there is more at stake in a book like The Footsteps of Israel> a study that tackles such an obviously politically charged subject matter. It is simply too easy to read the history of Christian hatred of Jews 4 · Frye, Great Code, xviii. 5 . Note the acknowledged debt ( often overlooked) of Jameson's seminal work on ideol ogy and narrative to Frye ( Political Unconscious, 6 8 - 7 4 ) . For a lucid discussion of the defini tions of ideology see Eagleton, Ideology. 6. Jameson, Political Unconscious, I ? ; emphasis added.

Introduction 5

found in Anglo-Saxon texts and then safely write another chapter in the grand recit of Oppression. Ultimately, there is something far more human, in all senses of the word, at work here . To deny the human element, the capacity of human beings-individual lives-to move beyond the textual chains that in part define them hews, in a strange fashion, too closely to an irrational view of life profoundly implicated in the pages that follow. To experience delight, fear, tragedy, awe , despair, the flu sh of power and pride ; to feel the working of the cre ative imagination and respond with words drawn out of desire and spun into the aesthetic shapes of the imagination-in short, to love and be human: all these emotions and human responses find their way into expressions of hatred for Jews in Anglo-Saxon England. It is imperative to move beyond the sheerly political horizon, however much it may seem difficult when caught in the darkness of anti-Judaic discourse. It is easy to be a cynic: the difficult task is to search out, touch, and apprehend the humanity revealed in these often painful words from pre- Conquest England. And perhaps, in the final analysis, such an apprehension might be far more disturbing. The Footsteps of Israel illustrates, through the example of Anglo Saxon England and in all its complexity, the process Hayden White calls "ostensive self-definition by negation. "? This is a pervasive habit of human thought, the source of much recent theorizing and analysis of "the Other" in texts and cultures of various sorts . As imprecise as the term "the Other" can be, it is perhaps better to think of it in a general way as what Frye termed "the dialectical habit of mind that divides the world into those with us and those against us. " 8 What is at stake in dividing the world in this fashion? Pointing the finger at the embodi ment of alterity in the cultural landscape is one strategy by which a culture regulates its boundaries, its cohesiveness and integrity: when antipathy to an "external group" ( even if, or perhaps especially if, lacking an empirical basis and thus essentially fictive in nature ) ossifies into commonplace assumptions, the tradition it forms renders the "we" more assured, more cohesive a social unit. Tradition, as Karl Morrison notes, "unifies the faithful and separates them from men outside the 7. White, Tropics of Discourse, I 5 1 - 5 2 . 8 . Frye, Great Code, I I 4 . Stallybrass and White call this process the "law of exclusion" in The Politics and Poetics ofTransgression, 2 5 , and Mellinkoff describes it as "who was included in the great feast of life and who was excluded" ( Outcasts I , li ) . For general theoretical orienta tion on the subject of alterity see J. Smith, "Difference" and Green, "Otherness Within. "

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 6

religious body. Tradition exists only among the faithful; only they have the doctrine of salvation. But, like a Damoclean sword, there always hangs over believers the danger that even they may lose or corrupt the words of truth and life, and thus suffer the fate of the infidel. "9 But traditions and ideologies are protean subjects, forever changing, shifting, contracting and expanding even as they maintain, in general, a definable shape. In Nicholas Howe's study of the Anglo-Saxon "migra tion myth," he notes the durability of tradition as it responses to various stimuli: "Through its power to capture the repeated order of the past, a myth of cultural identity endures and accommodates the new into an established yet still meaningful pattern. " I o As we track the understand ing ofJews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England, it will become appar ent that while in the broad outlines these rhetorical tropes have a similar texture, a common genealogy, they also exhibit a diversity of essence when placed and studied in their particular local contexts . This contin ual dialectic between the conservatism of tradition and the relentless dynamics of change is an element integral to Christian tradition in the early Middle Ages. I I Jews and Judaism are not, therefore, static motifs or images in the imagination of Anglo-Saxon England; they are also not simply an unchanging, universally despised, unproblematic "Other." Like any number of other elements in the fabric of humanity's "mytho logical universe," these words denote changing, fluctuating factors in the living mass of tradition produced by and for human beings. In the course of discussing Bede's England, Peter Brown notes that Anglo-Saxon Christian culture, though to a degree sui generis, was still part of a larger Mediterannean community: "It [i.e . , Anglo-Saxon En gland] shared with the many 'micro- Christendoms' which stretched, like so many beads on a string, from Iona across Europe and the Middle East to Iran and Central Asia, a common pool of inherited images and attitudes inherited from ancient Christianity."1 2 Jews are an important element in this "common pool of inherited images" found across early medieval Europe; The Footsteps of Israel will look deeply into that pool and examine what lies beneath.

9. ro. rr. r2.

Morrison, Tradition and Authority, 8 . Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, 2 . Morrison, Tradition and Authority, 6- 7. P. Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, 3 7 8 .

Introduction 7

Jews were of course living in northern Europe in considerable numbers in the early Middle Ages. r 3 But Jews migrated to England in substan tial numbers only in the later eleventh century; anti- Judaic discourse existed in Anglo-Saxon England, therefore, without the presence of actual Jewish communities. r4 The understanding of Jews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England is thus solely a textual phenomenon, a matter of stereotypes embedded in long-standing Christian culmral tradi tions. rs Thinking about Jews in Anglo-Saxon England was an act of individual imagination, always conditioned and bounded by the pon derous weight of tradition, as can be said of almost any medieval creative act: the powerful fusion of local intention and the overarching power of the auctor-defined past. What Jeremy Cohen compellingly terms the "hermeneutically and doctrinally constructed Jew" comes into being as ideologies, genres, authorial intentions, and any number of other factors ( except, apparently, the physical presence of Jews in England) clash, rebound and combine, and move into the depths of tradition and myth . 16 Through an understanding of the hermeneutics implicated in anti-Judaic discourse, we actually set foot into the terrain of deep fears, desires, and joys of Christian Anglo-Saxon culture; as I 3 . For nearby continental communities see Encyclopedia ]udaica, vol . 7, cols. 7- I4 ( "France : Roman <md Merovingian Periods, " esp. the map cols . I I - I 2 , and Golb, jews in Medieval Normandy, I - I I o . See Chazan, Medieval Stereotypes and Modern Antisemitism, I - I 8 , for background on Jewish settlement in northern Europe before the eleventh century. I 4 . Scholarly consensus maintains that Jews settled in England only after the Norman Conquest: see tl1e Encyclopedia ]udaica, vol. 6, col. 7 4 7; Jacobs, jews ofAngevin England, ix; Hyamson, History of the jt'IVS in England, I - 6; Calisch, Jew in English Literature, 3 3 ; Mi chelson, jew in EarZv English Literature, I 2- 2 I ; Baron, Social and Religious History ofthe ]ervs, vol. 6, 76; Roth, History ofthe jews in England, 2; Ben-Sasson, History ofthe jewish People, 3 9 4 ; Poliakov, Histo ry ofAnti-Semitism, vol. I , 77; Little, Religious Poverty and the Profi t Economy, 4 5 ; Pollins, Economic History of the Jews in England, I 5 ; Stow, Alienated Minority, 4 I ; Golb, Jews in Medieval Normandy, I I 2- I 4 ( but cf. I I 3 ). On Jews in Roman Britain see Applebaum, "Were There Jews in Roman Britain? " I 5 . Thus, tl1is smdy deals with an understanding o f Jews little influenced by actual Jewish culmre. Mellinkotf suggests in "Round, Cap-Shaped Hats" tl1at tl1e observation of real Jews could be responsible for the iconographic innovation of round hats on Jews (as opposed to pointed ones) in the illustrations of London, British Library, Cotton Claudius B. iv. For possible knowledge of Hebrew in Anglo-Saxon England see Keefer and Burrows, "Hebrew and the Hebraicum." Such bits of evidence do not argue for a substantial impact of Jewish culmre in Anglo-Saxon England. Any influence of Hebrew literan1re on Anglo-Saxon literary culture was probably through an intermediary text: see Biggs and Hall, "Traditions concern ing Jamnes and Mambres, " 8 5 - 8 6 . I 6. Cohen, Living Letters, 2; for tl1e genealogy of his development of tl1e term see Living Letters, 3 , note 3 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 8

Cohen notes, "Christian culture had crafted a Jew in keeping with the needs of its doctrine, as a foil for its interpretation of the Bible, as an instructive antithesis of its own self-image ." 17 The features of early medieval anti-Judaism are well-known : that the Jews are the killers of Christ, guilty of deicide; that they committed their act because they are "spiritually blind" or in some fashion deficient of mind, hence their rejection of Jesus : their carnal nature entails an insuf ficient understanding that prevents them from recognizing the divine presence of Christ in the offering from God; that this carnal nature leads them to a literal interpretation of the Bible, while the Christian mind sees through the base text to the animating Spirit within; in keep ing with this strongly dualistic hermeneutic, that the Old Law of the Jews is also superseded by the New Gospel of Christ, ancient covenant replaced by a new promise to a new chosen people; and that the histori cal dispersion of the Jews-their long tale ofwoe in the ancient world constitutes God's punishment for killing Jesus. r s These beliefs comprise what Gavin Langmuir calls the "core of Christian anti-Judaism . "r9 Throughout The Footsteps of Israel I follow Langmuir's distinction be tween the anti judaism of the early Middle Ages, characterized by "logi cal" ( albeit nonrational) conclusions about the Jews that are derived from empirical thinking, and the antisemitism of the centuries following I I oo, characterized by more fantastical, irrational suppositions . 20 In Langmuir's analysis, the traditional rhetoric of anti-Judaism proceeds from extrapolations based on observable, verifiable fact: for example, Jews do not accept Jesus Christ as the Messiah; they also do not read the I 7. Cohen, Living Letters, 3 9 I . r 8 . Cohen convincingly sees these elements as all belonging to Augustine's tremendously influential doctrine of "Jewish witness," itself an extension of Pauline doctrine ( Living Letters, 20). 19. Langmuir, History, Religion, and Antisemitism, 2 8 5 . 20. In addition to History, Religion, and Antisemitism, 27 5 - 3 0 5 , see Langmuir's Ttrward a Defi nition ofAntisemitism, 5 7- 1 3 3 , and "The Faith of Christians and Hostility to Jews. " See further Little, R eligious Poverty and the Profi t Economy, 42- 5 7 ; Moore, Formation ofa Persecut inJJ Society, 2 y- 4 5 , and "Anti-Semitism and the Birth of Europe. " Trachtenberg, Devil and the jews is still a useful survey of medieval antisemitism. Cohen notes, "By the thirteenth century, prominent churchmen perceived the European Jew as one who no longer fulfilled the role that Augustine had given him, as one who had deviated from the letter and life of the biblical text that it was his purpose to maintain" ( Living Letters, 3 9 4 - 9 5 ) ; Cohen's important study, The Friars and the J ews, analyzes these later developments. Elisabeth Young- Bruehl character izes anti-Judaism as an ethnocentrism, and antisemitism as an "ideology of desire" or an "orecticism" ; see her analysis infclrmed by psychoanalysis and sociology in The Anatomy of Prejudices, 1 8 4 - 9 9 , passim.

Introduction 9

Hebrew Scriptures in the same way Christians do-as the "Old Testa ment," fulfilled only by the writings of the New Testament. Therefore, charges of anti-Judaism, e . g . , that the Jews reject Christ, that the Jews follow the "Old Law" and not the new covenant prescribed in the New Testament, have a basis in verifiable reality, even if they are extrapolated beyond measure and couched in emotionally vehement terms. This anti- Judaic rhetoric should be distinguished from the fantasti cal, irrational suppositions of the High and Late Middle Ages: in "antisemitic discourse" (again, Langmuir's term) Jews are accused of doing things that were never verified empirically; poisoning wells, kidnapping and murdering Christian children, desecrating hosts, bear ing demonic body parts ( e . g . , tails, cloven hooves ) , etc. These charges belong to a discourse fundamentally different in both cause and effect from the anti-Judaism of the early Middle Ages. The grim irrationality of antisemitism finds its culmination in Auschwitz and Bergen-Bel sen; anti-Judaism, while certainly reinforcing Christian hatred of Jews as it complemented the fantastical charges of antisemitism, must be ap proached on a different basis. Looking ahead, an important finding is that we do not have one dominant mode of understanding Jews in Anglo-Saxon England, or even one clear arc of development in the image of the Jew: there is no simple story to tell here . Instead, we have a variety of discursive prac tices, sometimes distinct, sometimes overlapping each other-em bedded and tangled; at times meshing with perfect symmetry, at times residing in strange contradiction.2I The Footsteps ofIsrael defines a num ber of distinct modes of thinking about Jews, and sketches the broad outlines of hermeneutic strategies that shift and change in response to various contexts. Studies of early medieval attitudes toward Jews are few when compared to the number treating the later Middle Ages; to my knowledge, no one has taken an extensive, in-depth look at representa tions of Jews in pre - Conquest England. This study thus outlines an important "pre-history" and context to later persecutions in England. However, the book moves beyond a summa of anti- Judaic discourse to a more nuanced understanding of the role Jews and Judaism play in the construction of social identity and the shaping of the literary imagina tion in Anglo-Saxon England. 2 1 . Cohen comes to a similar conclusion concerning the complex role of "the Jew" in medieval culture ( Living Letters, 3 9 2 ) .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L IO

The conflict between Church and Synagogue is as old as Christianity itself, and inextricably connected to the early histories of Christian com munities . From the important formation ofPauline doctrine in the New Testament to the influential codification of anti-Judaic hermeneutics by Augustine, late antiquity was of fundamental significance in shaping the understandings of Jews that would obtain in Anglo-Saxon England. 22 The paradigm for the Christian understanding of Jews in the early Middle Ages was established by Augustine . According to Augustine , the Jews were once God's chosen people, but, due to their spiritual blindness, they kille d Christ and were thus forever cast out from God's grace . However, the Jews had an important place within Christian cos mology; they provided proof of God's divine plan as witnesses to the figural potential of the Christian New Testament latent within the Ju daic Old Law, and thus they were reserved for conversion at the end of time . 23 For Augustine , historical events proved his case; the Jews existed as a scattered and defeated people : Iudaei autem, qui eum occiderunt et in eum credere noluerunt, quia oportebat eum mori et resurgere, uastati infelicius a Ro manis funditusque a suo regno, ubi iam eis alienigenae domina bantur, eradicati dispersique per terras ( quando quidem ubique non desunt) per scripturas suas testimonio nobis sunt prophetias nos non finxisse de Christo . . . . 24 2 2 . As Young states, "[In the second century] Christian identity was being formed by diflerentiation from Jews on the one hand, pagans on the other, and Gnostics within the gates" ( Biblical Exeg es is, 24 I ) . For a concise discussion of New Testament anti-Judaism see Cohen, Living Letters, 6 - 9 , as well as Neusner and Frerichs, eds. "To See Ourselves as Others See Us," chapters 4, 5 , 6 (pp. 9 3 - I 6 I ) . On the early ChristiaJLmd patristic background of anti-Judaism see A. L. Williams, Adversus Judaeos; Berdyaev, Christianity and Anti-Semitism; Runes, Jew and the Cross; Ladner, "Aspects of Patristic Anti-Judaism"; Abel, Roots rrfAnti-Semitism, esp . r I 23 8 ; Ruether, Faith and Fratricide and "Adverstt s Jttdaeos Tradition"; Cohen, Friars and the Jews, I 9 - 3 2, "Jews as the Killers of Christ," Living Letters, 9 - I 5 (for a succinct overview) ; Maccoby, Sacred Executioner, I 3 4 - 62; Gager, Orwins ofAnti-Semitism; Neusner and Frerichs, eds. "To See Ourselves as Others See Us"; Stow, Alienated Minority, 6-40. For a collection of cmcial studies see Cohen, ed. , Essential Papers on judaism and Christianity in Conflict. 2 3 . This understanding informed the official policy toward Jews in the kingdoms of Europe in the Middle Ages and contributed to the relative stability ofJewish life in the period when compared to the later Middle Ages: see Bachrach, Early Medieval J ewish Policy, and the legal evidence collected in Linder, ed. , jews in the Legal Sources of the Early Middle Ages, esp . "Index of Subjects: Protections of Jews" ( 7 1 4 ) and "Violence: against Jews" ( 7 1 7 ) . 24 . Augustine, De civitate Dei I 8 -4 6. I 3 - I 8 , by book, chapter,

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 12

nineteenth century coincides with their use not only in the study of scripture , but also in the arena of natural history; e . g . , the Oxford English Dictionary citation from Tait)s Magazine ( r 8 5 6 ) : "There is typology as well as a teleology in nature. " Both uses of the word speak to a desire to apply systematic, scientific standards and terminology to their respective fields; it is my sense, however, that in modern scholarship on the Middle Ages, this distinction has been somewhat obscured, and it is rather thought that medieval authors would "apply typology," in this or that circumstance . Not exacdy; and proceeding with such an assumption about medieval habits of thought can be deceptive . To be sure, typus and jigura are medieval words; but Bede , for example, makes litde systematic distinction between what modern scholars would distinguish as "alle gorical" or "typological" interpretations : he tends to use the same words for all sorts of exegesis : if nouns, typus) jigura) iuxta allegoram) etc . ; if adverbs, jiguraliter., spiritualiter., and so on; if verbs, they tend to be common words such as indicare or designare.28 When a modern com mentator explains that in a particular text a medieval author is "using typology," the phrase perhaps goes too far in implying a systematic hermeneutic-the study of types and anti types in a coherent, hermetic register-that was not really there , at least for authors in the prescho lastic, early Middle Ages. Latin typus ( Greek tupos) is derived from the Greek verb tupoo) a word that designates the process of forming or molding through a stamp or impression; typus and jigura refer primarily to an imprint made from the impression of one object upon another. The terms imply two things at their most basic level : a connection of two disparate entities, and, as a result of that connection or fusion, a permanent mimetic resemblance . 29 Attempts to make the medieval application of these words exemplifica tions of a coherent system employed to connect events in the Old Testa ment with events in the New impose an order upon what seems to be a fundamentally more "disordered" way of thinking. What we designate as "typology"-calling to mind as it does other scientific disciplines such 2 8 . Cf. Young, Biblical Exegesis, I 5 2- 5 3 : "Ancient exegetes did not distinguish between typology and allegory, and it is often difficult to make the distinction, the one shading into the other all too easily. Allegory was often required to turn a scriptural oracle into a prophecy; allegory was also required to make a 'type' prophetic in its various respects. The modern affirmation of typology as distinct from allegory, . . . an affirmation which requires the his tori cal reality of an event as a foreshadowing of another event, its 'antitype,' is born of modern historical consciousness, and has no basis in the patristic material. " 29 . See Young, Biblical Exe;qes is, I 5 3 .

Introduction I3

as biology, endocrinology, physiology, psychology, archaeology, anthro pology (and their organized, coherent, scientific pursuits ) -was in medi eval reality a flexible system of thought, a habit of mind, a way to make connections, often in a far more fluid, creative fashion than is generally assumed. What, therefore, is the medieval practice of "typology"? Better terms (used throughout this study) include "figural discourse," "figural under standing," "figural interpretation" or "figurative composition . " Frye notes that typology is a "form of rhetoric, and can be studied critically like any other form of rhetoric" ; typology reflects the rage for order, the desire to find pattern in the uncertain movement ofhistory. 3° As Frances Young summarizes, "'Types' are forms of mimesis) the mimesis of a story or act, of a drama) a thing done, a life lived. " 3 r The analysis of the Anglo Saxon understanding of Judaism in the following pages will afford an opportunity to explore the dynamics and ramifications of figural under standing in greater detail . We shall see that in some shape, form, or strategy, each of the chapters that follow leads through the hermeneutics of the figural . Figural interpretation of the Old Testament allows Jewish narratives to be recast and neutralized for a Christian readership . James Parkes explains that "[f]or the Gentile Church the Old Testament no longer meant a way of life , a conception of the relation of a whole community to God, but a mine from which proof texts could be extracted. "3 2 Variations upon Augustine's formula guided figural interpretation of the Old Testament throughout the Middle Ages: " Quid est enim quod dicitur testamentum uetus nisi noui occultatio? Et quid est aliud quod dicitur nouum nisi ueteris reuelatio? [ For what is the Old Testament but a concealment of the New? And what is the New Testament but the revelation of the Old?) . 3 3 Through this process o f appropriation, the New Testament encloses or dominates the narratives of the Old Testa ment and subordinates them to a Christian hermeneutic.34 The mediat3 0 . Frye, Great Code, So, 8 o- 8 I ; see in general the whole chapter, "Typology I," 78- IOI. 3 I . Young, Biblical Exe�qes is, 209 ; emphases hers. 3 2 . Parkes, Conflict of the Church and the Synagogue, 3 7 4 . 3 3 . De civitate Dei I 6. 2 6 . 6 I - 6 3 ; the CCSL edition prints ttoui, presumably an error for nouz. 34· Hermann labels this process "sublation" (his appropriation of the Hegelian term Aufh ebung) , the "incorporation of a prior stage or concept by a subsequent one" (Allegories of War, 5 5 ) . Cf. Frye's description of the dialectic Hegelian process: "It is a much more complex

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L I4

ing presence of figural understanding renders the Jews and their stories obsolete, a footnote to the overarching story of Christianity; Ecclesia replaces Synagoga. 3 5 As Jill Robbins suggests, "[t]he dead letter, the old law, has to be there as something to pass through, to go beyond."3 6 Guided by the hermeneutics of figural discourse, the Hebrew Scrip tures ( and by extension the Jews ) , are emptied of any independent cultural identity of their own and thus resemble a mathematical vari able able to be placed into many equations, not valuable in and of itself, but necessary for the final "answer." As the analysis unfolds in the following chapters, we will survey an array of orientations and habits of thought that will best be gathered together and treated in summary fashion in the Conclusion. In good "typological" fashion the type here at the beginning of The Footsteps of Israel will need to await its anti type at the end.

Anglo-Saxon England affords the perfect opportunity for a "case study" approach to this complex, multifaceted phenomenon. Defined by decisive events that bookend the span of the culture (the invasion of the pagan Germanic tribes in the fifty century and the Norman Con quest in the mid-eleventh) , Anglo-Saxon England has traditionally been conceived as a distinct culture, different from what precedes and follows it; indeed, the interdisciplinary method in scholarly study of the culture, so productive for the past thirty years (at least ) , has fed off operation of a f(mn of understanding combining with its own otherness or opposite, in a way that negates itself and yet passes through that negation into a new stage, preserving its essence in a broader context, and abandoning the one just completed like the chrysalis of a butterfly or a crustacean's outgrown shell" ( Great Code, 2 2 2 ) . See also the comments ofBloom on the relationship between the Old and New Testaments in "'Bef(Jre Moses Was, I Am. "' 3 5 . On the iconography of Ecclesia and Synagoga see Schlauch, "Alleg01y of Church and Synagogue" ; Seiferth, Synagogue and Church in the Middle Aq es; Camille, Gothic Idol, I 7 8 8 o ; Mellinkofl� Outcasts, vol . I , 4 8 - p. 3 6 . Robbins , Prodigal Son/Elder Brother, 40; or as Bloom expresses it pungently, "In merest fact, and so in history, no text can fulfill another, except through some self-serving caricature of the earlier text by the later" ( Ruin the Sacred Trttths, 4 3 ) . Cf. Kruger, "Spectral Jew," I I : "The Christian exegetical apparatuses founded in Pauline doctrine . . . work to rewrite all of biblical histmy before Christ as literally dead, significant only as it points toward the incarnational narrative that remakes all of histmy, or as it comments on the soul's present relation to Christ, or as it gestures toward the living hist01y of the Church's triumph in the world. "

Introduction 15

this focused approach . Yet at the same time the progress of interdisci plinary scholarship in the field has also tended to show the deep connec tions between Anglo-Saxon culture and other times and places of the Early Middle Ages, whether the Germanic world of Northern Europe , o r the broad currents of European Latin culture, with strong roots in the classical world of Late Antiquity. And so, Anglo-Saxon England maintains an image as a distinct, firmly bounded time and place, a unified culture; yet it also obviously is not a hermetic entity, but is traversed by general European cultural currents that reach back to antiquity; it also , as much recent research has shown, did not come to a screeching halt at the Battle of Hastings in r o6 6 . 3 7 As such, this culture affords us an interesting angle to explore the dynamics of the understanding of Jews, since the various aspects of anti-Judaism and attendant phenomena also have a simulta neous existence : they are tropes that make up the contemporary fabric of life in the period, yet they also participate in long-standing Christian cultural traditions. So perhaps one theme for this study, and a justification for its Anglo Saxon subject, is continuity-in-change and change-in-continuity. The understanding of Jews and Judaism manages to retain certain identifi able features even as it adapts to a particular time and place . Anglo-Saxon England itself is a culture defined by transitions : at its inception, during the fall ofRoman Britain and the settlement period, it sits on the border of the medieval world and late antiquity. At the other end, the Norman invasion seems to mark the end of the early Middle Ages and the begin ning of the world of romance, Gothic cathedrals, and scholasticism . The vast shift in conceptualizing the world, resulting from the conversion from paganism to Christianity; the dislocation associated with waves of conquest; the slow movement from many kingdoms to one unified kingdom of England: all these cultural shifts serve as the background to the perceptions of Jews outlined here . As the subject of a case study, Anglo-Saxon England allows us to see the play of difference within the monolith of tradition. Anglo-Saxon England also has some further notable peculiarities that render the investigation more complex and rewarding. Anglo-Saxon England has an older and more extensive corpus of vernacular literature 3 7 · See, e . g . , the essays in Treharne and Swan, eds . , Rewriting Old English in the Tw elfth Century.

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L r6

than any other European culture in the early Middle Ages, with the possible exception of Ireland. This phenomenon produced a complex cultural interplay of orality and literacy, Latin and vernacular-longtime animating subjects of Anglo-Saxon scholarship and factors that distin guish pre- Conquest England from the rest ofEurope in the early Middle Ages. The Anglo-Saxons were Christians, yet never forgot either their (relatively) recent pagan past or their situation on the borders ofWestern Christendom. 3 8 The understanding of Jews and Judaism occurs in a learned context, emanating from centers such as Wearmouth/Jarrow, London, York, Canterbury, and others more difficult to localize . These background factors play about the issues raised in this study, never far from the surface; they inform, define and circumscribe the sorts of con clusions that can be made . The study of Old English poetry, for example, is a vexed issue in many ways . Generally without sure date or prove nance, how does one construct a historical context (beyond the very broadest, most general sort) for any particular poem? In some ways, the criticism of Anglo-Saxon literature has been an ongoing, never-ending search for legitimate contexts. Because this book traverses a number of texts-Old English homiletic prose, verse hagiography, secular and bib lical poetry, Latin exegetical commentaries and lyrics ( just to name a few)-the many caveats about authorship , audience, and textual states, as well as the general dynamics of textual production and consumption, must be kept in mind. I have done so in my local readings, hopefully saying nothing or making any assumptions beyond the bounds ofpropri ety and protocol established in the field. Yet sometimes one needs to see the overall landscape without tripping over each and every root. While well aware of problems in, for example, manuscript transmission and/or textual instability, problems of genre, audience, dating, and so forth, I generally have allowed these issues to inform my readings in an implicit way, rather than overburden the discussion and apparatus by constantly, explicitly addressing them. I hope my conclusions will be localized by others in studies of different, narrower scope. To an extent, the same might be said for this study's engagement with historical context. It is important always to keep the historical backdrop in mind, especially the general ebb and flow of historical/ cultural events. The period is rich and fascinating for a cultural histo3 8 . On these issues see the eloquent work of Nicholas Howe, both Migration and Myth akin;_q and his forthcoming study of geographical space in Anglo-Saxon England, previewed in his "An Angle on this Earth." m

Introduction I7

rian, from the Anglo-Saxon settlement and conversion, to the Northum brian Renaissance and the Mercian kingdom ( 7th/8th c . ) , to the age of King Alfred the Great and Wessex ( 9th c . ) , to the Benedictine reform and Viking settlements ( r oth c . ) , and finally to the anxious age of King Aethelred and the conquest of England by the Danes ( r oth/ n th c . ) . These events and cultural flux form the backdrop to this study ofJews : as such it will testifY to the remarkable persistence of particular ideas, even in changing cultural circumstances. Yet a close reading of these texts and their encoding of Jews will ultimately show us that no ideas are truly static but instead produce their own singular resonance when read in a particular context. In the following chapters, direct political/social context at times will play a role; at other times historical context will refer to long intellectual traditions. Often the delineation of specific historical circumstances is extremely problematic, e . g . , i n the case o f much of the Old English poetry studied here . However, the study of Jews and attitudes toward Jews in the Middle Ages presupposes a historical approach, and I hope I have presented this study within the context of the history of anti semi tism. The chapters often begin with late antique texts influential and alive in Anglo-Saxon England, then move to insular Latin and Old English materials, and often gesture beyond this to later developments and texts. In general, the early chapters of The Footsteps of Israel build a broad intellectual context for understanding Jews and Judaism in Anglo Saxon England. That context, once established, is then brought to bear in the final two chapters in the more closely historicized context afforded by the case of JElfric of Eynsham ( 9 5 s - r o r o C.E. ) .

Although The Footsteps of Israel attempts to track the understanding of Jews and Judaism across as wide a variety of texts and traditions active in Anglo-Saxon England as possible, this is in the end a hopeless task. References to Jews and Judaism are simply too numerous once the net has been cast. What follows is, to borrow Thomas Greene's words in his study of the vast epic tradition, "an attempt to manage the unman ageable."39 I have not sifted all the patristic authors studied in Anglo3 9 . Greene, Descent from Heaven, 6.

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Saxon England for their understanding ofJews and Judaism; I have not combed every inch of the Christian Latin poets oflate antiquity; I have not used every exegetical commentary by Bede or treated every Old English homily that mentions Jews; nor have I spent much time with the liturgy or glossed psalters . I have not plumbed Alcuin to his very core or fully exploited the Carolingian comparison. I leave these tasks to others . However, I have assembled a large enough sample of texts and tradi tions to map out some basic hypotheses, enough texts to claim represen tative status for the conclusions advanced.4° Auerbach's method in Liter ary Language and Its Public in Late Latin Antiquity and in the Middle Ages strikes me as an apt model: It is patently impossible to establish a synthesis by assembling all the particulars . Perhaps, however, we shall be able to do so by selecting characteristic particulars and following up their implica tions . This method consists in finding unusually fertile areas or key problems on which it is rewarding to concentrate, because they open up a knowledge of a broader context and cast a light on entire historical landscapes Y We begin in part I with the complex understanding ofJews found in the writings of Bede . Through a close examination of Bede's exegetical texts, two chapters detail Bede's use of the Jews as a complex, mobile signifier in various exegetical situations. Jews mean many things to Bede, for many different reasons. While he certainly falls within the general, orthodox lines of early medieval Augustinian theology, Bede displays a fascinating originality as he deploys the tropes of traditional anti-Judaism for particular rhetorical ends. Chapter I traces Bede's use of the most angry, emotional tropes of anti-Judaic discourse; chapter 2 analyzes strangely contradictory drives to understand the Jews through empathy. I have found that presenting a large number of examples of 4 0 . Cf. Derek Attridge's use of "representative texts": "I could have devoted the entire book to any of these turning points, moving from the chosen texts to others of its time, but my hope is that the close discussion of one text will be sufficient to indicate how other related texts could be read to extend and refine the argument for that particular period" ( Peculiar Langua�qe, 7 ) . 4 r . Auerbach, Literar_v Language, r 8 ; this also serves a s a description of Auerbach's Mimesis.

Introduction I9

biblical exegesis at work can be a bit overwhelming for a reader: one must provide context and text for the biblical source under analysis, then provide the medieval author's interpretation (which often in cludes further biblical subreferences ), and then tie it all into an argu ment as further examples are strung together. In order to make these chapters as "reader-friendly" as possible, I have provided ample con text, quotations, and cross-references throughout; however, it also might be usefl1l for a reader to keep a copy of the Bible close to hand during these chapters on Bede . This initial study of Bede functions as a preliminary sounding of the themes that will be traced throughout The Footsteps of Israel; thus a number of paths branch out from the study of Bede's exegesis. Given his interest in the history of the Gentile conversion and the analogy he finds with the growth and triumph of the church in England, we can pick up the outlines of a very common hermeneutic: the tradition of seeing the populus Israhel as metaphor, image, and exemplum. Chapters 3 and 4 survey this tradition of the populus Israhel: its sources in late antique authors such as Eusebius, Rufinus, Salvian, Prudentius, Oro sins, Paulinus of Nola, and Gildas, and its manifestations in such Anglo-Saxon authors and texts as Bede, Alcuin, the Old English poems Genesis A) Exodus) Daniel and Judith. The populus Israhel) a complex metaphor and political ideology, embraces both a figural understand ing of past and present and a traditional metaphor for the vagaries of history. The Jews were once the chosen people, but now the Anglo Saxons represent a new covenant with God, to be rewarded or pun ished as the occasion demanded. Jews provide a sense of history for Anglo-Saxon culture, an understanding of the relationship between past and present. A related, perhaps even more flexible image is the Christian understanding of Jewish history as one long historia calami tatum) a dire exemplum of God's wrath. Exile in Egypt, the Babylonian captivity, the final siege of Jerusalem and the dispersion of its people by the Roman eagle-this history provides a storehouse of powerfully resonant exempla and analogies . In this model, the Jews are essentially a tragic and elegiac people, once beloved of God, but now punished and scattered to the winds of exile . From this relatively ( stress on the word "relatively" ) benign tradition we descend to a darker, more disturbing dynamic treated in chapters 5 and 6 : a mode of thinking I term "somatic anti-Judaism . " Our touch stones for this body of discourse will be a wide range of texts and

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 20

traditions meeting in two Anglo-Saxon manuscripts : the Vercelli Book and the Blickling manuscript, codices often paired together as exemplifY ing a particular strain of pre-Benedictine-reform Anglo-Saxon theology. In this tradition, we see a more disturbing type of anti-Judaism, one highly charged with emotion. Jews cluster about the Old English texts of these manuscripts, prose and verse, as part and parcel of common concerns: eschatology, Christology, New Testament apocrypha, the body, and overall, a certain flamboyance of theological expression. The influence of the apocryphal New Testament and related texts has long had an important place in the history of antisemitism. In the later Middle Ages the apocrypha, with their concentration on the biography ofJesus and Mary and a related concern with their physical bodies, rose to the forefront of medieval antisemitism through cultural forms such as medieval drama. In the Anglo-Saxon period, the apocrypha were also an abiding influence, and as might be expected, these texts incite an under standing ofJews hopelessly trapped in a tangle of deeply emotional anti Judaism . The Old English texts of the Vercelli Book and the Blickling manuscript attest to this type of understanding : a fusion o f ideas deeply influ enced by the materiality and al terity of the body. Chapter 7 turns to the end of the Anglo-Saxon period and examines the representation of Jews in the context of the Benedictine reform, specifically in the work of lElfric of Eynsham . During this time of po litical upheaval and the tightening of orthodox doctrine promoted by lElfric's generation of ecclesiastical reformers, the Jews became not only a surpassed people supplanted by the "New Israel" and a dark repository of Christian anxieties, but also a rhetorical cipher, a political tool used to promote the visions of the Benedictine reform. The constituent parts of The Footsteps of Israel function in different ways : they focus on particular authors, such as Bede and lElfric; they also focus on long traditions incorporating many texts, such as the populus Israhel ideal. In the following chapters we will hear the recur ring sounds of the motifs played out in the anti-Judaic tradition; we will reconstruct the ebb and flow of that dark music in Anglo-Saxon England.

PA R T O N E

Bede) the Jews) and the Exegetical Imagination

Introduction

He appealed to all sides at once-to the side turned perpetually to the light of day, and to that side of us which, like the other hemi sphere of the moon, exists stealthily in perpetual darkness, with only a fearful ashy light falling at times on the edge. -Joseph Conrad, Lord jim Dread is a desire for what one ±ears, a sympathetic antipathy; dread is an alien power which takes hold of the individual, and yet one cannot extricate oneself from it, does not wish to, because one is afi-aid, but what one fears attracts one . -Kierkegaard, The Concept of Dread

n the large corpus of Bede's writings, the result of his "toil stupen dous" and "umelaxing use / Of a long life," we find a tremendous variety in his apprehension of Jews and Judaism. 1 Bede's hermeneutic, as exemplified in his exegetical commentaries, is marked by contradic tion and ambivalence; it is a complex mix of traditional rejection and subtle empathy. 2 Given Bede's important position both in the textual

I

I . William Wordsworth, Ecclesiastical Sonnets, 23 ( " Reproof "), 6, r 2- r 3 ( R epresentative Poems, ed. Beatty, pp. 5 0 1 - 2 ) . For introductions to Bede see Thompson, ed., Bede: His Life, Times, and Writings; Bonner, ed. , Famulus Christi; G. Brown, Bede; Ward, The Venerable Bede; Lapidge, ed. , Bede and His World. 2 . For introductions to Bede's exegesis see Jenkins, "Beck as Exegete and Theologian"; Jones, "Some Introductory Remarks" ; Meyvaert, "Becie the Scholar," 4 4 - 4 7 ; Bonner, "Becie

23

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 24

culture of Anglo-Saxon England and in early medieval intellectual his tory, his understanding of Jews calls for close explication . 3 Bede's homily o n John 5 : r - r 8 , for use during Lent, provides an introduction to the variegated themes associated with Jews in Bede's conception. In this pericope, Jesus heals an infirm man languishing before the pool Probatica in Jerusalem. The sick, blind, and crippled lie scattered about the five porches of the pool, and the gospel tells us that the water is endowed with healing power: " [A]n angel of the Lord descended at certain times into the pond and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water was made whole of whatsoever infirmity he lay under" ( John 5 : 4 ) . One particular man, crippled for thirty-eight years, could never find his way to the pool, thrust aside as others hurried down to be made whole by the waters : Jesus cures this unfortunate soul. The gos pel tells us that the Jews were angry at the former cripple for porting about his now-useless bed on the Sabbath; he exacerbates the situation when he explains to the Jews that "it was Jesus who had made him whole" ( John 5 : r 5 ) . As a result, "therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him" ( John 5 : 1 8 ) . In responding to this inflammatory verse, Bede lashes out with a predictable burst of exasperation: "Sed mira perfidorum dementia qui ad tam inopinatam diu languentis sanationem credere ac spiritaliter sanari debuerant e contra scandalizati sunt et saluato pariter ac saluatori calumniam struunt" [ But astonishing is the madness of the faithless people who ought to believe in the expected healing of one sick for so long, and who also ought to have been healed spiritually themselves; but, on the contrary, they were scandalized and fabricated a false accusa tion against both the healer and the man healed] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . r oo4 ) . Here Bede's rhetoric lands hard upon the Jews : they are possessed by madness ( dementia) , a tradition we will see again and again, and they are personally responsible for their stubborn unbelief-something about them obstinately refuses to see the truth before their very eyes. in the Tradition of Western Apocalyptic Commentary," I 5 6- 67; Ray, "Bede, the Exegete, as Historian" and "What Do We Know about Bede's Commentaries?"; Brown, Rede, 4 2 - 6 I ; Ward, Venerable Bede, 4 I - 87; Holder, "Bede and the Tradition ofPatristic Exegesis. " Discus sions of Bede's sources may be found in Laistner, "The Library of the Venerable Bede," and Stansbury, "Source-Marks in Bede's Biblical Commentaries . " On biblical study and exegesis in early Britain, see Sims-Williams, Religion and Literature in Western England, I 77- 2 I O . 3 . For Bede's influence see Whitelock, "After Bede "; Jones, "Bede's Place in Medieval Schools"; Brown, Bede, 97- I 0 3 ; Cross, "Bede's Influence at Home and Abroad. "

Introduction 25

As Bede explains, they were " [l]itteram legis stulte defendebant ignor ando dispensationem" [ foolishly defending the letter of the Law, by ignoring the divine providence ] of God; it was "quasi melius ipsi de sabbato quam tanta diuinitatis potentia nossent" [as if they would rather acknowledge the Sabbath than such divine power] ( Homeliae r . 2 3 . I 09 - I o; I o 6- 7 ) . Even in the face of "obvious" miracles, the Jews do not believe, "foolishly" focusing on the letter of the Law, on the "carnal Sabbath" [sabbato carnali] , rather than the spiritual Sabbath ( Homeliae r . 2 3 . I I 4 ) . 4 The anger encoded into this bit of exegesis can be found across a wide swath of Bedan texts. As he develops this utter rejection of the Jews, Bede applies the rhetoric of sickness, blindness, and corruption with a liberal hand. He explains that the man Jesus healed was both cleansed of his exterior illness and absolved of the sins within, the spiritual crimes that caused his physical deformity. But the Jews, who were "male intus languidi, iam deterius aegrotare incipiunt persequendo uidelicet Iesum quia haec fecerat in sabbato" [wretchedly torpid within, now began to sicken further by persecuting Jesus, of course, because he had done these things on the Sabbath] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 207- 9 ) . Although the Jews "legis auctoritatem simul et diuinae operationis exempla secuti" [were follow ing the authority of the Law and at the same time the example of divine work ( i . e . , in that God rested on the seventh day when he created the world) , they simply "nee maximum illud sabbati mysterium cognos centes" [did not recognize that great spiritual meaning of the Sabbath] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 2 I O- I I , 22o- 2 I ) . The expression of traditional, angry anti-Judaism displays Bede's exegetical imagination at work; a sample of this process, what Paul Meyvaert calls "a grand exercise in the use of the imagination," can be found in Bede's continued exposition in our test homily. s Bede knows his task is to strip away the darkness of the literal for his readers, to make manifest that which is obscure . Later in our same homily, in an imaginative leap, he does this by positing what Christ might have said, if he had spoken more clearly on this occasion: "Ac si aperte dicat, quid mihi inuidetis? Cur me uituperatis caeci legis lectores . . . . "' [But if he should speak clearly (he would say ) : "Why do you envy me? Why do you blind readers of the Law disparage me? . . . "] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 2 5 9 - 60 ) . Exegesis here is much like an act 4 · See also Homeliae 2 . I 7 . 2 3 0- 3 5 · 5 . Meyvaert, "Bede the Scholar," 4 5 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 26

of translation, bearing meaning from one domain to the clarity of another register: if Christ spoke more clearly, Bede explains, he would have posed the problem in the following way. Of course, this transla tion of Christ's implicit, hidden meaning is, in effect, Bede's particular interpretation. Although this statement seems to place blame squarely upon the shoulders of the Jews and their conscious choice to deny God, Bede immediately qualifies his statement by explaining that when con fronted by the miraculous incarnation of God made fle sh, "ipsi talis ac tanti mysterii minus capaces" [they were less fit for such a great mys tery] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 2 64 ) . Yet if the Jews do not have the capacity to understand the incarnation; if they face the world with diminished faculties and stunted capacities for the Word; if they are blind, trapped by the Old Law and bereft of spiritual sensibilities, how can they be blamed? This contradiction does not seem to be an issue at the level of conscious thought for early medieval Christianity: Bede had no prob lem believing that the Jews were not only stupid and blind, but also cunning and deceitful; guilty by their choices, but also lesser beings in the first place. At the end of the homily, Bede moves to a comparison of the "Jewish murderers of Christ" [ interfectores Christi Iudaei] with the Arian heretics ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 274- 7 5 ) . Bede explains that the Jews understood what the Arians could not, namely, that Jesus was claiming to be God Himself: "alii quid diceret dominus intellegentes uera eum dixisse negabant alteri uera quidem dominum de se testatum fatentur sed in his sensum ueritatis sequi et conprehendere detrectant" [Some, although understanding what the Lord said, yet denied that he had spoken the truth. Others acknowledge that the Lord indeed bears wit ness to the truth about himself, but decline to follow and comprehend the sense of the truth in these matters] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 2 8 0- 8 3 ) . Here the Jews understand but refuse that understanding and deny the truth of it. In any case, "ad unum finem utrorumque tendit impietas" [the impiety of both (i.e., Jews and heretics) moves to one end] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 2 79 ) . As we shall see, Bede is not entirely consistent in his repre sentation of Jewish motives for their crimes, or in his understanding of the magnitude of their unbelief when compared to other "faithless ones" [perfidi] , such as pagans and heretics . This contradiction is built into the structure of Christian anti-Judaism, and when Bede encoun ters this paradox, as he does time and time again, the result is contradic tion, ambivalence, and ambiguity-a hermeneutic gap in which we

Introduction 27

may glimpse an Anglo-Saxon response to Jews . Thus, the first chapter of this section will focus on Bede's "rhetoric of rejection"-his deploy ment and expression of the angry tropes of traditional anti-Judaism. However, even in the analysis of a pericope such as that of our test homily, which bluntly states that the Jews "sought the more to kill him," Bede's exegesis does not condemn the Jews on all points, with an all-out torrent of anti- Judaic invective . Instead, Jews are at times presented in a more detached fashion, with an informed scholarly curiosity that cleanly appraises them with a discerning, analytic eye, bereft of undue emotion. For example, Bede explains in our homily that "Probatica priscina quae quinque porticibus cingebatur populus est Iudaeorum legis undique custodia ne peccare de beat munitus" [the pool Probatica, which was enclosed by five porticoes, is the people of the Jews, fortified on all sides by the protection of the Law, lest they should sin ] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 6- 8 ) . Following Augustine's commentary on John, Bede notes that the five porches thus symbolize the five books of the Law ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 8 I O ) . 6 Bede's explanation of the occasionally troubled waters of the pool allows us to see his understanding of the Jews as a people of conflicting interpretations : "populus qui in quibusdam munditiam uitae seruare in quibusdam nero solebat immundorum spirituum temptamentis agitari per aquam signatur piscinae quae nunc placida uentis stare nunc eis inruentibus turbari consueuerat" [the people who had been accustomed to preserve the purity of life in certain matters, but were also used to being stirred up in certain other matters by the temptation of impure spirits, are signified by the waters of the pool, which sometimes used to stand calm in the winds, sometimes to be agitated when they rushed in] ( Homeliae i . 2 3 . I O- I 3 ) . Thus according to Bede, the Jews are the waters of the pool-they are pure, protected by the Law, but also at times sullied, stirred up by "unclean spirits . " The essential ambiguity of the Jews continues as Bede explicates the waters at greater length: he explains that the angel who descends upon the pool is Christ, a "paternae uoluntatis nuntius in populum Iudae orum" [ herald of the paternal will to the people of the Jews] , who heals them spiritually ( Homeliae 1 . 2 3 . 3 3 - 3 4 ) . Although Bede has just ex plained that the Law kept the Jews pure, he now shows its limitations in strong language : 6. Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannem, I 7 . 2 . r 2- r 3 , by tractate number, chapter, and line numbers.

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 28

Motus ergo aquae passionem domini quae mota turbataque Iudae orum gente facta est insinuat. Et quia per eandem passionem redempti sunt credentes a maledicto legis quasi descendentes in aquam piscinae turbatam sanabantur qui eatenus iacuerunt in porticibus aegroti . ( Homeliae r . 2 3 . 3 6- 4 r ) [Therefore the motion of the water implies the Passion of the Lord, which happened through the Jewish nation's agitation and confusion. And because those who believed were redeemed from the curse of the Law through his Passion, it is as if, descending into the waters of the pool, they were healed who had long been lying sick at the gates. ] Here the Law is a "curse" [ maledicto] rather than a warding instrument of divine purity. This is a common anti-Judaic image : the Jews as sick, enfeebled and infirm in some physical way. This sickness, of course, is a manifestation of the intellectual deficiency caused by strict adherence only to the Mosaic Law, without the saving grace of Christ. As Bede says, the letter of the Law "nescientes quid agendum quid uitandum esset edocuit" [taught the ignorant what was to be done and what was to be shunned] , yet it could not actually bring them to salvation, heal their spiritual infirmity; only " [ g]ratia autem euangelii quae per fidem ac mysterium dominicae passionis sanat omnes languores iniquitatum nostrarum a qui bus in lege Moysi non potuimus iustificari" [the grace of the gospel, however, through faith and the mystery of the Lord's Passion, heals all the sicknesses of our sins, from which we could not be redeemed in the Law of Moses] ( Homeliae r . 2 3 -4 1 - 4 2, 4 5 - 4 8 ) . This is the basic herme neutic that will be applied to Jews in Bede's exegesis : the Jews, followers of the Old Law, are incomplete, sick without the healing completion of Christ. But the question remains : should not the "sick" be healed? Are the Jews to blame for their state of insufficiency, or are they simply in need of healing, longing for completion? As Bede ends this portion of his explication, we are to understand that those outside of the pool are only temporarily beyond the great unity of the church; only those in the pool can be healed, and "praeter unitatem catholicae fidei nullum cuilibet locum patere salutis" [there is no place of salvation accessible to anyone outside the unity of the catholic faith ] ( Homeliae r . 2 3 . 6 5 - 66 ) . We will examine this in further detail in the second chapter of this

Introduction 29

section; suffice to say here that the place of the Jews in relation to the church and its history tends to generate in Bede's conception a cerebral rhetoric of empathy for the embattled "prisoners" of the Old Law, residing in contrast to the charged, emotional rhetoric of rejection. In the following pages, we shall explore these competing and often contradictory interpretations of the Jews, this apparently easy arc from frustrated anger, to measured scholarly observation, to pity. While Bede certainly falls into the general outlines of the early medieval Au gustinian understanding of the Jews, his expression of that tradition is quite complex and merits a careful consideration. Through the deploy ment of this tradition Bede generates, in effect, a distinctively Anglo Saxon shared understanding of Jews, a flexible hermeneutic that also could serve as a strategy for social self-definition. As Morrison notes in his study of the role of tradition in the early Middle Ages: "True believers were no longer simply those who upheld the Scriptures as tme, but those who shared a particular understanding of the Scriptures' inner meaning or implications . "? Exegesis creates a community ofread ers and educated believers; Frances Young explains that "the reading of scripture . . . was a deadly serious business . Its purpose was to under stand one's place in the great scheme of things, and to learn how to live and act." 8 Bede's exegesis of the Jews tells us a great deal about his understanding of the Anglo-Saxon Christian community.

7 . Tradition and Authority, 6 3 . 8 . Young, Biblical Exegesis, 297.

ONE

B ede and Hate

Sound and Fury great deal of anger finds its source in the supposed "stubborn" character of the Jews, their frustrating inability to acknowledge events and interpretations that, for Bede and his tradition, were as clear and plain as day; the great denial of Christ is the font of Bede's anti Judaic rhetoric. This exasperation directs Bede's explication of John I : I I ( "He came unto his own, and his own received him not" ) :

A

Quem enim in potentia deitatis cuncta creantem regentemque non cognouerant ipsum in carnis infirmitate miraculis coruscan tem recipere noluerunt. Et quod grauius est sui eum non receper unt homines scilicet quos ipse creauit. Iudaei quos peculiarem sibi elegerat in plebem quibus suae cognitionis reuelauerat archanum quos mirificis patrum glorificauerat actis quibus suae legis doc trinam contulerat ex quibus se incarnandum promiserat et in quibus se incarnatum ut promiserat ostendit ipsi eum recipere uenientem magna ex parte recusarunt. Neque enim omnes recus arunt alioquin nullus esset saluus et superuacua eius esset incar natio . ( Homeliae r . 8 . I 7o- 8 I ) 1 I . For other general statements of Jewish refu sal and denial of Christ see, inter alia, Homeliae 2 . r 6. 8 4- r o 5 ; In Ti1biam 3 . 2 5 . 2 2- 2 5 ; De Templo 2 . 694 - 9 5 ; Explanatio Apocalypsis PL 9 3 : 170.

30

Bede and Hate 3I

[ Indeed, the one whom they had not recognized as creating and reigning in all the power of his divinity, this same one they would not receive shining with miracles in the infirmity of the fle sh. And, what is more grievous, "his own received him not," namely the men whom he himself created. The Jews, whom he had chosen as his own special people, among whom he had revealed the mystery of knowledge of himself, whom he had glorified by the wondrous acts of the fathers, to whom he had brought the doctrine of his Law, from whom he had prom ised to incarnate himself, and among whom, as he also had promised, he showed himself incarnate-these Jews for the most part refused to accept him at his coming. Not everyone refused; otherwise, no one would have been saved, and his incarnation would have been useless. ]

The dark ignorance of the Jews cannot be pierced, even by the light of Christ "shining with miracles in the infirmity of the flesh" [ in carnis infirmitate miraculis coruscantem] , in Bede's rather flamboyant turn of phrase. Like a lawyer concluding his case, Bede strings his clauses together, piling the evidence up against the Jews : quos . . . quibus . . . quos . . . quos . . . quibus . . . ex quibus. When the Jews refuse to believe in Christ, following the wayward directions of a "stubborn mind" [ obstinata mente) Homeliae 2. I 6. I 09 ] , they provoke a Christian exegeti cal frustration. Bede knows that the Jews believed in a Messiah foretold in Scripture, but the fact that they did not connect this prophecy to Jesus is the central, exasperating point of their unbelief and hard hearts . From the Christian perspective, they are so close to salvation, and yet so very far. Indeed, Bede explains to his audience that some of the Jews refuse to believe even to his very day : "Erant enim quidam Iudaeorum, sicut et hodie sunt) ita perfidi ut, cum Christi passionem ac resurrectionem scripturis insertam negare non possint, haec tamen ad Iesum pertinere omnino negent magisque Antichristum expectare quam Iesum Christum credere uelint" [In fact there were certain Jews, just as there are today) so faithless that, although they could not deny that the suffering and resurrection of the Christ were present in the Scriptures, nevertheless they completely de nied that these things pertained to Jesus, and they preferred to await the Antichrist rather than to believe in Jesus Christ] ( Expositio Actuum

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 32

Apostolorum I 7 · 3 · 5 - 9 i emphasis added) .2 For Bede, the staunch refusal of the Jews to believe is like an unfinished argument: the Jews still refuse to admit that they were wrong. The open -ended, unresolved character of this rhetorical fantasy is like a festering wound that Christian culture can never quite heal, but insists upon ever tearing afresh . This reference to Jews in the contemporary world-the Jews ofBede's day and age-adds a note of urgency to the explication: these Jews, Bede implies, are not misbegotten relics of a bygone history, but still dwell in error, some where beyond the shores of England. Here we have a typical pattern for Bede : a standard trope of anti-Judaic rhetoric-that the Jews did not recognize Jesus as the Messiah-acquires further nuance as Bede's imagi nation meditates upon the point, musing upon the Jews of the here-and now, who maintain their ancient error. The rhetoric of anti-Judaism can be a vehicle for Bede's imagination. For example, Bede uses the vivid image of the stone rolled away from the empty tomb of Jesus to illustrate the hardness of the Jews' hearts : the tme believer opens his heart to Christ, like the opened tomb ; but Jews and pagans "triumphum uero resurrectionis eius pror sus credere recusant quasi clausum lapide adhuc monumentum per manet" [ absolutely refuse to believe in the triumph of his resurrection, remaining like a tomb still closed by a stone ] ( Homeliae 2 . r o . 69 - 70 ) . 3 It i s the "hardness o f their infidelity" [ duritia suae injidelitatis] that keeps them from understanding and accepting the resurrection ( Home liae 2 . r 0 . 7 2 ) . Indulging in a bit of wordplay, Bede compares the move ment of the heavy stone to the stripping away of the Old Law: "Mys tice autem reuolutio lapidis sacramentorum est reuolutio diuinorum quae quondam littera legis claudebantur occulta" [Symbolically, the rolling away of the stone implies the disclosure of the divine sacra ments, which were formerly hidden and closed up by the letter of the Law] ( Homeliae 2 . r 0 . 5 9 - 6o; emphases added) . Wordplay implies a level of aesthetic response to the text Bede explicates; aesthetic re sponse to the images involved in turn suggests an emotional invest ment in the hermeneutic process : at the very least a response located at a level deeper than simple exposition . Bede's expression of the anti2. See also Homeliae 2 . 2 4 . s o - 5 3 f(Jr a similar comment on the unbelief of "present-day" Jews. 3 · For further references to the Jews as hard-hearted (or hard like stones) see, inter alia, Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 7. 5 8 . I 5 4 - 63 ; 2 8 . 27 . 63 - 67; Homeliae 2.20. I 70 - 7 2 ; 2 . 24 · 3 3 - 3 5 ·

Bede and Hate 33

Judaic tradition is intended to give pleasure . This deeper imaginative engagement, however, also leads to exploration of other, darker aspects of the tradition as the hermeneutic circle widens .

Intention What was behind the great refusal of the Jews? Why did they deny the divinity of Christ?4 Bede attempts to answer these questions and at the same time makes it clear that this was a conscious choice on their part, an evil decision made of their own free will : the Jews "hunc deum credere noluisse meminerunt" [remembered that they had not wished to believe that he was God] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 7 . 5 6 . I 4 5 ) . 5 At the end of Acts, Paul preaches to the Jews of Rome, drawing on Isaiah: "For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears have they heard heavily" (Acts 2 8 : 2 7, alluding to Isaiah 6 : 9 - I o ) . Bede takes care to close off the possible (but incorrect) interpretation that such defects of heart and ear are inborn and not a matter offree will and choice ; and thus perhaps their unbelief is not the Jews' own "fault" : "Ne putemus cras situdinem cordis et grauitatem aurium naturae esse, non uoluntatis, subiungit culpam arbitrii et dicit: 'Et oculos suos compresserunt ne forte uideant oculis,' id est, ipsi meritis praecedentibus causa fuerunt ut deus eis oculos clauderet" [ Lest we think that hardness of the heart and dullness of the ear are part of their nature and not of their will, he added the fault of free will, saying, "And their eyes they have shut, lest per haps they should see with their eyes," that is, because of their earlier faults, they themselves were the reason that God closed their eyes] ( Ex positio Actuum Apostolorum 2 8 . 27 . 64- 69 ; Acts 2 8 : 27 ) . However, in other passages Bede seems to connect Jewish tmbelief with their innate nature : "Ne sic quidem fidei se dare uolentes. Ingenita enim malitia cor perfidum in signis etiam manifestis obturat" [And so they were unwill ing to give themselves to the faith . Indeed, inborn malice locks a faithless heart, even among clear signs] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 5 . 24 . 6 36 5; emphases added) . This use of ingenita seems to be somewhat iso lated: in the main, Bede underscores the evil intentions ofthe Jews, their status as willing participants in deicide . 4 · For a discussion of the trope see Cohen, "Jews as the Killers of Christ," I O- I I . 5 . Bede has a number of passages where he ascribes active intent to the Jews' killing of Christ; see, inter alia, Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 8 . 3 3 .97-99; 2 I . I 8 .26- 27; 2 5 . I I . I - 4 ; Homeliae 2 . 2 4 - 4 2- 4 3 , 6 I - 66, I 26- 2 8 , etc.

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 34

Again, this trope allows for play of the imagination . In a rather angry moment, Bede compares the cunning Jews to deceitful foxes . In Acts I 9 : I 4 "certain men, seven sons ofSceva, a Jew, a chief priest" attempt to exorcise evil spirits in the name of Jesus; they come to grief when one demon rebuffs their unsanctioned efforts with the words "Jesus I know; and Paul I know; but who are you? " (Acts I 9 : I 5 ) . Following Jerome, Bede explains that the name "Sceva" means a "barking little fox" [ uulpecula clamans] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 9 . I 4 . 5 4 ) . 6 Bede fur ther demonstrates that this epithet is appropriate : "Hoc enim animal doli et astutiae sagacissimum Iudaeos gentiles et hereticos ecclesiae dei semper insidiantes et quasi garrula uoce perstrepentes ostendit" [This animal, which is most shrewd in guile and cunning, represents the Jews, gentiles, and heretics, who are always plotting against the Church of God, and likewise making a loud clamor with a prattling voice ] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 9 . I 4 . 5 4- 5 7 ) . ? Jerome provides him with the raw material ofinterpretation in the etymology of "Sceva," but Bede anchors the name and its interpretation firmly in the anti-Judaic rhetorical tra dition. The pattern is familiar: Bede accesses the tradition of Jewish intentional deicide and then elaborates his expression ofthat tradition by means of a vivid image . Such images have an obvious rhetorical force : like Bede's wordplay noted above, they engage the reader at the level of aesthetic and emotional response beyond the imperatives of simple argu mentation and abstract exposition. 8 Bede is writing this text, after all, with an audience in mind, whether literal (the monks of Jarrow or correspondents) or figurative (the Chris6 . Jerome, Liber Interpretationis Hebraicorum Nominorum I 49 . I 9 - 20, by page and line numbers : "Sceua uulpecula clamans uel loquens. " 7 · For a similar association of Jews with heretics and Gentiles (i.e . , pagans) c f. Explanatio Apoca£ypsis PL 9 3 : I 8 2 : "Triforme belum impia civitas infert Ecclesiae Christi. Quam gentiles et Judaei aperto certamine, haeretici subdola defectione, f�1lsi fratres pravis infestant exemplis" [The impious city ( i . e . , Babylon) wages a triple war against the church of Christ. The pagans and Jews attack it with open battle, heretics with cunning rebellion, false brothers by perverse examples] . The link between pagans, Jews, <md heretics in tl1e early Middle Ages is common: for numerous legal examples see Linder, ed. , ]ews in the Legal Sources, "Index of Subjects," s.v. "Heresy, heretics"; for an acute discussion of this link (and its eventual extension to lepers) see Moore, Formation of a Persecuting Society, 66- 9 9 . 8 . For a discussion o f the rhetorical and ideological power o f etymology, and its connec tion to word -play, see Attridge, Peculiar Language, 90- I 2 6 ( chapter 4 : "Language as History/History as Language : Saussure and the Romance of Etymology"); on the "fetishism regarding Hebrevv proper names" in the exegetical tradition, see Bloch, Etymologies, 3 4 - 3 7 ( 3 5 ) ; for general background on etymology a s a medieval rhetorical habit see Curtius, Euro pean Literature, 49 5 - 500, and Carruthers, Craft (if Thought, I 5 5 - 6 I .

Bede and Hate 35

tian populus as a whole ) . Thus his anti-Judaic rhetoric often has a didactic thrust, and to move the reader to aesthetic satisfaction is effec tive pedagogy. In an explication of John n : s 6 ( "They [i.e., the Jews ] sought therefore for Jesus; and they discoursed one with another, stand ing in the temple . . . " ) , Bede comments, " Quaerebant enim Iudaei Iesum sed male quaerebant ut uenientem ad diem festum interficerent" [The Jews were seeking Jesus, but seeking him with evil intention, so that they might kill him when he came to the festival day] ( Homeliae 2 -4 . 3 2- 3 3 ) .9 Here again the Jews are active conspirators : even though Jesus knew "conspirasse de se occidendo Iudaeos" [that the Jews had conspired to kill him ] , he did not flee from the "hands of those plot ting" ( insidiantium manus] against him ( Homeliae 2 - 4 -47, 4 7- 4 8 ) . 10 Having established their conspiracy, near the end of this homily Bede exults in a mixture of anger and triumph as he comments on the plot of the chief priests to kill the newly resurrected Lazarus : "0 caeca cae corum uersutia occidere uelle suscitatum quasi non posset suscitare occisum qui poterat defimcmm! " [0 blind cunning of the blind, to wish to kill one who had been restored to life; as if he could not resurrect one who had been killed, when he had been able to restore one who had died! ] ( Homeliae 2- 4 . 1 9 8 - 9 9 ) . Combining two familiar motifs-the intentional plotting and the blindness of the Jews-Bede then opens this traditional discourse to a contemporary application: "Sed nos, fratres, relicta malitia perfidorum sequamur deuotionem fi delium abeamus" [But let us, brothers, leave behind the abandoned malice of the faithless and follow the devotion of the faithful ] ( Home liae 2 . 4 . 20 1 - 2 ) . As Bede delicately positions the relicta militia perji dorum against the deuotionem jidelium) the hortatory and exemplary use of the Jews in this context is clear. By piling all the rhetorical weight upon the Jews, making them the archetypes of error and faithlessness, Bede seeks to regulate the conduct of his audience-the aim of any good homilist.

Intellectual Opacity In apparent contradiction to the notion that the Jews were intentional criminals-the evil conspirators and devious villains of Christ's Pas9 · Following Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannem, 5 0 . 3 . 1 - 4 . 1 0 . See also Homeliae I . I 4 . 1 8 8 - 9 2 .

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sion-Bede also paints the Jews as deficient in their mental faculties, standing in ignorance before clear evidence. But do not conspirators need at least a modicum of savvy in order to initiate their plot? How can Jews be both devious and cunning villains, as well as blind and bumbling poltroons? In his explication of Jesus' feeding of the five thousand ( John 6 : 1 - 1 4 ) , Bede turns his attention to the boy who provided the five loaves and the fish : "Puer qui quinque panes et duos pisces habuit nee tamen eos esurientibus turbis distribuit sed domino distribuendos obtulit populus Iudaeomm litterali sensu puerilis qui scriptuarum dicta clausa secum tenuit" [The boy, who had the five loaves and two fish and did not distribute them to the hungry crowds but carried them to the Lord for distribution, is the people of the Jews : childish in apprehension of the literal sense, and a people who held the words of the Scriptures closed within themselves] ( Homeliae 2 . 2 . 1 2427 ) . The Jews are "childish" (sensu puerilis) in the development of their spiritual sensibilities; the implication is that they have not yet devel oped the mental ability to recognize and understand Christ-they have not reached spiritual "maturity," but languish in a spiritually "pre pubescent" simplicity. The bread the boy bears is the unrealized poten tial of the Jews themselves: Christ "accepit et quid intus haberent utilitatis ac dulcedinis ostendit" [received them and showed what use fulness and sweetness they had within] ( Homeliae 2 . 2 . 1 2 8 - 29 ) . The Jews are raw material, like the five loaves and fish that grew to feed a multitude : "Et haec per apostolos suos apostolorumque successores cunctis nationibus ministrando porrexit" [and he gave these things (i.e., the potential for salvation within the Jews ) to all nations to be managed by the apostles and their successors] ( Homeliae 2 . 2 . 1 3 1 - 3 2 ) . Once again, the basic anti-Judaic trope is quite traditional: the Jews could not understand the spiritual sense of the events and texts before them; only the true Christian possesses a discerning spiritual eye . But by unfolding the exegetical implications of the child and his paltry food, Bede continues to develop a store of images as he works in and around the traditions of early medieval anti-Judaism. There is a "poet ics" of exegesis at work here . But is there no remedy for the poor judgment, the dullness ofJewish intellectual capacity? Perhaps it is the teacher in Bede, his lifelong mis sion to educate the ignorant, that leads him at times to express the faithlessness of the Jews as a simple lack of education. We can see this impulse in Bede's exegesis of the meeting between Nicodemus and Jesus

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in John 3 : r - 2 1 . Bede turns his gifts to the story of Nicodemus, a "princeps Iudaeorum uenit ad Iesum nocte cupiens secreta eius adlocu tione plenius discere mysteria fidei cuius aperta ostensione signorum aliquatenus iam rudimenta perceperat" [a leader of the Jews who came to Jesus in the night desiring to learn more fully, by speaking with him secretly about the mysteries of the faith, the rudiments of which he had already perceived somewhat by the clear manifestation of signs ] ( Home liae 2 . 1 8 . 2- 4 ) . Nicodemus is a willing neophyte who needs only to be led to the truth he already, unknowingly, seeks : "Qui quoniam pru denter ea quae ab illo fieri uidebat intellegere curauit subtiliter ea quae ab illo quaerebat inuestigare promeruit" [Because prudently he had tal<:.en care to understand the things which he saw being accomplished by Jesus, he deserved to investigate more subtly the things that he was seeking from him ] ( Homeliae 2 . r 8 . 5 - 7 ) . The finely balanced symmetry of verbs and adverbs in this sentence underscores the development in Nicodemus's rewards : his cautions (prudenter) diligence to understand ( intellegere) is the perfect mental disposition for a student, leading to well-deserved qualities: as a result, he thus deserved to investigate ( inuestigare) these matters in a more complex fashion ( subtiliter) . In the fine lattice of this sentence, the apposed objects also mirror the develop ment in Nicodemus's merits, in the transition from passive seeing to active understanding: as soon as he understands the evidence ofhis own eyes ( ea quae . . . uidebat) , he is released to a deeper level ofinvestigation and "independent study" [ ea quae . . . quaerebat] . Like a pupil who is making an honest effort, Nicodemus is to be encouraged in his igno rance, not condemned: he simply "necdum lucis mysteria capere nou erat" [did not understand yet how to seize the mysteries of the light] ( Homeliae 2 . 1 8 . 2 6- 27 ) . Therefore, his eagerness should be rewarded: "Et quia Nichodimus ad primam domini responsionem sollicitus quo modo sit intellegenda diligenter inquirit meretur iam planius instrui et quia secunda natiuitas non carnalis sed spiritalis audire" [And because Nicodemus, moved by the first answer of the Lord, inquired diligently how it was to be understood, he now deserved to be instructed more fully, and to hear that the second birth was not carnal but spiritual ] ( Homeliae 2 . r 8 -4 6- 5 o ) . Bede explains that, like a good teacher, Jesus rebukes Nicodemus for his ignorance : "Art thou a teacher in Israel, and knowest not these things? " ( John 3 : r o ) . However, Jesus says this "non quasi insultare nolens ei qui magister uocetur cum sit ignarus sacra mentorum caelestium" [not as if he wished to insult him who was called

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a teacher when he was ignorant of the heavenly sacraments] ( Homeliae 2 . I 8 .9 8 - I oo ) . But rather by "ad humilitatis ilium uiam prouocans" [rousing him toward the way of humility] , Nicodemus might find the gate ofheaven ( Homeliae 2 . I 8 . I oo- I o i ) . I I Like Bede himself, presum ably, Jesus is devoted to teaching eager students who make an effort, using whatever means necessary. However, Bede has rather artificially separated Nicodemus from the larger audience of Jews in the gospel. When Jesus asks Nicodemus how he can possibly not understand these things and still call himself a teacher in verse I o , the next two verses seem to be addressed to Nicode mus and the larger community of unbelievers of which he is a part: "Amen, amen, I say to thee tibi that we speak what we know and we testify what we have seen; and you receive not our testimony. If I have spoken to you vobis earthly things, and you believe not; how will you believe, if l shall speak to you heavenly things? " ( John 3 : I I - I 2 ) . In his commentary on these verses, Bede explains that Jesus' words are di rected at the unbelieving Jews and not at Nicodemus, splitting the promising student off from his unsavory company: Non tamen credebant uerbo quod dixit sed ne hoc quidem in tellegere ualebant quia non de alio quam de templo corporis sui diceret. Qui ergo terrena audientes non capiebant quanto minus ad caelestia, id est diuinae generationis capienda mysteria suffi ciunt. Addit autem adhuc dominus et de caelestibus sacramentis et de terrenis instruere eum quem uidet sapienter ac diligenter his quae audit intendere . ( Homeliae 2 . I 8 . I o 6- I 3 ) [ However, they ( i . e . , the Jews ) did not believe the words he spoke; but indeed, they were not able to understand that he was not speaking of anything other than the temple of his body. There fore, since they did not grasp earthly things even while listening, how much less adequate would they be for grasping heavenly mysteries-that is, the mysteries of divine birth? However, the Lord still continued to instruct (Nicodemus) , whom he saw was wisely and diligently attending to the things he was hearing about, both the heavenly mysteries and the earthly ones. ] I I . Following Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannem, I 2 . 6 . 6- I O .

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There i s little basis in the gospel verses for the idea that Nicodemus is "wisely and diligently attentive" ; instead, Bede has created Nicodemus as a proxy for his own Christian audience in this homily. It is surely Bede's wish that his audience listen "carefully and diligently" to what is said; perhaps they are ignorant of the full implications of the divine mysteries, but they also will open their hearts to Christ and come forth, out of the darkness. Thus, like the tradition of Jewish intention, the tradition of Jewish intellectual opacity opens up the free play of imagi native embellishment. As Bede expounds Nicodemus's significance, this exegetical "character" begins to take on a life of his own under Bede's steady hand; Nicodemus is extracted from the gospel and given a liminal character as a Jew who stands on the verge of true enlighten ment, needing only the firm but gentle voice of the magister to cross over. 12 And of course this relationship models the pact between Bede and the audience of his exegesis: Bede hopes that his readers, like Nicodemus, will move vigorously from ignorance to understanding. Again, the exegetical "space" of the Jews finds easy assimilation to ad hoc rhetorical application. This process of imaginative , rhetorical exten sion, derived from the anti-Judaic tradition, can easily slip into the depths of hatred and anger.

Frenzy and the Boundaries of the Human At its most emotional, Bede's anti-Judaic rhetoric coalesces around the notion of the Jews' frenzied madness. The anger is especially apparent in his commentaries on Acts . In Acts 5 : 1 7- 24 , the apostles are rescued from prison by an angel, leaving behind only an empty cell; the chief priests hear this news but are "in doubt" over this supposedly miraculous escape (Acts 5 : 24 ) . This skepticism triggers Bede's anger: "Quid, profane Iudaee, caeca stimularis insania furanti bus dicens apostolis dominum fuisse de monumento sublatum? Die, rogo, eosdem apostolos de carcere tuo clauso cuius furtu credis ab latos? [Why, 0 profane Jew, are you incited by blind frenzy, saying that the Lord was carried from the tomb by the thieving apostles? What, I ask, do you say-by whose trick do you believe-that those I 2. See Kermode, Poetry, Narrative, History, 4 I- 42 on the narrative ambiguity ofNicode mus in the gospel accounts.

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same apostles were released from the locked prison? ] ( Expositio Ac tuum Apmtolorum 5 : 2 2 . 5 9 - 6 2 ) . The second-person address lends an element of dramatic accusation to Bede's rhetoric. This situation here in Acts apparently reminds Bede of the end of Matthew's gospel, where the Jews attempt to "cover up" Christ's resurrection by bribing the soldiers who discovered his empty tomb, instructing them to say that "his disciples came by night and stole him away" (Matthew 2 8 : I 3 ) . This doubt incites an angry response, accentuated by the second-person address to the Jews, as if they were a living, breathing segment of Bede's audience : "Why are you prompted to blind frenzy? " Bede believes that the Jews have called this doom upon themselves in their madness, quoting their own words from Matthew 27: 2 5 : "May his blood be upon us and upon our children" ( Expositio Actuum Aposto lorum 5 . 2 8 . 6 8 - 69 ) . The martyrdom of Stephen in Acts 7 is another fla shpoint for emo tional anger in the rhetoric of anti-Judaism . In unlocking the hidden meanings of Stephen's martyrdom, Bede again plays upon the horizon of expectations established by the anti-Judaic tradition. In this instance, instead of personal or original imaginative play, he deploys the rhetori cal power and authority of a source, or in other words, invokes the play ofintertextual semiotics . Before Stephen dies, the proto martyr recapitu lates the origin and history of Israel (Acts 7 : 2- 5 3 ) . Be de explains that Stephen is demonstrating the ever- contrary nature of the Jews-rebel lious even in the time of Moses, just as they still refuse to accept God's word after the coming of the Messiah: "Qui enim insimulabatur aduer sus locum sanctum et legem docuisse, pergit ostendere quomodo Iesus Christus ex lege monstretur esse promissus et quod ipse nee tunc Moysi nee domino nunc seruire maluerint" [For this man ( i . e . , Stephen) , who was accused of teaching contrary to the holy place and the Law, went on to show how it could be demonstrated from the Law that Jesus Christ was the promised one, and that they had been chosen not to be subject to Moses then, and they chose not to be subject to the Lord now] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 7 . I 6. 6 3 - 6 7; see also 7 . 2 7. 7 5 77) . Bede summarizes, drawing upon Stephen's own words as he be rates the crowd : "You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Ghost. As your fathers did, so do you also" (Acts 7: s r ) . I3 In order to further explicate the intense scene, Bede cites I 3 . Cf. Homeliae I . I I . I ? I - 8 3 and De Templo 2.972- 8 0 .

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a powerful verse from the Latin poet Arator's influential verse para phrase of Acts, De actibus apostolorum ( early sixth century) . Bede first remarks that Stephen was killed outside the city while looking towards the heavens, like Christ at his crucifixion : "Et iuxta rerum mutationem martyr mundi cordis ad caelos intuitum dirigit, persecutor durae cerui cis manus ad lapides mittit'' [And, in accordance with the turning of events, the martyr directed the gaze of his pure heart to the heavens; the stiff-necked persecutor extended his hands toward the stones] ( Ex positio Actuum Apostolorum 7. s 8 . r 5 8 - 6o ) . The spiritual martyr looks to the heavens; the base murderers look to the cold stones of the earth. Bede then quotes Arator: Lapides, Iudaea rebellis, In Stephanum lymphata rapis, quae crimine duro Saxea semper eris. r4 [Frantic, rebellious Judaea, you clutch stones against Stephen, you who will always be as hard as stones in guilty crime ] . This is similar to Bede's citation of Arator in reference to Acts r 9 : r s r 6, in which an evil spirit questions the authority of the Jews to invoke Jesus' name in exorcism, asking them, "Jesus I know and Paul I know; but who are you? " The possessed man then leaps upon these Jews, "mastering them both, prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded. " Arator's poem responds to the de mon's knowledge of Christ's authority, flaring in anti-Judaic rhetoric through citation in Bede's commentary: Cognosce furorem, Gens inimica, tuum . Daemon regnare fatetur, Quem uenisse negas, atque hoc conuinceris ipso, Quo stimulante ruis . 1 5 [ Recognize your mad fury, 0 hateful people; the demon recog nizes that he rules whose coming you deny, and this fact is proven by the very one who vexes you so that you scramble away. ] q . Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 7 · 5 8 . r 6 r - 63 ; Arator, De actibus apostolorum 1 . 5 9 3 - 9 5 . r 5 . Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 1 4 . 1 5 . 60- 63 ; Arator, De actibus apostolorum 2 . 647- 5 0 .

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Just as Bede's hermeneutic expands to include the imaginative play of image and metaphor in and around his inherited rhetorical tradition, his process of understanding also drags powerful intertextual authority into the overall hermeneutic structure . 1 6 In this way Bede perpetuates the anti-Judaic tradition in a diachronic sense, but he also augments his own textual power in a synchronic fashion: Bede cites Arator by name, and informed readers will recognize the embedded quotation as an authoritative source (if they have read Arator before ) ; or they will glean another level of cultural authority from the citation to a previous source; or, at the least, they will recognize the added aesthetic adorn ment of verse embedded in prose . Some or all of these possibilities serve to make Arator's powerful denunciation Bede's own, with an ex ponential increase in interpretative authority. In the same fashion, Bede explores the nature of the Jews' "mental distraction" through a vivid use of Pope Gregory the Great's ( 5 40604 ) vast work of exegesis, the Moralia in Job. According to Bede's reading of Gregory, John the Baptist's diet of honey and locusts refers to the mental instability of the Jews : "Locusta propter breuem uolatum mobilem Iudaicae gentis animum quo inter dominum et idola sursum iusumque ferebatur insinuat" [ On account of their short flight, the locust suggests the inconstant mind of the Jewish nation, by which they were borne up and down between the Lord and idols ] ( Homeliae r . r . r o 8 - r o ) . 17 Once again, Bede elaborates the traditional trope of Jewish mental instability or madness through apt citation of an author ity, pulling the vivid image into Bede's own particular hermeneutic, much as he used Jerome to interpret "Sceva" as a "barking fox" above . Bede's use of Gregory perpetuates Gregory's contribution to the anti Judaic tradition, but it also merges with Bede's wider network of anti Judaic rhetoric, adding its own grim luster to the overall design. A hortatory use of Jewish rage and frenzy can be found in Bede's exposition of John r o: 22- 3 o . In response to John's offhanded detail that when Jesus preached before the Temple in Jerusalem "it was win ter," Bede explains that the evangelist "duritiam perfidiae Iudaeorum per asperitatem aurarum uoluit designare brumalium" [wished to desig nate the hardness of the Jews' unbelief through the harshness of winter r 6. See Young, Biblical Ex�qesis, 99- 1 0 3 , 1 1 9 - 3 9 , on the importance of quotation and allusion in exegetical thought. 1 7 . Following Gregory, Moralia in Job, 3 1 . 2 5 . 6 - 2 4 , by book, chapter, and line numbers. For Bede's relationship to Gregory see Meyvaert, "Bede and Gregory the Great. "

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winds and storms ] ( John 1 0 : 22; Homeliae 2 . 24 . 3 4 - 3 6 ) . Following Augustine, Bede explains that the Jews thought Christ was a man, not God, and that they expected the Messiah to be an earthly king like David ( Homeliae 2 . 24 .40- 5 0 ) . r s Bede himself maintains that this was their error then, and is their error now: "Credebant . . . qua etiam dementia posteri eorum usque in praesens et donee antichristum pro Christo suscipiant errare non cessant" [They believed . . . this with the insanity which their present descendants possess, and they will not cease to err as long as they accept the Antichrist in place of Christ] ( Homeliae 2 . 24 . 5 0 , 5 2- 5 3 ) . By placing the Jews in the "present" time Bede again casts a contemporary light on his entire intellectual con struct: such crazed beings, led astray by dementia) exist even now, somewhere out in the world. This change in focus clears the way for an application of these concerns to Bede's own people. The Jews form a paradigm into which Bede places his audience . As the homily ascends into the subjunctive, he exhorts the audience not to be like Jews, not to descend to the level of raving beasts and pay the price for such insanity: "Circumdemus ergo et nos eum, carissimi, non sicut Iudaei insidiis appetendo sed ut fidelissima domus eius placidam illi in nobis sedem parando" [And so let us gather round him, dearest ones, not approach ing with traps like the Jews, but rather, like the most faithful of his house, preparing a peaceful seat for him] ( Homeliae 2 . 24 . 6 1 - 64 ) . He further entreats his audience to seek the Lord and not rage madly against him, like the Jews ( [p] etamus eum non ut illi uesaniendo) Home liae 2 . 24 . 66; John 1 0 : 24 ) . Bede raises the specter of Jewish insane rage once again, implying that to deny Christ in any way is to lower oneself to the level of the subhuman, the level of the Jews, those beasts who could not apprehend the voice of reason ( Homeliae 2 . 24 . 9 2- 9 7 ) . When Bede asks his readers to "beseech him not by raging madly against him," he implicitly raises in the mind ofhis audience something akin to Hamlet's apprehension, that humanity-bereft of spiritual un derstanding and gripped only by the imperatives of sleeping and feed ing, while the capability of "large discourse" and "godlike reason /. . . fust in us unused"-ultimately might be only a "beast, no more . " The long-standing association of the Jews with the frenzied madness, Ham let's " [ b ]estial oblivion," allows the easy ad hoc hortatory adaptation of anti-Judaic traditions in quite specific rhetorical circumstances. r 9 1 8 . Following Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannem, 4 8 . 3 . 1 - 3 9 · 1 9 . Shakespeare, Hamlet, IViv. 3 4 - 4 0 .

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This notion of Jewish rage, therefore, is an enduring component of anti-Judaic rhetoric, used by Bede to excite emotion and to cast the Jews as the most negative of exempla: Jews function as the Christian commonplace of how not to behave . This use of "examples to the con trary" in preaching is addressed directly by Bede and illustrated with respect to Jews in a homily for Holy Week. Bede elucidates John I I : 5 5 - I 2 : I I , in which the Jews plot to capture Jesus, even as Mary and Martha anoint his feet. Bede opens his homily with the following extended exposition of his hermeneutic: Moris esse prudentium solet non solum ex eis quae recte ac pru denter uerum etiam ex illis quae aliter gesta seu dicta cognouerint prudentiae discere uirtutem haec nimirum ut imitentur sequendo illa deuitando se incurrant. Quod nos, fratres dilectissimi, in hodierna sancti euangelii lectione facere ratio cogit non tantum uidelicet deuotionem amatorum Christi ad exemplum discere uirtutis sed perfidiam considerare et consideratam citius declinare persequentium. Sequamur enim necesse est illarum prudentiam feminarum quas tanta fide et dilectione adhaesisse cognouimus fugiamus insipientiam pontificium et Pharisaeorum qui sapien tiam Dei circumuenire insidiis et interficere quaerebant. Caueamus dementiam eorum qui sanctificandi propter pascha Hierosolimam ascenderant sed obliti sanctificationis in ipsa domo orationis saluatoris necem tractabant. ( Homeliae 2 . 4 . I - I 5 ) 2 0 [ It is customary for prudent people to learn the virtue of pru dence not only from the things which they recognize correctly and prudently, but also from those things which have been done or said otherwise : surely they can imitate the former by following them, and shun the latter by avoiding them. Dearest brothers, in the reading of today's holy gospel reason drives us to carry out the following: namely, not only to learn the devotion ofvirtue accord ing to the example of those who loved Christ, but also to consider the faithlessness of those who persecuted him and having consid ered it, to quickly shun it. For we ought to follow the wisdom of those women whom we recognize stuck by him and we ought to 20. See also Homeliae I . I o . 8 6- 8 7. Bede uses the same explanation of the imitation of positive and negative models at the very beginning of the Historia Ecclesiastica; see discussion in chapter 3 .

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flee the ignorance of the priests and Pharisees who sought to surround the wisdom of God with traps and to kill him. Let us beware of the insanity of those who went up to Jerusalem to be sanctified for the paschal festival, but, forgetful of sanctification, worked out the murder of the savior in the house of prayer. ] What is the nature of this insanity, this dementia that Bede warns against as he again shifts to the hortatory subjunctive? Bede provides an intriguing discussion in his commentary on Habacuc 3 : 1 4 : "Prae cidisti in alienatione capita potentium, movebuntur in ea gentes" [You have cut off in a frenzy the heads of the mighty; the nations will be shaken by it] . 21 In a philological mode, Bede focuses on the meaning of "in a frenzy" [ in alienatione] : Pro alienatione, in graeco scriptum est in extasi, quod quidam in stupore alii in excessu mentis interpretati sunt. Siue autem stupor sine alienatio siue excessus mentis dicatur, unum idemque signi ficat cum quis repentino miractllo turbatus ac stupefactus, a sensu suae mentis redditur alienus, quod accidisse Iudaeis crebra euan gelii prodit historia, dicens quod stuperent ac mirarentur in doc trina ac uirtutibus Iesu dicentes : "Uncle huic haec omnia, cuius nouimus patrem et matrem. " E t in actibus apostolorum, curato per Petrum et Iohannem claudo ad ostium templi: "Impleti sunt," inquit, "stupore et extasi," in qua uidelicet extasi, id est admira tione siue alienatione mentis, multi de populo prouocati sunt ad credendum in domino; sed capita potentium id est principes sacer dotum et seniores praecisi sunt non crendendo a sorte fidelium. Motae sunt quoque in ea gentes, dum auditis siue uisis domini et apostolorum eius uirtutibus, adeo stupefactae et miratae sunt, ut anathematizatis abiectisque eis quos coluerunt diis, nouam Christi fidem deuota mente susciperent . . . . ( In Habacuc 5 2 6- 42; cf. 5 5 7- 6 1 ) [For alienatio it i s written in Greek in extasi) which some have translated as in stupore) others as in excessu mentis. But whether it is called stupor or alienatio or excessu mentis) it signifies one and the same thing when, confused and dumbstruck by a sudden marvel, 2 r . Bede follows the Vetus Latina here, rather than the Vulgate.

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one is left estranged from the consciousness of one's own mind. The history of the gospel often demonstrates that this happened to the Jews, saying that they were stunned and amazed at the teaching and virtues of Jesus : "Where did this man whose father and mother we know come by all this? "22 And in the Acts of the Apostles when the cripple was healed by Peter and John at the door of the temple, "They were filled," he says, "with wonder and amazement" (Acts 3 : I o ) ; clearly, in this amazement (that is, the wonder or rapture of the mind) , many of the people were roused to believe in the Lord. But the heads of the mighty (that is, the chief priests and elders ) were cut off from the lot of the faithful by not believing. The nations also were shaken by it when, having heard or seen the miracles of the Lord and his apostles, they were so dumbfounded and amazed that they cursed and rejected the gods they had worshiped, and with devout mind received the new faith of Christ. ] This rapture or loss of mind cannot be far from the dementia of the Jews . In both responses the Jews take leave of their senses. This can have a beneficial effect-it can initiate that loss of self so necessary for conversion-but it can also stall at the level of mental incapacity and dementia. Once again, Bede's understanding of the Jewish frenzied anger is not monolithic: it condemns the Jews and rejects them, but it also illuminates the path not taken. If only, the text suggests, like the Gentiles the Jews had moved past the alienationem to the embrace of God.

Blind Synagoga Hard-hearted, scheming villains; the dull owners of an ossified wit; the crazed subjects of an almost Dionysian frenzy: in addition to these well worn tropes of early medieval anti-Judaism, Bede takes up another blindness . As such a well-established image-blind Synagoga-it easily lends itself to rhetorical and ideological appropriation. For example, in the Historia Ecclesiastica Bede relates that Pope John's letter to the Irish compares the Irish position on the Easter controversy to the errors of the blind Jews . As he warns here in his own words, the pope had discovered 2 2 . John 6 : 4 2 , but Bede's text differs slightly from the Vulgate verse.

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that "quosdam prouinciae uestrae contra orthodoxam fidem nouam ex ueteri heresim renouare conantes pascha nostrum, in quo immolatus est Christus, nebulosa caligine refutantes et XIIII luna cum Hebreis cele brare nitentes" [certain men of your kingdom were attempting to revive a new heresy out of an old one and, befogged with mental blindness, to reject our Easter in which Christ was sacrificed for us, contending with the Hebrews that it should be celebrated on the fourteenth day of the moon] ( HE 2 . I 9 . 200 ) . 23 It is easy to see the potential use ofthe Jews as a standard rhetorical example of any group or individual stumbling about in a "mental blindness" [ nebulosa caligine] ; however, more subtle appro priations also occur in the movement of Bede's exegetical imagination, and here Tobit will serve as our primary example . Bede's commentary on the Old Testament book of Tobit illustrates his understanding of the Jews' blindness and, further, its ambiguity. In summary fashion, Bede explains : "Caecitas ergo Tobias designat 'quia,' sicut apostolus ait, 'caecitas ex parte contigit in Israhel"' [Therefore, Tobit's blindness denotes, as the apostle says, "that blindness in part has happened in Israel" ] ( In Tobiam 2 . I o- I r . 8 - 9 ; Romans I I : 2 5 ) . 24 To bit's blindness, interpreted figurally, represents the blindness of the Jews who would later kill Christ. Bede notes that, to a certain extent, this blindness is due to the immoral conduct of the Jews at the time of Christ's incarnation: "Haec autem caecitas populo Israhel maxime im minente aduentu domini in carne praeualuit cum et Romanae seruitutis iugo premerentur et legis diuinae praecepta pessime uiuendo uiolarent" [But this blindness overpowered the people of Israel especially since the advent of the Lord in the flesh was imminent, when they were both being oppressed by the yoke of Roman servitude and transgressing the precepts of the divine Law by the worst conduct] ( In Tobiam 2 . I o I I . I 8 - 2 I ) . The Jews have been living a corrupt and sinful life, and their blindness is thus their punishment. Tobit's blindness is somatic and literal; the corresponding blindness of the Jews is spiritual and 2 3 . Cf. also 3 -4 . 224 and 3 . I7 .266 for similar citations. In the same vein, Egbert converts the monks of lema to the Roman usage , converting them fi·om "inueteratam illam tra· ditionem parentum eorum de quibus apostolicum ilium licet proferre sermonem, quod aemulationem Dei habebant, sed non secundum scientiam" [the deep-rooted tradition of their ancestors to whom the apostle's words apply: "They had a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge"] ( 5 . 2 2 . 5 5 2, 5 5 4 ) . Paul's cited words here (from Romans I o : 2) were, of course, originally applied to the Jews. 24 . See also Expositio Actuum Apostolorztm 2. I 9 . I 2 8 - 3 8 ; 9 . I 8 .29- 3 4 ·

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figural. This blindness, its potential for interpretation, piques Bede's exegetical imagination. Tobias (Tobit's son) heals his father's blindness : the son anoints the father's eyes, and then "a white skin began to come out of his eyes, like the skin of an egg" (Tobias I I : I 4 ) . Tobias strips away this detritus, restoring his father's sight. For Bede this moment of illumination repre sents the final conversion of the Jews at the apocalypse : "Et Iudaeorum populus postquam amarissimam nequissimi hostis malitiam cognouerit amissam recipiet lucem. Albugo quae obsederat eius oculos stultitiam sibimet placendi designat" [And when the Jewish people recognize the absolutely bitter malice of the most vile enemy, they will recover their lost light. The white film which had obstructed (Tobit's) eyes signifies the foolishness of self-indulgence] ( In Tobiam I I . I 3 - I 5 .42-4 5 ) . The oozing excreta of Tobit's blindness represents the corruption produced by their pessime uiuendo) their "terrible conduct" ( In Tobiam 2 . I o I I . 2 I ) . But as Bede plays out the exegesis of this physical detail, it opens up to the possibility of variform understandings of the Jews . For while the Jews are certainly blind (with all the traditional weight of that trope behind the image ) , they will also "recover their lost light." Bede's tone is sad but hopeful: paradise lost, but perhaps, one day, to be regained. According to Bede, this white film obscuring Tobit's eyes signifies both moral condemnation and righteousness : Habet ergo populus Iudaeorum adhuc uelamen ante faciem cordis ut non intellegat gratiam Christi, habet albuginem quia sibimet candidus et iustus prae omnibus uidetur, sed habet eandem albugi nem quasi membranum oui quia caecitatem sustinet mentis sub spe stultissima et superuacua nascituri in carne Christi atque eos lib eraturi eisque regnum magnum daturi per orbem . ( In Tobiam I r . J 3 - I 5 . 5 8 - 64 ) [Thus the Jewish people still have a veil in front of their heart so that they cannot tmderstand the grace of Christ; they have a white film because they seem white and just compared to everyone else, but they have a white film like the skin of an egg because they endure blindness of the mind in their very foolish and useless hope of a Christ who is to be born in the flesh and set them free and give them a great kingdom throughout the world. ]

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In the same way that ignorance can become understanding through the intervention of a fine teacher, blindness can become sight through divine conversion. Perhaps it is this potential that stirs Bede's thought: certainly a figure of blindness in the biblical tradition almost automati cally carries with it the narrative expectation of a miraculous cure . Unlike Tiresias, the biblical blind do not tend to be compensated with prophetic powers; and they do not seem to remain blind. This poten tial for illumination and conversion resides behind Bede's apprehen sion of this verse, and it is manifested in the gmdging acknowledgment of other, perhaps more positive valences of the white film. Yes, it signifies the "typical" blindness of the Jews, awaiting in vain an earthly Messiah, but the film is white "because they seem white and just com pared to everyone else." The Jews may suffer from blindness, but they have a measure of nobility in comparison to other unbelievers . The potential for change inherent in the state of blindness, the possibility of visual restoration, opens the door a crack to other possible understand ings of Jews differing from their simple representation as villains . We have seen this process before : as B ede utilizes the standard anti -Judaic tropes, they open out into other rhetorical concerns; in this case, the hermeneutic circle spirals on as it maneuvers around the somatic details of the Jews' blindness . It discloses an exegetical space of ambivalence where the Jews have redeeming qualities, even as it opens once again to a contemporary valence, gesturing toward the Jews who "still" [ adhuc] have a veil over their hearts, as they yet await the earthly Messiah. This potential for diversity of response is important: it is, perhaps, endemic to the figural mindset and will be traced throughout the rest of this chapter and the next. The character of Tobit himself embodies this ambiguity. Bede ex plains that it should not be thought strange that Tobit, blind and preaching the word of God, signifies "reprobos simul et electos" [both the reprobate and the elect alike ] ( In Tobiam 2 . I O- I I . 3 I ) . He explains that in the same way, after wrestling with the angel, Jacob "et claudus pariter est factus et benedictus, in claudicatione uidelicet infideles suae gentis significans, in benedictione fideles" [was both crippled and blessed, that is, signifying the unbelievers of his nation by his limping and signifying the believers by his blessing] ( In Tobiam 2. I o- I I . 3 23 4 ) - As Bede advises : 'Ne mireris lector quod aliquando bona typice malum aliquando bonum mala hominum facta significant" [Do not

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marvel, reader, that sometimes, figurally the good deeds of men signify something evil and sometimes their bad deeds signify something good] ( In Tobiam 2. I o- I r . 3 - 5 ) . Tobit prefigures both the Jews who were blind and rejected Christ, and the Jews who converted and became Christians : Insultabant Tobiae cognati, exprobabat et uxor quasi frustra Deo seruisset. Quos increpans ille et instruens ad Deum se orando conuertit. Erant in populo illo quidam qui stulta temeritate ipsius populi miseriis insultarent quod a felicitate prisca sanctorum patrum qui apud eos quondam Deo sublimiter seruiebant iam Ionge distaret. Quos idem populus per doctiores quosque et electos suos corrigere sedulus curabat seseque ad implorandam Dei clementiam pro aeternae uitae perceptione conuertebat. ( In Tobiam 2 . I o- I 1 . 22- 29 ) [The relatives of Tobit insulted him, and his wife reproached him as if he had served God in vain. He rebuked and instructed them and turned to God in prayer. There were some among that people who with foolish indiscretion scoffed at the troubles of his people because they were then far from the ancient happiness of their holy ancestors who at one time nobly served God among them . The same diligent people (i.e., the latter-day Jews ) took care to correct themselves through all their more learned and chosen ones and turned to invoking the mercy of God to attain eternal life . ] We will return later to Bede's classification of the Jews into various groups, including the blind deicides scoffing with "foolish indiscre tion" [ stulta temeritate] and the Jews who follow the example of their Mosaic ancestors who once served God "nobly" [sublimiter] : these "diligent" [sedulus] Jews would be the fertile, noble, raw material of the early church. For our purposes here, as we catalogue Bede's deploy ment of the standard tropes of anti-Judaism, it is enough to note the complexity of response, the blooming of Bede's exegesis into new spaces. Close attention to the twists and turns of Bede's exegesis reveals the complex response to the Jews-the inheritance of anger embedded in somatic metaphors, but also the delicate negotiations involved at the textual level when theory turns to praxis .

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Sick and Sterile Bede's use of the anti-Judaic tropes of sickness and sterility operate in the same ambivalent fashion. Another image in Bede's anti-Judaic lexi con, the sterile tree, extends the notion of Jewish somatic insufficiency. Through Arator, Jesus' parable of the fig tree finds its way into Bede's commentary on Acts as "Iudaea uacans, sterilis quae dicitur arbor" [ empty Judaea, which is said to be a sterile tree ] and "did not bear fruit" [fructum non adtulit] _ 2 5 The stunted spiritual capacity of the Jews finds expression in the tangible world of sterility and sickness. Bede also uses this image in a complex passage from his commentary on Habacuc . The verse in question obviously brings this tradition of the sterile tree to mind : "For the fig-tree shall not blossom: and there shall be no spring in the vines . The labour of the olive-tree shall fail; and the fields shall yield no food" (Habacuc 3 : I 7 ) .2 6 Again, the image here is one of potential : these traditional biblical signs of bounteous plenty fig trees, vines, olives, fields-signify figurally the potential of the Jews, a nobility they once possessed, but lost ( In Habacuc 6 8 I - 8 3 ) . The Jews had potential : Synagoga once swelled with fruited plenty, but is now desolate . The Jews did not fulfill this great potential when the crucial time came; as Bede explains, the fig tree/Jew had several opportunities to "bear fruit," but did not and was damned to everlasting sterility ( In Habacuc 69 2- 9 6 ) . As Bede states in a rather poetic turn of phrase, "Defecit generatio in uineis quondam domini, id est fructus caritatis in turbis Iudaeorum" [The potential on the Lord's vines failed long ago, that is, the fruits of love in the crowds of the Jews ] ( In Habacuc 6969 8 ) . Generatio is a rich word in this context: the Dictionary of Medieval Latin tells us that the word can have a sexual connotation of "beget ting" or "engendering," in the sense of the actual potential for reproduc tion ( s .v. generatio) s. I , 2, 3 ) ; it can also refer to the issue, progeny, or descendants produced ( s . I O , I 2 ) ; or it can refer more generally to a tribe, nation or community ( s. I 3 ) . All these meanings seem apt here, as they refer both to the Jews' once-proud possibilities in the past, and to their eventual, latter-day downfall; the word manages to capture 2 5 . E.xpositio Actttttm Apostolorttm 2 0 . 3 I . 9 3 , 9 4 ; Luke I 3 : 6- 9 ; Arator, De actibtts aposto lorttm, 2.909- I o . 26. For other fruitless fi g trees see Matthew 2 I : I S - 2 2; Mark I I : I 2- I 4 ; Luke I 3 : 6- 9 ; on tree imagery in the Bible generally see the discussion o f Frye in Great Code, I 4 7- 5 0 .

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different temporal perspectives all at once . Bede encases the entire history of the Jews' refusal within this exegetical image of sterility. As Bede continues to interpret the "false" olive trees as the "false" people, he moves on to more hermeneutic matters as he equates the barren fields with the sterility of the Jews' understanding : "Campi non faciunt escas, cum plebs eadem apertis diuinorum apicum paginis, pascua ueritatis inuenire recte intellegendo non ualet" [The fields do not make food when these people, upon opening the pages of the divine Scriptures, are unable to find the pastures of truth with a cor rect understanding] ( In Habacuc 706- 8 ) . The Jews "pabulum caelesti intellectus . . . non sapiunt" [do not taste the food of heavenly mean ing] in the scriptures ( In Habacuc 7 r 6- r 7 ) . 2 7 Such images of agricul tural generation, birth and fecundity strike deep chords, calling to mind the image, in Paul's letter to the Romans , of the "branches" ( Jews ) lopped off the great "tree" of the church, in order to make way for the newly grafted stock of the Gentiles ( Romans r r : r 5 - 24 ) . As Bede explains, the author of Habacuc was "quae omnia perfidae parti gentis suae superuentura considerans" [contemplating all the things that were to happen to the unbelieving part of his own people] ( In Habacuc 7 1 7- r 8 ) . For Bede, floral sterility finds a counterpart in sterility of the worn b . In his homily o n the birth o f John the Baptist ( Luke r : 5 7- 6 8 ) , Bede explains why Zachary was struck mute and Elizabeth was barren. Eliza beth's sterile womb refers to the Old Law, "quae auxilio sacerdotalis officii spiritalem Deo sobolem gignere iussa est neminem ad perfectum adduxit" [which was ordered to produce spiritual progeny for God with the help of the priestly office, but led no one to perfection] ( Homeliae 2 . 20 . 9 8 - r oo ) . Christ, "factus sub lege auctor ipse legis" [the author of the Law himself, created under the Law] , removed from the Law the "shame of sterility" [ sterilitatis obproprium] , when he showed that the Law should be understood spiritually ( Homeliae 2 . 2o . r o r - 2 ) . The sterility of Jewish adherence to the Law is inscribed on the somatic insufficiency of Elizabeth's womb . The physical lack of fecundity is closely related to the images of the Jews as sick or physi cally deformed. Just as Elizabeth's sterile womb represents the sterile Law of the Jews, so too the mute Zachary represents the Jewish people. 2 7 . Note the wordplay between sapere, "to taste," and sapiens, "wise, discerning" and its related forms (e.g., sapientia) here.

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His mute tongue signifies the "spiritually mute" tongues of the Jews, teaching and caring only for the letter of the Law ( Homeliae 2 . 20 . 9 29 7 ) . In the interpretation of this scene one can trace the process whereby a traditional trope, such as the obsolescence of the Law, forms a new expression (in this case, the mute tongue ) organized under the rubric of Jewish somatic deformity. With a seemingly irresistible attrac tion, these tropes pull together in Bede's thought, in response to stim uli in the biblical text. In Bede's exegesis, a lame or crippled person-again, a subject so matically deficient-acts as one of these stimuli. In Acts 3 : 2 Peter and John find a man "lame from his mother's womb" at the door of the temple. Bede explains: "Quia populus Israhel non solum domino incarnato sed a primis etiam legis datae temporibus rebellis extitit, quasi ex utero matris claudis fuit" [Because the people of Israel were found rebellious, not only at the Lord's incarnation, but even from the earliest times when the Law was given, it was as if they were lame from the mother's womb ] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 3 . 2.9- n ) . Bede shows that this was prefigured by Jacob, who was blessed but lame when he wrestled the angel, "quia populus isdem domino in passione praeualens in quibusdam per fidem benedictus, in quibusdam nero est per infidelitatem claudus" [because the same people, when they prevailed over the Lord in the Passion, were blessed in some through faith, but lame in others through infidelity] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 3 . 2 . I 2- I 4 ) . 28 Like Tobit ( as noted previously) , this so matically compromised subject, this lamed man, represents for Bede both the true and the false among the Jews . Even the position of the crippled man in Acts, brought to recline just outside the temple, de notes the existential angst of the Jews . Bede explains that the gate of the temple represents the Lord, and " [a]d hanc portam debilis Israhel ire non ualens legis prophetarumque uocibus adfertur, ut ab ingredienti bus in interiora sapientiae fidei audiendae deposcat auxilium" [ crippled Israel, unable to go to this gate, was brought there by the words of the Law and the prophets, so that she might call out for help from those who were entering into the interior places of the wisdom of the faith which she was to hear in the future ] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 3 . 2 . I 7- I 9 ) . These images of sickness, by their very structure, imply a dual attitude toward the Jews. As sick, crippled, and infirm of body, 2 8 . Following Augustine, De civitate Dei, I 6 . 3 9 . I - I 7 .

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they are of course rejected; but also, as sick, crippled, and infirm, they languish in need of help and healing. Like Jacob, they are blessed but lame : "crippled Israel" awaits healing at the gates. After all, those who are sick can be cured. Later in Acts ( r 4 : 7- 9 ) Paul and Barnabas heal a cripple in Lystra; Bede cross-references this miracle to the healing miracle before the temple discussed above : "Sicut claudus ille quem Petms et Johannes ad portam templi curant salutem praefigurat Iudaeomm, ita et hie Lycaonius aeger populum gentium longe a legis templique religione remotum sed Pauli apostoli praedicatione collectum" [ Just as that lame man whom Peter and John cured at the gate of the temple prefigured the salvation of the Jews, so too this diseased Lycaonian (prefigured) the people of the Gentiles, who were for a long time remote from the religion of the Law and the temple, but who were gathered in by the preaching of the apostle Paul ] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 4 · 7 · 9 - I 2 ) . Bede explains that the par ticular historical times of these miraculous cures were appropriate be cause "ille primis fidei temporibus, cum necdum gentibus uerbum crederetur, hie uero Iudaeis ob perfidiam expulsis et damnationis puluere respersis inter nona conuersae gentilitatis gaudia sanatur" [the former (i.e., the man at the temple gate in the beginning of Acts ) was healed in the first days of the faith, when the word was not yet believed by Gentiles; the latter (the man at Lystra later in Acts ) was healed in the new joys of the converted gentile world, when the Jews had been expelled for their faithlessness and sprinkled with the dust of damna tion] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 4 · 7 · I 4 - I 7 ) - In this exegetical structure we see the workings of Bede's imaginative expansion of the traditional anti-Judaic rhetoric . The hate and anger are still there : with an adroit turn of phrase drawing on Acts r 3 : 5 1 , Bede sprinkles the Jews with the "dust of damnation." However, when the hermeneutic spiral widens to include the conversion of the unbelieving Gentiles in a comparison to the unbelieving Jews, the subtle twists enter Bede's rendering of the anti-Judaic tradition. We can sense here in Bede the desire to heal the Jews, a hope for their final reunification with the elect. Jews are compared to the stum bling of the blind Tobit, who upon hearing of the arrival of his son, rose up and "began to run, stumbling with his feet" (Tobias r r : r o ) : "Audita a doctoribus uerbo salutis exsurgit populus Hebraeorum de Iongo perfidiae suae ueterno, currit amore ad dominum quamuis of fendens gressibus opemm donee plenae fidei et operationis bonae

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lucem recipiat regeneratus in Christo et instructus" [Having heard the word of salvation from the teachers, the people of the Hebrews get up from the long sluggish lethargy of their unbelief and run with love to the Lord, although stumbling in the steps of their deeds until they receive the light of full faith and of good work, reborn and instructed in Christ] ( In Tobiam r r . r o . 2 2- 2 6 ) . This eschatological hope for the healing and reunification of the Jews perhaps speaks to a deeply human desire for unity and closure . Perhaps the peculiar dynamic of Christian anti-Judaism requires that the sundered kin must always remain apart, on the periphery; and therefore, it may be nevertheless the endlessly deferred desire for unity that speaks to Bede as he works in that tradi tion . For him the hope remains, ever out of reach: if the Jews are sterile, perhaps like Sarah, Elizabeth, and others they will one day bear fruit; if the Jews are mute, perhaps one day they will speak; if the Jews stumble and wait at the temple gates, one day they will rise and enter. All rivers eventually run to the sea, and the great hope for Bede's hermeneutic is that the circle will close, the Jews will return to the Lord's embrace, and take their place in the final unity of Judgment.

Apocalypse and Judgment However, one does not wish to overstate the case-in the final Bedan analysis, the Jews are the deicidal criminals of the Christian tradition, all such crimes are answered at the eschaton, and anger accompanies the final trumpet. The Jews will convert on Judgment Day, and thus they remain in the world as a witness people , the living potential for ultimate conversion. As one might expect, Bede often sounds this com mon theme, derived ultimately, of course, from Augustine . 29 In his homily for the Feast of the Holy Innocents (Matthew 2 : 1 3 - 23 ) , Bede interprets the flight of Mary and Joseph to Egypt, their exile until Herod's death and their ultimate return, as prefiguring the end times : Quod erant i n Aegypto usque a d obi tum Herodis indicat figurate fidem Christi in gentibus mansuram donee plenitudo earum in troeat et sic omnis Israhel saluus fiat. Obitus quipped Herodis 2 9 . On Bede and eschatology see Bonner, "Bede in the Tradition of Western Apocalyptic Commentary"; Brown, Bede, 5 9 - 60; Mackay, "Augustine and Gregory the Great in Bede's Commentary on the Apocalypse. " For an excellent survey of the patristic background of eschatology see Daley, Hope of the Early Church.

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terminum intentionis malitiosae qua nunc contra ecclesiam Iudaea saeuit insinuat. Occisio paruulorum mortem humilium spiritu quos fi1gato a se Christo Iudaei peremere designat. Quod autem defuncto Herode redit ad terram Israhel Iesus finem saeculi denun tiat quando Enoch et Helia praedicantibus Iudaei sopita modernae inuidiae flamma fidem ueritatis accipiunt. ( Homeliae r . r o . 8 3 - 9 2 ) [That they were in Egypt until the death of Herod signifies fig urally that the faith of Christ would remain among the gentiles until all of them would come into the number of the faithful, and thus all Israel would be saved. And in fact, Herod's death implies the end of the malicious intention with which Judaea then raged against the church. The killing of the little ones designates the death of those humble in spirit whom the Jews deprived of life when they had rejected Christ. Moreover, the fact that Jesus re turned to the land of Israel when Herod was dead foretells the end of the world, when with the preaching of Enoch and Elijah the Jews will have received the faith of truth, and the flame of their present envy will have been put to rest. ] The triumphant rhetoric of this passage is matched by its anger : Judaea "raged" against the church with "malicious intention"; Herod's massa cre of the children-an act, like the charges of blood libel in the later Middle Ages, sure to provoke the deepest emotional response-figures as those souls whom the Jews "deprived of life" when they killed Christ. When the Jews finally do convert at the apocalypse, the expres sion exhibits that flaring metaphorical burst of imagination characteris tic of the rhetoric of rejection: "the flame of their present envy ( mod ernae inuidiaeflamma) will have been put to rest. " Bede's concentration of anger and emotion here is typical of eschatological representations of the JewsY There is a note of final vindication in this rhetoric, a sense that a conclusion will finally punctuate a long-standing argument with the Jews : they will get their "just desserts. " In explicating Revelation 3 : r o, Bede explains that at Judgment the Christian world will see the "humil iatio Judaeorum sub tempore Antichristi" [humiliation of the Jews in the time of Antichrist] , and while the wicked Jews will be deceived, 3 0 . The intensity of eschatological representations of the Jews is discussed at greater length in chapter 5 .

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others will convert and be incorporated among the faithful ( Explanatio Apocalypsis PL 9 3 : r 4 r ) . In these passages Bede rhetorically sets his foot upon the necks of a long-recalcitrant enemy, as "the Jews are to be made subject to the church" [subjiciendos Ecclesiae ]udaeos] at the final trial ( Explanatio Apocalypsis PL 9 3 : r 3 o ) . Although, as Bede notes ( quot ing from 2 Thessalonians 2: r o ) , the Jews are those "who 'receive not the love of the truth, that they might be saved,"' nevertheless their final conversion will involve humiliation and pain ( Explanatio Apocalypsis PL 9 3 : r 79 ) . For Bede, this is a form of harsh but loving justice; the Jews have always possessed an important, honorable place in the overarching unity of the church, in the mysterious plan of Providence . As he ex plains in De Tabernaculo) "Fuerunt etenim iusti ante legem fuerunt sub lege fuerunt temporibus prophetarum, item post ascensionem do minicam congregata est ecclesia primitiua de Israhel congregatur nunc de gentibus congreganda est in fine mundi de reliquiis Israhel" [For there were righteous people before the Law, as there were under the Law, and as there were in the times of the prophets; likewise, after the Lord's ascension the primitive Church was gathered from Israel , now it is gathered from the Gentiles, and it will be gathered at the end of the world from the remnants of Israel ] ( r . r r r 4- r 8 ) Y The early church sprang from the Jews, and at the eschaton it will complete the circle and collect the stray remnants who had denied the faith at the first incarna tion. Thus ( and we sense Bede's strongly Augustinian stance here ) , the Jews have a vital part to play in the well-defined arc of the church's history. De reliquiis Israhel) "from the remnants of Israel" : something in that haunting phrase points toward further complexities of Bede's under standing. Altogether strangely, even in the midst of such anger, Bede can strike a note of studied commiseration when explaining the eschato logical function of the Jews. The Jews are an important part of church history, and this understanding at times mediates the harsh anger to ward the stubborn deicides. For example, in the first book of Acts, the apostles must replace the traitorous and now departed Judas with one of their own, the lot falling to Matthias . Bede interprets this passage (Acts r : r 5 - 2 5 ) eschatologically: the restoration of the full number of the apostles figures the final conversion of the Jews : "At cum in fine 3 I . See also De Tabernaculo I . I I 3 3 - 4 I .

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mundi populus Iudaeorum qui dominum crucifixit reconciliandus ec clesiae creditur, uelut quinquagesimo die propinquante apostolorum est summa restaurata" [But since at the end of the world it is believed that the people of the Jews who crucified the Lord will be reconciled to the church, in the same way when the fiftieth day drew near the full comple ment of the apostles was restored] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I . I 6. I 8 5 - 8 8 ) . Note that this passage expresses the same general inter pretation as the exegesis of the flight to Egypt above ; yet while the former bristles with anti-Judaic emotion, the latter is more or less tran quil, tracing the action of an ordained plan for history, as if seen from a great height. Bede's exegesis is not formulaic, nor is it the imposition of a rigid system of multileveled exegesis; instead, as Roger Ray notes, in the process of explication "he usually responded to the text at whatever level it seemed to speak."3 2 Here, the voice of the anti-Judaic tradition moves him to a moderate response. In another example, in the following homily for Easter ( on Matthew 2 8 : I 6- 2o ) , the function of the Jews at Judgment implies the benign ubiquity of Christ throughout history. In that history the Jews will not be humiliated at the end of the world, but will be welcomed back as prodigal sons . Bede explicates the various appearances of Jesus after his resurrection: Apparuit primo in Iudaea deinde in Galilaea post haec rursum in Iudaea die quo ascendit in caelum . Aderat ecclesiae cum primo solius Iudaeae terminis clauderetur; adest modo cum Iudaeis ob culpam perfidiae derelictis transmigrauit ad gentes; aderit in fu turo cum ante finem saeculi reuertetur ad Iudaeam et sicut apos tolus ait intrante gentium multitudine sic omnis Israhel saluus erit. ( Homeliae 2 . 8 . I 9 5 - 20 I ) 3 3 [He appeared first in Judaea, then in Galilee, and after this again in Judaea on the day on which he ascended into heaven. He was present when the church was first enclosed within the limits of Judaea alone ; he is present now when, after abandoning the Jews on account of the fault of unbelief, he has crossed over to the Gentiles; he will be present in the future, when he will return to Judaea before the end of the world, and, as the apostle says, when 3 2. "What Do We Know about Beck's Commentaries? " 1 4 . 3 3 · See Romans 1 1 : 2 5 - 26.

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the multitude of the nations has come in, thus will all Israel be saved. ] The balanced stmcture of this second sentence mirrors perfect symme try of the divine plan itself. The three distinct phases are marked out by the progressively changing tenses of adsum and the temporal adverbs marking the clauses : aderat . . . primo; adest . . . modo)· aderit in futuro. This anaphora-like structure, the repetition of these simple verbs of being, is finely detailed by verbs of motion: in the cum-clause of the first, "past-tense phase," the church is stalled and without motion ( clauderetur) ; in the cum-clause of the second, "present-tense phase," the church has crossed over ( transmigrauit) to the gentiles, leaving behind ( derelicitis) the stifle d, immobile Jews of the past; in the third, future phase the church will complete the circular journey and wind up the charm, returning ( reuertetur) to Judaea. When this series of mo tions is complete, when the bulk of the Gentiles have been drawn in ( intrante) , only then does the simple, yet powerful, final main clause fall into place: sic omnis Israhel saluus erit. The Jews will not be cast out forever; they will be brought back into the fold joyfully (but humiliated and chastened ) , as an important part of the unified elect at the apocalypse. The great final gathering that provides shape to Christian history and narrative produces the fear and satisfaction that all endings produce, whether literary or historical; as Kermode puts it, "we are programmed to prefer fulfillment to disap pointment, the closed to the open. "34 Yet the imminence is all, and the trembling at the eschaton, what Wallace Stevens called "a revolution of things colliding," opens up the hermeneutic space awaiting revela tion to the imperatives of anti-Judaic tradition . 3 5 This trope of reunifi3 4 · Kermode, Genesis of Secrecy, 64 . As Barbara Herrnstein Smith lucidly explains: "It would seem that in the common land of ordinary events-where many experiences are fragmentary, intermpted, fortuitously connected, and determined by causes beyond our agency or comprehension-we create or seek out 'enclosures' : stnKtures that are highly organized, separated as if by an implicit frame trom a background of relative disorder or randomness, and integral or complete" ( Poetic Closure, 2; see I - 3 7 for a full discussion) . Murray Krieger interrogates the genealogy of this tradition, what he calls the "organic aesthetic," in A Reopening of Closure, I - 5 6 . The connections Krieger draws between the traditions of organic closure and typological or figural thinking are especially apt in this context. Cf also Young, Biblical Exegesis, 9 - 4 5 on the unity of Scripture in the phenomenol ogy of exegesis, and L. Krieger, Time's Reasons, I 67 , passim, on unity in the perception of history. 3 5 . Wallace Stevens, "Girl in a Nightgown, " I 3 ( Collected Poems, p . 2 I 4 ) .

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cation, like the other traditions of anti-Judaism we have been examin ing, plays into the workings of Bede's exegetical imagination in com plex ways . As Bede explains in his commentary on Tobit, the gentiles owe a debt to the Jews for bringing them into the church, for acting as the launching pad for the Gentile conversion; this debt will be repaid at the end of time when the Jews convert. Bede explains that when Tobit lent ten silver talents to Gabelus, this figures the debt of the gentiles to the Jews : Et populus Dei gentibus per septuaginta interpretes diuinae legis quae in decalogo continetur scientiam commisit ut per hoc eas ab infidelitatis egestate liberaret; sub chirographo autem dedit, id est sub conditione restituendi postquam ipse ditesceret uel qui de derat repeteret. Acceperunt autem gentes uerbum Dei a populo Israhel per interpretatione quod post incarnationem dominicam etiam spiritaliter nunc intellegunt et ad conquirendas uirtutum diuitias exercent; reddunt uero faeneratori cum credentes in fine saeculi Iudaeos in unitatem ecclesiae recipiunt eisque saluandis Christi sacramenta committunt et scripturarum quoque reserant archana. ( In Tobiam 1 .9 .4 5 - 5 5 ) [And the people of God ( i . e . , the Jews ) entrusted to the Gentiles, through the seventy translators, the knowledge of the divine Law which is contained in the Decalogue so that through this they could free them from the poverty of unbelief; but they gave it under a signed contract, that is, on the condition that it be repaid after they themselves grew rich or the one who had given it demanded its return. However, the Gentiles received the word of God from the people of Israel through translation because after the Lord's incarnation they now also understand it spiritually and work to acquire the riches of virtues; but they pay back the inves tor at the end of the world when they accept the believing Jews into the unity of the church; and, as well as entrusting to them the mysteries of Christ for their salvation, they also unlock the secrets of the Scriptures . ] Here, for the third time, is the same exegetical subject: the conversion of the Jews at the apocalypse. Yet, in the turning ofBede's hermeneutic, the expression of that subject takes yet a different path. This time the

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Jews and Gentiles have an equal and reciprocal relationship . They share a knowledge, passing it back and forth, one dependent on the other. 3 6 This explanation expresses a certain sympathetic concern for the Jews, a message that they can always come "home." We also see this in Bede's explication of the figural meaning behind the journey of Raphael and Tobias to Rages, and Tobias's later safe return to his parents : "Promittit dominus credentibus ex populo Iudaeorum quamuis idem populus ex magna sit parte caecatus quod incarnationis suae sacramenta plebi gentilium aperiat rursusque in fine temporum eadem suo populo ex quo carnem assumpserat latius pandat comitante ubique simul et cuncta operante fide diuinitatis ipsius" [The Lord promises the believ ers among the Jewish people, although this same people is for the most part blinded, that he will disclose the mysteries of his own incarnation to the people of the Gentiles, and once again at the end of our times will reveal them more widely to his own people from whom he had taken fle sh, when faith in his divinity will both accompany him every where and accomplishing everything] ( In Tobiam 5 . r r - q . r 3 - r 8 ) . 3 7 Bede's exegesis ends o n an almost poignant note : the Jews are, in effect, exiled from Christ ( or he from them) , and the prodigal-son metaphor feels even more apt in this instance : Christ is, to adapt the well-known phrase from Boniface's oft-quoted letter, related by "blood and bone" 3 6. Cf. the triumph of the Roman Easter and rite of tonsure among the monks of lona in 7 1 6, described in the HE 5 . 2 2 . 5 5 4 : " . . . catholicoque illos atque apostolico more celebra tionem, ut diximus, praecipuae solemnitatis sub figura coronae perpetis agere perdocuit. Quod mira diuinae constat factum dispensatione pietatis, ut quonimn gens ilia quam nouerat scientiam diuinae cognitionis libenter ac sine inuidia populis Anglorum communicare cura uit, ipsa quoque postmodum per gentem Anglorum in eis quae minus habuerat ad perfectam uiuendi normam perueniret. Sicut contra Brettones, qui nolebant Anglis eam quam habebant fidei Christim1ae notitiam pandere, credentibus imn populis Anglorum et in regula fidei catholicae per omnia instructis, ipsi adhuc inueterati et claudicantes a semitis suis et capita sine corona praetendunt et sollemnia Christi sine ecclesiae Christi societate uenerantur" [He (i.e., Egbert) taught them how to celebrate the chief festival after the catholic and apostolic manner, as has been said, and to wear on their heads the image of the unending crown. It is clear that this happened by a wonderfl.1l dispensation of divine mercy, since that race had willingly and ungrudgingly taken pains to communicate its own knowledge and understand ing of God to the English nation; and now, through the English nation, they are brought to a more perfect way of life in matters wherein they were lacking. On the other hand the Britons, who would not proclaim to the English the knowledge of the Christian faith which they had, still persist in their errors and stumble in their ways, so that no tonsure is to be seen on their heads and they celebrate Christ's solemn festivals differently from the fellowship of the church of Christ, while the English are not only believers but are fully instructed in the rules of the catl10lic taitl1] . 3 7 · See also In Tobiam r o . 9 . 2 8 - 4 o ; 1 3 . 1 . 5 - 8 on the Jews converting at the apocalypse .

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to the Jews . 3 8 This familial metaphor dwells at quite a remove from the more traditional angry torments of the final revelation. According to Bede the Jews eagerly, even painfully, await this future salvation. Tobias's parents are worried that he has not come back to them at the agreed time; this represents the distress of faithful converts among the Jews who await the completion of Christ's work among the nations : "Et nunc morante Christo per fidem in ecclesia congregata de gentibus quicumque singillatim de Iudaeis ad fidem illius conuertuntur multum dolent animo quia tardat dominus uenire ad saluandos eos retentus in gentibus" [And now, as Christ lingers in the church assem bled from the Gentiles through faith, all those who are converted individually to his faith from among the Jews suffer greatly in spirit because the Lord, detained among the Gentiles, is slow in coming to save them] ( In Tobiam r o . r - 3 .2- 6 ) . As the tormented speaker of The Wije)s Lament puts it: "Wa bid pam pe sceal / oflangope leofes abidan" [ Unhappy is one who must await a beloved in longing] . 3 9 This world is in haste, as Wulfstan might say, and anxiously awaits the unification of the sundered brethren. The key word in this passage is "individually" [ singillatim] : Bede refers to those Jews, apparently from the apostolic age to Bede's own day, who have converted to Christianity and yet still live among Jews. To further clarify this concept, consider the explica tion of these Christians/Jews awaiting Christ from among their people . In Tobias r o : 4 - 6, Tobit's wife laments that their son has gone away, and Tobit reassures her to have faith, explaining that the man they sent with him is "very trusty" [ satis jidelis] . Bede explains that this is an appropriate response, as it refers to "eisdem ipsis qui nunc de Iudaeis credunt conuenit qui se suosque in hoc consolantur quod uere futurum sit tempus quando reuertatur ad eos dominus et tunc omnis Israhel saluus fiat scientes quia satis fidelis est dominus qui hoc promisit, sicut enim supra docuimus, idem Tobias et per caecitatem suam incredulos et per fidem credentes more scripturis usitato designat" [the circum stances of these same people who now believe among the Jews, who console themselves and their own in this : that there will indeed be a 3 8 . Writing to the English, Boniface is quoting the continental Saxons on their relation ship to the English: "Miseremini illorum, quia et ipsi solent dicere : 'De uno sanguine et de uno osse sumus "' [Have pity on them, because they are saying, "We are of one blood and bone with you"] (Tangl 7 5 ). On this passage see Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, 1 24 - 3 8 . 3 9 · The WijC's Lament, 5 2b- 5 3 ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, ASPR 3 , 2 r o- r r ) .

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time when the Lord will return to them, and that then all Israel will be saved, knowing that the Lord who promised this is "very trusty." Just as we have seen above, this Tobit signifies, in the usual manner of the Scriptures, both the unbelievers through his blindness and the believers through his faith] ( In Tobiam r o -4- 6. q - r 8 ) . One could not hope for a better example of the workings of the exegetical imagination as it expands the tropes of anti-Judaic tradition . Bede paints a picture of isolated former Jews pining away for a joyous reunion with their exiled, ill-starred people-an utter fantasy.4° In Bede's imagination, a mourn ful song flows from the Jews who now "believe" and await their lost people on the other side of a great divide : "Recordatur enim diuina dementia quoniam tristitia est magna et continuus dolor cordis creden tibus ex Iudaeis pro caecitate incredulorum qui sunt cognati eorum secundum carnem qui sunt Israhelitae" [For the divine mercy remem bers that the believers among the Jews experience great sadness and continual grief of heart at the blindness of the unbelievers, their rela tives according to the fle sh, who are Israelites] ( In Tobiam 1 0 . 9 . 242 7 ) . Consequently, Bede hesitates to level the full force of anti-Judaic rhetoric upon these "believers among the Jews" [ credentibus ex Iudaeis] , these liminal phantasms, these Christians-who-are-Jews . This ambigu ity is perfectly captured in the figure of Tobit, who with the wondrous flexibility of exegetical thought both symbolizes the faithful and un faithful, chosen and accursed.

We have examined a great deal of anger, fiery striations in the dark bulk of anti-Judaic tradition . Bede's imagination touches here and there, igniting certain strains in brief flares of emotion, but letting others fade to ash, to be replaced by an "elegiac" hope. Commentators have recog nized the originality of Bede's exegesis, even if this only refers to his deployment and synthesis of source texts : there is an art to his apt citations, his well-placed appeals to authority and allusion. Ray notes 4 0 . Cf Bede, In Regttm XXX Q;taestiones l.4 3 - 4 6 : "Nam etsi pauci tamen aliqui cotidie ex Iudaeomm non tantum plebeia sed et sacerdotali stirpe ad ecclesiam confi.1giunt, et cum intrauerit plenitudo gentium tunc omnis Israhel saluus fiet'' [For some of the Jews, even if only a few (not only of the common type, but also the priestly kind) now flee daily to the church, but when all the Gentiles have entered, then all Israel shall be saved ] .

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that Bede's exegesis was "not just allegorical and figural, but mainly eclectic and pastoral" ; Bede's method was "to deploy the clarified and inflected patristic texts according to didactic aims that make the result ing works his own."4r Bede's interest in teaching, in philology, and in the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons ( as we shall see in the next chap ter), all color his expression of anti-Judaism in his exegetical tracts. In De Tabernaculo Bede illuminates the figural meaning of the walls of the tabernacle described in Exodus 2 6 : 22- 2 3 ( "But on the west side of the tabernacle thou shalt make six boards . And another two again which shall be erected in the corners at the back of the tabernacle" ) . Bede explains : Vemm iuxta allegoriae sensus occidentalis plaga quae utrumque in se parietem recipiens aedificium tabernaculi consummat recte adimpletionem totius sanctae uniuersalis ecclesiae quae cum in fine huius mundi perficitur designat ad quam usque fides et op eratio recta utriusque populi perseueratura quasi gemini longi tudo parietis pertingit. Neque enim credibile est uel ante tempus dominicae incarnationis umquam defuisse qui ex gentibus creder ent uel nunc quamuis grauiter damnato ob perfidiam populo Iudaeorum non esse aliquos ex illis tametsi paucissimos qui inter christianos exulantes cotidie credendo ad salutem perueniant. Quod si quis negare praesumpserit, dicamus quod negari nul latenus potest quod uidelicet spiritales utriusque testamenti doc tares atque interpretes qui iuxta sermonem domini proferant 'de thesauro suo noua et uetera' usque ad finem saeculi sint in sancta ecclesia permansuri. ( De Tabernaculo 2 .9 r 5 - 29 ) [However, according to the allegorical sense of the western side , which, by taking both walls into itself, finishes the tabernacle build4 I . "What Do We Know about Bede's Commentaries? ," 9, I I ; see also Brown, Bede, 4 2 ; Holder, "Bede and the Tradition o f Patristic Exegesis," 4 0 7 ; Jones, "Introductory Remarks," I 5 I - 5 3 ; Kelly, "On the Brink, " who notes that in his use of allegorical explication, Bede "never took a strict line, varying his exegetical method to suit the point he wished to make" ( I O I ). Carruthers describes this mode of exegetical originality in the following concise way : "In the minds of monastic writers , every verse of the Bible thus became a gathering place for other texts, into which even the most remote (in our judgments) and unlikely matters were collected, as the associational memory of a particular author drew them in. Associations depending upon assonance and dissimilarity are just as likely to end up being collated as those of consonance and likeness" ( Craft rr{ Thought, I9 ) .

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ing, correctly designates the completion of the entire holy universal church which is perfected at the end of this world, until which point faith and just works shall persevere among both peoples, just as the length of the two walls extends all the way to the western side . For it is not believable that either before the time of the Lord's incarnation there were not any among the Gentiles who believed, or that now, however severely damned the people of the Jews may be because of their faithlessness, there are not some among them, even if just a very few, who live in exile among Christians and come to salvation every day by believing. If anyone will presume to deny this, let us say what cannot at all be denied, namely, that the spir itual teachers and interpreters of both testaments, who according to the word of the Lord bring forth "out of his treasure new things and old" (Matthew r 3 : 5 2 ) , are to remain in the holy church until the end of the world . ] Strange as it may seem, given the angry denunciations of the Jews we have seen in this chapter, Bede also treasures the people of Israel, a people of great antiquity, rich history, the very stock from which Jesus sprang and the living potential for conversion and redemption. For Bede, the Jews are not simply the deicidal murderers of the anti-Judaic tradition; as he rather defensively asserts above, the "very few" [paucis simos] who live , perhaps unwittingly, in the torment of exile ( exulantes) among the Christian people have their role also . If the English, exiled on the margins of the world, can move from ignorance of the Word to tme belief, Bede and his audience must accept the imperatives of hope. How this fond hope can exist in the heart of such hate is the ever present question of Christian anti-Judaism; how Bede mediates this opposition is the subject of the next chapter.

TW O

Bede and Love

Conciliation s we have seen throughout the previous chapter, the imaginative

A act of exegetical interpretation leads Bede to diverse local expres

sions of anti-Judaic rhetoric . While these expressions certainly can pulse with the ardent anger so typical of the tradition, they can also, by virtue of the exegetical hermeneutic, lead to moments of quieter reflec tion, a more measured and responsive understanding of the Jews . To be clear: Bede is deeply immersed in the emotional rhetoric of Jewish rejection. However, he does not always burst forth at the moments one might expect. Why should particular biblical verses and scenes provoke him, while others, seemingly ripe for anti-Judaic interpretation, not do so? For example, in his commentary on Acts, Bede often refrains from overt anti-Judaic comment on just those inflammatory verses one would expect to incite antipathy toward Jews . When Bar-Jesus is struck blind in Acts, Bede does not interpret this as representing the Jews and their blindness; instead, he simply refers to Paul's comparable experi ence . r In a similar fashion, the emotional anti-Judaism is lacking in Bede's explication of Acts 3 : I 2- 2 3 . In these verses, Peter berates the assembled crowd for their unbelief and deicide : "But you denied the I . Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 3 . I I . 2 3 - 6 .

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Holy One and the Just; and desired a murderer to be granted unto you. But the author oflife you killed, whom God hath raised from the dead; of which we are witnesses" (Acts 3 = 1 4- I 5 ) . In summary, Peter then cites the prophecy of Moses concerning the coming of an avenging prophet to judge the Jews : "And it shall be, that every soul which will not hear the prophet shall be destroyed from among the people" (Acts 3 : 2 3 ; Deuteronomy r 8 : 2o, Leviticus 2 3 : 29 - 3 0 ) . This would be the perfect opportunity for an intense anti-Judaic excursus; one expects that Arator or Cassiodorus, for example, could have hardly resisted. But instead, Bede's commentary is relatively mild: "Breuiter ac dilucide prophetarum legisque testimonio docet dominum a cunctis audiendum gentibus et incredulos quidem damnatunim, fideles nero aeterna ben dictione donaturum" [ Briefly but plainly he (i.e., Peter) teaches by the testimony of the prophets and of the Law that the Lord is to be heard by all the nations, and that he will certainly damn the unbelieving, but he will present an eternal blessing to the faithful [ Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 3 · 2 3 . 5 1 - 5 4 ) . The object of damnation is reduced to the abstract category of "the unbelieving"; the fateful spark of anti-Judaic anger is, to a degree, hidden. 2 To be sure, this does not constitute evidence for a "pro-Jewish" Bede . We have already seen him display the full range of anti- Judaic anger, and perhaps Bede simply feels such passages are self-evident and do not need comment. Yet in the pages that follow we will see another, more empa thetic aspect ofBede's understanding ofJews . Existing side by side with his rhetoric of rejection is a subtle, discriminating, and responsive under standing. Several factors influence this aspect of Bede's hermeneutic, appealing to his instincts as a scholar, historian, and teacher, to an extent defusing the anger of the anti- Judaic tradition. The previous chapter provided glimpses of this effect, especially in the apocalyptic hope of final reunification of the Jews with the elect at the end of time; this chapter will explore the issue in greater detail. Once again I wish to be 2. This is a fairly common pattern in his commentary on Acts; although the denuncia tions of Jews are severe, he often declines to comment on quite inflammatory verses. Bede is silent on the following passages: Acts 4 : I 5 - 2 I (conspiracy); Acts 5 : 29 - 3 3 (deicide accusa tion ) ; Acts T 5 1 - 5 2 , 5 4 , 57 (inflammatory verses on the death of Stephen ) ; Acts I 3 : 4 5 - 46, 5 0 ( envy and conspiracy of the Jews ) ; Acts I 4 : 2- 5 (unbelieving, seditious Jews ) ; Acts I 4 : I 6- I 8 ( Jews attack Paul ) ; Acts IT 5- IO ( attack of envious Jews ) ; Acts I 8 : 4 - I7 ( angry, murderous Jews and invective ) ; Acts 20: 3 - 7 ( Jews plot against Paul ) ; Acts 20: I 8 - 22 (plots of the Jews ) ; Acts 2 1 : 29 - 3 6 (plot to kill Paul ) ; Acts 2 5 : I - I O ( Jews attempt to kill Paul ) ; Acts 26: I I - 23 (Paul explains that the Jews have been trying to kill him ) .

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clear: this rhetoric does not afford the Jews an unambiguously positive place within Bede's Weltanschauung. However, the anger, the rage and the frustration of the anti-Judaic tradition do not rise to the fore in the dynamic sketched in the following pages. For Bede the Jews were, after all, once God's chosen people : he is thus interested in the Jews as a distinct "race" with customs, rites, and a history all their own . Bede also displays an interest in the ecclesiam primitivam) the early church during the apostolic age; he wishes to understand and track the evangelical message of the Lord as it spread from its humble local beginnings to reach eventually the whole world, including England. For this reason, he clings to the qualification that during Jesus' ministry a part of the Jews did believe-a common-sense point, since if no one heeded his initial call among the Jews, the church would have ended before it had begun. The role of these early Jewish converts and the great mission to the Gentiles capture Bede's imagination and foster a commiserative tone in his understanding of the Jews .

Bede the Scholar and the (�ncient People of God )) The Jews were formerly God's chosen nation, the "antiquam illam Dei plebem" [the ancient people of God ] , as Bede calls them ( De Tabernaculo 2 . 8 6 8 - 9 ) . 3 Bede understands that the Christian church grew out of this once-chosen people, and this knowledge often restrains his more polemi cal rhetoric. We saw this dynamic earlier, in the expression of the Jews' eschatological function. Bede is fully aware that the Christian populus sprang from the Jews in the days of the early church, and thus he can easily fall into acclamation of the Jews, praises that would be hard put to fall from the lips of more anti-Judaic writers . From Bede's perspective, one cannot deny one's origins. He explains that before the incarnation "sola ilium gens Iudaea sequebatur credendo" [ only the Jewish nation followed him ( i . e . , God) by believing ] : the Jews were noble monothe ists, clinging to the Lord in a sea ofpaganism ( Homeliae 2 . 2 - 4 5 - 4 6 ) . But afterward, once Jesus had passed "per incarnationis suae dispensa tionem" [through the plan of his own incarnation ] , a "maxima . . . multitudo credentium . . . nationum" [great multitude of believing na tions ] followed him ( Homeliae 2 . 2 -4 6- 4 7, 4 7- 4 8 ) . There is an implicit analogy here : once the Jews alone believed, then a great many from 3 · See also De Tabernaculo 2 . 2 3 7; De Templo 2.9 1 - 9 2 .

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among the gentiles believed. The object of belief is crucially different in each case, but this analogy, which is constantly mediated by figural interpretation, is not colored by the angry denunciations of deicide and betrayal . Take as another example of this hermeneutic Bede's explication of Luke 2 : 22- 3 5 in his Homeliae: Bede expounds the encounter of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph with Simeon and Anna during Christ's purification. Simeon and Anna stand for the Jews, who according to Bede, stood waiting to receive Christ with open arms : Quod autem Simeon et Anna prouectae uidelicet aetatis uir et femina deuotis confessionum officiis dominum quem corpore paruum uident sed magnum diuinitate intellegunt excipiunt illam profecto populi Iudaeorum sinagogam figurate denuntiant quae longa incarnationis eius expectatione fatigata promptis ilium mox ut aduenit et piarum ulnis actionum et fidei non fictae uocibus exaltare ac magnificare studuit acclamans illi et dicens: "Dirige me in ueritate tua et doce me quia tu es Deus salutaris meus, et te sustinui tota die." ( Homeliae r . r 8 .9 6- r o 5 ; Psalm 24 : 5 ) [Simeon and Anna, of course, a man and woman of advanced age, met the Lord with the devoted services of faithful praise . They saw that he was small in body, but they understood that he was great in divine power. Designated figuratively, they signify the synagogue of the people of the Jews, who, fatigued by their long wait for his impending incarnation, made ready to exalt and glo rify him as soon as he came, with both their arms of pious actions and their voices of truth faith. They were acclaiming him and saying: "Direct me in thy truth, and teach me; for thou art God my Savior, and on thee have I waited all the day long."] Again, the tone of Bede's understanding of this scene is one of joyful expectation. Bede "conveniently" ignores the fact that these Jews also rejected Christ: like his image of the Jews prostrate and enfeebled before the gates of salvation and eagerly awaiting their cure, the Jews here, represented by Simeon and Anna, embrace him joyfully, as a babe in their arms . Bede is referring to those Jews who converted to Chris tianity, but still designates them as the populi Iudaeorum) the synagoga.

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It is difficult to reconcile the tone and rhetoric of this passage with his more inflammatory rhetoric. As he continues to explicate the scene, Bede notes Simeon's dire warnings that the babe "is set for the fall and for the resurrection of many in Israel and for a sign which shall be contradicted" (Luke 2 : 3 4 ) . Remember, Bede had just depicted the Jews in a very positive light, as joyfully accepting Christ with outstretched arms; however, the proph ecy of Jesus as a "sign which shall be contradicted" should raise the opposite, very traditional sentiment-the Jews also rejected Christ. But here, his benevolent tone carries over into the subsequent exposition, ameliorating the traditional rhetoric of hatred: "Signo dominicae cru cis multi saepe Iudaeorum exterius multi contradixere gentilium, multi quod est grauius falsi fratres hoc interius professionis superficie sequun tur sed ueritate prauae actionis nimium persequuntur dicentes se nosse Deum factis autem negantes" [Many of the Jews and many of the gentiles have often contradicted the sign of the Lord's cross externally, and what is more grievous, many false brothers do this internally: they follow it (i.e . , the cross ) with a superficial dedication, but they falsely follow it in the reality of their depraved actions, saying that they know God, but denying him in their deeds] ( Homeliae I . I 8 . I 27- 3 2 ) . One would expect that any text placing Jews, Jesus, and contradiction in the same semantic vicinity would activate the traditional angry Christian rhetoric denouncing the deicide of the Jews . But instead, Bede turns aside and places the Jews in a group that also consists of Gentiles and, even worse, false Christian brothers or monks, who hypocritically con tradict Christ in their hearts .4 Placing the Jews into this wider context, moving them out of the spotlight, defuses the potential provocation of the biblical verse. The Jews had been the chosen people, historically, the fertile ground from which the Christian church grew. In De Tabernaculo Bede explains the figural meaning of the crossbar that connects the walls of the tabernacle : it "ipsum absque omni ambiguitate redemptorem nostrum figurate denuntiat qui quasi ab angulo usque ad angulum peruenit quia a plebe Iudaica quam prius elegit sese ad saluandam etiam gentium multitudinem propitiatus extendit" [without any ambiguity signifies figurally our Redeemer, who moved through from corner to corner, as it were, because he reached out from the Jewish people which he had 4 · On "false brothers" and the Jews see Explanatio Apocalypsis PL 9 3 : I 8 2 .

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first chosen for himself; he turned his attention also to the salvation of the multitude of the Gentiles ] ( De Tabernaculo 2 . I 3 4 8 - 5 2 ; cf. 2 . I 8 2 8 3 9 ) . Jesus "reached out" from the Jews, whom he had "chosen for himself " ; it is from out of the kingdom of the Jews that Jesus took human form . 5 If the Jews were worthy of election by God, it follows that they should merit a measure of respect as a distinct historical people, at least to the extent that Bede the historian and ethnographer is naturally interested in such matters : namely, the origins and history of a great people. In his commentary on Tobit, Bede explains that during the Babylo nian captivity the devil tried to destroy the people of God but failed because of the vigilance of the holy teachers among them ( In Tobiam r . 22- 2 3 . 5 8 - 6 I ) . The steadfast monotheism of the Jews in captivity, surrounded in a land of powerful pagan idolaters, merits Bede's admira tion: "fugit autem cum filio et uxore quia nee fidem dominicae incarna tionis nee statum sinagogae potuit hostis auferre quamuis uiolenter insisteret, quod in Machabeomm agonibus multum claruit" [ However, he ( i . e . , Tobit) fled with his son and wife because the enemy could not deprive them either of faith in the Lord's incarnation or of the syna gogue as an institution however violently he pressed them, as became evident in the trials of the Maccabees] ( In Tobiam r . 22- 3 . 6 I - 64 ) . In this respect for Synagoga "as an institution" [ statum] , we can find the impulse behind Bede's careful delineation of categories when writing about the Jews from a historical perspective . For example, Bede is carefi1l to explain clearly the term proselytes in Acts, expounding their relationship to Judaism "as an institution." 6 In the second chapter of Acts the apostles begin to speak in tongues, and the spectators marvel aloud at the phenomenon, saying that even "strangers of Rome, Jews also and proselytes" can understand them (Acts 2 : I O- I I ) . Bede then defines proselytes: "Proselytos, id est adue nas, nuncupabant eos qui de gentibus originem ducentes circumci sionem et iudaismum eligere malebant'' [They were named proselytes, that is, foreigners, those who found their origin among the Gentiles; 5. See In Habacuc 144-46: "Mons autem de quo uenturus idem sanctus canitur, regnum Iudaeorum, ex quo ille carnis originem duxit, ualet intellegi" [ However, the mountain from which it is predicted that this holy one is to come can be understood as the kingdom of the Jews, from which he took origin] ; cf. also De Tabernaculo r . r r r 4 - r 8 and r . r r 3 3 - 4 I . 6 . On proselytes and the "God-fearers" of Acts see Collins, "Symbol of Otherness," 170- 8 5 .

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they preferred to choose circumcision and Judaism ] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 2 . I I . 9 3 - 9 5 ) . The proselytes are converts to Judaism; Bede displays an awareness ofJudaism as a system of belief, something that is chosen, a calling and way oflife . This is, however, only a potential state : there are still those who are Jews "by nature" : "Non solum ergo, inquiunt, qui natura sunt Iudaei ex diuerso orbe conuenerant, uemm et hi qui de praeputio nati eorum adhaesere ritui" [Therefore they say that not only those who are Jews by nature) but also these who adhered to the rite of the foreskin of their children had come together from diverse areas of the world] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 2 . I r .9 6- 9 8 ; empha sis added) . Bede later defines proselytes as "eos qui natura gentiles erant sed religione Iudaei" [those who were Gentiles by nature but Jews in religion] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 3 · 4 3 · 7 6 ) . 7 This is, in effect, a dual insight: Bede recognizes that Judaism is a religion and not simply an ethnic designation; yet he also sees Jew as denoting a particular people "by nature" ( natura) -Jews qua Jews . Bede explores the details of Jewish culture insofar as he can infer them from his textual tradition. This exploration is manifested in small details: Passover is the "festival day of the Jews"; the tearing of gar ments is a "custom of the Jews," a terrified reaction to blasphemy. 8 In explaining Paul's haste to reach Jerusalem for Pentecost, Bede digresses for a moment on the particular ritual "feast days" of the Jews and Paul's new relationship to those old rituals: "Praeceptum quidem legis erat ut omnes Iudaei ter in anno, id est, tempore paschae, pentecosten et scenophegiae Hierosolymam conuenirent, sed apostolus ruptis saeculi nexibus diem quinquagesimae, hoc est remissionis et spiritus sancti, agere festinat" [There was a certain precept of the Law that all Jews should gather in Jerusalem three times a year, that is, at the time of Passover, of Pentecost, and of the Feast of Tabernacles . However, the 7 · Cf. Explanatio Apocalypsis PL 9 3 : 1 3 8 : "Judaeus enim religionis nomen" [For Jew is the name of a religion] . 8 . Homeliae 2 . 2 . 5 ; Expositio Actuum Apostolorum J 4 . 14 -40-4 3 , following Jerome, Com mentariorum in Matheum Libri IV, 4 · 1 4 1 5 - 24 , by book and line numbers; see also Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 1 5 . 2 1 .4 1 - 4 7 · Cf. his interest in the word semicinctia: "Multi nostrum quid 'simicinthia' significent ignorant, uerum Gregorius, qui nunc est apostolicae sedis an tistes, cum adhuc esset achidiaconus, sciscitante amico de Brittania et hoc inter alia rescripsit, genus esse sudarii quo Hebraei uterenn1r in capite" [Many of us do not know what 'semicinctia' means, but Gregory, who is now the bishop of the apostolic seat, when he was still archdeacon and a friend from Britain asked him, wrote back this among other things : that a 'semicinctia" is a type of face-cloth which the Hebrews use on the head] ( Retractatio in Actus Apostolontm 1 9 . 1 2 . I 3 - 1 7 ) .

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apostle, because he had broken the bonds ofhis world ( i . e . , broken from his Judaic origin) , was hurrying to celebrate the fiftieth day, that is, the day of forgiveness and of the holy spirit] ( R'!Cpositio Actuum Apostolorum 20. 1 6 . 5 3 - 5 7 ) . Paul hurries to Jerusalem in the manner of his former people, but for a different, Christian end. The tone here is informative and ethnographic, an investigation into Jewish customs and culture .9 Bede's homily for the dedication of a church expresses a similar senti ment. Following Augustine, he explains that the "feast of the dedica tion" in John r o : 22 is the commemoration of the dedication of the temple, but then he adds the comment that this was a ceremony "quae populus Dei ex antiqua patrum traditione per annos singulos cele brare consueuerat" [which the people of God were accustomed to cele brate every year by the ancient tradition of their ancestors] ( Homeliae 2 . 24 . 3 - 4 ) . 10 Bede emphasizes the Christian continuity with this noble tradition. "Quorum uestigia nos hodie iuxta morem christiani orbis sequentes annuam dedicationis ecclesiae nostrae diem diuinis laudibus et uigiliis studuimus agere sollemnem" [Today we, following in their foot steps and according to the practice of the Christian world, take pains to observe with divine praises and vigils the annual solemn observance of the dedication of our church] ( Homeliae 2 . 24 - 4 - 7 ) . By expressing the relationship between Jewish and Christian festivals as a continuum, Bede necessarily lends a degree of nobility and stature to the Jewish practices . The Christian version of the dedication "follows in the foot steps" of the rites performed by the populo Dei)· he does not break away and completely repudiate the Jewish practice, nor are the two explicitly linked in a figural hermeneutic, though the figural mind-set is certainly somewhere in the background. By following in the "footsteps of the Fathers" ( vestigia patrum) , the Christian practice extends the Jewish rite . And although Bede certainly knew that the laws and rituals of the Jews had been superseded, he implies that they nonetheless have their own power, their own particular nobility. Paul confronts Agrippa in Acts : "Believest thou the prophets, 0 king Agrippa? I know that thou believest" (Acts 2 6 : 27 ) . Bede explains: "Non haec adulando, ut qui dam putant, sed uere profatur; Agrippa enim, utpote Iudaeorum ritu et 9 · Bede's In Regum XXX Qyaestiones, f(Jr example, is especially concerned with the explication of ±actual, rather than figural, details. JElfric displays a similar interest; see Part 4 , chapters 7 and 8 . 1 0 . Following Augustine, Tractatus i n Iohannem, 4 8 . 2 . 1 - 8 ; Be ck, however, adds the modifying phrase "by the ancient tradition of their ancestors . "

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legibus imbutus, credebat uera locutos esse prophetas, sed ad quem eadem ueritas pertingeret, id est, dominum Christum" [He did not declare this with flattery, as some think, but he spoke the truth. Indeed Agrippa, inasmuch as he was imbued with the ritual and laws of the Jews, believed that the prophets spoke the truth; however, he did not know to whom this truth pertained, that is, the Lord Christ] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 26. 2 7 . 27- 3 1 ) . Agrippa's immersion in the rituals and laws of the Jews gives him access to the truth, yet his lack of faith prevents the truth from "zeroing in" on the correct target. Again, seen on their own terms the Jews are perfectly honorable in tradition, cus tom, and deed: for example, Bede speaks very well of the learning and intelligence of Josephus ( 3 7- r o r C.E . ) , his source for portions of De Tabernaculo.I I Thus, Bede's awareness that the Jews were once the chosen people of God leads him inexorably to closer examination of that esteemed populus on their own terms. Bede is far too scrupulous a scholar and historian to do otherwise than engage his subject with a certain measure of empathy. 1 2 Cohen notes that " [ c ]hurch fathers and medieval Catholic theologians generally proceeded from the premise that the Jews had, in fact, been God's chosen people . . . . few could deny that at least in some basic, minimal sense, a Pauline scheme of salvation history guaranteed respectability to the Judaism of the past and to the Jews (who would convert) in the fumre . " r 3 The trajectory of this hermeneutic automatically tones down the angry rhetoric of dei cide and rejection. The relationship between the Jews and Christians is too intimately (and uneasily) linked for it to be otherwise . Because their fates are so closely woven together, Bede carefully examines the intertwined destinies of both Jew and Christian in the sacred history of the church; in doing so anger melts away, drained off into more placid channels.

The Discriminating Mind One way this anger is defl1sed is through a partitioning of the Jews some accepted Christ, some denied him. As we have seen previously, Bede feels there is more than enough guilt to parcel out to the Jews as a I I . De Tabernacttlo I . 3 3 6- 3 9 ; cf. Bede's similar praise for Cassiodorus, who according to Bede drew his learning from the "ancient Jews" [ antiques Iudaeis] ( De Templo 2 - 4 8 - 5 2 , at 5 0 ) . I 2 . See Meyvaert, "Becie the Scholar," for

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Jews, almost the entire world, deaf and mute, was wandering from knowledge and confession of the truth] ( Homeliae 2 . 6 . r 3 - r 7 ) . rs Here the Jews-or more specifically, a portion of them-are the only righ teous people to be found in this fallen world. The rest of humanity, presumably the pagan Gentiles and the unbelieving of Israel, are wan dering in the dark of ignorance and error. By staying faithful to a historical understanding of the origins of Christianity, an awareness ofhis own faith's Jewish roots, Bede necessar ily verges away from vimlent anger to what is, in effect, an appreciation of Judaism, at least within its own very specific, historically bounded, Christian terms . Markus notes that although Eusebius and Orosius (im portant influ ences upon Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica) strove to make a clean break with their recent past, "Bede could not bring himself, as a historian, to disown the past in this way."r 6 As Bede explains, Christ brought light to all nations because "prius sola Iudaea et hoc ex parte habebat" [formerly Judaea alone, and only in part, possessed it] ( Home liae 2 . 2 0 . 76) . The Jews "magna ex parte recusarunt" [for the most part refused to accept] ; but " [n]eque enim omnes recusarunt alioquin nullus esset saluus et superuacua eius incarnatio" [not everyone refused; other wise, no one would have been saved, and his incarnation would have been useless] ( Homeliae r . 8 . 1 79 , 1 79- S r ) . When Bede follows the in stincts of what might be called his "common sense," he engages with the Jews in a manner quite different in tone from the rhetoric of rejection. Jews and Gentiles begin to weigh evenly in the scheme of God's provi dence, both manifestly of equal potential : the two temple doors de scribed in 3 Kings 3 r - 3 2 symbolize the fact that "utriusque populi fidelibus et Iudaei uidelicet et gentilis eadem uitae ianua reseratur" [this gate oflife is unlocked to the faithful ofboth peoples, namely to the Jews and Gentiles] ( De Templo r . r 5 69 - 70 ) . 17 Bede's discriminate understanding of Jews generates distinctions among the motifs of traditional anti-Judaic rhetoric . These discrimina tions imply and necessitate an apprehension of difference in Bede's mind 1 5 . Cf. the imagery in Romans r r : r 6- 24 . r 6. Markus, "Becie and the Tradition of Ecclesiastical Historiography," 1 3 . 1 7 . See also De Templo 2 . 5 79 - 8 2 : Just as the apostles go fishing before encountering the risen Christ, so too do holy preachers "et Iudaeis et gentibus uerbum fidei commitnmt atque utriusque populi electos a fluctibus saeculi praesentis extractos ad futurae gloriam pacis et immortalitatis perducunt" [deliver the word of faith to both the Jews and the Gentiles and extract the elect of both peoples from the waves of the present world and lead them to the glory of future peace and immortality; emphasis added] .

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and in the reader's, rather than the swift onward thrust of emotional, rhetorical negation. This discriminating mind, as we have begun to see, informs Bede's syncretic notion of the church. One calls to mind the celebrated passage from Galatians: "There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither bond nor free; there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus" ( Galatians 3 : 2 8 ) . All, even the "believing portion" of the Jews, are one in the body of the church. An important metaphor used to express this hermeneutic is the biblical cornerstone . r s When Peter declares to the chief priests and Saducees that Jesus "is the stone which was rejected by you, the builders, which is become the head of the corner" (Acts 4 : I I ) . Be de explains: Aedificantes erant Iudaei qui, cunctis gentibus in desolatione idolorum morantibus, ipsi soli legem et prophetas ad aedifica tionem populi cotidie legebant. Hi, dum aedificant, peruenerunt ad lapidem angularem qui duos parietes amplecteretur, id est, inuenemnt in scripturis propheticis Christum in carne uenturum qui duos conderet populos in semet ipso, et quia ipsi in uno pariete stare, hoc est soli salui fieri, malebant, reprobauerunt lapidem qui non erat aptatus ad unum sed ad duos. Vemm deus, illis licet nolentibus, hunc ipse per se posuit in caput anguli, ut ex duobus testamentis et ex duobus populis aedificatio surgeret unius eius demque fidei. ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 4 . I I . I 6- 2 6) 19 [The builders were the Jews who, while all the Gentiles were delayed in the desolation of idols, alone were reading the Law and the prophets daily for the building up of the people . While they were building, they came to the cornerstone, which em braces two walls: that is, they found in the prophetic scriptures that Christ, who would unite the two peoples in himself, was to come in the flesh; moreover, because they preferred to remain in one wall, that is, to be saved alone, they rejected the stone which was not prepared for one side, but for two . But certainly, al though they were unwilling, God himself placed this stone at the I 8 . For background to this concept and its exegesis in late antique and early medieval thought, see Ladner, "Symbolism of the Biblical Corner Stone"; cf Christ I, I - I7 ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, ASPR III, 3 - I 5 ) . I 9 . See also Homeliae 2 . 3 . I 5 8 - 63 ; In Tobiam 2 . I 6- I 8 .74-76. Peter's words derive from Psalm I I T 22 and Isaiah 28 : I 6; cf. Matthew 2 I : 4 2 ; Mark I 2 : I o ; Luke 20: I 7 ; Romans 9 : 3 2- 3 3 ; I Peter 2 : 6- 8 .

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head of the corner through himself, so that from two testaments and two peoples a building of one and the same faith would arise . ] This syncretic vision of Christ the cornerstone, placed at the key junc tion in the great edifice of the church, is an image that allows Bede to understand Judaism in such a way that the Jews are preserved rather than rejected. Jews are necessary figures in an equation that includes, importantly, the fate of the Gentiles; Christ unites the two peoples, just as a cornerstone links two walls ( In Epistolas VII Catholicas 2 3 6 . I 4448 [on I Peter 2 : 7 ] ) .20 This integration of Jews and Gentiles within the structure of the church takes a number of specific forms . Certainly the Gentiles will inherit the sovereign mantle formerly belonging only to the Jews ; in his commentary on I Peter 2 : 9 ( "But you are a chosen generation, a kingly priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people " ) , Bede explains that Peter here gives t o the Gentiles "[h]oc laudis testimonium quondam antiquo Dei populo per Moysen datum est [this testimony of praise which previously was given by Moses to the ancient people of God] because they believed in Christ "qui velut lapis angularis in earn quam in se Israhel habuerat salutem gentes adunauit" [who, like a cornerstone, brought the Gentiles into the salvation which Israel had possessed for itself ] ( In Epistolas VII Catholicas 23 7 . I 64- 6 5 , I 6 6- 6 8 ) . The Gentiles are the New Israel, obtaining the salvation formerly the right of the Jews only, as they find themselves connected through Christ the cornerstone . The complex tradition of the New Israel will be the subject of the next two chapters; the remainder of our discussion of Bede's "conciliatory rhetoric" looks ahead to that herme neutic as we trace Bede's complex understanding of Jews in relation to the conversion of the Gentiles .

Jews and Gentiles: Synthesis and Unity One common tendency in Bede's exegesis is to speak of the Jews and Gentiles in one breath, in an almost formulaic mode of expression. Christ's mission was to the two peoples: he was sent into the world to redeem "et populum Iudaicum a tenebris perfidiae et gentilitatem ab idolatriae seruitute" [both the Jewish people from the darkness of unbe20. Cf. Ephesians 2: q - I 6 .

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lief and the Gentiles from the servitude of idolatry] ( In Tobiam 3 . 2 5 . 2 3 24 ) . 2 1 Scriptural items that come in pairs often find their figural mean ing as Jews and Gentiles; for example, Bede interprets the two women who visit Jesus' tomb ( Mary the mother ofJames and Mary Magdalene ) as the two people of faith, Jews and Gentiles ( Homeliae 2 . 7 . 77- 8 2 ) . 22 The duality of the women stirs Bede's exegetical imagination, as does a pair of animals in his explication of Jesus' humble birth in a manager. Animals naturally eat in a manger, and so this prefigures the saving grace of the Eucharist, where all the faithful would be gathered "in sacrosancta altaris mensa" [at the sacred table of the altar ] ; all who obey Christ will be refreshed, ofwhom it was said "The ox knoweth his owner and the ass his master's crib" ( Homeliae r . 6 . r 8 o , 1 77- 8 4 ; Isaiah r : 3 ) . Bede then explains this citation: "In boue etenim designat populum Iudaeorum qui iugum legis portare et eius consueuerat uerba ruminare in asino popu lum exprimit gentium qui sordibus idolatriae semper manebat inmun dus" [ Indeed, by the ox he designates the people of the Jews, who were accustomed to bear the yoke of the Law and to ruminate upon its words; by the ass he signifies the people of the Gentiles, who always remained unclean with the stains of idolatry] ( Homeliae r . 6. r 84- 8 8 ) . 2 3 Likewise the shepherds (who were the first to see and proclaim him ) came from the Jews ; and the wise men (who came from afar to venerate him ) came from the Gentiles ( Homeliae r . 6 . r 9 r - 9 6 ) . But even in the same homily Bede is careful to qualify his analysis . When the angel proclaims "Fear not; for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy that shall be to all the people" ( Luke 2 : r o ) , Bede explains that this means " [n]on omni populo Iudaeorum neque omni populo gentium sed omni populo qui uel de Iudaeis uel de gentibus orbis totius ad unam Christi confessionem adgregatus" [not to all the people of the Jews, nor to all the people of the Gentiles, but to all the people who, either from the Jews or from the Gentiles of the whole world, are gathered to one confession of Christ] ( Homeliae r . 6 . 24 1 - 4 3 ) . In Bede's hermeneutic these binary paradigms set Jews and Gentiles on a more or less equal footing within the structure 2 1 . Many examples can be cited: see Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 5 . 1 6 . 3 1 - 3 5 ; In Habacuc 6- 8 , 299- 3 0 3 ; Homeliae 1 . 4 . 20 3 - 5 ; 2 . 1 5 . 6 1 - 6 5 ; 2 . 20. 1 4 3 - 4 8 , etc . 2 2 . Cf. Homeliae 2 . 1 7 . 270- 72, in which Bede interprets the two loaves of bread to be offered from the first harvest as the church which "de utroque populo Iudaeorum scilicet et gentium colligit quos in nouam suo redemptori familiam consecret" [collects from both peoples-the Jews and the Gentiles-those it can consecrate to its redeemer in a new family] . 23 . See Deshman, "Imagery of the Living Ecclesia," 272. On ruminatio and the Jews see further chapter 8 .

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o f the church . The careful discrimination of categories is essential to Bede's exegesis of this subject. But only the particular chosen subset from among the Jews and Gentiles will be assimilated into the church. In Matthew 2 I : 7 Jesus enters Jerusalem accompanied by a donkey and its foal ; Bede explains : "Asina et pullus quibus sedens Hierosolimam uenit utriusque populi Iudaei uidelicet et gentilis simplicia corda designant qui bus ipse praesidens quaeque a noxia libertate suo frenans imperio ad uisionem supernae pacis adducit" [The donkey and the foal on which he ( i . e . , Christ) sat when he came to Jerusalem designate the sincere hearts of both people, namely the Jews and the Gentiles. Protecting them and restraining them from dangerous freedom by his rule, he leads them to the vision of heavenly peace ] ( Homeliae 2 . 3 . 3 6- 3 9 ) . Only those Jews and Gentiles with "sincere hearts" [simplicia corda] will be saved; the Jews here are not automatically damned, any more than the Gentiles both potentially can reach salvation . Following Augustine, Bede ex plains that when Jesus commands the disciples to untie the ass and foal (Matthew 2 I : 2 ) , this demonstrates that both people were "fimibus peccatorum erat circumplexus et solutione diuina opus habebat" [bound by the ropes of sins, and had need of a divine loosing ] ; both had been bound fast in sin-the Jewish populus "legem quam acceperat non obseruando" [ by not observing the Law which it had received] and the gentile populus "legem quam seruaret numquam accipiendo" [by never receiving a Law which it could keep ] ( Homeliae 2 . 3 . 64- 7 ) . 2 4 This paral lel expression of the relationship between the Jews and Gentiles endows them with a rough equivalence in a drive toward unity and synthesis. Assimilation and unity find other metaphors of expression, includ ing the digestive . Having already explained that John the Baptist's diet of locusts and wild honey represents, respectively, the Jews and the Gentiles, Bede extends the interpretation further: "Et dum ex utroque populo dominus quos in unitatem sui corporis quod est ecclesia do cendo traiciat eligit locustis nimirum et melle siluestri pascitur quia et ex ea quae instabili intentione caelestia quesierat et ex ilia gente quae terrenae solum philosophiae saporem nouerat multos in sua membra conuertit'' [And when from both people the Lord chose those whom he would pull into the unity of his body-that is, the church-by his teaching, they were surely being nourished by locusts and wild honey, because he transformed many into his members, both from the one 2 4 . Following Augustine, Tractatus in Iohannem, 5 I . 5 . 3 - 24 .

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people, who sought heavenly things with an unstable intention (i.e., the Jews-locusts ) , and from the other nation, who knew only the taste of earthly philosophy (i.e., the Gentiles-wild honey) ] ( Homeliae I . I . r r 2- r 7; emphasis added) . 25 Convertit is multivalent in this con text: it means both "transform" or "change," apt in the context of the somatic metaphor here-the Jews and Gentiles become part of Christ's body; but the verb also means "convert to a new religious belief," appropriate for the historical point at stake . 26 Jews and Gentiles blend and merge together in the rhetoric of assimilation, and in the workings of this hermeneutic the traditional anti-Judaic rhetoric falls into a subor dinate place, as the issues at stake in the exegetical moment open out onto other concerns. We can further see this process in Bede's final interpretation of the tabernacle and the temple. Both structures can represent the universal church; as Bede explains concisely in his Homeliae) the temple is the church, constructed from the living stones of all believers ( Homeliae 2 . 24 . 2 3 4 - 3 7 ) . 27 The figural hermeneutic governs this exposition; in a beautiful expression in De Templo he tells us that he intends to seek the "spiritual mansion of God" [ spiritalem Dei mansionem] in the "material structure" [ structura materiali] ( De Templo r . 5 5 ) . 28 As the "spiritual chil dren of Israel" the Christians, of course, supersede more material and 2 5 . For further references to the Jews and Gentiles, with an emphasis on their composi tion in the unity of the church and their identity as the elect, see inter alia: In Tobiam I r . I 6I 8 .7 1 - 79 ; De Tabernaculo 2 . 3 49- 5 3 , 990- 9 9 , 1 622- 2 8 , 3 - 47 5 - 8 1 . For visions of this unity of all nations ( Jew and gentile) in the architecture of the temple, see De Templo r . 8979 0 5 , 9 3 7- 4 3 , 1 4 5 3 - 5 8 , 1 5 1 8 - 24 , 2 . 2 63 - 7 5 , 3 77- 8 1 , 779- 8 5 , 8 0 1 - 8 , 9 0 1 - 1 5 . Another fascinating image of diversity-in-unity is the pomegranate: De Templo 2-442- 60, 5 8 2- 8 5 ; but cf De Tabernaculo 3 . 70 1 - 3 0 . 2 6 . Dictionary ofMedieval Latin, s .v. convertere: s. 5 , s. 7 . 2 7 . For general introductions to De Templo and De Tabernaculo, see the series of articles by Holder, "Allegory and History in Bede's Interpretation of Sacred Architecture," "New Treasures and Old in Bede's 'De Tabernaculo' and 'De Templo, " ' "The Venerable Bede on the Mysteries of Our Salvation. " For general background see Krinsky, "Representations of the Temple of ]emsalem" ; Carmthers, Craft of Thought, 2 3 1 - 3 7 . 2 8 . De Tabernaculo has a similar intent; in speaking of the constmction of the tabernacle, Bede explains God's purpose : "Cuncta haec quae dominus sibi a priore populo ad faciendum sanctuarium materialiter offerri praecepit nos quoque qui spiritales filii Israhel . . . esse desideramus spiritali intellegentia debemus offere" [All these things that the Lord directed to be oflered to him in a material fashion f(Jr the making of a sanctuary by the people of earlier times should be offered with spiritual understanding by us who desire to be the spiritual children of lsrael] ( De Tabernaculo 1 . 2 3 6- 4 0 ) . For other citations of the common imperative to read the Old Testament in a spiritual sense see, e.g., De Tabernaculo 1 . 1 274-77, 1 3 0 5 - 8 ; 2 . 1 0 1 8 - 27; 3 ·9 5 - 9 7 ·

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carnal expressions of devotion . Yet in the grand scheme oftime providen rial, the link to bygone Israel is absolutely vital . Bede carefully distinguishes between the tabernacle and the temple : although both represent the church, one was carried about until it en tered the promised land, and the other was built permanently in the city, to stand on an "ever inviolable foundation" [ inuiolabili semper funda mento] ( De Templo 1 .4 r ) . Therefore, the tabernacle represents the "toil and exile" [ labor et exilium] of the present church, and the temple repre sents the "rest and happiness" [ quies et beatitudo] of the future church ( De Templo 1 . 4 3 - 4 4 ) . 2 9 But he then suggests that the situation is more complex than this, open to further interpretations : Vel certe quia ill a a so lis filiis Israhel haec autem a proselitis etiam et gentibus facta est, possunt in ilia principaliter patres ueteris testa menti et antiquus ille Dei populus in hac autem congregata de gentibus ecclesia figuraliter exprimi, quamuis aedificium utriusque domus enucleatius spiritali sensu discussum et labores praesentis ecclesiae cotidianos et praemia in fl1turo perennia gaudiaque regni caelestis et electionem primae de Israhel ecclesiae et salutem omnium gentium in Christo multimodis ostendatur insinuari figuris. ( De Templo 1 .44- 5 3 ) . 3° [And certainly because the former ( i . e . , the tabernacle ) was made by the children of Israel alone , but the latter ( i . e . , the temple ) by proselytes also and by Gentiles, the first can be expressed princi pally as a figural representation of the fathers of the Old Testa ment and the ancient people of God, but the second for the church gathered from the Gentiles; however, it can be shown that 2 9 . See also De Tabernaculo 2 . 1 - 1 8 . 3 0 . See also De Templo 1 . 4 1 8 - 2 I and De Tabernaculo 2 . 3 6- s o ; cf. De Templo 1 .440- 4 2 . Bede also gives u s a succinct summary o f the mem1ing of the two stmctures in his Homeliae: "Duae etenim sunt conditae domus ob significationem utriusque populi in eandem fidem uenturi Iudaei scilicet atque gentiles. Vnde bene tabernaculum sola plebs Hebraea condit in heremo templi autem stmcturam proselyti, id est aduenae de gentibus quotquot in populo Israhel tunc inueniri poterant deuota fide conpleuerunt" [And indeed the two houses were constmcted for the symbolism of the two peoples who were to join together in the same faith, namely the Jews and the Gentiles. Hence it is appropriate that the Hebrew people alone built the tabernacle in the desert, but the proselytes, that is, those newly arrived from the Gentiles, as m<my as could be found then among the people of Israel, completed the stmcture of the temple with devout faith] ( Homeliae 2 . 2 5 . 3 6- 4 2 ) .

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the building of both houses, when discussed more clearly accord ing to the spiritual sense, signifies in various figures the daily labors of the present church, the rewards and perennial joys of the heavenly kingdom in the future , the election of the first church from Israel, and the salvation of all the Gentiles in Christ. ]

Multimodisjiguris) indeed: exegetical subjects such as the tabernacle and temple are rich material for the turning of Bede's hermeneutic. Both structures fit securely into a figural understanding : the tabernacle is the Old Law and the ancient people of God; the temple is the church gathered from the Gentiles in accordance with the words of the gospel. Yet multiple interpretations accrue : both structures will represent the living and growing present organism of the church . Jews play an important part in building this community. As is ex plained in 3 Kings 5 : I 5 - I 8, three kinds of workers combine their skills to build Solomon's temple-porters, stonemasons, and overseers. Out of these verses Bede crafts a comprehensive vision of unified, commu nal labor. These three groups stand for the Jews, the proselytes, and the Gentiles (respectively) . All three contribute their individual skills to help build the universal church of Christ ( De Templo I . 272- 8 I ) . Here, instead of the collocation Jew/Gentile, the Jews are subsumed into a tripartite structure : Jews, proselytes, and Gentiles working together in unison. Once again the adjunction of the Jews to the Gentiles dilutes or, perhaps better, transmutes Bede's anti-Judaic rhetoric. As the Jews assume a position in equilibrium with proselytes and Gentiles, they recede further from the glare of anti-Judaism . Hiram of Tyre is thus an important figure; the skilled craftsman has been chosen from the wilderness of the Gentiles to help construct the church . As Bede continues to explicate these figures, the importance of the Gentiles rises to the surface ; this Tyrian craftsman "electos de gentibus uerbi ministros significat" [ signifies the ministers of the word chosen from the Gentiles] ( De Templo 2 . 24 I ) . Hiram represents the importance of the Gentiles in the evangelical growth of the church: "Petit ergo Salomon in opere templi auxilium ab Hiram quia cum veniens in carne dominus dilectam sibi domum uidelicet ecclesiam aedificare disponeret non de Iudaeis tantummodo uerum etiam de gentibus adiutores operis elegit" [Therefore Solomon sought help from Hiram in the work of the temple because when the Lord came in the fle sh and arranged to build a beloved home for himself, namely, the

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church, he chose helpers for the work not from the Jews alone but also from the Gentiles. For he picked ministers of the Word from both peoples] ( De Templo r . 8o- 8 3 ) . Bede asserts the vitality of the Gentiles, and correspondingly, the Jews : both were chosen by God and destined for an important role in the church . These "chosen ministers of the Word" [ electos uerbi ministros] are crucial for the spread of the church and a source of pride for their people. Hiram thus sends timber to Solomon; this represents impor tant men of the Gentile world, humbled by their conversion to Christ ( De Templo r . 8 4 - 9 1 ) . Hiram and his craftsmen represent, for example, pagan philosophers such as ( Pseudo - ) Dionysius the Areopagite who were "conuersos ad ueram sapientiam" [ converted to true wisdom] ( De Templo 1 .9 1 - 9 2 ) . In 3 Kings 5 : 6, Solomon orders Hiram's ser vants to cut down cedar wood; Bede explains that the servants of Hiram "doctores sunt electi de gentibus quorum officii est eos qui in hoc mundo rebus et gloria laetabantur a superbiae fastu corrigenda sternere atque ad obsequium sui redemptoris eorum nota transferre" [are the teachers chosen from the Gentiles whose business it is to cut down those who rejoice in the goods and glory of this world by correcting their pride and arrogance and to convert their desire into obedience to the Redeemer] ( De Templo r . r o 6-9 ) Y Bede could easily call to mind, for example, the heroic teachers and ministers of the Word commemorated in his Historia Ecclesiastica. The Gentiles were the fertile ground for the church's next generation of heroes after the apostles : "Laetatus de fide Christi populus gentium et de uocatione gentilitatis ad Deum tantum proficiebat in domino ut etiam de eius numero doctores fierent idemque postmodum et martyres extitissent" [ Delighted at the faith in Christ and the calling of the gentile world to God, the gentile people made so much progress in the Lord that some from among their number also became teachers and these same ones later even became martyrs ] ( In Tobiam 8 . 22 . 4 1 - 44 ) Y Perhaps Bede, but for his characteristic humility, might have counted himself among these noble doctores. As a teacher, Bede's pedagogical interests are well known and seem to be reflected in the further meanings of Hiram, maker of fine metals: 3 r. See also In Tobiam 2 . I o- 1 r . 2 2- 29 ; In Habacuc 2 3 9 - 5 0 . 3 2 . See also In Tobiam 5 . 22. 3 6-40.

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Fecit autem opus ex aere quia illis committere uerbum quaerit doctor strenuus qui autem pie suscipere ac perseueranter cus todire desiderant quique etiam aliis praedicando latins diffamare quaecumque ipsi didicerunt recta satagunt; aeris namque metal lum ualde esse dura bile constat atque omnimodo sonorum . ( De Templo 2 . 2 5 7- 62 ) [Moreover, he made the work from bronze because the zealous teacher seeks to deliver the Word to those who desire to receive it piously and protect it for all time, and who also, by preaching to others, wish to spread more extensively whatever correct doctrine they have learned themselves; for it is known that bronze is a very durable metal and produces all types of sounds . ] The Gentiles, in effect, are the resounding bronze that will produce sweet music in the latter-day history of the church; the spread of the church will depend on the finely tuned talents of the Gentiles, such as Bede and the English church. The further Bede's discussion of the Jews is drawn into a concurrent and analogous discussion of the Gentiles, the closer we ultimately draw to the conversion of the English from the wilderness of unbelief to the faith of the true church. As these historical issues begin to shadow the exegesis, the traditions of anti-Judaic anger, once again, move aside . Teaching and preaching : these are central concerns in Bede's exegesis; as he notes in the famous passage at the end of the Historia Ecclesiastica) it was ever his delight "aut discere aut docere aut scribere" [to learn or to teach or to write ] ( HE 5 . 24 . 5 6 6 ) . This imperative is reflected in his understanding of the Gentiles' evangelical role : it is best to have "native speak to native" when spreading the word of salvation. Bede explains that Solomon wanted the servants of Hiram to do the work because the servants were more experienced in working with the wood, but he wanted his own servants there because they knew the exact dimensions that were needed for the temple . Bede explains: Cuius rei figura in promptu est quia nimirum apostoli certius uerbum euangelii quod a domino audire meruerunt aliis prae dicare nouerunt, sed gentiles ab errore conuersi atque ad uerita tem euangelii transformati melius ipsos gentium errores nouerant

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et quo certius nouerunt eo artificiosius hos expugnare atque euacuare didicerunt. ( De Templo I . I r 7- 23 ) 3 3 [What this symbolizes is plain, namely, that the apostles knew more surely how to preach to others the word of the gospel which they were worthy to hear from the Lord, but the Gentiles, con verted from error and transformed by the truth of the gospel, better understood those errors of the Gentiles, and therefore they learned to counteract and refute them more skillfully. ] When Bede explores this dynamic of conversion, his hermeneutic shifts; in this evangelical mode Jewish beliefs and customs are appropri ated for conversion purposes . Perhaps more than any other early medieval author, Bede is inter ested in the primitivam iudaizantem ecclesiam) that is, in the early church as a Jewish institution, and the crucial transitional phase when it left behind its Jewish character in the conversion of the Gentiles.34 In Acts, Peter compliments the Jews : "You are the children of the prophets and of the testament which God made to our fathers, saying to Abraham: 'And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed"' (Acts 3 : 2 5 ; Genesis r 2 : 3 ) . Bede explains : "Semen quidem Abrahae Christus est in cuius fide nominis omnibus terrae familiis, Iudaeis uidelicet et gentibus, est benedictio promissa. Demulcet autem apostolus animas Iudaeorum, quo ad credendum faciat promptiores, dicendo quod to tius mundi saluator eos primum uisitaturus et benedicturus elegerit" [ Indeed, Christ is the offspring of Abraham; in the faith of his name a blessing is promised to all the families of the earth, namely to the Jews and Gentiles. However, the apostle assuaged the minds of the Jews by which he made them more inclined to believe by saying that from the whole world, the Savior chose to visit and bless them first] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum 3 . 2 5 . 6 3 - 67 ) . 3 5 Bede interprets Peter's comment 3 3 · See also I . 1 2 8 - 3 4 . For more on preaching to the Gentiles and evangelism see De Templo 2 . 5 8 6-9 5 , 70 5 - 29 ; De Tabernaculo I . 1 9 2 - 2o 8 , 4 27- 3 2, 773 - 76; 2 . 104- 1 1 , 70 1 6 , 1 602- 8 ; In Tobiam 6 . 6 . 8 8 - 97; 7. I . 1 - 3 . 3 4 · Olsen, "Bede as Historian, " 5 20, 5 23 - 24 , passim . For general background see Ches ter, "Jews of Judaea and Galilee," 20- 24; Young, Biblical Exegesis, 57- 69 ; Segal, "Jewish Christianity"; Murray, "Disaffected Judaism. " 3 5 · See also 2 . 2 2- 23 . 1 49- 5 4 ; 1 5 . 2 I .4 1 - 4 7 ; 23 . 5 . 1 0- 1 4 ; Homeliae I . 22 . 3 1 - 3 4 . Cf. Gregory's advice on converting the English recorded in the Historia Ecclesiastica-the process must be gradual: "Nam duris mentibus simul omnia abscidere inpossibile esse non dubium

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as suasive rhetoric: in order to effect conversion, one is permitted to retain a "flexibility" in discourse with the Jews . In other words, one need not always denounce; an emphasis on cultural continuity can also bring the Jews into the body of the church. Such tactics are common features of the apostolic mission. In Acts I 6 : 3 , Paul circumcises Timothy, whose mother is Jewish but whose father is a Gentile. But has not the coming of Christ abolished circumci sion, replacing it with the baptism of the Holy Spirit? Why would Paul do such a thing? Bede explains that Paul, of course, did not "quod figuras legis, euangelii ueritate Iucente, quippiam utilitatis crederet adlaturas" [believe that the figures of the Law could provide anything of use with the truth of the gospel shining forth] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 6 . 3 . 2- 3 ) . But rather, he did this so that "ne per occa sionem gentium Iudaei a fide recederent" [the Jews (i.e., the judaizing Christians ) would not fall away from the faith because of the pretext of the Gentiles] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 6 . 3 . 3 - 4 ) . Instead, the "old shadows" [ umbra uetus] would be removed gradually, just as the "depravity of their ancient customs" [ morum prauitas antiquorum] would be filtered from the pagan Gentiles ( Expositio Actuum Aposto lorum I 6 . 3 -4- 5 ) . The apostles would use these "shadows of the Law" [ umbrae legales] to keep the potential-convert Jews invested in Chris tianity ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I 6 . 3 . 6- 8 ; see also 2 I . 2 I , 24 . 3 05 7 ) . In much the same way Paul is free to "act Jewish" when the occasion demands: the ends justify the means, when that end is conver sion. Thus, Paul has his head shaved "for he had a vow" (Acts I 8 : I 8 ) . Bede explains that this is a particular custom "according to the Law of Moses" [ iuxta legem Moysi] , and Paul does this only in order to appease his audience's familiarity with Jewish custom: "Haec ergo Paulus fecit, non quidem oblitus quid de abolitione legis cum ceteris apostolis Hierosolymis statuerat, sed, ne scandalizarentur qui ex Iudaeis credider ant, simulauit se Iudaeum ut Iudaeos lucrifaceret" [Therefore, Paul did these things, not indeed because he had forgotten what he had estab lished at Jerusalem with the rest of the apostles concerning the aboli tion of the Law, but lest any of the Jews who believed be scandalized, he imitated a Jew himself in order to win over the Jews] ( Expositio est, quia et is, qui summum locum ascendere nititur, gradibus uel passibus , non autem saltibus eleuatur" [It is doubtless impossible to cut out everything at once from their stub born minds: just as tl1e man who is attempting to climb to tl1e highest place, rises by steps and degrees and not by leaps] ( I . 3 0 . I o 8 ) .

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Actuum Apostolorum r 8 . r 8 . 2 8 - 3 r ) . Paul "imitated" [simulauit] a Jew: here we can see a dynamic Bedan mix of cross-cultural understandings. Bede notes the continuity between Judaism and Christianity, and his approval of the evangelical intention behind Paul's act overrides any extreme anti-Judaic rhetoric of anger and hatred. By "playing along" and shearing his hair according to Jewish custom, he tried to raise them "a carnali legis et prophetarum sensu ad spiritalem" [from the carnal sense of the Law and the prophets to the spiritual sense ] ( Homeliae I . 5 . 7 6- 77 ) . In a similar fashion Bede explains that the Gospel of Matthew was written "ob eorum uel maxime causam qui ex Iudaeis crediderant nee tamen a legis caerimoniis quamuis renati in Christo ualebant euelii" [especially for the sake of those from the Jews who believed, but who, although reborn in Christ, were unable to be torn from the ceremonies of the Law] ( Homeliae r . 5 . 7 4 - 7 6 ) . Thus, in both the homilies and in the commentary on Acts he speaks of "those among the Jews who believed" with exactly the same phrase : "qui ex Iudaeis crediderant" : this is the primitivam iudaizantem ecclesiam. Not surpris ingly, Bede demonstrates a sensitivity to the fact "that Christianity itself had passed through stages of development, beginning with a period in which Jewish influences were pronounced and passing into a period in which the distinctiveness of Christian teachings became more appar ent."3 6 As Roger Ray notes, this sympathy for the judaizing Christians of the early church certainly reflects Bede's attitude toward the conver sion of the English: Bede treats the texts under scrutiny with "the apparent assumption that new believers cannot be expected to spring full grown into the faith, that it takes time to separate converts from their old ways . So the 'judaizing' period of the primitive Church re flects human limitations-limitations, I might add, which Bede knew very well from the Christian conversion of his own people."37 3 6. Olsen, "Bede as Historian," 5 3 0 . 3 7 · What D o We Know about Bede's Commentaries?" 20. See also Olsen, "Bede as Historian, " 5 2 I - 22; Kelly, "On the Brink," 9 5 - 9 6 . Cf. the debate between Colman and Wilfi'id in the Historia Ecclesiastica. Colman argues that in the Easter conflict the Irish are following correctly the example of John. Wilfrid replies that he has the utmost respect for John, but: . . . cum scita legis Mosaicae iuxta litteram seruaret, iudaizante adhuc in multis ec clesia, nee subito ualentibus apostolis omnem legis obseruantiam, quae a Deo instituta est, abdicare, quomodo simulacra, quae a daemonibus inuenta sunt, repudiare omnes, qui ad fidem ueniunt, necesse est; uidelicet ne scandalum Elcerent eis qui inter gentes erant ludeis . Hinc est enim quod Paulus Timotheum circumcidit, quod hostias in

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The Conversion of the Gentiles Thus, an accurate understanding of the Gentile conversion during the apostolic age of the church is important for Bede. Since Jews and Gentiles are so closely linked in the primitivam ecclesiam, by tracing Bede's understanding of the apostolic mission, we can better map out the more complex, nuanced, and empathetic aspects of his understand ing of Jews . For example, on the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, Jesus encounters a woman who asks him to cure her daughter, and at first Jesus does not reply (Matthew 1 5 : 2 1 - 2 3 ) . Bede explains : "Respon dere distulit ne daretur occasio Iudaeis calumniandi quod gentiles eis in docendo uel sanando praetulerit ideoque ipsi fidem eius suscipere iuste recusauerint" [ Jesus delayed to answer her lest an occasion be given to the Jews to accuse him of preferring the Gentiles over the Jews in teaching or in healing, and that, therefore, they could justly refuse to accept his faith] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 2 . 3 1 - 3 4 ) . Once again, we have a notion of the "politics" of conversion, the sense of delicate diplomacy at work in the spread of the faith . The woman represents the Gentiles, and Jesus states that he has come to minister only to the lost of Israel: in his words, "It is not good to take the bread of the children and to cast it to the dogs" (Matthew 1 5 : 26 ) . The persistent woman responds with humility, "Yea, Lord; for the whelps also eat of the cmmbs that fall from the table of their masters" (Matthew r 5 : 2 7 ) . Bede interprets for us by "translating" her reply into the figural idiom : "Id est ueraciter ut Templo immolauit, quod cum Aquila et Priscilla caput Chorinti totondit, ad nihil uidelicet utile, nisi ad scandalum uitandum Iudaeorum. ( HE 3 · 2 5 . 3 00 ) [ . . . h e literally observed the decrees of the Mosaic Law when the church was still Jewish in many respects, at a time when the apostles were unable to bring to a sudden end the observance of that Law which God ordained in the same way as, tor instance, they made it compulsory on all new converts to abandon their idols, which are of devilish origin. They teared, of course, that they might make a sn1mbling-block ti:Jr the Jewish proselytes dispersed among the Gentiles. This was the reason why Paul circum cised Timothy, why he otlered sacrifices in the temple, and why he shaved his head at Corinth in company with Aquila and Priscilla; all this was of no use except to avoid scandalizing the Jews. ] Wilti·id's riposte is interesting ti:Jr two reasons: first, it demonstrates the rhetorical use of Jews in Bede's discourse. In their stubborn opposition to Roman practice the Irish are like the Jews; they have not achieved the fully evolved spiritual understanding of the true Christian . Second, Colman and the Irish have failed to historicize the nature of the early church and the tactics the apostles used to spread the gospel. Either way, Wilfrid's tactic makes the Irish look a bit behind the learning curve, mere pupils to be taught by the more scholarly representatives of Rome.

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asseris ita est quia non est bonum sumere salutem plebi Israhel caelitus dis tinatam et dare earn gentilibus" [that is, "Truly it is as you assert, because it is not good to take the salvation divinely set aside for the people of Israel and to give it to Gentiles"] ( Homeliae 1 . 22. 5 2- 5 4 ) . In its almost poetically resonant way, ( sumere meaning "to take" as well as "to eat" ) this response proves the woman's ( i . e . , the Gentiles' ) humility and inner faith, because "indigna quidem sit integris dominicae doc trinae qua Iudaei utebantur epulis refici sed quantulacumque ei a dom ino foret inpertita gratia hanc sibi ad salutem sufficere posse putauerit" [being unworthy to be refreshed by the food of the Lord's whole teaching, which the Jews had for their use, she nevertheless thought that however small the grace related to her by the Lord might be, it could be sufficient for her salvation] ( Homeliae 1 . 2 2 . 5 7- 60 ) . This en tire movement from Jews to Gentiles is sparked in Bede's understand ing by the very first verse of the homily's pericope, in which Jesus journeys to the "coasts of Tyre and Sidon" ( I 5 : 2 I ) : "Vbi manifeste praefiguratur quod post passionem resurrectionemque suam dominus in praedicatoribus suis Iudaeomm perfida corda relictums et in partes gentium exterarum esset secessurus . Tyrus quippe et Sidon quae ciui tates fuere gentilium munimenta doctrinae ac uitae gentilis in quibus stulti confidunt indicant" [In this place it is prefigured distinctly that after his Passion and Resurrection the Lord, in his preachers, was going to leave behind the faithless hearts of the Jews and withdraw into the regions of foreign nations . Obviously Tyre and Sidon, which were cities of the Gentiles, indicate the fortifications of gentile teaching and life, in which the foolish trust] ( Homeliae 1 . 22. 79- 8 5 ) . We see here the notion of the great outward force of the evangelizing mission of Acts, reaching out to the gentile lands. However, even though only the foolish tmst in gentile strongholds, and there is at times an equivalence between the Jews and the Gen tiles as the material of the early church, the Gentiles are ultimately placed in a position above the Jews . For example, in Acts I o: 44-4 5 the Gentiles are accepted quicldy into the church by the Holy Spirit. Bede explains that the worth of the Gentiles is demonstrated by their accep tance into the community of the faithful without the waters of bap tism; the Jews were never accorded such an unprecedented honor ( Ex positio Actuum Apostolorum I 0 -44 . I 8 4- 8 8 ; see also 2 8 . 3 1 . 7 3 - 7 6 ) . For Bede, the Jews who do not believe and the Gentiles who do not believe

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are both condemned in their separation from God; however, the Gen tiles are not as guilty. Paul preaches to the men of Athens, saying, "I found an altar also, on which was written : 'To the unknown God"' (Acts 1 7 : 23 ) . Bede comments: "Notus in Iudaea deus" sed non receptus, ignotus in Achaia deus quamuis per multa quaesitus; et ideo qui ignorat ignorabitur, qui praeuaricatur damnabitur, neutri immues a culpa sed excusabil iores qui fidem non obtulere Christo quem nesciebant quam qui manus intulere Christo quem sciebant. ( Expositio Actuum Apostolo rum 1 7 . 2 3 .29- 3 4 ; Psalm 7 5 : 2 ) [ " God was known in Judaea" but not accepted; he was unknown in Achaia, though he was sought by many. He who does not know will not be known, and he who bears false witness will be damned; neither one will be immune from blame, but the people who did not place their faith in the Christ they did not know ( i . e . , the Gentiles ) are more excusable than are the people who laid hands on the Christ whom they did know ( i . e . , the Jews) . ] Thus, "neither will be exempt from blame," but the Gentiles will be more worthy than the Jews . How do the English-Bede's own people, brought into the fold of the church only in recent days-fit into these varying registers? Naturally, Bede inserts the English and their conversion into the exegetical space provided by the Gentiles. Through this bond, Bede's hermeneutic explores his own culture's origins. Consider the architec ture of the temple and its spiritual significance : as one might expect, the statues of the two cherubim within the temple represent the Old and New Testaments ( De Templo ! . 1 3 8 8 ) . 3 8 Bede explains that the two linked cherubim signify the perfect concordance of the two testaments, and this is why the inner wings of the cherubim touch each other ( De Templo 1 . 1 4 1 6- 2 8 ) . Bede then reiterates the significance of the two walls touched by the outer wings of the cherubim; in this passage we see the relationship of Jews and Gentiles through the Old and New Testaments : 3 8 . See also De Tabernaculo 1 . 547- 5 1 ·

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Item alis exterioribus iste unum parietem ille alterum contingebat quia uetus testamentum proprie antiquo Dei populo scriptum est nouum uero nobis qui post incarnationem dominicam ad fidem uenimus et secunda parieti, hoc est septemtrionali, recte compara mur quibus post figuram ac tenebras idolatriae lucem ueritatis cognoscere datum est. Nam etsi primitiua ecclesia maxime de Iudaeis effloruit et omnis Israhel circa finem saeculi saluandus esse credatur, plurimi tamen fidelium huius temporis de gentibus congregantur ad euangelii suscipienda sacramenta quibus hoc etiam diuinitus donatum est ut reuelatis oculis sui cordis mani feste cognoscant litteram ueteris testamenti euangelicae gratiae plenam esse mysteriis . ( De Templo r . r 4 2 8 - 4o ) 3 9 [Further, with their outer wings, one touched one wall, the other touched the second because the Old Testament was written specifi cally for the ancient people of God, but the new was written for those of us who came to the faith after the incarnation of the Lord and we are correctly compared to the second wall, that is, the northern wall, for to us it was granted to recognize the light of truth after the figures and shadows of idolatry. For although the primitive church bloomed principally from the Jews and it may be believed that all Israel is to be saved at the end of the world, nevertheless many of the faithful of this age are gathered from the Gentiles to receive the sacraments of the gospel; and to these faithful the divine God has also granted this : that with the eyes of their heart unveiled they can recognize clearly that the letter of the Old Testament is full of the mysteries of the grace of the gospel . ] This powerful elucidation illustrates the fertile workings of Bede's exe getical imagination. The figural hermeneutic is set firmly in place : the Old Testament was composed for the ancient people of God, the New Testament for latter-day Christians. As we have also seen, Bede's inter est in the ecclesiam primitivam results in a rhetoric of historical continu ity, drained of excessive anti-Judaic emotion : the church "bloomed" [ effloruit] from the Jews . Yet it is the Gentiles who are important; they are the majority ofbelievers "of this age" [ huius temporis] . The temporal marker is important: Bede is writing of the Christian world at the time 3 9 · Cf. De Tabernaculo i . I 290- I 3 0 5 ; In Habacuc 299- 3 0 3 .

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o f his own pen strokes; he stresses that just as the Old Testament was written "especially" for the ancient people of God, the New Testament was intended for Bede's audience-the English and Christian world of the eighth century, for "those of us who came to the faith after the incarnation of the Lord . " The Gentiles/English are the "north wall," an apt comparison, Bede explains, because "to us it was granted to know the light of truth after the figure and darkness of idolatry." Now, "the north" certainly alludes to the northern apostate kingdoms of Israel ; however, "north" can also refer more direcdy to the northern people, the Anglo-Saxons who, as Bede knows full well, recently dwelt in the "darkness of idolatry."4° In fact, the Gentiles deserve a place of honor, above and beyond the Jews, "quia prius frigido gentium pectore splen dor fidei exortus est et pro eadem inopinata fide Iudaea deum tre mendo glorificat" [because the splendor of the faith first sprang forth 4 0 . Further, in De Tabernaculo Bede explains that the south side of the stmcmre desig nates the "antiquam ill am Dei plebem" [ancient people of God] ( 2 . 8 6 8 - 69 ), but the second side, which faced the north, figures the multitude of the Gentiles "quae tenebris ac frigore infidelitatis usque ad tempus dominicae incarnationis torpere non destiterat" [which did not cease to be sluggish ( torpere, a verb appropriately meaning "to be stupid" as well as "to be stiff / sluggish" ) in the shadows and cold of unbelief up to the time of the Lord's incarnation] ( 2 . 8 7 I - 7 3 ) . Bede continues: "de cuius uocatione pulchre dominus per prophetam, 'Dicam,' inquit, 'aquiloni,' "Da," et austro, "Noli prohibere," quod est aperte dicere, 'Dicam populo gentium diutius sine fide algenti, "Da de tuis filiis qui ad meae fidem confessionis et amoris conueniant," Dicam et plebi Israheliticae quae iam meae lumine cognitionis fi·uebatur, "Noli prohibere gentes in sortem electionis recipi" [ Concerning their noble calling the Lord says through the prophet: "I will say to the north, 'Give (them) up,' and to the south, 'Do not hinder them,' ( Isaiah 4 3 : 6 ) , that is to say openly, 'I will say to the people of the Gentiles who f(Jr a long time have been freezing without faith, "Give your children that they may gather in faith to the confession and love of me," and I will say to the people of the Israelites who have already enjoyed the light of knowledge of me, "Do not prevent the Gentiles from receiving a portion of election"] ( 2 . 8 7 3 - 79 ) . See also the similar comment at 2 . I 2 3 9- 4 8 : "Diximus autem supra quia latus tabernaculi meridianum antiquam Dei plebem significaret quae prior lucem diuinae cognitionis prior teruorem diuinae dilectionis accepit pars nero septemtrionalis eiusdem tabernaculi congregatam de gentibus eccelsiam quae diutius 'in tenebris et in umbra mortis' remanserat indicaret. Vnde recta distinctione c;mdelabmm quod in parte australi collocatur potest gratiam quae priori populo data est insinuare, mensa uero quae in parte aquilonis stabat ea quae nobis sunt donata Dei beneficia designare" [Moreover, we have said above that the south side of the tabernacle signifies the ancient people of God who first received the light of divine knowledge, first received the fire of divine love, but the northern part of the same tabernacle indicates the church gathered from the Gentiles which remained f(n· a longer time "in darkness and in the shadow of death" (Psalm I o 6 : I O ) . Whence it is also correct to make a distinction between the lampstand that was set up in the southern part, which can suggest the grace that was given to the former people, and the table that stood in the northern part, which designates those benefits of God that have been given to us] . Cf De Templo 2 . I I 7 2- 7 8 .

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from the cold heart of the Gentiles, and because of this same unex pected faith, Judaea glorified God as they trembled with fear] ( Expositio Actuum Apostolorum I r . I 8 . I 8 - I 9 ) _4I The incarnation of the Lord struck an especially resonant chord with the wider world of Christian ity, even to the edges of the world, the home of the English. In unfold ing Isaiah I I : I O ( "In that day, the root of Jesse, who standeth for an ensign of the people, him the Gentiles shall beseech; and his sepulchre shall be glorious" ) , Bede explains that: "ipsum 'gentes deprecabuntur' quia non solum Iudaeos sed et nos qui de finibus terrae ad eum clamare nouimus gratia suae uisitationis aduocauit" [the "Gentiles shall be seech" him ( i . e . , Christ) , because by the grace of his visitation he called not only the Jews, but also us, who are able to cry out to him from the ends of the earth] ( Homeliae 2 . I o . 2 2 6- 2 8 ) . 42 The history of the first century church inexorably calls to mind the latter- day conversion of the English; the complex cultural situation of Jews, liminal proselytes, and unbelieving Gentiles in the apostolic mission speaks to Bede in such a compelling way that, as he imagines his people crying out to the Lord "from the ends of the earth," the standard angry and emotional tropes of anti-Judaism submit to the imperatives of local history. This process is yet more notable in the following exegesis of the base of the temple from 3 Kings 7: 3 0 ( "And every base had four wheels, and axletrees of brass: and at the four sides were undersetters under the laver molten, looking one against another" ) . Bede explains that the four wheels figure the four Gospels, an apt comparison, since wheels show the rapid spread of the gospel to the four corners of the world ( De Templo 2 . I 004- 4 I ) . Bede then explicitly compares this dynamic to the conversion of Britain: Rotae basem subpositae ad portandum luterem templi a terra sustollebant cum nostris nuper temporibus beatus papa Grego rius euangelicis roboratus eloquiis Romanam rexit ecclesiam; rotae eaedem currus Dei subnexae longe gestabant cum reueren dissimi patres Augustinus Paulinus et ceteri socii eorum eisdem euangelicis confirmati oraculis iubente illo uenere Brittanniam et 4 I . See Gregory, Moralia, 27-4 3 . I - 24 . 4 2 . See also Homeliae 2 . 20 . I42-4 8 : at the time o f Christ's resurrection, fear struck the heart of the Jews nearby, and also the heart of the Gentiles "even to the ends of the earth" [ ttsqu.e ad fines terrae] ( I 4 7-4 8 ) .

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uerbum Dei incredulis dudum comm1sere gentibus . ( De Templo 2 . 1 04 1 - 4 8 ; cf. 2 . 1 1 72- 7 8 ) [The wheels placed beneath for the support of the basin of the temple raised the base from the earth when recently in our own day the blessed Pope Gregory, strengthened by the words of the gospel, ruled the Roman church; the same wheels fastened be neath God's chariot carried people for a long distance when the most venerable Fathers, Augustine, Pauli nus and the rest of their companions, supported by the oracular gospel words came to Britain at his command and a short time ago entrusted the Word of God to the unbelieving Gentiles . ] The English are the latter-day people, the "Gentiles" ofBede's exegesis; as such they have an intimate relationship with the Jews .43 The Jews and Gentiles both need to be taught the error of their ways; they both need to accept Christ faithfully. The cherubim of the temple touch each wall with their wings : "Duos autem aeque parietes alis suis tangunt quia fideles utriusque populi Iudaei scilicet et gentilis possessores secum habent aulae caelestis; non quia in ilia patria distinctio sit localis inter utrumque populum sed quia maior fiat festiuitas internae beatitu dinis de consortia adunatae fraternitatis" [However, they touch the two walls equally with their wings because they regard the faithful of both peoples-that is, the Jews and the Gentiles-as possessors with them of the heavenly court; not because in that homeland there is distinction of place between each of the peoples, but because the cele4 3 . Cf. the use of apostolic imagery in the Historia Ecclesiastica. When St. German us and Lupus of Troyes come to Britain to combat Pelagianism, they are compared to the apostles : tl1ey are "apostolici sacerdotes" [ apostolic bishops] ( I . 1 7 . 5 6) . Augustine and his mission are described in similar terms. When they took up residence in Britain, they "coeperunt apos tolicam primitiuae ecclesiae uitam imitari" [began to imitate the way oflife of the apostles and of the primitive church] ( I . 26.76; see also I . 2 7 . 8 0 ). Bede has a poor opinion of the Britons, who did not attempt to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christim1ity; however, this is just as well because : "Sed non tamen diuina pietas plebem suam, quam praesciuit, deseruit; quin multo digniores genti memoratae praecones ueritatis, per quos crederet, destinauit" [Nevertheless God in his goodness did not reject the people whom he foreknew ( i . e . , the Anglo-Saxons ), but he had appointed much wortl1ier heralds of tl1e truth to bring this people to tl1e faith] ( I . 2 2 . 6 8 ) . See also Fates ofthe Apostles; Howe states that in the poem "[t]he progression from the center of Christendom to its dark corners offers the appropriate model for honoring later missionaries who imitated Christ's apostles" ( Migration and Mythmaking, r 1 4 ; see also his Old English Catalogue Poems, 8 8 - r o 3 ) .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 96

bration of their inner happiness is enhanced by the fellowship of frater nal union] ( De Templo r . q 6 I - 6 3 ; 3 Kings 6 : 27 ) . When the issue at stake is unity and ultimate destiny, joy and hope replace anger and rage as the dominant tones. Yet ultimately, although the tone of Bede's rhetoric within the evangelical hermeneutic is one of love and equality, priority must be given-however shrill or sedate the expression-to the Christian people, to the English of the here-and-now, the New Israel. In conclusion, we can call to mind here again Bede's exegesis of the scene in John I , when Christ proclaims his new disciple Nathanael "an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile" ( John I : 4 7 ) . According to Bede, in this Nathanael refers to the "electione spiritalis Israhel, id est, populi Christi ani" [the choosing of the spiritual Israel, that is, the Christian people ] ( Homeliae I . I 7 . 2 0 3 - 4 ) ; Bede then summarizes: 0 quam magna nobis quoque qui de gentibus ad fidem uenimus in hac sententia nostri redemptoris spes aperitur salutis ! Si enim uere Israhelita est qui doli nescius incedit, iam perdidere Iudaei nomen Israhelitarum quamuis carnaliter de Israhel quotquot doloso corde a simplicitate patriarchae sui degenerauerunt, et adsciti sumus ipsi in semen Israhelitarum qui quamlibet aliis de nationibus genus carnis habentes fide tamen ueritatis et munditia corporis ac mentis vestigia sequimur Israhel. ( Homeliae I . I 7 . I 72- 8 o ) [ Oh what a great hope of salvation i s opened by this statement of our Redeemer to those of us who have come to the faith from the Gentiles! For if he is truly an Israelite who walks as one ignorant of deceit, the Jews, although physically descended from Israel, already lost the name of Israelites, as many have by their deceitful hearts degenerated from the simplicity of their patriarch. And we have been admitted among the descendents of the Israelites, since, although according to the flesh we have our origin from other nations, nevertheless by the faith of truth and by purity of the body and mind, we follow in the footsteps of Israel. ] Bede's response to the Jews is complex, changing in response to source-texts at hand, the general tenor of anti-Judaic traditions, the politics and history of the English church, Bede's own deft engagement with the biblical text-in short, everything that makes Bede an individ-

Bede and Love 97

ual author and creative force in his own right. As Jones states bluntly: "Exegesis is literary criticism, not theology. "44 Rolling, dark anger of the anti-Judaic tradition and studied commiseration-both find a home in the imaginative space of exegesis, the inviting poetics of the biblical text. When Bede describes the English as "following in the footsteps oflsrael," he is both responding to and helping to constmct a long-lived pattern of Christian historical understanding : the rhythms of the "New Israel," the mythos of the populus Israhel.

4 4 . "Some Introductory Remarks, " I 5 I .

PA RT TW O

The Populus Israhel Metaphory Image) Exemplum

Introduction: Excursus on B ede's Historia Ecclesiastica

For we have not obeyed thy commandments: therefore are we deliv ered to spoil, and to captivity and death, and are made a f�1ble and a reproach to all nations, amongst which thou hast scattered us. -Tobias 3 : 4 . . . it is ourselves we are encountering whenever we invent fictions. -Frank Kermode, The Sense of an Endin�q

or a medieval Christian culture, thinking about Jews and Judaism is a process that involves constructing a framework with which to understand history, to give the past shape and form . Whether looking into the deep continuity of the past or imagining future vicissitudes, it is unlikely that the Anglo-Saxons would have found any reason to disagree with T. S . Eliot's proposition that

F

Time present and time past Are both perhaps present in time future, And time future contained in time past. I I . "Burnt Norton," lines I - 3 , in Four Quartets, I 3 - 2o. Cf. Eliot's comments in "Tradi tion <md the Individual Talent": "[T]he historical sense involves a perception, not only of the

IOI

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L I02

Drawing in part on the form of the Christian Bible itself-its persis tently self-referential sweep of narrative from creation to apocalypse and receiving schematic elaboration in the patristic formulation of time and eternity exemplified by Augustine and Boethius, the Christian Middle Ages saw history fundamentally as Heilsgeschichte-a fact with deep implications for the Anglo-Saxon understanding ofJews and Juda ism. 2 Although at times opaque to human perception, the contours of time and history yet reveal the skillful hand of a guiding maker at every turn. As the poet Cxdmon sings in praise : Nu sculon herigean heofonrices weard, meotodes meahte and his modge]nnc, weorc wuldorfxder, swa he wundra gehwxs, ece drihten, or onstealde . He xrest sceop eoroan bearnum halig scyppend; heofon to hrofe, ]n middangeard moncynnes weard, ece drihten, xfter teode firum foldan, frea xlmihtig . 3 pastness of the past, but o f its presence . . . . This historical sense, which i s a sense of the timeless as well as of the temporal and of the timeless and the temporal together, is what makes a writer traditional" ( 3 8 ) . See the first chapter of Toliver, Past That Poets Make ( chapter I , "The Wayward Temporality of Literature," 9 - 3 o ) f(Jr eloquent reflections on the literary effect of seeing the present in terms of the past. Such a focus also informs the first half of Peter Clemoes, Interactions, 3 - 22 5 ; his aim is to show how Old English poetry " furnished society in the present with memorable images, sometimes unforgettable, typifYing the past" ( xi ) . For reflections on what the past meant, qua past, to the Anglo-Saxons as refracted through Beowulf see Frank, "The Bemvulf Poet s Sense of History," and through Bede see Davidse, "Sense of History"; more generally see Hunter, " Germanic and Roman Antiquity. " 2. On the Christian view of providential history see Collingwood, Idea ofHistory, 46- 5 6; Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History, esp . 7 4 - 9 5 ; Momigliano, "Pagan and Christian Historiography"; L. G. Patterson, God and History, esp . I 3 3 - 5 7 ; and Chesnut, First Christian Histories-an excellent study. For extremely learned discussions of the Chris tian view of history and its operations in literary texts, see Patt·ides, Milton, 220- 6 3 ( chapter 8 , Ascending b_v Degrees Magnificent: The Christian View ofHistory" ) , and his Grand Design of God; see also the sensitive study by Bloomfield, "Chaucer's Sense of History," esp . I 3- I 7 , for background orientation. 3 · "Cxdmon's Hymn" ( The Anglo-Saxon Minor Poems, ed. Dobbie, ASPR 6, I o6 ) . Cf. The Order ofthe World, 8 2- 8 5 ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, ASPR 3 , I 6 3 - 66 ) : '

Forpon swa teotenede, se p e teala cupe, da:g wip nihte, deop wio hean, lond wio wxge, lyft wiolagustream, flod wio flm 1e, fisc wio ypum.

Excursus on Bede)s Historia Ecclesiastica I03

[Now we must praise the guardian of the heavenly kingdom, the Creator's might and his mind's intention, the work of the glorious Father: in that he, the eternal Lord, established the beginning of each wondrous thing; he, Holy Creator, at the first created heaven as a roof for the children of men; he, the guardian of mankind, Lord eternal, almighty ruler, afterward prepared for mortals the expanse of earth, the world. ] The unity of mind, intention, and creation expressed in "Cxdmon's Hymn" reflects this basic assumption concerning the guided shape of human history: a commonplace of medieval thought, to be sure, but one that is worth repeating, especially when the process of literary creation is so strongly analogous to the divine "mind's intention" [ modgepanc] that sets the world in motion.4 The idea of creation as design binds itself naturally to the recurrence and repetitions of pattern in the course of human events; if God is essentially a maker, a crafts man, he will naturally employ repetition, one of the basic principles of design and artistic composition. s Thus, seeing the present in terms of the past, in the "august light of abiding memories," as Conrad puts it, was , to some extent, a pervasive medieval habit of thought; but one might go even further and postulate that it is a ftmdamental characteristic of human perception and under standing : in Robert Hanning's words, "Identification with the past is an intuitive , imaginative process which seeks as its fulfillment a perception not merely of the relevancy of the past, but of its actuality."6 To see the [And so he who knew best ( i . e . , God) joined together the day with the night, the abyss with the heights, the sky with the sea, the land with the ocean, the flood with the waters, the fish with the waves. ] 4 . On God as the shaping craftsman of the world and its history see Shepherd, "Scrip tural Poetry," 3 - 4 ; Frank, "Some Uses of Paronomasia," 2 I I - I 3 ; Bloomfield, "Medieval Idea of Perfection," 5 I - 5 3 ; Clemoes, Interactions, 4 3 8 - 8 7 (chapter I 3 , "This World as Part of God's Spiritual Dominion" ) ; Neville, Representations ofthe Natural World, I 3 9 - 4 4 · 5 . Frye notes this in a brief discussion of meter in the Anatomy of Criticism: "Metre is an aspect of recurrence, and the two words for recurrence, rhythm and pattern, show that recurrence is a stmchiral principle of all art, whether temporal or spatial in its primary impact" ( 2 5 1 ) ; see also his Great Code, 4 3 · Cf Kermode, Sense of an Ending, 5 8 - 5 9 , 62- 64 , on what he terms "fictions of concord. " 6. Hanning, Vision of History, 3 ; Conrad, Heart rrfDarkness, 2 8 . Hunter describes this as the "tendency to translate the past into terms of an idealized present" ( "Germanic and Roman Antiquity," 4 7 ) .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 1 04

self in the paradigm of bygone days is a way not only to draw the past into a contingent relationship with the world of the present, but also, in a deeper sense, to create the past qua past. The past of historical distance is a relational term-it has distinctive meaning only when placed within a framework of historical perception and temporal unfolding. In this sense, the representation of past events shares affinities with the very basic modes of fiction-making. As a great deal of work on the narrativity of historiography has suggested, the line between facmal history and fictional constmct is blurred by the shared power and guiding hand of narrative rhetoric : as R. W. Southern once noted in a fine statement, " [ t ]he facts of history, when heated in the fire of the imagination, be come malleable."7 While this useful insight can perhaps be tal\:.en too far in its emphasis on the "textuality" of history, verging too often on a solipsistic relativism, nevertheless, the connections between the repre sentation of the past and the protocols ofliterary rhetoric remain undeni able . As we shall see, the Jews inhabit this boundary between history and literary rhetoric, in modes both epic and elegiac. The enduring image of the populus Israhel-the Jews conceived as a "tribe," a "race," a "nation"-and the related narratives concerning their history bound together by patterns of repeated motifs and images and assembled into a rough unity by the parameters of Christian historiography-all these elements form the outlines of a complex rep resentational nexus that will be explored in these two chapters, tracing its path out of late antiquity into the literary culture of Anglo-Saxon England. As metaphor, image, and exemplum, the "people of Israel" function as a foundational mythos ( one of many, of course) for the societies of the early medieval West. The populus Israhel is a "mythos" in Northrop Frye's terms : as he explains, at the most basic level "myth . . . means, first of all, mythos) plot, narrative, or in general the sequential ordering of words. " 8 In this sense, all verbal structures have a sequence 7· Southern, "Aspects of Historical Writing," r 8 r . See also White , Content of the Form, edsp . 26- 5 7 (chapter 2, "The Question of Narrative in Contemporary Historical Themy") and 179- 8 r . Following Paul Ricoeur, White notes: "Historical stories and fictional stories resemble one another because whatever the differences between their immediate contents (real events and imaginary events, respectively), their ultimate content is the same: the structures of human time . Their shared form, narrative, is a function of this shared con tent. . . . Far from being an antithetical opposite of historical narrative, fictional narrative is its complement and ally in the universal human effort to reflect upon the mystery of temporal ity" ( Content of the Form, 1 79 - 8 0 ) ; see also Kermode, Sense of an Ending, 64 . 8 . Great Code, 3 r .

Excursus on Bede)s Historia Ecclesiastica 105

of some sort; hence all verbal structures are "myths." In a more specific sense, myths are "the stories that tell a society what is important for it to know, whether about its gods, its history, its laws, or its class structure . "9 As stories "charged with a special seriousness and importance" a mythos "rooted in a specific society transmits a heritage of shared allusion and verbal experience in time, and so mythology helps to create a cultural history."I o The populus Israhel mythos fulfills a multifaceted cultural need; the Jews, like other originary peoples-the Trojans, the Greeks, the Romans-are present yet left behind, in part, to myth and the tall shadows of fiction. I I Such clusters of culturally significant narrative have an enduring representational life : " . . . mythical structures con tinue to give shape to the metaphors and rhetoric of later types of structure. "I2 What Frye calls the "repeating mythos of the apostasy and restoration oflsrael" provides an important model for the Anglo-Saxon understanding ofJews . I 3 The expulsion from Eden; the Egyptian captiv ity; the struggle for the promised land against the Philistines; the Babylo nian captivity; the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes; the Roman destruction of the Second Temple; and the expulsion from Jerusalem : this rising and falling pattern of successive desolation and redemption works within Christian Heilsgeschichte as an important hermeneutic model. I4 For example, the declaration of Judges 2 : 20- 22 exemplifies an important literary/rhetorical pattern for understanding history through out the Middle Ages: And the wrath of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he said: "Behold, this nation hath made void my covenant, which I had 9 · Great Code, 3 3 · Cf Bernard Lewis's notion of "remembered history," which "em bodies poetic and symbolic truth" as understood by a particular social group ( History: Remem bered, Recovered, Invented, 1 2- I 3 ) . I o . Great Code, 3 3 , 3 4 ; cf. Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History, 22- 23 . I I . On the Trojan foundational myth see Waswo, Founding Legend, I - 6 3 . On founda tional myths in general, see also Bickerman, ((Origines Gentium '�· Lewis, History: Remembered, Recovered, Invented, 5 9 - 6 I ; Southern, "Aspects of Historical Writing"; Reynolds, "Medieval Origines Gentium," 3 7 5 - 9 0 ; cf. Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, 3 I 8 - 20 . I 2 . Great Code, 3 5 . I 3 . Great Code, I 69 . I 4 . See the diagram in Frye, Great Code, I 7 I . Leonard Krieger makes a similar observa tion concerning the pervasive influence of Hebraic history on Western thought: " . . . the perception of Hebraic traditions, whether actual or mythic, (became) a part of the historical reality of the West and thereby enthroned the b ets as well as the legends and interpretations of Hebraic history as basic to Western reality" ( Time's Reasons, I 6 ) .

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made with their fathers, and hath despised to hearken to my voice. I also will not destroy the nations which Joshua left, when he died: that through them I may try Israel, whether they will keep the way of the Lord, and walk in it, as their fathers kept it, or not." Old Testament Jewish history is the "favored model" for early medieval authors when attempting to understand the particulars of their past; this historical model, both on its own terms and in terms of the figural "New Israel," "proved a rich, fertile source of speculation and interpretation which permanently molded and colored the life and self-awareness of the first Christian centuries. " r s These are inseparable, intertwining dis courses, a nexus of related images, congruent orientations, and deeply woven interpretations of tradition. This traditional pattern of trial and reward is not a static, unchang ing motif: while there are certainly undeniable constants at work, this is at heart a living, changing mythos. As Harold Toliver explains, "fictive systems can station events at precise distances from the reader and from each other in a highly articulated past; yet their networks of allusion and echo also bring selected moments of the past into an immediately experienced present, as each new text modernizes what it absorbs. " 16 Since each new text "modernizes what it absorbs," the populus Israhel image designates both a literary mythos and an ideological fiction, with all the rhetorical mobility one would expect of such a fiction. We have seen at the end of the last chapter that one aspect of Bede's understanding of Jews is his drive to subsume them into the larger structure of the church and its arc of divine, providential history. An important, inevitable component of this rhetorical strategy is to cast the English as a "New Israel. " This is, of course, a natural effect of figural thinking; however, the particular inflections of this hermeneutic reveal considerable local variation in the deployment of the idea, as various authors shape the tradition for their own ends . We shall see that a variety of factors influence the configuration of the populus Israhel mythos, but broadly speaking two related figural motifs rise to the surface : the "epic" I 5 . Hanning, Vision ofHistory, 5 - 6. Hanning's first chapter, "The Formation of the Early Medieval Historical Imagination" ( Vision ofHistor)j I - 4 3 ), is important background material to the historical discourse of "New Israel"; see also Morrison's brief comments in Tradition and Authority, I 2- I 5 . I 6. Toliver, Past That Poets Make, r .

Excursus on Bede)s Historia Ecclesiastica I07

discourse of the Christian New Israel and the discourse of the "elegiac" Israel-the all-purpose, flexible use of the populus Israhel as an exemplum of God's wrath. In Benedicta Ward's phrase, the Historia Ecclesiastica is, among many other things, a "commentary on a new people of God."I7 Among its many functions, the Historia Ecclesiastica was composed, in part, to promote a sense of English identity. IS As such, Bede knew the value of exempla and vivid historical illustrations against which the En glish should be compared; in fact he promotes this method in the Preface to the Historia Ecclesiastica: Siue enim historia de bonis bona referat, ad imitandum bonum auditor sollicitus instigatur; seu mala commemoret de prauis, nihilominus religiosus ac pius auditor siue lector deuitando quod noxium est ac peruersum, ipse sollertius ad exsequenda ea quae bona ac Deo digna esse cognouerit, accenditur. ( Praefatio) p . 2 ) . I9 [Should history tell of good men and their good estate, the thoughtful listener is spurred on to imitate the good; should it record the evil ends of wicked men, no less effectively the devout and earnest listener or reader is kindled to eschew what is harmful and perverse, and himself with greater care pursue those things which he has learned to be good and pleasing in the sight of God. ] As the populus Israhel moves from chosen to cursed, and back to chosen, it provides an important, useful example of both "good men and their good estate" as well as "the evil ends of wicked men." In well-known passages, Bede details the sinful corruption of the Britons just prior to the invasion and settlement of the Anglo-Saxons in the fifth century, thus justifYing the divine wrath of conquest the Romano- Celtic natives will soon endure . Bede's rhetoric of decline, corruption, and retribution strikes notes familiar from his historio graphic models, particularly Eusebius and Gildas, models we shall turn I 7. Ward, Bede, I I 4 . Peter Brown also describes Bede's concept of the gens An;_qlorum as a "New Israel" ( Rise rif Western Christendom, 3 5 I ) . I 8 . See Cowdrey, "Bede and the 'English People,"' and Wormald, "Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum." I 9 . See also Homeliae r . I o . 8 6- 8 7 , 2 -4 . I - I 5 . On mimesis in the Historia Ecclesiastica see Kendall, "Imitation. "

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to in due course . The ultimate paradigm for this rhetoric derives from the Old Testament: the divine judgment against sinning Israel. 20 Mter an abortive invasion by the Picts, the land prospered under the Britons, but perhaps too well : "Cessante autem uastatione hostili, tantis frugum copiis insula quantas nulla retro aetas meminit, affluere coepit, cum quibus et luxuria crescere et hanc continuo omnium lues scelemm comitari adcelerauit" [After the enemy's depredations had ceased, there was so great an abundance of corn in the island as had never before been known. With this affluence came an increase of luxury, followed by every kind of foul crime ] ( HE I . I 4 · 4 8 ) . Such luxury leads to decline and corruption; Bede explains that something is rotten in Britain: "ebrietati animositati litigio contentioni inuidiae ceterisque huiusmodi facinoribus sua colla, abiecto leui iugo Christi, subdentes" [They cast off Christ's easy yoke and thrust their necks under the burden of drunk en ness, hatred, quarreling, strife, and envy and other similar crimes] ( HE I . I 4 .4 8 ) . 21 Set in motion by the allure of luxuria) the process of divine retribution begins; as a result of their sins, a plague falls upon the "corrupt people" ( HE r . I 4 .4 8 ) . However, this is only a taste of things to come : "Vnde non multo post acrior gentem peccatricem ultio diri sceleris secuta est" [For this reason still more terrible retribution soon afterward overtook this sinfi1l people for their fearful crimes ] ( HE r . I 4 .4 8 ) . The "slackness of the Britons" [segnitia Brittonum] brings about their fall from grace ( HE I . I 5 . 5 o ) . As the invading Saxons rampage across the land, Bede focuses his exposition by directly comparing the desolation of Britain to the de struction of Jerusalem : "Siquidem, ut breuiter dicam, accensus mani bus paganorum ignis iustas de sceleribus populi Dei ultiones expetiit, non illius inpar qui quondam a Chaldaeis succensus Hierosolymorum moenia, immo aedificia cuncta consumsit" [To put it briefly, the fire kindled by the hands of the heathen executed the just vengeance of God on the nation for its crimes. It was not unlike that fire once kindled by the Chaldeans which consumed the walls and all the build20. Hanning shows that by following Gildas, Bede inherited a scheme of historical thinking that allowed him to cast the Anglo-Saxons as a New Israel: "By accepting Gildas' testimony on the sinfulness of the Britons, he made possible a depiction of the Saxons not simply as virtuous heathens (like Salvian's estimate of the barbarians in the fifth cenhuy), but, from his eighth-century vantage point, as the new Israel, chosen by God to replace the sin stained Britons in the promised land of Britain" (Hanning, Vision ofHistory, 70 ) . For a careful discussion of Bede's use of Gildas as a historical source see Miller, "Beck's Use of Gildas. " 2 I . Cf. Matthew I I : 29 .

Excursus on Bede)s Historia Ecclesiastica 1 09

ings of Jerusalem] ( HE I . I 5 . 5 2 ) . 22 Guiding Bede's hand in the narra tive shaping of this history is the populus Israhel mythos : expelled from Golden Age bliss and favor, the populus Dei incurs the wrath of God, and the human representatives of his swift and terrible retribution follow hard upon. In the next two chapters we shall see the rich texture of this image and its history as it forms in late antiquity and flowers in Anglo-Saxon England. Utter destruction tracks the retreating Britons : some are killed, some surrender to become slaves, and some are scattered into exile : "alii transmarinas regiones dolentes petebant; alii perstantes in patria trepidi pauperem uitam in montibus siluis uel rupibus arduis suspecta semper mente agebant" [some fled sorrowing to lands beyond the sea, while others remained in their own land and led a wretched existence, always in fear and dread, among the mountains and woods and precipi tous rocks] ( HE I . I 5 . 5 2 ) . 23 As we shall see in these chapters, the image of the once-noble, once-chosen people broken to remnants and cast out upon the crags of exile is affixed inescapably to the name of Israel but then applied in any number of rhetorical simations. Here Bede, draw ing upon Gildas, projects the image upon the Britons; but in other places, the Anglo-Saxons are understood as both the "Old Israel," consumed by fire and conquest for their sins, and also as the "New Israel," the agents of supercession-the newly elect of the Lord. In other words, this discursive pattern is flexible : the "populus Israhel'' stands for a complex of ideas, a monitory system of empathic under standing. In the apprehension of time past, time present and time future, the history of the populus Israhel projects a durable image, imme diate and clear. As Judith McClure explains, Bede saw the ancient Israelites in "conditions which he readily perceived were analogous to those determining the development of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms . "24 2 2 . Cf. 4 Kings 2 5 : 8 - r o . 2 3 . Bede's image o f desolation endured at least into the seventeenth century: c f. Milton's summary at the end of book 3 of his The History of Britain ( r 670- 7 1 ) : "Thus omitting Fables, we have the veiw of what with reason can be rely'd on for truth, don in Britain, since the Romans forsook it. Wherin we have heard the many miseries and desolations, brought by divine hand on a perverse Nation; driv'n, when nothing else would reform them, out of a fair Country, into a Mountanous and Barren Corner, by Strangers and Pagans . So much more tolerable in the Eye of Heav'n is Infidelity pro±ess't, then Christian Faith and Religion dishonoured by unchristian works" ( I 8 3 ) . 24 . McClure, "Bede's Old Testament Kings, " 76; see also Thacker, "Bede's Ideal of Reform," 1 4 2- 4 3 ; Clemoes, Interactions, 3 1 0- 1 3 ; Kendall, "Imitation," 1 7 5 - 76; Godden, "Biblical Literature. " E . g . , see Bede's comparison of lEthelfrith to Saul:

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L I IO

Obviously for Bede, the complex of meaning around the populus Israhel was a well-established hermeneutic strategy. Chapter 3 will trace the image of the populus Israhel in key texts stretching from late antiq uity to Anglo-Saxon England. Having established this background, we will then go on to observe in chapter 4 the operation of this mythos in various insular texts and authors; all the while, we will pay close atten tion to the subtle permutations of the tradition: when it encompasses figural thinking, when it functions as a "negative exemplum," when it serves as a vital model for the self, when it speaks to the rage for order. Malcolm Godden, speaking of the Anglo-Saxons, notes that Poets, preachers, historians, even kings and generals found [the Old Testament] an ever-useful storehouse of information and in spiration; its great collection of stories, poems, proverbs and prophecies provided a rich literary tradition for the Anglo-Saxons which both complemented and challenged the literary tradition of the Germanic inheritance . 2 5 The populus Israhel mythos is an important element in this "store house" : what are its recurring tropes, images, ways of thought and understanding?

His temporibus regno Nordanhymbrorum praefuit rex fortissimus et gloriae cu pidissimus Aedilfrid, qui plus omnibus Anglorum primatibus gentem uastauit Bret tonum, ita ut Sauli quondam regi Israheliticae gentis conparandus uideretur, excepto dumtaxat hoc, quod diuinae erat religionis ignarus. ( HE 1 . 3 4 . I I 6) [At this time !Ethelfrith, a very brave king and most eager for glory, was ruling over the kingdom ofNorthumbria. He ravaged the Britons more extensively than any other English ruler. He might indeed be compared with Saul who was once king of Israel, but with this exception, that JEtheltrith was ignorant of the divine religion. ] Cf. Bede, In I Samuhelem 2 . 2402- 3 3 . O n the representation of Saul in this commenta1y and its relevance for British political history, see J. M. Wallace-Hadrill, Earzv Germanic Kingship, 76- 7 8 ; as he notes, for Bede the "kings of the Bible and those of sixth-cennuy Britain were inextricably woven in his mind and in his narrative " ( 7 5 ) 2 5 . Godden, "Biblical Literature, " 206. .

THREE

The Populus Israhel Tradition

Rufinus-Eusebius ne of the most important models for Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica) and also for his conception of the populus Israhel) was Eusebius of Caesarea's ( 2 6 3 - 3 4 0 C.E . ) Ecclesiastical History) as transmitted to the Christian West by the Latin translation of Rufinus of Aquileia ( ca. 3 4 5 - 4 I o/n C.E. ; translation 402/3 C.E. ) . 1 Composed in Greek by

O

I . Fine introductions to Eusebius include Deferrari, "Eusebius"; D . S . Wallace- Hadrill, Eusebius; Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History, 5 4 - 7 3 ; the well-chosen remarks of Momigliano in "Pagan and Christian Historiography," 8 9 - 9 2 ; Chesnut, First Christian Histories, 3 3 - I74; and the essays by various hands in Attridge and Hata, eds . , Eusebius, Christianit)\ and Jttdaism. On Rufinus and his translation see Murphy, Rufinu.s of Aqttileia, I 5 8 - 8 5 ; Amidon, Church History, vii- xix. See Oulton, "Rufinus's Trm1slation," for a close comparison of the Greek m1d Latin texts. For the influence of Eusebius and his tradition of ecclesiastical historiography on Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica see Barnard, "Bede and Eusebius as Church Historians"; Bonner, "BeLie and Medieval Civilization," 8 s - 8 6 ; Momigliano, Classical Foundations ofModern Historiogra phy, r 3 8 - 5 2; Markus, "Bede and the Tradition of Ecclesiastical Historiography"; Hanning, Vision ofHistory, 6 3 - 9 0 . But see also the important argument ofWalter Gofiut ( Narrators of Barbarian History, 29 6- 3 07, 3 2 5 - 2 8 ) , who contends that the most immediate influences on the composition of the Historia Ecclesiastica are to be found in contemporary Northumbrian ecclesiastical narratives; in short, he proposes a more local, immediate context to Bede's history, rather than the broader currents of European and Mediterranean historiography.

III

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L II2

Eusebius in the late third or early fourth century, and then translated into Latin and expanded by Rufinus in the early fifth century, the Rufinus-Eusebius Ecclesiastical History betrays an anxiety about Chris tianity as a valid, authentic religion with its own long, storied history. 2 In Roman eyes a religion was, by definition, ancient; a "new" religion was something of an oxymoron. The Ecclesiastical History, a ten-book prose history of the church from its foundation down to 3 24 C.E . , is in part an answer to the skeptical Roman world, a defense and justifica tion of the somewhat newly minted faith, by means of the rule of history. As the church becomes the state religion of the Roman empire in the early fourth century, Eusebius's text plays an important part in that imperial transformation. In this rhetorical use of the populus Israhel mythos, the Jews function as an important imprimatur of Christianity's legitimacy; the Jews are used in order to bring an air of antiquity to the narrative of Christian history in the pages of the Rufinus-Eusebius history. In book r , Rufinus-Eusebius argues against this pagan suspicion that the Christians are latter-day imposters and not of a true religion : "Quod autem recentis vocabuli Christianorum gens videtur et ritus observantiae eius nuper exortus, quid etiam haec ipsa novitas in se vetustatis contineat, ostendamus" [ But although it seems that the race of the Christians is of a recent name, and that our practice of his worship has recently appeared, nevertheless we shall show that this same "novelty" has in fact comprised a long existence ] . 3 This demon stration involves linking the history of Christianity to the Jews : there fore, the Jews necessarily must be portrayed as a people of rich and On the general import<mce of Eusebius in the formation of the early medieval historical imagination, see Hanning, Vision of History, 23 - 3 2; Markus, "Church History and Early Church Historians"; Chesnut, "Eusebius, Augustine, Orosius" and First Christian Histories, I - 5 and esp . I99- 2 3 0 (chapter 9 ; "Sozomen, Theodoret of Cyrrhus , and Evagrius Scholas ticus: Other Successors
The Populus Israhel Tradition II3

noble antiquity: "Antiquissimum prae omnibus fere gentibus Hebrae orum genus haberi puto, quod nulli dubitandum videatur" [ I think that the race of the Hebrews is considered to be most ancient, before almost all other tribes, which it seems no one doubts] ( 4 r . r - 2 ) . The Hebrews are described as "iustitia et pietate praeditis viris" [men gifted in piety and righteousness] ( 4 1 . 5 ) . Rufinus-Eusebius is sensitive to the criticism that the Christians are not an authentic people; they are a new sect and therefore of dubious heritage, at least as defined in antiquity.4 For Rufinus- Eusebius the solution is to extend the Christian lineage by linking it to the history of the former people of God. As Barnard explains, " [t]he roots of Christianity lay for [Eusebius ] in the era of the Jewish patriarchs . . . . Eusebius shows the sensitivity of Christians of his day to the criticism that their religion was of recent origin. " s Eusebius's achievement was, therefore, significant: in Droge's judg ment, " [ the Ecclesiastical History] marked the beginning of a new under standing of history within the thinking of the early church and, ulti mately, western antiquity as a whole. In addition to recording the history of the church, Eusebius invested Christianity with a past history in an attempt to legitimize it in the eyes of its detractors . In the process he produced a new kind of national history."6 But how could the Jews be utilized as noble precursors or ancestors? Are they not, according to a powerful countertradition, also the mur derous, deicidal killers of the Christian faith, the furious, raging, fool ish enemy? The standard answer of course would utilize figural herme neutics : the Old Testament Hebrews are in fact not the Hebrews, per se, but really ( i . e . , figurally speaking) the typus of the Christian populus) 4 · We can see the same anxiety behind the introduction to book I , chapter 2 ofEusebius's Demonstratio Evan;_qelica ( Proof of the Gospel, vol . I , pp . 7- 8 ) : "I have already laid down in my Preparation that Christianity is neither a form of Hellenism, nor of Judaism, but that it is a religion with its own characteristic stamp, and that this is not anything novel or original, but something natural and t:<miliar to the godly men before the time of Moses who are remembered for their holiness and justice "; see further Eusebius, Demonstratio Evangelica, book 3 ( Proof(if the Gospel, vol. I, pp. I O I - 62 ). As D. S. Wallace-Hadrill explains, "The charge could be levelled against Christians by pagan and Jew alike, for the assertion of apostolic authority for Christian belief and practice would carry little vveight with those who could trace their cultural ancestry back to Homer and Moses" ( Eusebius, I 7 2 ) . On this subject see further Droge, "Apologetic Dimensions"; Courcelle, "Anti-Christian Arguments"; Wilken, Christians as the Romans Saw Them; Benko, Pagan Rome and the EarZv Christians; Cohen, Living Letters, I O . 5 . Barnard, "Bede and Eusebius as Church Historians," I I I . On the identification of Christianity witl1 tl1e pre-Mosaic patriarchs in Eusebius's thought, see also D. S . Wallace Hadrill, Eusebius, I o 2- 3 , I 69 - 7 2 ; Chesnut, First Christian Histories, 72-73 , 9 8 . 6. Droge, "Apologetic Dimensions," 499- 5oo; emphasis in original.

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the true church . It is only with the great figural pivotal movement to the New Testament that the Jews are now the enemies, only the empty shell of the former, chosen people . Note, however, that Rufinus Eusebius does not explicitly use figural language in his depiction of the noble preincarnation Jews : he simply paints them in glowing terms, without any discursive figural justification for this apparent contradiction. The "pure race" [gentem integram] of the Hebews had "ad sui cultum venerationemque convertit" [turned to the veneration and reverence ( of God ) ] ( 2 5 . 5 , 6 ) . Although they were "utpote adhuc rudibus et contagione vitae prioris infectis" [yet unpolished and in fected by the contamination of their prior life ] ( 2 5 . 7 ) , nevertheless their Law soon spreads, civilizing other races. The Law, like a "fra grant aroma" [ odoris sui fraglantia] , moved to all the corners of the world and "coeperunt et agrestes ac feros hominum mores ad decora atque honesta instituta revocare" [began to transform the primitive and savage customs of men to proper and honest laws ] ( 2 5 . I 2, I ? I 8 ) . 7 The Hebrews are the great people of the Law, the monotheists surrounded by a sea of pagans . However, as Milton later expresses it, this is only the first step : So Law appears imperfect, and but giv'n With purpose to resign them in full time Up to a better Cov'nant, disciplin'd From shadowy Types to Truth, from Flesh to Spirit . . . 8 Milton, in qualifying the nobility of the ancient Hebrews, explicitly lays out the language of figural understanding-the disciplined people moving from types to truth, passing to a better covenant, stripping away the shadows of the flesh to reveal the gleaming truth of the spirit. Rufinus-Eusebius does not seal his very similar portrait of the He brews with such an explicit figural argument; he simply glorifies the ancient populus Israhel and then proceeds to link them with the latter day Christians : Omnes ergo illos, qui ab Abraham sursum versus usque ad primum hominem generationis ordine conscribuntur, etiamsi non 7. See Chesnut, First Christian Histories, 7 3 - 7 5 . 8 . Milton, Paradise Lost, r 2 . 3 00- 3 03 .

The Populus Israhel Tradition II5

nomine, rebus tamen et religione Christianos fuisse si quis dicat, non mihi videtur errare . ( 4 r . 8 - I I )9 [Therefore, all these, from Abraham back to the first man in order of generation, can nevertheless be classified as Christians in deeds and in religion, even if not in name : if anyone should say this, it should not seem to me to be in error. ] Christianity is thus not only ancient, but it is more ancient than the competing Judaism of late antiquity. Christianity is a rebirth of the purest, most ancient form ofJudaism, a reincarnation of the line of folk closest in blood and bone, spirit and divinity, to Adam, the originary father. The result of this rhetorical strategy was "to give Christianity a prehistory at once more ancient and more venerable than that of the Jews or of pagan religions . " r o Perhaps the instinct to apply figural thinking, Old and New Israel, was so strong already in the early fourth cenhlry, such an embedded part of the early Christian mind-set, that Rufinus-Eusebius does not need to schematically account for his fig ural strategy. However, it is possible that something more immediate is at stake . One trope of the populus Israhel mythos, from its earliest manifestation, is the simple authenticity of the chosen, upright and righteous before God. This is a very early expression of the ad hoc use 9· Cf Eusebius, Demonstratio Evangelica, book r chapter 2 ( Proof of the Gospel, vol. r , p . 9 ) : Eusebius claims the pre-Mosaic patriarchs tor Christianity: These men, then, were not involved in the errors of idolatry, moreover they were outside the pale ofJudaism; yet, though they were neither Jew nor Greek by birth, we know them to have been conspicuously pious, holy, and just. This compels us to conceive some other ideal of religion, by which they must have guided their lives. Would not this be exactly that third form of religion midway between Judaism and Hellenism, which I have already deduced, as the most ancient and most venerable of all religions, and which has been preached of late to all nations through our Savior? Christianity would therefore be not a form of Hellenism nor of Judaism, but some thing between tl1e two, tl1e most <mcient organization for holiness, and the most venerable philosophy, only lately codified as the law for all mankind in the whole world. See also Droge, Homer or Moses?, r 8 s - 8 7 . r o . Hanning, Vision of History, 2 4 ; following D . S . Wallace-Hadrill. See also Droge, "Apologetic Dimensions, " 5 0 2 : "Eusebius drives a wedge between the Hebrews (the original Christians) and the Jews. In contrast to the religion of the patriarchs, Judaism represents a decline in religion, peculiar to the Jewish nation but akin to the corruption of religion among the pagans. "

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of the populus Israhel mythos . As Hanning notes, this mythos "gave a literal fullness to the history of the church even beyond what could be claimed as a result of typology. The patriarchs did not prefigure the church of Christ; they were its first concrete manifestation, separated from the Christian ecclesia by the interlude of Jewish history. . . . " n Authenticity and antiquity: these related tropes of the populus Israhel mythos are deployed by Rufinus-Eusebius in response to ideological pressures on late third-/early fourth-century Christianity, in situ. His history speaks to the struggle of early Christianity, especially in an imperial context; yet since it was such an influential text in its Latin translation, it captured, introduced, and codified an important under standing of Jews for subsequent centuries in the West. Once incorpo rated into the mythos, however, these tropes naturally interact with other tropes, molding to fit diverse hermeneutic cross-currents . For Rufinus-Eusebius's purposes, the relationship between ancient He brew and contemporary Christian is one of simple identification and empathy, rather than the explicit discursive webs of figural understand ing. As he sums up in a rhetorical question and answer: Quid igitur obstat, ut non una atque eadem religionis observantia deputetur in his in quibus unam atque eandem fidei atque operum esse constitit formam? Et ideo non novella neque peregrina est Christianorum religio vel nuper exorta, sed si fas est libere indi care quod verum est, prima omnium atque ab ipsa simul mundi origine ac nativitate descendens eodem Christo cleo doctore et institutore iam inde ab initio speciem formamque suscipiens . Et de his quidem ista sufficiant. ( 4 5 . I o- I 7 ) 12 [What then hinders us from understanding that it is one and the same practice of religion in these matters, in which it is resolved to be one and the same shape and practice of faith? And thus the religion of the Christians is neither new nor strange, or recently come forth, but instead is clearly shown to be the first of all religions, descending in its origin and birth from Christ's teach ing and taking its form and appearance from that origin. And this is enough concerning this subject. ] I r . Hanning, Vision ofHistory, 24; emphasis added. I 2 . Cf. Demonstratio Evan;_qelica, book I, chapters 2, 4 - 6 ( Proofofthe Gospel, vol. I, pp . 7I I , 22- 4 2 ) .

The Populus Israhel Tradition I I7

As the "New Israel," Christianity can claim the bold inheritance of the formerly chosen populus Dei,· but as the new chosen, they are sub ject thus to a renewed, continual cycle of chastisement and punish ment-a "logic of retribution," in G. W. Trompf 's phrase, that pro vides a powerful model for later authors, both antique and medieval. I3 Rufinus-Eusebius's view of history is also cyclical ; the Christian perse cutions ( another great theme of the Ecclesiastical History) are, in their own turn, God's judgment against a latter- day, sinning people . He explains that "ex multa libertate multaque indulgentia vitiati sunt mores et disciplina corrupta est" [ our character was defiled and our culture corrupted by excessive freedom and indulgence] ( 7 3 9 . I I- I 2 ) . People turned against each other at all levels of society until "divine providence" [ divina providentia] began to "chastise the fallen ones" [ rqrenare lapsantes] , and the persecution of the Christians began ( 7 3 9 · I 8 , I 9 - 20) . The Christians fall from their chosen status into the populus Israhel mythos pattern of chastisement. As Patrides notes, Eusebius's work is marked continuously with "the recurrent affirma tion that God marches through history in judgement or in mercy, and always in glory" ;I4 or in D . S . Wallace-Hadrill's words : "The essence of Eusebius' view was that the clock had been put back, that history was repeating itself, with the qualification that now the 'bright intellectual daylight' had dawned there was no night to follow."r5 Codified in the sober tracts of influential historiography, it is no surprise to see this cyclical pattern of retribution taken up and aes theticised by the poets . We turn first to Prudentius ( 3 4 8 - ca. 4 I O C.E. ) , the important Spanish Christian Latin poet perhaps best known for his allegorical epic of the virtues and vices, the Psychomachia. In his collec tion of devotional poems dedicated to the Christian martyrs, the Peristephanon, he details the beginnings of the Roman persecutions : Forte tunc atrox secundos Israhelis posteros ductor aulae mundialis ire ad aram iusserat idolis litare nigris esse Christi defl1gas . 1 6 I 3 . Trompf, "Rufinus and the Logic of Retribution": "Formulating a characteristic ac count of retribution, and using it to guide readers' evaluations and endow meaning upon events, was one among an essential cluster of conventions f(x ancient narrators to exploit, and one means of leaving a trademark" ( 3 5 8 ) . I 4 . Patrides, Milton, 229 . I 5 . Eusebius, I 8 3 ; see also generally Chesnut, First Christian Histories, 6 5 - 9 5 . I 6 . Prudentius, Liber Peristefanon, 1 .40- 4 2 ( Carmina, ed. Cunningham, 2 5 1 - 3 8 9 , cita tions by book and line numbers) ; emphasis added.

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[Then, perchance, the cruel one (i.e., the Roman emperor) , the ruler of the worldly sphere, ordered the second race of Israel to go and worship at the altars of a dark idol and deny Christ. ] As they fall under the hammer of persecution, the Christian populus becomes the "second race of Israel. " Further, in his Liber Apotheosis) a didactic poem on the doctrine of the Trinity, the destruction of the second temple occasions a diatribe against the deicidal Jews; yet in these lines Prudentius also ruefully elegizes the passing of a former glory, the dwindling of Rufinus-Eusebius's once-powerful race of old, a people at one time able to authenticate nascent Christianity by the simple association of name and history: Quid mereare Titus docuit, docuere rapinis Pompeianae acies, quibus extirpata per omnes terrarum pelagique plagas tua membra ferunhlr. Exiliis uagus hue illuc fluitantibus errat Iudaeus, postquam patria de sede reuulsus supplicium pro caede luit Christique negati sanguine respersus commissa piacula soluit. En quo priscorum uirtus defluxit auorum ! Seruit ab antiquis dilapsa fidelibus heres nobilitas, sed iam non nobilis, illa recentem susceptat captiua fidem. I7 I7. Prudentius, Liher Apotheosis, 5 3 8 - 4 8 ( Carmina, ed. Cunningham, 73 - I I 5 ) ; cita tions by line numbers. Cf. Eusebius's summary at the beginning of the Dcmonstratio Evan lJelica, book I , chapter I ( Proofofthe Gospel, vol. I , pp. 3 - 4 ) : [In the words of the prophets] you can hear the wailings and lamentations of each of the prophets, wailing and lamenting characteristically over the calamities which will overtake the Jewish people because of their impiety to Him Who had been foretold. How their kingdom, that had continued from the days of a remote ancestry to their own, would be utterly destroyed after their sin against Christ; how their fathers' Laws would be abrogated, they themselves deprived of their ancient worship, robbed of the independence of their forefathers, and made slaves of their enemies, instead of free men; how their royal metropolis would be burned with fire, their venerable and holy altar undergo the flames and extreme desolation, their city be inhabited no longer by its old possessors but by races of other stock, while they would be dispersed among the Gentiles through the whole world, with never a hope of any cessation of evil, or breathing space from troubles.

The Populus Israhel Tradition I I9

[You deserve what Titus and the legions of Pompey have taught: through those devastations your destroyed race: is carried through all the misfortunes of the lands and seas . The wandering Jew roams here and there in aimless exile, ripped from his paternal home and stained with the blood of Christ (whom he denied) since he paid for the punishment of the murder and atoned for the crimes committed. Behold how the virtue of the ancestors of the forefathers has declined! The noble heir of the ancient com pany of the faithful, now fallen, has been enslaved and 1s no longer noble; instead, the captive takes up the new faith. ] The "virtue of the ancestors, of the forefathers" [priscorum virtus . . . auorum] and the tone of elegy that surrounds the phrase in Pru dentius's passage refle cts, in miniature, the easy transition of the populus Israhel mythos from history to poetry. The use of the populus Israhel mythos in the writing of ecclesiastical history and in its derived poetic applications contributes to the construction of a past for the Christian populus)· ecclesiastical history is, according to Markus, "a specialised form of this corporate self- awareness . " 18 The tradition established by Eusebius in the fourth century was remarkably coherent: as Markus further notes, "ecclesiastical historians saw themselves almost as mem bers of a kind of diachronic syndicate responsible for the instalments which would add up to make a single, cumulative 'ecclesiastical his tory."'r9 In the fourth and fifth centuries Christianity fights to establish itself in a Roman context; at the same time, the empire begins its long transformation under the pressures of the so-called Age of Migration. In the following pages we will trace the adaptations of the populus Israhel mythos during this period of change, in representative histories of Paulus Orosius and Salvian of Marseilles, and the poetry by Paulinus of Nola and Prudentius .

Paulus Orosius The Roman sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of the second temple in 70 C.E . , and the final dispersion of the Jews according to the Edict of Cf. similar passages on the destruction of Jerusalem, Demonstratio Evangelica, book 6, chap ters 7, 1 8 , book 8 , chapter 3 ( Proofofthe Gospel, vol . 2, pp. 7- 8 , 26- 3 6, 140-4 1 ) . 1 8 . Markus, "Church History and Early Church Historians," r . 1 9 . Markus, "Church History and Early Church Historians," 8 .

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Hadrian in I 3 5 C.E., occupies a prime place in the tropes of the populus Israhel mythos. Taking its place next to the agon of the other calami ties-Egypt, the Philistines, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome-visited upon the former populus Dei) the sack of Jerusalem functions as an important image associated with the populus Israhel.20 In Anglo-Saxon England it is depicted, for example, on the Franks Casket (see fig. I ) and finds narrative form in the Vindicta Salvatoris) surviving in both Latin and Old English versions . 21 The well-known Historiarum adver sum paganos libri VII ( ca. 4 I 7 C.E . ) of Paulus Orosius (fl. early fifth century) also narrates this well-known tale; due to the text's great popularity in the West (and, of course, in Anglo-Saxon England) , Orosius's text bears witness to a dominant tmderstanding o f the populus Israhel and its fortunes. 22 Crime and punishment in the final siege of Jerusalem : this dynamic constitutes a prevalent theme in book 7 of Orosius's history. For Orosius, writing in part to explain the calamities afflicting the Christian Roman Empire of the fifth century, the Romans and the Jews move on a parallel track: just as Rome's great empire rises on the one hand, so too the Jews gain their freedom from the Babylonian captivity and build the second temple : "Cum uindicante libertatem suam Roma, tunc quoque Iudaeorum populus, qui apud Babylonam sub regibus seruiebat, in sanctam Hiersalem recepta libertate redierit templumque Domini, sicut a prophetis praedictum fuerat, reformarit" [when Rome was claiming her own freedom, at that time also the Jewish people, who had been enslaved at Babylon under their kings, having claimed their freedom, returned to Holy Jerusalem and restored the temple of the Lord, just as had been predicted by the prophets ] ( 7. 2 . 4 3 4 - 4 5 ) . 23 Orosius tends, as all historians do regardless of "doctrinal" imperatives, to impose patterns and narrative symmetries upon the flux of events viewed in retrospect. Orosius sets down in his history what he sees as the linked ebb and flow of peoples and ages. The overarching structure of his historical narrative, indeed, is shaped to demonstrate the rise and 20. On the imagery of Jerusalem in Old English poetry see Clemoes, Interactions, 4 5 3 56. 2 1 . On the Vindicta Salvatoris in Anglo-Saxon England see chapter 6 . 2 2 . For introductions to Orosius see Duckett, Latin Writers ofthe Fifth Centur)\ r 62-72; Mil burn, Early Christian Interpretations ofHistory, 8 8 - 9 2; Hanning, Vision ofHistory, 3 7-4 2 . 23 . See Chesnut, First Christian Histories, 77- 7 8 , 8 2- 8 3 . Orosius citations b y book, chapter, and page numbers .

Fig. l. The Franks Casket (back) showing the Roman siege and destruction of Jerusalem in Museum. )

70

C.E.

(By permission of the British

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fall of four powerful civilizations : the Babylonian, Macedonian, Cartha ginian, and Roman empires. The Jews have a role to play within this narrative structure, provid ing a minor echoic theme with these larger movements . The fall of the Jews quickly follows the death of Jesus; the Roman emperors Vespa sian and his son Titus (ruled 69 - 79 and 79- 8 1 C.E . , respectively) serve as the agents of divine wrath: Ceterum et tunc capta euersaque Vrbe Hierosolymorum, sicut prophetae praenuntiauerunt, extinctisque Iudaeis Titus, qui uindicandum Domini Iesu Christi sanguinem iudicio Dei fuerat ordinatus, uictor triumphans cum Vespasiano patre Ianum clausit. ( 7 · 3 · 4 3 9 ) 24 [ But then, when the city of Jerusalem had been captured and plundered, as the prophets foretold, and when the Jews had been completely destroyed, Titus, who had been chosen to avenge the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ by the judgment of God, closed the temple of Janus with his father Vespasian, like a triumphant victor. ] According to Orosius, prior to the destruction of Jerusalem misfortune followed the Jews, ever since the reign of the emperor Caligula: the Jews, "qui iam tunc ob passionem Christi meritis ubique cladibus exagitabantur" [who then were being persecuted everywhere with de served calamities because of Christ's Passion] sent a desperate legation to Caligula; but the overture only angered him further, inciting him to defile the temple ( 7. 5 · 44 5 ) . The aggression continued during the reign of Vespasian, the father of Titus . During Vespasian's reign, "Iudaei post passionem Christi destituti in totum gratia Dei cum omnibus undique malis circumuenirentur" [the Jews, after the Passion of Christ, being completely destitute with respect to the grace of God and, when they were surrounded by evils on all sides] broke out into revolt ( 7. 9 · 4 5 8 - 5 9 ) . Chapter 9 of book 7 relates the great climactic siege of Jerusalem and destruction of the temple by Titus . Ultimately, Titus was faced with the momentary choice of burning the temple or trying to capture it as a prize . Orosius pauses for a moment to reflect: "Sed

The Populus Israhel Tradition I 23

Ecclesia Dei iam per totum orbem uberrime germinante, hoc tamquam effetum ac uacuum nullique usui bono commodum arbitrio Dei aufer endum fuit" [Since the Church of God was growing very abundantly now throughout the whole world, in the judgment of God, this ( i . e . , the temple ) was to be removed as something used up and empty and as fit for no good use to anyone ] ( 7.9 . 4 60 ) . One can note here the hint of figural language describing the Jews : they are the "used up and empty" husk to be thrown away and replaced. As with Rufinus-Eusebius, Orosius does not discursively adduce a figural explanation: in the writ ing of history, the enactment of narrative and event can demonstrate the workings of such hermeneutic processes without their being explic itly stated. However, to present such a comment without the explicit use of figural language is surely to have a different effect. As text without gloss, it normalizes the discourse, puts it into the realm of the commonplace, the easily accessed world of the matter-of-fact. However, the Jews do not accept supercession and go gently into the good night. Suddenly, during the subsequent reign of the emperor Trajan ( 9 8 - I I 7 C.E. ) : "Incredibili deinde motu sub uno tempore Iudaei quasi rabie efferati per diuersas terrarum partes exarserunt" [then, all at the same time, the Jews exploded in an incredible uprising in different parts of the world, as if enraged with madness ] ( 7 . I 2.467 ) . 25 Having fallen far from the stams of chosen, furthest from the pristine nature of the pre -Mosaic patriarchs, the Jews are now at the ebb of their fortune, residing at the foundation of their woe ; and as a result they strike back with the savagery of bestial madness. As so often is the case with this trope of anti-Judaic discourse, the sound and fury of their madness is to no avail, futile and sterile in the end. Hadrian ( emperor I I 8 - I 3 8 C.E. ) , acting a s the agent of the divine will, subdues the Jews once and for all : Iudaeos sane, pertubatione scelerum suorum exagitatos et Pales tinam prouinciam quondam suam depopulantes, ultima caede per domuit, ultusque est Christianos, quos illi Cocheba duce, cur sibi aduersum Romanos non adsentarentur, excn1ciabant; praecepit que, ne cui Iudaeo introeundi Hierosolymam esset licentia, Chris tianis tantum ciuitate permissa: quam ipse in optimum statum murorum exstructione reparauit et Aeliam uocari de praenomine suo praecepit. ( 7. I 3 .4 6 8 - 69 ) 2 5 . Cf. also 7 . 27.497.

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[ Indeed, ( Hadrian ) vanquished the Jews in a final slaughter, who were agitated in the discontent of their own crimes and were savaging the province of Palestine, once their own; and thus he avenged the Christians whom the Jews, under the leadership of Cochebas, were torturing because they would not join them against the Romans; and he ordered that no Jew should be al lowed to enter Jemsalem, that the city be open only to Christians, and he renewed the city to an exalted state by rebuilding the walls, giving orders that it be called "Aelia," after his own name . ] The renaming of Jerusalem reflects the Jews' loss of the true "name of Israel. " The finality of the expulsion, the closing of the city to the old populus Dei) constitutes another trope of the populus Israhel mythos. With wandering steps and slow, the banished populus Israhel moves among images of wrack, slaughter, and exile . At the end of his history, Orosius explains that he has set down in his pages the "cupiditates et punitiones hominum peccatomm, conflicta tiones saeculi et indicia Dei" [the desires and punishments of sinful men, the conflicts of the world and the judgments of God] ( 7 . 4 3 · 5 64 ) . As Orosius traces the intersection of divinity with the shabby carnality of humanity, his history cannot help but possess a certain melancholy gravitas as the dialectic of human and divine plays out against the rise and fall of peoples and empires. The record of humanity's attempts to outscorn the to-and-fro conflicting press of events is a thing of somber grandeur; even if that struggle is illuminated, as Orosius intends, by the light of divine Providence, such illumination cannot help but throw the record of shadows into deeper relief. This chiaroscuro tapestry depicting the rise and fall of great empires, cities, and peoples stretches across the ancient, medieval, and modern worlds . One calls to mind the fragmentary vision of The Waste Land: What is that sound high in the air Murmur of maternal lamentation Who are those hooded hordes swarming Over endless plains, stumbling in cracked earth Ringed by the flat horizon only What is the city over the mountains Cracks and reforms and bursts in the violet air

The Populus Israhel Tradition 1 25

Falling towers Jerusalem Athens Alexandria Vienna London Unreal26 The lachrymose textures of the populus Israhel mythos constitute a pow erful series of patterns in the Western apprehension of history. These tales of triumph and defeat stand side by side with the Jews and Jemsa lem in a history of blood, power, and the hand of the divine : lam hinc post passionem Domini, quem Iudaei quantum i n ipsis fuit persecuti sunt, continuae clades Iudaeorum, donee exinaniti dispersique deficiant, incessabiliter strepunt. ( 7 4 44 3 ) ·

·

[From this point onward after the passion of the Lord (whom the Jews had persecuted as much as they could) a continuous series of disasters for the Jews rumbled incessantly until, lifeless and scat tered, they passed away. ] Once again, let us compare the expression of this trope detailed by the historian's pen-the awe and depth of tragic inevitability associated with the fall of the populus Israhel-with its manifestation in the poetic imagination. The cultured Christian man of letters, Paulinus of Nola ( 3 5 s- 4 3 I C.E . ) gives us a perfect representative of late antique think ing about Jews . 27 In Paulinus's Carmen 3 I he discusses the Roman destruction of the temple, that cataclysmic event foreshadowed by the rending of the veil in the temple subsequent to Christ's death (Mat thew 27: 5 1 ; Mark I 5 : 3 8 ) . After Christ succumbed on the cross Tunc et discisso nudata altaria uelo amisere sacri religionem adyti, ut monstraretur uacuandum numine templum 2 6 . T. S . Eliot, The Waste Land, 3 67-77. 2 7 . For excellent introductions to Paulin us of Nola see Walsh, Poems of Paulinus of Nola, r - 29, and Trout, Paulinus of Nola. On Paulinus's literary methods see Witke , Numen Lit terarum, 7 5 - r o i . On knowledge of his work in Anglo-Saxon England, see Mackay, "Pan linus of Nola" and "Bede's Hagiographical Method"; Neil Wright, "Imitation" and "Imita tion: A Postscript. " Citations are from the edition by de Hartel, by poem number and line numbers.

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e t fore ab hostili sancta profana manu, quod duce Romano docuit post exitus ingens euersis templo ciuibus urbo sacris . Fas etenim, ut Iudaea, cui suus hostia Christus non erat et per quam uictima Christus erat, sede locoque simul uetemm uiduata sacrorum, infitiata fidem, perderet omne sacmm . [The altar of the temple was then exposed by the tearing asunder of the veil, and it lost the religious consecration of a sacred holy of holies, in order to show that the temple would be deprived of divinity, and the holy things be profaned by a hostile hand; the huge destruction afterward under a Roman leader, in which the temple, citizens, city, and sacred things were destroyed, taught this . And indeed it was correct that Judaea, who did not accept the sacrificed Christ as their own and through whom Christ became a victim, be deprived of the place and seat of their ancient mysteries, and having denied the faith, lost forever everything sacred to them. ] Paulinus, in a typical pattern, enhances the bare matter of the historical event (the destruction of the temple ) and its most basic causation ( divine vengeance against the deicidal Jews) by focusing with a poet's eye upon one poignant detail in particular-the rending of the Temple veil. Paulinus manipulates the veil's synecdochic function : it is a part of the most sacred of shrines, but its stripping away also represents the loss of "everything sacred to them. " This poetic concentration on one detail, standing for the entire array of destruction, and the overarching trajectory of decline and fall, displays the hermeneutic potential of this particular populus Israhel trope. As Paulinus continues to reconstruct the subject, he employs a more explicit diction of figural understanding: Et puto quod scissi in templo mysteria ueli id quoque signarint, gratia quod tribuit. Nam ueluti rupto patuere sacraria uelo, 2 8 . Cf. also lines r 29 - 3 4 of the same poem.

The Populus Israhel Tradition I 27

sic reserat nobis legis operta fides. Inde sub antiquo legitur uelamine Moyses Iudaeis nebula cordis opertus adhuc, quam de luminibus mentis mihi creditus aufert Christus, adumbratas discutiens species seque docens prisca uelatum legis in umbra iamque reuelamm corporis in facie, qualem praemissi cecinemnt adfore nates, qualis apostolicis coram oculis patuit, qualem et Iudaei non perspexere uidentes mentibus obtunsis impietate sua, et qualem, quamuis non uisum in corpore nobis, credendo interno lumine conspicimus . [ I believe that the mystery concerning the tearing of the veil in the temple signified also what grace grants . For just as the sacred objects were exposed by the tearing of the veil, so also faith opens the secrets of the Law for us . And so we perceive Moses under the ancient veil, though he is yet concealed from the Jews by a cloud of the heart which Christ-I believe in him-removes from the un derlying illuminations of my mind's eye . Christ shatters the murky forms, and he teaches me that he himself was veiled in the ancient shadows of the Law, and that he is now revealed in his corporeal form, just as the prophets sent before him prophesied, and just as he manifested himself before the eyes of the apostles. And in this way the Jews looked at him, but did not see him, in the dullness of their minds and in their impiety. But although we have not seen him in the fle sh, we do see him in this way with the internal light of belief. ] Taking his cue from the temple's veil, Paulinus plays off the resem blance between velatum and revelatum in lines 67- 6 8 : Christ was "veiled" in the shadows of the ancient Law but is now "revealed" in the fle sh. The figural language creates a pleasing symmetry in these lines, reflected also in the parallel syntax: participle (uelatum/reuelatum) fol lowed by a similar prepositional phrase (legis in umbra/corporis in facie) . A contrast is also drawn between the "mental dullness" [ mentibus obtensis] derived from the Jews "own impiety" [ impietate sua] , and the

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"internal light" [ interno lumine] of Paulinus and his Christian audience, drawn from the strength of their belief (credendo) . Thus the destruction ofJerusalem, and in particular one focused detail, serves as a meditative vehicle for the tenor of figural understanding; the destruction of the temple's inner sanctum produces a discursive reflection on the dynam ics of surface and depth, outer form and inner mystery: it is no surprise that Paulinus moves from the desolation of the temple's heart to refle c tions on the contrast between the inner hearts of Jews and Christians, and their corresponding relationship to revelation and faith. 29

Salvian ofMarseilles Salvian of Marseilles's treatise De gubernatione Dei ( ca. 4 3 9 - 4 5 1 C.E. ) uses the populus Israhel mythos as a rhetorical negative exemplum in the context of fifth-century political and social instability. 3° In his polemi cal lament for the fate of the Roman empire, Salvian blames the misfor nmes of his times-the steady advance of barbarian hordes-on the woeful sins of the Christian populace; as God once did to sinning Israel, he now sends an instrument of divine retribution against the Christian populus in the form of invading armies Y Just as we saw in Orosius's history, the populus Israhel mythos here provides a model for the rise and fall of a people, in somber antiquity and majesty. As it was for Eusebius, Salvian's first step is to emphasize the nobility of the ancient Hebrews . In book r of Salvian's treatise the Old Testament Hebrews in the desert are righteous wanderers : "Igitur post hunc 2 9 . Cf a similar moment in Henry Vaughan's Silex Scintillans, "The Search"; as the speaker's soul spends the night "in a roving ecstasy," searching for Christ in the Holy Land, it enquired Amongst the doctors, and desired To see the Temple, but was shown A little dust, and for the Town A heap of ashes, where some said A small bright sparkle was a bed, Which would one day (beneath the pole) Awake, and then refine the whole . [4, r 3 - 20, Complete Poems, ed. Rudrum, pp. r 5 7- 5 9 ] 3 0 . For discussions of Salvian (ca. 400-ca. 4 8 0 C.E . ) and his text see Duckett, Latin Writers rif' the Fifth Century, r 7 2- 8 r ; Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History, 9 2 9 5 ; L. G. Patterson, God and History, qo-47; Hanning, Vision of History, 4 6 - 4 9 . 3 r . For general background to the concept see Mazzarino, End tif' the Ancient Wrwld, 44- 7 5 ·

The Populus Israhel Tradition I 29

rerum gestarum ordinem ingreditur heremum uictrix sine bello gens Hebraeorum. Agit iter sine itinere, uiatrix sine uia, praeuio deo, diuino commilitio honorabilis, ductu caelesti potens . . . " [Therefore, after the sequence of these (deeds) , the race of the Hebrews, victorious without warfare , entered the desert. Travelers without a road, they kept a course without a path, led by God and honored by his divine fellowship , powerful through their heavenly leader . . . ] Y The Hebrews are the "peculiarem ac propriam dei gentem" [ special and particular race of God] ( 1 9 2. 3 2- 3 3 ) . This fulsome praise resembles not only the bur nished portrait of the pre-Mosaic patriarchs depicted by Rufinus Eusebius, but also (looking ahead to the next chapter) the noble pro tagonists of the Old English Genesis and Exodus. The purpose of this encomium, in part, is to make the later fall of the populus Hebreorum all the more dramatic, powerful, and tragic. Salvian is careful to point out that the esteemed name of "Israel" is only that: a label, a designation that can be removed. At the beginning of book 4 , he explains that, likewise, the name of " Christian" is not intrinsic; it is merited only by Christian deeds and behavior: "per hoc totum in id reuoluitur, ut qui Christiani nominis opus non agit, Chris tianus non esse uideatur; nomen enim sine actu atque officio suo nihil est" [The entire matter revolves around this point, that he who does not perform work of a Christian name does not appear to be Christian, for the name without the proper motive and observance is nothing] ( 2 3 2.9- r 2). In other words , the identity of "chosen" is not necessarily innate; it is performative, something to be achieved: "quid est aliud sanctum uocabulum sine merito nisi ornamentum in luto?" [What else is a sacred name without merit except as ornament in the mud? ] ( 2 3 2 . r 6- r 8 ) . Salvian follows the simple sentiment of Proverbs 1 4 : 3 4 : "Justice exalteth a nation, but sin maketh nations miserable ." In his customary fashion, Salvian cites historical precedents for this assertion : "Denique qui uult plenius scire uocabula nihil esse sine re bus, respiciat quomodo innumerabiles populi cessantibus meritis etiam nomina perdiderunt" [ Finally, he who wishes to know in greater depth that words are nothing without deeds should contemplate how count less peoples, by failing in good works, have utterly lost their rightful names] ( 23 4 . 2 3 - 2 5 ) . Extending his example, Salvian explains that the 3 2 . De gubernatione Dei I 3 8/r 40.27- 3 0 . All citations fi·om the De gubernatione Dei are from the edition by Lagarrigue, given parenthetically in the text by page and line numbers.

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twelve tribes of the Hebrews "cum electae quondam a deo essent, duo nomina sacrosancta acceperunt" [when they were once upon a time chosen by God, received two sacred names] -"the people of God" and "Israel" ( 2 3 4 . 2 6- 2 8 ) . Playing with the traditional etymology of Israel ( "seeing God" ) , Salvian concludes that the Jews can no longer claim either of these appellations : "Ergo Iudaei aliquando utrumque, nunc neutrum . Nam nee 'dei populus' dici potest qui cultum dei olim reliquit, nee 'uidens deum' qui dei filium denegauit" [Therefore, once the Jews had both of these names, but now they have neither. For they who long ago left behind the worship of God cannot be called "the people of God," nor can they who denied the son of God be called "seeing God" ] ( 23 4 . 29 - 3 2 ) . After backing up this hypothesis with a number of scriptural citations, Salvian applies the model to the late antique Christian populus) currently in a morally dubious lassitude : " Quod quidem timeo ne non magis tunc de eis dici potuerit quam de nobis mmc dici possit, quia nee uerbis dominicis obtemperamus, et qui uerbis domini non obsequimur, sapientiam profecto in nobis penitus non habemus" [But indeed I fear that what could be said about them at that time could now be applied to us, since we do not obey or submit to the words of the Lord, and actually we are utterly devoid of wis dom] ( 23 4 .4 1 - 44 ) . Thus, for Salvian, the populus Israhel functions primarily as a warn ing, a mobile and useful paradigm. The calamitous events of his day are a clear judgment, and the Christian populus has only itself to blame : "Primum enim ignem accendit, postea uires ignibus praebet, postre mum flammam ingreditur quam parauit" [First we kindle the fire, then add fuel to the flames, and lastly enter the conflagration that we have prepared] ( 2 62 . 3 2- 3 4 ) . In Salvian's imaginative world, the Jews have moved into the realm of the commonplace; they are an immediately recognizable exemplum for Christian culture in late Roman antiquity. Salvian asks how his audience can possibly claim to be true Christians, how they can possibly scoff at the Goths and Vandals as heretics, when their own practices are so sinful . Like the Jews of old, the once-chosen populus Israhel) the Christian world stands in need of rebuke and correc tion. Salvian explains, "Itaque rectissime nobis dicitur illud quod Iudaeis in lege fidentibus dixit sermo diuinus" [Therefore the words of the divine Scripture ( i . e . , the warnings of Jeremiah ) spoken to the Jews who trusted in the Law are most correctly applied to us ] ( 4 64 . 27- 29 ) . Salvi an's adaptation of the populus Israhel mythos includes a motive for

The Populus Israhel Tradition 13 I

reading, interpreting, and empathizing: only through knowledge of historical events and their proper interpretation, through empathy and understanding, and through active and rigorous participation in God's covenant can one retain the name of "Israel." In this hermeneutic, the populus Israhel serves an important heuristic function, enabling the Christian populus to see itself and its path : "Quo utique ostenditur quod, si ista non facimus, superfine nobis catholici nominis praesump tione plaudamus" [ By this surely it is shown that if we do not change our ways, it is useless for us to assert our claim to the catholic name ] ( 4 64 . 3 6- 3 7 ) . In Salvian's hand, the populus Israhel mythos is a stylus with which to compose the abstract and brief chronicle of his own time, to give it the fullness of memory and purpose .

Paulinus of Nola and Psalm

I3 6

Paulinus of Nola shows us that the ideological flexibility of the populus Israhel mythos can be a source of consolation as well as a mode of chastisement, an exemplum of endurance as well as a lesson for the wicked. Carmen 2 6 ( composed 4 0 2 C. E . ) celebrates the day of St. Felix's triumphant death and his assumption into the divine company of saints . Paulinus explains that the troubled political events of the day ( specifically, the aftermath of Alaric's sack of Rome in 4 0 I C.E. ) should not impede celebration of Felix's glory ( Carm. 26.29- 3 4 ) . 3 3 In the following lines Paulinus uses the fortunes of the populus Israhel to argue his point: like the Jews, who suffered across the arc of elation and bitter chastisement, the latter-day chosen populus Christianus must persevere stoically through times of trouble . The passage merits quotation in full: Legifer ut quondam Pharii tellure tyranni pascha sacrum Moyses prima sub lege dicauit sanctaque tunc Iudaea, domo licet inpius illos maturare fugam ualida ui cogeret hostis, libertate tamen deuoti pectoris audax nee turbante metu iussum sollemne reliquit, sed trepidans fugiensque licet diuina peregit 3 3 · On this context see Trout, Paulintts of Nola, r r 8 - 1 9 ; Walsh, Poems ofPMtlinus ofNola, 403 , note r . For the impact of the barbarian invasions on the general literary culture of the early fifth century see Roberts, "Barbarians in Gaul. "

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festa, salutifero laetis epulatus in agno coetibus et ficto Christi iam sanguine uictor, duxit ouans !aetas uicto Pharaone choreas (inde fugae memores etiam nunc azyma sumunt Iudaei solo retinentes nomine gentem, infermentatis pulsi quia panibus olim Aegypto fecere fugam; paribus modo signis per patrios, sed iam per inania sabbata, ritus antiqui recolunt uestigia grata timoris; nam frustra ueterem uacua sub imagine legem exercent, uerum nobis quia pascha repleuit unus pro cunctis patri datus hostia Christus, et quia corpus adest uitae, perit umbra figurae ) : sic igitur modo nos turbato in tempore laeti, mente pia festum dilecti martyris omnes conlatis hilarae studiis pietatis agamus . [ Long ago, Moses the lawgiver dedicated the sacred lamb, under the first Law in the land of the Egyptian tyrant. At that time even though the impious enemy with irresistible might compelled the Jews to hasten their flight from home-holy Judaea neverthe less emboldened themselves in the freedom of their devout hearts and did not cast away the solemn command of the Lord in their quaking fear. Instead, although trembling and fearful, Judaea per formed the holy rites and feasted upon the lamb of salvation in joyous groups. Now victorious and rejoicing in the seeming blood of Christ, Moses led his happy band away from the de feated Pharoah. And from that time even to this present day the Jews-retaining only the name of that race-eat unleavened bread because then, when they were expelled and made to flee from Egypt, their loaves were unleavened. Now, in all lands they follow a similar observance , but on behalf of an empty Sabbath, duly accepting the just traces of that ancient fear. For in vain do they follow the old Law, labor under a worthless symbol; because Christ alone has fulfilled the true paschal lamb for us, given as a sacrifice to the Father for all of us . His living body is present among us, and the shadow of that figure passes away. So there fore let us be happy in this fashion, in this turbulent age, and let

The Populus Israhel Tradition I33

us all with pious minds carry out the festival of our esteemed martyr Felix, united in the zeal of blessed piety. ] Like Rufinus-Eusebius, Paulinus emphasizes that the Hebrews are crea tures of the Law: "under the first Law" [prima sub lege] the Jews were "then holy Judaea" [sancta tunc Iudaea] , "bold" [ audax] in the face of danger; and there they "did not cast away the solemn command of the Lord in their quaking fear" [ nee turbante metu iussum sollemne reliquit] . The fall of the Jews is foreshadowed in Paulinus's description of Judaea as audax: primarily a term of praise in context (the Jews, even under harsh conditions, maintaining their courage ) , audax can also imply too bold, "audacious. " The overweening pride of the Jews rumbles under the connotations of the word . Like automatons, the Jews maintain the old rites but now in service of an "empty Sabbath" [ inania sabbata] . Pau linus perhaps allows a note of sadness to enter his lines as he shows the Jews reliving the "traces ofthat ancient fear," in vain (frustra) attempting to follow the old law "under a worthless symbol" [ uacua sub imagine] . Moses, in his triumph, was exalting in only "the seeming [ or false ] blood of Christ" [jicto Christ . . . sanguine] . Caught in the pointless worship of emptiness, the Jews embody, in their mechanical devotion, the sad flltil ity of a people surpassed. Paulinus concludes that Christ is all, through whose body "the shadow of that figure passes away" [perit umbra jigurae] , and through whom Christians become the "true" Israel.H 3 4 · Another well-known Christian Latin poet, Avitus of Avienne (ca. 4 5 0-ca. p 8 C.E . ) uses the phrase "tme Israel" [ vents Israe[j in reference to the Christian populus at the end of the fifth book of his De spiritualis historiae gestis, a poetic adaptation of parts of the Old Testa ment. The poet has denounced Jews throughout, but here at the very end, after the Hebrews have crossed the Red Sea in triumph, we learn that the crossing symbolizes Christian baptism and the emergence on the far bank of the New Israel: Si quid triste tltit, dictum est quod paupere versu, Terserit hie sacri memorabilis unda triumphi, Gaudia quo resonant, crimen quo tollitur omne Per lavacrum vivitque novus pereunte veterno; Quo bona consurgunt, quo noxia facta necantur, Israhel verus sacris quo tingitur undis; Consona quo celebrat persultans turba tropaeum, Quo praecurrentes conplentur dona figurae, Quas pius explicuit per quinque volumina vates. ( 5 - 7 I I - I 9 , by book and line numbers. ) [But whatever grim events have been narrated in this poor verse, these too will have been cleansed by the memorable water of that holy triumph in which joys resound, by

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The language and imagery of figural understanding establishes a framework of identification-the Jews are U!i) Paulinus implies, yet not us : we follow them, yet hope to avoid their ultimate fate . He con cludes, therefore : Credite non armis neque uiribus esse timendos allophylum populos, quos propter crimina nostra offensi mouet ira dei, ut formidine mortis excitet ad curam uitae torpentia corda. ( Carm. 2 6 . 70- 7 3 ) [Be sure that what we are to fear is not the might of foreign races in armed men, because they are being aroused by God's wrath for our sins, so that through the fear of death they rouse our sluggish hearts for the love of life . ] Poetry, history, and figural understanding-all meet under the ru bric of the populus Israhel mythos. Let us turn to another example of the manipulation of the hermeneutic in various late antique and early medi eval texts : the poetic adaptation of Psalm I 3 6 (Super flumina Baby lonis) . The full text of the psalm is as follows : I . Super £lumina Babylonis, illic sedimus et flevimus cum rec ordaremur Sion. 2 . In salicibus in medio eius suspendimus organa nostra. 3 . Quia illic interrogaverunt nos qui captivos duxerunt nos verba cantionum. Et qui abduxerunt nos "Hymnum cantate nobis de canticis Sion . " 4 . Quomodo cantabimus canticum Domini i n terra aliena? 5 . Si oblitus fi1ero tui, Hierusalem, oblivioni detur dextera mea. 6. Adhereat lingua mea faucibus meis, si non meminero tui : si non praeposuero Hierusalem in principia laetitiae meae . 7 · Memor esto, Domine , filiorum Edom, diem Hierusalem: qui dicunt "Exinanite, exinanite, usque ad fundamentum in ea." which all sins are taken away, through whose purgation the new man lives as the old dies, from which all good arises, and by which deadly deeds are slain, by whose holy waters the trtte Israel is washed, in which a harmonious throng rejoices and celebrates its victory and in which are fl.1lfilled the figures that foreshadowed flnure gifts, figures which the holy prophet explained in his five volumes; emphases added. ]

The Populus Israhel Tradition I35

8 . Filia Babylonis, misera: beatus qui retribuet tibi retributionem tuam quam retribuisti nobis . 9 · Beatus qui tenebit et adlidet parvulos tuos ad petram. r . [ Upon the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and wept when we remembered Sion. 2. On the willows in the midst therofwe hung up our instmments . 3 . For there they that led us into captivity required of us the words of songs. And they that carried us away said: "Sing ye to us a hymn of the songs of Sion." 4 · How shall we sing the song of the Lord in a strange land? 5 . If I forget thee, 0 Jemsalem, let my right hand be forgotten. 6. Let my tongue cleave to my j aws, if i do not remember thee : if I make not Jerusalem the beginning of my joy. 7 · Remember, 0 Lord, the children of Edom, in the day of Jerusalem: who say, "Raze it, raze it, even to the foundation thereof. " 8 . 0 daughter of Babylon, miserable : blessed shall he be who shall repay thee thy payment which thou hast paid us . 9 · Blessed be he that shall take and dash thy little ones against the rock.] Compelling in its elegiac longing and nostalgia, this psalm falls easily into the populus Israhel mythos. Pmdentius adapts the text in his poem Captivitas Israel) drawing out and dwelling upon its elegiac tone : Gens Hebraeomm peccamine capta frequenti fleuerat exilium dirae Babylonis ad amnes, tum patrios cantare modos praecepta recusat organaque in ramis salicis suspendit amarae . 3 5 [ Captive because of their frequent sins the race of the Hebrews bewept their exile upon the rivers of cruel Babylon; although commanded, they refused in those days to sing the songs of their nation and hung their harps on the bitter willow tree's branches. ] Prudentius retains select vocabulary from the psalm (flevimus>fleuera�· salicibus> salici�· organa> organaque) but adds telling enhanced details . 3 5 . Prudentius, Tituli Historiarum, 8 9 - 9 2 ( "XXIII: Captivitas Israef') ( Carmina, eeL Cunningham, 3 9 0 - 4 0 2 ) .

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The first-person plural of the psalm is discarded for the more specific gens Hebraeorum. In the poem the Hebrews are captive because of their "frequent sins" [peccamine captafrequenti] , but in the psalm any intellec tual reason, justification or explanation for the captivity is left unspeci fied. The psalm's "songs of Sion," the "song of the Lord," become both less exalted and more particular: the "songs of their nation" [patrios . . . modos] . The willow tree of the psalm turns "bitter" [ amarae] in Pru dentius's poem . In all these changes the psalm necessarily moves fur ther from the originally Hebrew source-text in the process of poetic adaptation, changing to something more decidedly Christian, encod ing an interpretation shaped by the populus Israhel tradition. The Jews cannot be a "we" in Prudentius's poem; they are "them," the gens Hebraeorum) enduring their exile ( exilium-a word Prudenti us adds ) in the historical past (tunc). They brought about their own fate with their transgressions, and bitter indeed it is . We can see a similar but more elaborate adaptation of this text and tradition in Paulinus's Carmen 9 · When the misfortunes of a nation beckon, this psalm falls naturally to hand. Paulinus's Carmina 6- 9 are verse paraphrases of Scripture : Carmen 9 is a remarkable adaptation of Psalm r 3 6, expanding and developing the elegiac tone, heightening the emotion, and finally, providing it with a Christian interpretation and context in 7 1 hexameter lines. These poems are not simply meditative or academic/rhetorical exercises, but instead speal' to the struggle be tween Christian and pagan culture in the empire in the fourth century; as Walsh notes, these poems ( 6- 9 ) "have a contemporary relevance as shots in the ideological battle which Paulinus wages on the secular Roman world. " 3 6 Although the "lexicon" is inherited and traditional, the expression of the Christian understanding of Jews and Judaism always responds to a particular historical context. The famous opening image of the psalm found in the first two verses ( "Upon the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and wept when we remem bered Sion. On the willows in the midst thereof we hung up our instruments" ) is expanded and transformed in Carmen 9 :

3 6 . Walsh, Poems of Paulinus (if' Nola, 20; see also, generally, r 6- 20 and the commentary on 3 6 r - 63 . Cf. Carruthers, Craft, 67- 6 8 . For another reminiscence of Psalm r 3 6, see Carmen 20, lines 5 2- 5 3 ; see Witke, Numen Litterarum, 9 3 . Howe discusses the Old English translation of the psalm in "Falling into Place," r 4 - I 7 , an essay that came late to my hand.

The Populus Israhel Tradition I37

Sedimus ignotos dirae Babylonis ad amnes captiui, Iudaea manus, miserabile flentes, cum patrium memori traheremus pectore Sion et meritum iusta suspiraremus ab ira exilium, lentis qua consita ripa salictis hospitibus populis umbras praebebat arnicas . Illic Assyriae mediis in moenibus urbis obliti !aetas per maesta silentia uoces de salicum ramis suspendimus organa nostra. ( Carm. 9 . 1 - 9 ) [We, a band o f Jews, sat beside the unknown waters of cruel Babylon as captives, weeping miserably as we called our native Sion into the memory of our hearts . We sighed for our deserved exile sent by God's just anger, on the bank which was planted with delightful willow branches : a place that provided pleasant shade to visiting peoples . There, within the inmost walls of the Assyrian city, we cast from our memory the happy songs in our melancholy silence and we hung our harps upon the willow tree's branches . ] Like Prudentius, Paulinus retains vocabulary from the psalm verses (sedimus> sedimus)· flevimus>flentes)· salicibus> salictis) salicum)· suspendi mus m:gana nostra>suspendimus m:gana nostra)) but the tone shifts in subtle ways , playing off the inspiration of the source-text. Interesting changes abound. Prudentius seems to be behind Paulinus's "cruel wa ters of Babylon" [ dirae Babylonis ad amnes] ( cf. Prudentius, line 90, above ) and the description of the entire situation as an "exile" [ exilium] (ibid. ) . However, Paulinus has moved back into the first-person plural; singing no longer of the gens Hebraeorum) Paulinus instead uses a whole line to define the collective speaker ( "captive," "weeping miser ably" ) , and, in something of a diminution from the gens Hebraeorum) they are a "band ofJews" [ Iudaea manus] . There is an affective develop ment of the psychology of exile here ; Paulinus adds that these are "unknown" [ wnotos] waters . The place of exile is further specified as within the walls of the "Assyrian city," enhancing the notes of exile with a subtle strain of imprisonment. Paulinus also builds a contrast between the beauty of the natural setting and the misery of the Jews

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not found in the psalm or in Prudentius : Paulinus's willow branches are not bitter; they are "delightful" [ lentis] , affording pleasant shade to visiting travelers . But not for the Jews : this is an exile justified by the anger of God (meritum iusta . . . ab ira). In a telling change, the Jews of Paulinus's poem do not "remember Sion" [ recordaremur Sion] ; instead they ultimately "forget" [ obliti] the joyous songs as they hang up their harps. Again, there is interpretation encoded here in this image, drawn from the vast storehouse of the populus Israhel mythos; these Jews have brought this fate upon themselves, because of their own sins, and have thus lost their cultural heritage (i.e., the "songs of their nation" ) . Psalm I 3 6 , bearing in miniature much of the populus Israhel matter, becomes a common figure for exile of all sorts . In a later example the Carolingian Latin poet Gottschalk of Orbais ( ca. 8oo-ca. 8 6 8 C.E . ) uses Psalm I 3 6 in his poem on exile, "Ut quid iubes? " Gottschalk's speaker in the first stanza asks Ut quid iubes pusiole, quare mandas, filiole, carmen dulce me cantare, cum sim Ionge exul valde intra mare? 0 cur iubes canere? 3 7 [Why ever are you commanding, little boy, Why, little son, are you telling me To sing a sweet song, Although I am in exile, far away On this sea? 0 why are you telling me to sing? ] Gottschalk employs the mournful populus Israhel of Psalm I 3 6 to de velop the imagery of exile in his poem: Scis captive plebicule Israheli cognomine praeceptum in Babilone 3 7. Gottschalk, "Ut quid iubes? " I ( Carolingian Poetry, ed. and trans. Godman, p p . 2 2 8 3 3 , by stanza numbers ) .

The Populus Israhel Tradition 1 39

decantare extra Ionge fines Iude . 0 cur iubes canere? Non potuerunt utique, nee debuerunt itaque . Carmen dulce coram gente aliene nostri terre resonare o cur iubes canere? 3 8 [You know that the captive little people Called Israel Was ordered to sing In Babylon, far away From the bounds of Judah. 0 why are you telling me to sing? They simply couldn't And so they didn't have to . 0 why do you command me To sing a sweet song Before the people of a land Foreign to ours? ] As Godman notes, Gottschalk uses the captivity imagery of Psalm I 3 6 as a "figure for spiritual exile"; again, the populus Israhel mythos is flexible, open to a range of adaptations . 3 9 I n Carmen 9 Paulinu s paraphrases the end o f the psalm i n the follow ing lines: 3 8 . Gottschalk, "Ut quid iubes?" s - 6. 3 9 · Godman, Carolittqian Poetry) 2 3 0 . See Godman's commentary on the poem, 3 9 - 4 2 ( esp . 4 I ) and 2 2 8 - 3 2. For another poetic use of Psalm I 3 6 , very different i n nature , see the opening of Milo ofSaint-Amand's poem on sohrietas in Godman, Carolingian Poetry) 3 I O - I 3 . Although outside the scope of this study, it is worth noting the self conscious "biblical cast" of the Carolingian Renaissance : e.g., Charlemagne's kingdom is a "New Israel," with Charle magne himself cast as David at Aachen : see Godman, Carolingian Poetry) 5 , I 2 , and God man's selection from Theodulf 's poetry, I 50- 6 3 , esp. lines 29 - 3 2; and more generally, ]. M. Wallace-Hadrill, Earzy Medieval Histor)\ I 8 I - 2oo, and Early Germanic Kingship) 99- I oo, I06, and especially the excellent study by Garrison, "Franks as the New Israel? "

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Infelix miserae Babylonis filia, felix qui tibi pro nobis in nos tua gesta rependet. Nee minus ille beatus erit, qui parua tenebit et simul elidet solidae tua pignora petrae .

( Carm. 9 . 4 6-49 ) [Unhappy daughter of wretched Babylon, happy will be the one who for us repays your deeds in kind. Not less happy will be the one who seizes your little ones and smashes them against the mas sive rock. ] As the final grim image of the psalm hangs in the air, Christian interpre tation follows . In an allegorical reading of the psalm, the "little cher ished ones" of Babylon represent sins, and the rock symbolizes Christ: Si cupis extincta Babylonis stirpe beari, in te ipso primis gliscentia crimina flammis frange fide . lam propter adest petra Christus; in ipso uipeream sobolem ualidis elide lacertis . ( Carm. 9 · s o- 5 3 ) 4° [ If you wish to be happy when the line of Babylon has been destroyed, shatter the growing sins within you with your faith, before the onset of the flame . For now Christ the Rock is here : with strong arms smash those serpent's children upon him . ] I n this scheme, Babylon's children represent the flesh and its seductive dangers : "Nam Babylon nomen confusio, filia cuius I est caro peccatis mater, quae turba saluti I noxia corporeis ducit mala semina fibris" [For the name "Babylon" means "confusion," and her daughter is the flesh, the mother of sin, that horde which blights salvation and brings evil seeds into the body's internal matter] ( Carm. 9 · 5 4 - 5 6) Y As the poem concludes, it takes on a violent note, surely cued from the ending of the psalm itself, but now fused with a Christian allegory: Ne parcas igitur talem mactare cateruam. non tibi crimen erit nocituram perdere gentem 4 0 . See Walsh, Poems ofPaulinus of Nola, 3 63 note 3 ("Poem 9 " ) . 4 1 . O n the etymology see Walsh, Poems ofPauJimts of Nola, 3 63 note 4 ( "Poem 9 " ) .

The Populus Israhel Tradition I4 I

ultricemque malo perfundere sanguine petram; gaudet enim iustus, si concidat inpia proles; nam magis atque magis pius ista caede piatur, si perimat peccata suis dominantia membris et fracta in Christo uitiomm plebe triumphet. ( Carm. 9 · 6 s - 7 I ) [Therefore do not hesitate to kill this mob . It will not be a sin for you to exterminate a race trying to kill you, and to submerge the avenging Rock in their evil blood. Indeed, the righteous man rejoices if his wicked progeny dies; for by this sort of slaughter a man increases in piety if he kills the sins dominating his body, and exults over the mob of vices destroyed by Christ's power. ] Here text and interpretation mesh within the populus Israhel mythos; the imaginative design spreads far out from the original elegiac topos of Psalm r 3 6. One cannot read the bloody language of Paulinus's interpretation, given the tradition of early medieval anti-Judaic ideol ogy, and not feel a foreboding about the delicate line between calls to exterminate sins of the flesh and analogous invective against human, Jewish flesh.42 " [T]he elegiac is often accompanied by a diffused, resigned, melan choly sense of the passing of time, of the old order changing and yielding to a new one " : Frye's words ring tme .43 In Carmen 22 Pan linus tells us that: Tempore namque uno tellus communis habebat Iudaeos, quae sola deo tunc lecta fuit gens; et tamen illa dei grauis hostibus ira superbis permixtos inter populos discreta cucurrit. ( Carm. 22.94- 9 7 ) [For there was a time when the Jews had a common land; at that time they were alone God's chosen people . But the anger of God 4 2 . Paulinus's poem also reflects its political context; according to Walsh; he chooses this psalm because "this Old Testament theme seemed to have a pressing relevance to the age. The Jews, the chosen people of old, had been the victims of persecution by Babylon. Now in the Christian imagery, pagan Rome is called the daughter of Babylon, and as such is contrasted by Christian apologists with the new Jerusalem, the civitas Dei" (Walsh, Poems ofPaulinus of Nola, r 9 ) . 4 3 . Anatomy of Criticism, 3 6- 3 7 .

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weighs heavily upon proud foes, and they have now been sepa rated and have scattered away among intermingled races . ] Thus, we see in Paulinus of Nola the flexibility o f the populus Israel mythos, the way it can be deployed in various ways, reacting to new cultural situations. The interacting tropes of judgment upon the once chosen people, exile and supercession of the old by the new, all play about the image of the populus Israhel in a profound rhythm of history and elegy. Like many literary traditions, this combination of image, metaphor, rhetoric, and narrative displays a remarkable longevity and basic integrity, even as it responds and changes in the hands of different authors and eras, changing political and social contexts . Its expression in Anglo-Saxon England is no exception.

F O UR

The Populus Israhel Tradition in B ritain

Gildas he influence of the populus Israhel mythos in Anglo-Saxon England comes from many quarters . An important conduit was Gildas's De excidio et conquestu Britanniae ( mid- sixth century; hereafter DEB) , a lament for the destruction of Roman Britain by invading Germanic pagan tribes in the mid-fifth century. r Like Salvi an, Gildas uses the populus Israhel mythos as a way to denounce his own people, the native Romano-British population. 2 The calamities that overtake the Britons, in the form of the invading and rampaging Saxons, constitute a test of the Britons as a latter-day Israel. Once again, the repetitive cycle of the chosen race locks into place for another Christian nation. Gildas's pref ace to the DEB details how he formerly read of the tribulations of God's chosen people in the Old Testament; a people that had been

T

I . On the importance of Gild as as a model for later historians of Britain, see Hanning, Vision of History, 44- 62; and Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, 8 - 4 9 , passim. For a caveat concerning Hanning's promotion of Gildas's text as a model for Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica see Ray, "Bede, the Exegete, as Historian," 1 3 9 note 47· Perhaps the best introduction to Gildas is the collection of essays edited by Lapidge and Dumville, Gildas: New App roaches; see also Sims-Williams, "Gild as and the Anglo-Saxons. " 2. On the similarity of Gildas and Salvian, see Higham, English ConqTtest, 8 - 9 .

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"very dear to God" [ deo carissimum] had broken his laws and command ments .3 In Gildas's hermeneutic, the Old Testament functions as a mirror: "Ista ego multa alia veluti speculum quoddam vitae nostrae in scripturis veteribus intuens" [I gazed on these things and many others in the Old Testament as though on a mirror reflecting our own life ] ( L 7, trans. I 4 ) .4 When he turned to the complementary New Testa ment, he received enlightenment: "ibi legebam darius quae mihi forsi tan antea obscura fl1erant, cessante umbra ac veritate firmius inlucescente" [ I read there more clearly what had previously, perhaps, been dark to me : the shadow passed away, and the truth shone forth more boldly] ( I . 7- 8 , trans . I 4 ) . Driven by this mimetic imperative , history seems to repeat itself, and Gildas cannot help but compare British events with the Old Testament turmoil of the Jews . 5 And in an analogous fashion, Gildas will place himself in the company of the Old Testament prophets, using their words against his own countrymen. As he declares, "Respondeant . . . vates . . . contumacibus superbisque huius aetatis principibus" [Let them, the prophets, reply to the proud and stubborn princes of this age ] ( 3 7 · 3 , trans. 3 6 ) . 6 Gildas saw himself as a latter-day prophet in the Old Testament mode; as Patrick Sims Williams describes him, Gildas was a "fearless critic of the present age who refers to past events and past prophecies only insofar as they reveal the pattern of history, the origins of the present order, and the inevit able consequences of disregarding the moral laws of God."7 The native Britons, abandoned by the withdrawal of the Roman legions, fall into corruption; as Orosius, Salvian, and Eusebius before him, and Bede after, Gildas narrates the fate of a native folk as they feel the wrath of divine retribution: a foreign people serves as God's ham mer. 8 If God did not spare his chosen of old, Gildas muses, what will he do to a latter-day, lesser populus Dei ? 3 . DEB r . 3 , trans. I 3 . Citations from the DEB are from the edition of Winterbottom, by chapter and section numbers inserted parenthetically in the text. The translation is by Win terbottom ( occasionally with my own changes), cited by page number. 4 · Neil Wright detects an echo of Cicero's In Pisonem here : see "Gildas's Prose Style, " I I I ; see also Higham, English Conquest, 8 I - 8 2 . 5 . For example, Gild as compares Alban's "parting" of the Thames with the crossing of the Jordan by the Israelites ( 1 1 . 1 , trans. I 9 - 20 ) ; on this moment see Hanning, Vision uf History, 5 3 · Cf DEB 24 .2, trans. 27. 6. On the influence of ]eremiah on Gildas see Higham, English Conquest, 67- 8 9 . 7 · Sims-Williams, "Gildas and the Anglo-Saxons," 2 . 8 . O n Gildas's use of Orosius (with a fine overview o f the issue) see Neil Wright. "Did Gildas Read Orosius ? " ; Wright treats Gildas's use of Rufinus in the same article, 4 I - 4 2 .

The Populus Israhd Tradition in Britain 14 5

Haec igitur et multo plura quae brevitatis causa omittenda de crevimus cum qualicumque cordis compunctione attonita mente saepius volvens, si, inquam, peculiari ex omnibus nationibus populo, semini regali gentique sanctae, ad quam dixerat: "primo genitus mens Israel," eiusque sacerdotibus, prophetis, regibus, per tot saecula apostolo ministro membrisque illius primitivae ec clesiae dominus non pepercit, cum a recto tramite deviarint, quid tali huius atramento aetatis factums est? Cui praeter ilia nefanda immaniaque peccata quae communiter cum omnibus mundi sce leratis agit, accedit etiam illud veluti ingenitum quid et indelebile insipientiae pondus et levitatis ineluctabile . ( I . I 3 , trans . I 5 ) 9 [For ( I said to myself ) when they strayed from the right track the Lord did not spare a people that was peculiarly his own among all nations, a royal stock, a holy race, to whom he had said: "Israel is my first-born son," [Exodus 4 : 2 2 ] or its priests, prophets, and kings, over so many centuries the apostle, minister, and members of that primitive church . What then will he do with this great black blot on our generation? It has heinous and appalling sins in common with all the wicked ones of the world; but over and above that, it has as though inborn in it a load of ignorance and folly that cannot be erased or avoided. ] Note that to better chastise the Britons, Gildas exalts the qualities of the Jews . They are a "people that was peculiarly his ( i . e . , God's) own among all nations, a royal stock, a holy race." This is one of the intrigu ing aspects of the populus Israhel mythos : in drawing these comparisons with the Jews-whether by contrast or similitude-the Jews often come across as a worthy model. Admittedly, they are perhaps most often a model by contrast: "Do not be like them"; however, whether they are the Jews of old and thus noble, or the ravaged, once-proud remnant now serving only as an example of bygone power and sover eignty, their paradigmatic function necessitates a measure of empathy, simply by virtue of the structure of the traditional comparison. Gildas describes the Britons in terms quite similar to anti-Judaic rhetoric . The Britons are willfully intransigent: "Haec erecta cervice et 9 · membrisque illius primitivae ecclesiae is an echo of John Cassian's Collationes 1 7 . 2 0 , "omnesque illius ecclesiae primitivae praecipui principes"; the expression is common in Cas sian's work (Wright, "Gildas's Reading," 1 3 7 ) .

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mente, ex quo inhabitata est, nunc deo, interdum civibus, nonnum quam etiam transmarinis regibus et subiectis ingrata consurgit" [ Ever since it was first inhabited, Britain has been ungratefully rebelling, stiff necked and haughty, now against God, now against its own country men, sometimes even against kings from abroad and their subjects ] ( 4 . 1 , trans . 1 7 ) . 10 When the Britons decide to invite the Saxons into their land, Gildas calls them blind: "Tum omnes consiliarii una cum superbo tyranno caecantur" [Then all the members of the council, to gether with the proud tyrant (i.e . , the native British king Vortigern) , were struck blind] ( 2 3 . 1 , trans . 2 6 ) . In response to the fatal British decision to invite the Saxons into the country, Gildas can only exclaim, "0 altissimam sensus caliginem ! [ How utter the blindness of their minds ! ] ( 2 3 . 2 , trans. 2 6 ) . 11 Given the dominant hermeneutic of Gil das's outlook-reading the history of his own times and people as replicating the misfortunes of the Old Testament populus Israhel-these descriptions of the Britons as stiff-necked, blind, and stubborn reso nate perfectly with other common anti-Judaic tropes of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages. 1 2 The repetitive pattern of chastisement and restitution even seems to influence Gildas's perception of the fortunes of the British as the Saxon storm breaks. The leadership of Ambrosius Aurelianus (a proto- King Arthur figure ) temporarily holds the line : "Ex eo tempore nunc cives, nunc hastes, vincebant, ut in ista gente experiretur dominus solito more praesentem Israelem, utmm diligat eum an non" [ From then on victory went now to our countrymen, now to their enemies: so that in this people the Lord could make trial ( as he tends to ) of his latter-day I O . Gildas echoes here Jerome, Epistola 2 2 . I 3 and 6o.I 6, and perhaps Job I 5 : 26 ( "erecto collo et pingui cemice armatus est" : see Neil Wright, "Gildas's Reading, " I 4 3 ) . Cf DEB 47 . I , trans . 4 2 . I I . Lapidge cites this and similar exclamations, comparing them to parallels in Cicero, as evidence for Gildas's education in rhetoric: see "Gildas's Education," 4 5 - 4 6 . Howe com ments on this passage in M(qration and Mythmaking, 4 2-4 5 , observing, "By referring to their blindness, Gildas opposes their perception of the Saxons as saviors with his perception of them as destroyers" ( 4 3 ) . I 2 . Gildas also describes the Britons with a selection of beast imagery: see Sutherland, "Imagery of Gildas's De Excidio Britanniae," I 5 8 - 62 . Such imagery, which denies the Britions "the capabilities peculiar to, and constitutive of, humanity-the power of speech and of social organization-[ capabilities] which uphold the distinction between bn1te and ra tional beings" (Sutherland, "Imagery of Gild as's De Excidio Britanniae," I 6 2) parallels similar descriptions of the Jews as possessed by a bestial madness.

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Israel to see whether it loves him or not] ( 2 6. I , trans . 2 8 ) . I 3 For Gildas, the Britons are the praesens Israel) the latter-day, or current and present people of Israel; he later chastises the British priests for not doing enough "ad constabilitionem spiritalis Israel" [for the establish ment of a spiritual Israel] ( 70. I , trans . 5 5 ) . For Bede also, following in Gildas's footsteps, the native Britons seem all too close to the blind, stubborn, sinning Israel, left after their sins to wander the rocks of exile and mourn their lot by strange waters . As Nicholas Howe notes, Gildas's influence on later Anglo-Saxon authors extends to the "elusive qualities of vision and tone."I4 In Migration and Mythmaking in Anglo Saxon England Howe convincingly details the cultural myth of the "migrating Anglo-Saxons," the animating memory of the exodus of the Germanic tribes in England; here we have a similar, overlapping model. What this model implies is that if the Britons "are" the Old Israel, the former chosen, then of course the Anglo-Saxons are the New Israel, the present-day chosen, but subject now to the same cycle of apostasy and restitution.

Alcuin Alcuin of York ( ca. 740- 804 C.E . ) was an important figure in ninth century intellectual history. An Anglo-Saxon by birth and education, he was brought to Charlemagne's court and became one of the archi tects of the Carolingian Renaissance . Alcuin thus serves as a representa tive of high culture in early medieval Europe and Anglo-Saxon En gland, one whose finger would be on the pulse of Christian cultural issues such as the understanding of Jews . In his long epic poem on the history ofYork (�rsus de patribus regibus et sanctis Euboricensis ecclesiae)) which details the history of the city, including the Anglo-Saxon inva sion period, the Saxons are no longer simply the barbaric sword of a wrathful God. Before the Anglo-Saxons inhabited Britain, the "lazy race of the Britons" [gens pigra Britonum] held sway. I 5 In contrast, the I 3 . This is an imitation of Judges 3 : 4 , " ut in ipsis experiretur Israhelem utmm audiret mandata domini . . . an non" ( see Neil Wright, "Gildas's Reading," I 27 ) . On the praesens Israel in this passage see Hanning, Vision of History, 5 5 ; and Howe, Migration and Mythmak ing, 4 5 - 4 6 . 1 4 . Micqration and Mythmaking, 4 7 . I 5 . Alcuin, Versus de patribus, 4 I ( Alcuin: The Bishops, Kings, and Saints of Yiwk, ed . Godman), citations by line number.

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Saxons are a people "antiqua, patens bellis et corpore praestans" [an cient, powerful in war, superior in body] ( 4 6 ) . Here is history written from the victors' perspective . No longer simply the barbaric sword of a wrathful God, Alcuin's ancestors now take their place, in his encomium to the civilized ideal ofYork, as the New Israel. These righteous Saxons drive the Britons from England, becoming the true populus Dei: Hoc pietate Dei visum, quod gens scelerata ob sua de terris patrum peccata periret intraretque suas populus felicior urbes, qui servaturus Domini praecepta fuisset. Quod fuit affatim factum, donante Tonante iam nova dum crebris viguerunt sceptra triumphis et reges ex se iam coepit habere potentes gens ventura Dei. [ In his blessedness God saw to it that the accursed race should lose the lands of their ancestors by their own sins; and that a more fortunate people should enter their cities, a people that would keep fast the commands of the Lord. This came to pass quite well, with the consent of God Almighty. For a new power then grew to prosperity in abounding victory; and God's race of the future now began to bring forth powerful kings from its own people . ] The pattern here is clear: the "accursed/criminaljdefiled people" [gens scelerata] gives way to God's race of the future (gens ventura Dei)-the Anglo-Saxons . Details are familiar from the long tradition we have been outlining, such as the old race bringing about its own destruction ( ob sua . . . peccata) ; what is lost to the ancient race is their ancestral land (de terris patrum . . . periret))· the distinguishing factor of the new chosen people is their commitment to God's commands (servaturus Domini praecepta fuisset) and their vast, unbounded potential for the future . We can also turn to Alcuin for an example of the elegiac texture of the populus Israhel mythos. In his poem on the sack of the Lindisfarne monastery by Viking raiders in 79 3 C.E. (De clade Lindisfarensis mona sterii)) he consoles the survivors with an elegy on the transitory nature of the present world. He opens the poem by mourning the sad turning of fortune, the great fluctuating patterns of joy and sorrow: "Prospera

The Populus Israhd Tradition in Britain 1 49

conturbat sors tristibus impia semper, / Alternis vicibus ut redit unda maris" [ Impious chance always afflicts the good things in life with sorrow; like the waves of the sea, it always goes back and forth in varying changes] . I 6 Imposing a rhythm and pattern of events upon the world's chaos is a shaping act of imaginative design, providing in miniature a reflection of the wider historical forces at work in Alcuin's conception. From generalized statements of the unstable world, Alcuin moves to specific examples of kingdoms, once great, now thrown down by the grinding movement of history-Babylon, Persia, Rome, and so forth. In a moving apostrophe, Alcuin sings of Jerusalem, a symbol of the lost magnificence of the populus Israhel: Quid te, sacta, canam, David urbs inclita regis, In mundo m1llis aequiperanda locis? In te templa dei, cultus, laus, gloria, virtus, In te mansit ovans sancta propago patrum. Dum tua, quis teneat lacrimas, nunc ultima cernit: Gens inimica deo iam tua tecta tenet. Hen, Iudea, tuis habitator in urbibus errat Rarus in antiquis, laus tua tota perit. Nobile nam templum toto et venerabile in orbe Quod Salomon fecit, Caldea flamma vorat. Deicit hoc iterum Romana potentia bellis, In cineres solvens moenia, tecta simul. Ecce, relicta domus Siloe per secla remansit, In qua sancta dei area potentis erat. [What will I sing of you, holy, renowned city of King David, without compare in the world? In you dwelt the temples of God, worship, praise, glory, virtue; in you dwelt the triumphant holy children of the patriarchs . Who can hold back tears when he sees your final end: a race hateful to God now holds your dwellings . Alas Judaea, the population of your city of old wanders scattered. Your glory has passed away completely. The Chaldean flame de vours the noble temple, venerated throughout the world, that I 6. Alcuin, De clade Lindisfarensis monasterii, I s - I 6; citations are by line numbers. I 7. Cf Alcuin's prose letter to the monks of Lindisfarne on the same subject ( Two Alcuin Letter-Books, ed. Chase, 5 0 - 5 2 , 3 8 - 4 7 ) .

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Solomon wrought. The might of Rome crushed it again in war, reducing its walls and roofs to ashes. Behold the home at Siloam, abandoned and left behind through the ages, in which stood the holy ark of God's power. ] In a gnomic statement familiar from any number of Old English po ems, Alcuin concludes: "Sic fugit omne decus, hominis quod dextera fecit, /Gloria seclorum sic velut umbra volat" [Thus passes all the glory made by the hand of man; the splendor of the earthly world disappears like a shadow] ( 5 5 - 5 6) . Alcuin's lament for Jerusalem is, of course, simultaneously a lament for Lindisfarne; in this rhetoric the Jews are equated with the English monks, the Chaldeans and Romans implicitly finding their counterparts in the Vikings. Once again, when the populus Israhel mythos is deployed in a specific historical and cultural context, it tends to paint the Jews in a worthy light. The play of similitude fimc tions as consolation in Alcuin's poetic lament. As Alcuin notes, a rational explanation of these dire events of world history and their reflection in the vicious sacking of the monastery can only go so far: "Talia, cur, Iesu, fieri permittis in orbe / Iudico occulto, non ego scire queo" [ I cannot know why, Jesus, in your hidden judg ment such disasters are allowed to happen in the world] ( 8 5 - 8 6 ) . All he can muster is the notion that suffering purifies the soul and readies it for the next life; thus God's chastisement is a manifestation of his love, the ultimate end and reason knowable only to him : Aurum ut flamma probat, iustos temptatio mundat, Purior utque anima sidera celsa petat. Quemque pater natum caro complectit amore, Saepius huic tristi dura flagella a dabit. [ Just as the flame tests gold, so temptation cleanses righteous men; and so the purer soul may seek the heavenly stars . . . . The father embraces with love the child whom later he will mournfully strike with hard blows . ] The loving application of chastisement to a chosen people, a populus Dei known and esteemed of old but now fallen: this prevailing and

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enduring image, built up through a long tradition of history and poetic image , from Eusebius to Alcuin and beyond, provides a context, a significant background, for the understanding of certain Old English poems .

Old English Scriptural Poetry: Genesis A and Judith It is a commonplace in the criticism of the Old English scriptural poetry-especially on those poems based in the main on Old Testa ment sources, Genesis) Judith) Exodus) Dan iel-that the Old English compositions tend to present the biblical past in a distinctly Germanic light. r s As Howe states in a discussion of the Exodus-poet's ability to cast the Israelites as Germanic warriors : "These Jews are not distant figures from biblical history, rendered accessible only through figural identification; they are warriors who belong in the heroic world cele brated by the secular poems of the language. " r 9 Thus in Genesis A) for example, Abraham is a Hebrew eorl) as is Lot.20 Abraham, like a Ger manic hero-king, is also the "friend of the Hebrews" [ wine Ebrea] and the "chief of the Hebrews" [Mago Ebrea] ( 2 8 r 7a, 29 1 7a) . The Ger manic "beasts of battle" motif follows Abraham's martial exploits, and many scenes of the poem correspond to other topoi of Old English battle-poetry ( e . g . , Genesis A r 9 8 2- 20 1 7; 203 9 - 9 5 ) . Certainly this Germanic-heroic coloring of the Old Testament is not to be disputed: such a melding of cultural forms gives these Old English poems their distinctive power. However, one might go further in appreciation of this mode of poetic composition, beyond the deployment of Old Enr 8 . See, inter alia, Kennedy, Cedmon Poems, xxvii- xxxix; Raw, Art and Background, 8 2 3 ; Clemoes, Interactions, 229 - 7 2 (chapter T "Vernacular Poetic Narrative in a Christian World" ) . On the Germanic "coloring" of Genesis A see Doane, Genesis A, 40- 4 1 , 70- 7 3 ; Godden, "Biblical Literature," 209- r o ; on Exodus see Irving, Exodus, r 6 3 0 - 3 r ; Lucas, Exodus, 64 - 6 5 ; on judith see Godden, "Biblical Literamre," 220- 22; Griffith, judith, 6270. judith is found in the Bemvulf manuscript (British Museum, Cotton Vitelli us A.xv; see Griffith, Judith, r - 8 ) ; Genesis, Exodus, and Daniel are found in the so-called Junius manu script ( Oxford, Bodleian Library, Ms. Junius XI) . For a thorough introduction to the poems of the Junius manuscript, with comprehensive reviews of scholarship , sources and contexts, paleography and codicology see Remley, Old E7tqlish Biblical Verse, r - 9 3 , and Karkov, Text and Picture in Anglo-Saxon England. 1 9 . Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, S o ; see also his "Falling into Place. " 20. Genesis A 202 1 , Genesis A 2 4 4 6 , respectively ( Genesis, The fTmius Manuscript, ed . Krapp, ASPR r , r - 8 7 ) , by line numbers. I have also regularly consulted the edition by Doane, adopting his readings and interpretations in several instances. ,

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glish rhetorical formulas and the distinctive use of poetic vocabulary and type-scenes. What is the animating impulse behind this poetry? What context might apply to its understanding? As Shepherd notes, the Junius poems "deal mainly with the collective destiny oflsrael and the Church."2I If one keeps in mind the vastly perva sive tradition of the populus Israhel mythos as developed in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages-its poetic complexity and power-as one reads the Old English Old Testament biblical poetry, such a context can bring added nuance and understanding to the achievement of these po ems and what they meant as cultural statements, both to their authors and to their possible readers and auditors, as difficult as these may be to determine . The Genesis A-poet tells us ofthe origin ofthe Hebrews : many descen dants sprang from Cam, including Shem and his son Eber, the epony mous founder of "unrim peoda, pa nu eedelingas, / ealle eordbuend, Ebrei hatad" [ multitudes of people, whom princes and all the earth's inhabitants now call Hebrews ] ( I 64 7-4 8 ) . Calling to mind the bold mythic origins of any number of northern tribes, these people are "strong heroes" [ roft rincas] ( I 6 5 I a) who move resolutely to seek a new homeland upon the plain of Shinar : Gewiton him pa eastan eehta leedan, feoh and feorme . Folc wees anmod; rofe rincas sohton rumre land, odpeet hie becomon cordrum miclum, folc ferende, peer hie feestlice eedelinga bearn, eard genamon. Gesetton pa Sennar sidne and widne leoda reeswan leofl1m mannum heora geardagum grene wongas, feegre foldan, him fordwearde on deere deegtide dugude weeron, wilna gehwilces weaxende sped. [They left the east, bringing all their possessions, cattle and goods. They were a determined people; bold warriors , they 2 I . Shepherd, "Scriptural Poetry," 22.

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sought a more spacious land, until finally that wandering race, the children of princes, arrived in great hosts where they could se curely settle a homeland. The leaders of that people and all their esteemed men settled far and wide throughout Shinar. In their bygone time the green fields fair upon the earth were a constant blessing to them in their days, growing prosperity in all their desires. ] This is a familiar dynamic : the Hebrews reach their destination, and achieve a measure of glory that begins to dim even as it glows at its brightest in Shinar's green and pleasant land. This passage begins by completely endorsing the migrating Hebrews; yet notice how the populus Israhel narrative pattern of rise and fall merges seamlessly with the migrating dynamic : D a p;rr mon m;rnig b e his m;rgwine , oderne bxd xdeling anmod, p;res hie him to mxrde, ;rr seo mengeo eft geond foldan bearm tofaran sceolde, leoda m;rgde on landsocne burh geworhte and to beacne torr up arxrde to rodortunglum. "Pxs pe hie gesohton Sennera feld, folces rxswan, swa pa foremeahtige pa yldestan oft and gelome larum sohton lidsum gewunedon; weras to weorce and to wrohtscipe, odpxt for wlence and for wonhygdum cyddon crxft heora, ceastre worhton and to heofnum up hlxdrx rxrdon, strengum stepton stxnenne weall ofer monna gemet, mxn)a georne, hxled mid honda. ( r 66 r - 7 8 a) [There many a man, every resolute prince among his kin, urged one another that for their own honor and before their number their unity of tribes-should again scatter among the sons of men in search of new land, they should found a city and raise up

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a tower unto the stars of the firmament. And so they then sought the fields of Shinar, just as the mighty past heroes of their people, their ancestors, had often dwelt in happiness. They searched for men with skills to do this work and evil act; and finally it came to pass that in their pride and folly they proclaimed their skill, estab lished their city, raised the many stories of the tower to the heav ens in their power, and erected a stone wall beyond the measure of mankind-they did all this with their own hands, those men so eager for glory. ] The Tower of Babel is built not only as a sign of unified glory and power before their kin should scatter over the earth, but also to com memorate their mighty heroic ancestors who had dwelt there in joy ( r 664- 7oa) . These "proto-Hebrews" of Genesis A are the Jews of the populus Israhel tradition; noble, powerful, and united, their pride, how ever, is exemplified in the height of the vainglorious Tower of Babel. Poised, almost literally, at the pinnacle of success, the Hebrews in this passage shift without warning from the noble seekers of a homeland to boastful criminals, mighty men terrible in their day, but ready now for the inevitable fall, the entire arc mirrored by the movement from lin guistic unity to the crashing chaos of tongues in the post-Babel world. When unity is sundered by linguistic diversity, the rhythmic process begins again, and the people go four separate ways . The rise of Abra ham's line is described in suitably noble, amplified terms : Weox pa under wolcnum and wrioade mxgburh Semes, oopxt mon awoc on pxre cneorisse, cynebearna rim, peawum hydig. pancolmod wer, ( 1 702- 5 ) [Then the line of Shem prospered and grew under the skies, until one was born among the number of the noble children of that tribe, a wise man, prudent in habits . ] This "wise man" []Jancolmod wer] is Abraham's father, Thare, here unnamed; his advent is afforded a nobility and mystery akin to Scyld's, arriving as the savior of the Danes in the beginning of Beowulf. As the populus Israhel begins its upward arc it is led by heroic leaders who arise

The Populus Israhd Tradition in Britain I55

not alone, but in the context of a whole lineage of noble "ring-givers. " The tone and movement o f the passage reflect not only the established tradition of the nobility of the Old Testament Jews in general, but of the pre-Mosaic patriarchs in particular: this man's sons, Abraham and Aaron, are "leaders, heroes bold of courage" [frumgaran) I h.ele/J hige rof] ( I 7o8b-9a) . Abraham and his nephew Lot shine in the glory of renown : Da magorincas metode ge}:mngon, Abraham and Loth, unforcuOlice, swa him from yldrum x3elu wxron on woruldrice; for3on hie wide nu duge3um dema3 drihtfolca beam. [Then the warriors, Abraham and Lot, prospered nobly in the Lord, as the lineage in the kingdom descended to them from their elders; because of this, among the heavenly hosts they now widely judge the children of men. ] The "lineage" [ te/Jelu] that fell upon these two heroes is the great bur den of being the populus Dei. Even as he describes their prosperity within the ambit of the Lord's power on earth, the poet shifts to the time nu) projecting this former vanguard of the populus Israhel into the future, enjoying their bliss in heaven after the te/Jelu has been passed to a latter-day generation. Once again, this represents the upward move ment of the populus Israhel> the establishment of the chosen race and their righteousness. The force of the populus Israhel mythos, however, shadows this glorification with the inevitable sense that a downward turn must be in the future . Perhaps the way to think of this fusion of ancient tradition and Old English idiom is that the populus Israhel mythos structure demands that, at this point in the "historical cycle," the populus Israhel be pre sented in as positive terms as possible . Hence in the Old English poetic idiom Abraham must lead, and exemplifY, the best of peoples. For example, after Abraham's victory over the forces of Sodom, the de feated king of the sinful city comes forth to ask for the return of his once-captive women, but he offers to let Abraham keep the booty he has won. Abraham returns the treasure (excepting a share for a few of

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his comrades) and in a grim speech the "halga . . . /Ebrea leod arna gemyndig" [ holy lord . . . /of the Hebrew people, mindful of honor] ( 2 r 6 3 b - 4 ) concludes: Gewit ]:m ferian nu ham hyrsted gold and healsma:geo, leoda idesa. l>u pe laora ne pearft ha:leoa hildpra:ce hwile onsittan, noromanna wig. Eacne fuglas blodige sittao, under beorhhleo]:mm peodherga wa:le piece gefYlled. [ Go now and bear home the ornamented gold and the beloved maidens, the women of your people . You do not need to fear for some time the attack of the enemy soldiers, the war of the north men. Gorged, the birds of prey sit bloody under the mountain cliffs, sated with the slaughter of the host. ] This is a spirited adaptation of the biblical Abraham . As the strongest and most resolute of races at this point in the populus Israhel cycle, the Hebrews are portrayed in Genesis A) through Abraham, as the fiercest of tribes . The populus Israhel mythos provides an additional context for under standing a subject thought to be so "typically Anglo-Saxon" in Old En glish poetry as exile . Again in Genesis A Abraham explains to Abimelech why during his travels he has deceptively told people Sarah was his sister, rather than his wife . Again, the biblical source verses are very spare, and the Old English poetic expansion is revealing; Abraham explains : Ac ic me, gumena baldor, guobordes sweng leodmagum feor lare gebearh, siooan me se halga of hyrde frean, mines fa:der fYrn alxdde . Ic fela siooan folca gesohte, wina uncuora, and pis wif mid me, freonda feasceaft. Ic pxes fa:res a 2 2 . Following Doane's edition, I retain the manuscript

eacne

(line 2 r 59b )

.

The Populus Israhd Tradition in Britain I57

on wenum sxt hwonne me wraora sum ell]xodigne aldre beheowe, se oe him pxs idese eft agan wolde . Foroon ic wigsmioum wordum sxgde sweostor wxre pxt Sarra min pxr wit earda leas xghwxr eoroan winnan sceoldon. mid wealandum [But I, far from my people, 0 prince of men, protected myself against the clash of the warlike shield with cunning, after the holy one long ago led me from the household of my lord, of my father. I, and that woman with me-both deprived of companions sought afterward many races, many strange friends . I have always expected this danger, that an enemy, one who wished to possess this woman for himself, would cut short my life-me, a foreign stranger. Therefore I told the warriors that Sarah was my sister anywhere the both of us, deprived of our homes, had to stmggle among foreign nations. ] Abraham and Sarah's predicament calls to mind the elegiac paths of protagonists in poems such as The Wanderer and The Seafarery as well as the mournful ebb and flow of Beowulf-a sad, desolate tone often thought a singular feature of Old English poetry. I concur, but should we not also see the populus Israhel mythos working behind these particu lar lines? The mythos was so pervasive , such a commonplace of Chris tian thinking at the most basic level, that regardless of the special circumstances of composition and reception involving Genesis A ( or any of the poems under scrutiny here ) we should duly place the longer patterns of the populus Israhel mythos-moving in the background of the subject matter-into the critical repertoire necessary for an effec tive reading of Old English biblical poetry. 2 4 As expressed in an Old 2 3 . Cf. Genesis 20: I I- I 3 : "Abraham answered: 'I thought with myself, saying "Perhaps there is not the fear of God in this place; and they will kill me for the sake of my wife . " Howbeit, otherwise also she is truly my sister, the daughter of my father, and not the daughter of my mother, and I took her to wife . And after God brought me out of my father's house, I said to her, "Thou shalt do me this kindness: in every place to which we shall come, thou shalt say that I am thy brother.""' 24 . Frank asserts that the Genesis-poet's proclivity for wordplay "had peculiar power to express a mood of cyclic inevitability and timelessness" ( "Some Uses of Paronomasia," 2I 5 ) .

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English poetic idiom, the populus Israhel mythos would acquire a fur ther depth, a deeper nuance, as the vernacular rendering could point to the English appropriation of historical tradition as the new, Anglo Saxon, Israel. The historical character of the poem is brought out by Nina Boyd; she does not see the poem, as Ruppe and Doane do, as completely permeated by patristic learning and exegesis; instead, Gene sis A "is a version of history on which the poet has superimposed a framework of moral values which is restricted to a purely secular con cept of propriety and nobility."25 Her reading perhaps goes too far in simplifying the poem as, therefore, a "moral poem, in which 'good' deeds are rewarded."26 I do not doubt that secular (i.e., "Germanic" ) concepts of morality are superimposed upon the narrative's historical framework to some degree, but I would add that other influ ences are also at work: the populus Israhel mythos, powerfully so . The same can be said for Judith) a poem its most recent editor aptly describes as "a work of historical fiction which illustrates God's special relationship with the Israelites. "27 When the Hebrews and Assyrians clash in battle after Judith's execution of Holofernes, the two opposed enemies are described in terms of territory and ancient confli cts : H<eleO w<eron yrre, landbuende, laOum cynne, stopon styrnmode, stercedferhoe, wrehton unsofte ealdgeniOlan 28 medowerige . [The heroes, the native inhabitants of the land ( i . e . , the He brews ) , were enraged against the hated race . Stern-hearted and determined, they advanced and ungently awoke their drunken ancient enemies. ] At 3 I4a the Hebrews are again called the "native inhabitants of the land" [ londbuendum] , while the Asyrians are "their ancient enemies" 2 5 . Boyd, "Doctrine and Criticism, " 2 3 7. Hill also concludes that Genesis A is "before all else a historical poem," by comparing the text with Latin historiographic f(mnulas noting the death or passing of various characters ( "Variegated Obit," r o r ) . 26. Boyd, "Doctrine and Criticism, " 2 3 7 . 2 7 . Griffith, judith, 5 I . 2 8 . All citations are from Griffith's edition, by line numbers.

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[ hyra ealdfeondum] ( 3 I 5 a ) ; the Hebrews are "the guardians of the homeland" [ eoelweardas] ( 3 2oa ) , while the Assyrians are their "persecu tors of old" [ ealdhettende] ( 3 2ob ) . 29 Like Abraham's line, or the "proto-Hebrews" who initially claim the plain of Shinar in Genesis A) the Jewish army is presented here as God's chosen. The Hebrews are successful in the stmggle against their foe :

Mxgen nealxhte, folc Ebrea, fuhton pearle heardum heoruwxpnum, hxfte guidon hyra fYrngcflitu, fagum swyrdum, ealde xf3oncan. Assyria wean) on oam dxgworce dom geswiorod, bxlc forbiged. ( 2 6 I b-7a)3° [The powerful force, the Hebrew people, drew closer; they fought vigorously with their hard swords; with the sword's edge, the stained blade, they avenged their ancient gmdge, the ancient strife. In that day's work the renown of Assyria came to an end, their pride humbled. ]

When one looks past the grim flash of blood and swords, the Orosian movement of rise and fall comes into focus : as the Hebrews draw closer into the foreground of this battle scene, the final result is that the Assyrians pass away. One people rises, another falls-the very essence of the populus Israhel mythos . The Assyrians, of course, were never God's chosen, per se, but the general stmctural pattern of the populus Israhel mythos leaves its telltale mark. In the climax of Judith) the populus Dei is at one of the peaks of its glory, owing all to the special designation and touch of the Lord . As the Hebrews triumph, the surviving enemy flees the battle :

2 9 . Griffith notes that "the Assyrians are the ancient enemies of the Hebrews; the same term is used of the Babylonians in Daniel 5 7 , 4 5 3 and, elsewhere, in the singular, of Satan or, in the plural, of his minions" (Judith, 1 4 2 , note on 3 1 5a). 30. I adopt Griffith's tentative definition of hefte as "sword-hilt, sword? " : see Griffith, Judith, 1 3 5 - 3 6, note on 263b, and glossary s.v. heft.

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him on laste for sweot Ebrea sigore geweor6od, dome gedyrsod. Him feng dryhten god fxgre on fultum, frea xlmihtig. [Exalted in glory, honored in victory, the army of the Hebrews moved on their trail ; the Lord God, almighty King, came to their aid. ] As the Hebrews advance on a stark, simple verb (for)) the Assyrians fade from the light with an equally simple movement: I>xr on greot gefeoll se hyhsta dxl heafodgerimes Assiria ealdordugu6e, la6an cynnes . Lythwon becom cwicera to cy66e . ( 3 o7b- r r a; emphasis mine ) [There in the dust fell the greatest part of the total number of the Assyrian nobility, of that hated race . Few reached their home alive . ] As the chosen, proud, triumphant race carries its booty to the home land, we sense, with the aid of the populus Israhel context, the workings of a great cycle, constant and terrible, glorious and doomed: I>a seo cneoris eall, mxg6a mxrost, anes mon6es fYrst, wlanc, wundenlocc, wxgon ond lxddon to 6xre beorhtan byrig, Bethuliam . [Then the entire race, most famous of nations, proud and curly haired, carried and led (treasures ) into that shining city Bethulia for a whole month . ] As the chosen people enter a gleaming city, laden with treasure, the medieval reader tuned to the populus Israhel mythos knows that such

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glory, indeed like all earthly renown and achievement, will one day pass away, the mantle passed on eventually to a new folic The Hebrews are commended for their justifiable pride , their wlanc in their victory; however, remember that it was for wlence that the inhabitants of Shinar built the Tower of Babel in Genesis AY

Old English Scriptural Poetry: Exodus In the Old English poem Exodus) a highly allusive , obscure adaptation of the Exodus story, the warlike Abraham makes another appearance ; within the knotted, enigmatic images o f the poem, the Exodus-Abra ham is no less Germanic than the Genesis A version. In Exodus the mass of the Hebrews enters the parted Red Sea, tribe by tribe ( cynn after cynne) 3 5 I a) : 3 2 Cude xghwilc mxgburga riht, swa him Moises bead, eorla xdelo Him wxs an fxder, leof leodfruma, landriht gepah, freomagum leof. frod on ferhde, Cende cneowsibbe cenra manna heahfxdera sum, halige peode, Israela cyn, onriht godes, swa ]:>xt orpancum ealde reccad ]:>a pe mxgburge mxst gefrunon, frumcyn feora, fxderxdelo gehwxs . ( 3 s r b- 6 r ) 3 3 3 I . Griffith notes, "The victory of the Hebrews over the Assyrians is viewed by the poet as the manifestation of their spiritual ascendancy" ( Griffith, Judith, 62 ) . Thus, Griffith goes on to suggest, this is why the poet expands the battle at the end of the poem so extensively from tl1e source. 3 2 . Exodus, as is well known, presents a host of textual and interpretative difficulties. I have used as my base text the edition by Krapp in The Junius Manuscript, ASPR I , 9 I - I07, but have consulted the editions of Tolkien, Irving, and Lucas, as well as Irving's supplements to his edition ( "New Notes" and "Exodus Retraced " ) . In general, I have adopted a conserva tive stance to the text and its problems. Citations are by line numbers. 3 3 . Tolkien notes that mtegbur;ga riht "probably means Israel as a group of kindreds, since the riht that Moses had declared to tl1em was common to all the Chosen People" ( Exodus, 64 , note on line 3 5 2 ) . Lucas disagrees and explains this as "the correct position for each tribe," i . e . , in the procession (Lucas, Exodus, I 22, note on line 3 5 2 ) . Irving sees eitl1er interpretation as a possibility: '"[ t ]he right of the tribes,' either the rights to which each tribe was entitled,

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[Each one knew the birthright of the tribe, the noble lineage of the men, just as Moses has proclaimed. There was one father of them all (i.e., Abraham ) , a beloved leader of his people, who had received the right to the land : wise in spirit, he was beloved by his noble kin. He, one of the patriarchs, brought forth a race of bold men, a holy people: the tribe of Israel, righteous before God, just as old men skillfully recount, those who most deeply heard tell of the tribes, the origin of men, and the paternal ancestry of each. ] The emphasis on epic origins in this passage is striking. As the tribes step forward the poet traces the deep lineage of the "tribe of Israel" [ Israela cyn] , kept immanent through the skilled living memory of men, and in poetry itself. The poet's establishment of right and lineage (mtegbur;ga riht) eorla teoelo) landriht) frumcyn flora) foderteoelo)) reflects the influence of the populus Israhel tradition, the mythology of a people "righteous before God" [ onrihtgodes] . Note the similarity to the Abra ham in Genesis A) were the "lineage/inheritance" [ t£0elu] descended to his line "in the world" [ on woruldrice] from their "ancestors" [from yldrum] ( I 7 I 6- I 7a) . The poetic emphasis on origins, land granted by God, chosen folc and a mighty ruler calls to mind-almost inevitably, once this broad context has been reconstructed-the complex of the populus Israhel mythos . 3 4 But again this triumph of the Hebrews, when or, more exactly, the position each tribe was to take" ( Exodus, 8 3 , note on line 3 5 2 ) . Tolkien translates onriht as "rightful, legitimate" : "The Israelites were the 'true/legitimate' people of God" ( Exodus, 6 5 , note on line 3 5 8 ; so also Irving, Exodus, 8 9 , note on line 3 5 8 ) . Following the suggestion of Robinson ( "Significance of Names," 19 3 - 94 ), Irving ( "New Notes," 3 r 3 , note on line 3 5 8 ) and Lucas explain that onrihtgodes is a translation ofJerome's etymology for Israel ( rectus Domini) . 3 4 · This section leads into the so-called patriarchal digression of the poem ( 3 62- 4 4 6 ) , following which there i s a lacuna in the manuscript; when the poem resumes, the E!,,'yptian army is drowning in the Red Sea. Once thought to be an odd interpolation, the integral place of this account of Noah, Abraham, and the sacrifice of Isaac (and other subject matter lost in the manuscript lacuna) has been clarified by the sequence of studies relating Exodus to the baptismal liturgy and to patristic learning : tl1e seminal study is Earl, "Christian Tradition"; see also the balanced discussion of the Christian doctrinal sources of the poem in Lucas, Exodus, s r - 6o (the liturgy on 5 9 - 60 ) . Hauer cogently presents the various arguments for the aptness of the digression in "Patriarchal Digression. " In his edition Irving dismissed the liturgical approach to understanding tl1e poem, but in "Exodus Retraced" he admitted tl1e possibility: "[I]t is probably tme, I now realize, that a liturgical model must have inevitably given the poem some of its shape, though we must be wary of simply transferring the full 'meaning' of the liturgy to the poem itself " (" Exodus Retraced, " 2 0 5 ) . My analysis here does not depend on an either/or choice between tl1ese ways of iliinking about tl1e poem; ilie

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set against the tempestuous background of the populus Israhel) has a fleeting q uality. 3 5 Hauer notes that one of the connections between the patriarchal digression and the main text of the poem is the digression's interest in establishing a genealogy: "the poet is presenting the pedi gree, as it were, of Israel as an insight to its national character."3 6 Aside from the stories of Noah, Abraham, and Isaac, the poet also pauses to look ahead, in one of his rapid shifts in temporal perspective, to the building of the temple. On the very ground of Sion, where God stayed Abraham's hand, the temple would later rise: wuldor gesawon, Wxre hie pxr fundon, halige heahtreowe , swa hxleo gefrunon. l>xr eft se snottra sunu Dauides, wuldorfxst cyning, witgan !arum getimbrede tempe! gode, eorocyninga alh haligne, se wisesta on woruldrice, heahst and haligost, hxleoum gefrxgost, mxst and mxrost, para pe manna bearn, fira xfter foldan, folmum geworhte . [And there (i.e., on Mount Sion ) , so men have heard, they found a covenant and a holy pledge; they saw God's glory. And, after ward, there the wise son of David, the glorious king, built with his wise teachings a temple to God. The wisest of all earthly kings in the world's realms established a holy shrine, the highest and "liturgical axis" of scholarly/critical work on the poem helps to explain the unity of the text ( or at least one aspect of its unity), through placing it in a specific intellectual tradition, and thus might suggest something about the use of the poem or its original context. Yet at the same time Exodus is not, after all, a liturgical text-it is a vernacular narrative poem, surely speaking ( at the very least) to somewhat diflerent desires in terms of composition and reception. As Irving so often lamented, the poetic texture of Exodus tends to be overlooked in the stampede to align it with the liturgy. 3 5 . Cf. also the contrast between the resounding triumph of the fourth and fifth acts of Shakespeare's Henr_y V and the sudden foreshadowing of the inevitable fall to come detailed in the Chorus's epilogue to the play. 3 6 . Hauer, "Patriarchal Digression, " 8 o . 3 7 · I follow Lucas in translating witgan larum ( 3 9ob) as "wise teachings"; but cf. Tol kien, Exodus, 66, note on line 390, and Irving, Exodus, s .v. wit(e)ga.

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most sacred, famed among men, the greatest and most splendid of all things the children of men have built upon the earth . ] I t i s a s i f the poet, i n the instant o fpause at the climax o fthe Exodus, sees the flow of God's history, the history of the populus Israhel scroll out before him, in multiple perspectives. And yet as glorious and triumphant as the moment is, in the manuscript context (where the text of Exodus follows Genesis A and B and precedes Danie� the building of Solomon's temple appears to look back to the building of the Tower of Babel in Genesis A, and forward to the destruction ofJerusalem in the beginning of Daniel.3 8 Whether the compiler ofJunius XI did or did not intend this concatenation is irrelevant: the imaginative design of the populus Israhel provides a meaningfi1l pattern to sacred history, across the poetry of the codex. Just after the climax of the poem, once the Egyptians have drowned in the flo od, the poet pauses to tell us that on the shore Moses spoke to the Israelites in a "holy speech" [ halige spr£ce] , imparting to them "eter nal laws" [ ece r£das] and a "profound message" [ deop £rende] ( 5 r 8b, s r 6b, 5 l9a) . 3 9 However, Moses does not get to his speech until more than thirty lines later, at line 5 5 4; instead we have another effective moment of drawn-out anticipation. As we wait with an expectant ear to hear Moses' "profound message," the poet instead tells us that Dxgweorc ne mad swa gyt werdeode, on gewritum findad doma gehwilcne , para de him drihten bebead sodum wordum. on pam sidfate

3 8 . See Hauer, "Patriarchal Digression," 8 5 - 8 6 . On the figural dimensions of this pas sage see J. Hall, "Building of the Temple . " 3 9 · Tolkien translates ece rtedas a s "eternal counsels" ( Exodus, 3 1 , line 4 4 2 ) . Lucas notes that the phrase "probably refers to the content of the f(Jllowing reported speech" ( Lucas, Exodus, 1 4 1 , note tO line 5 1 6) . 4 0 . Following Tolkien and Lucas, I accept their retention of the manuscript reading dteg weorc as dttCJWeorc and accept their emendation of manuscript nemnaiJ to ne mao: see Tolkien, Exodus, 7 5 , notes to line 5 1 8 and lines 5 1 9 - 4 7 ; Lucas, Exodus, 1 4 2 , note to line 5 1 9 . Irving emended dtegweorc to dtegword ( Exodus, 97- 9 8 , note to line 5 6 1 ) but later retracted his stance and restored the manuscript reading ( "New Notes," 3 20- 2 1 , note on lines 5 1 9 - 20 ) . Thus, the reading Dtegweorc ne mao seems to have prevailed (for now). Also following Lucas , I tal(e dtegweorc as the subject of ne maO (Lucas, Exodus, s.v. dttqJveorc) . [O}n gewritum is glossed by

The Populus Israhd Tradition in Britain r 6s

[The deeds of that day did not remain concealed, just as nations still find in writings each decree that the Lord proclaimed to them on that journey in true words . ] Suddenly establishing a different temporal perspective, the poem opens out into a broader realm of hermeneutics and prophecy. The poet then presents an enigmatic digression stretching from lines 5 2 3 - 5 4 8 , which seems to call for some particular interpretative key, perhaps figural in nature : the poem tells us that the soul has the keys to unlock the understanding of the spirit; that as a result mysteries will be clarified, the darkness of ignorance dispelled; that this wisdom will lead to a realization of the ephemeral nature of the transitory world and to the joys of eternal life awaiting in the beyond; that the terrors of hell wait below, but the promise of final judgment and glory gives hope to exiled souls who will be led, in the end, on the final exodus to heavenly blissY In other words, in the expectant space before the delivery of Moses' words, the poet presents the issue of interpretation: we are to understand that the entire preceding Exodus narrative carries meanings other than the literal. As this space of interpretation is dramatically inserted, it colors our understanding of Moses' words when he finally does get to utter them, released from his moment of silence and slow time.42 The poet returns to the narrative and to Moses, reminding us of the gravity of the moment: Swa reordode manna mildost,

rxda gemyndig mihtum swided,

Tolkien, Irving, and Lucas as "in Scriptures, " but the simpler translation "in writings" (with the Scriptures implied, of course) perhaps preserves the typical riddling ambiguity of the poet's diction. 4 r . This "allegorical digression" has also occasioned a great deal of commentary: see Lucas , Exodus 3 2- 3 3 for a summary. Tolkien thinks that the poet has Moses' later sermoniz ing to the Hebrews in mind here, since no biblical account has Moses speaking to the people in this fashion on the shore ; but he adds that he believes the passage is an interpolation ( Exodus, 7 5 , note on lines 5 1 9 - 4 7 ) . Shippey notes that this digression may not necessarily be an encouragement to figural interpretation, per se: "However, one might also see the poet here as turning from his main subject to exhort his readers to apply the story to themselves, using a full apprehension of history to find solid faith . . . " ( Old English Verse, 1 4 2 ) . 4 2 . C f. Andersson's discussion of "suspended action" in the epic tradition, Earzy Epic Scenery, 3 0- 3 2 , 44 - 4 5 , and Auerbach's famous analysis of the suspenseful digression on Odysseus's scar in Mimesis, 3 - 7 .

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hludan stefne; here stille bad witodes willan, wundor ongeton, modiges muoh;rl [Thus, mindful of wisdom, the kindest of men spoke with loud voice, strengthened in might. Silently the host awaited the will of the ordained one; they perceived a wondrous thing: the spoken word of salvation from their valiant leader's mouth . ] I n a hushed, dramatic pause the assembled Israelites hang upon Moses' imminent words; and they are also, in this capacity, a proxy for the audience of the poem-Moses speaks to the assembled multitudes and to the reader/auditor: Micel is peos menigeo, mxgenwisa trum fullesta m;rst, se oas fare l;rdeo; hafao us on Cananea cyn gelyfed brade rice; burh and beagas, wile nu gel;rstan p;rt he lange gehet mid aosware , engla drihten, in fyrndagum fxderyncynne, gif ge gehealdao halige lare, p;rt ge feonda gehwone foro ofergangao, gesittao sigerice be s;rm tweonum, beorselas beorna. Bio eower blxd micel. [ Great is this company, strong the war-leader; he who leads this journey ( i . e . , God) is the greatest of supports . He has delivered unto us the tribe of Canaan, their city and treasures, a broad kingdom. He will now fulfill that which he, the Lord of Angels, long ago promised with sworn oath to the forefathers in days long ago : that if you preserve his holy teaching, you shall over come every enemy, shall reside in a realm of victory between the two seas, in joyful halls of men. Great shall be your glory. ] 4 3 · Following Irving and Lucas, I take 7Vitodes as genitive singular masculine ( "the or (lained one" [i.e . , Moses ] ) ; but cf. Tolkien, Exodus, 77, note to line 5 5 I ·

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[ G] ifge gehealdao halige !are: this is perhaps the key clause in Moses' address . The glorious triumph of the populus Israhel) fresh in the plunder and triumph of the Red Sea crossing, will endure if-only if-the Jews can "preserve his holy teachings. " Kruger identifies this moment, when the Egyptians are described as a drihtfolca m.est at the end of the poem ( calling to mind the same use of the epithet to describe the Israelites at line 3 22 ) , as part of the poem's subtle dual movement: while it estab lishes binary oppositions that move the poem (and reader) toward some form of allegorical interpretation, a simultaneous contrary movement undermines those oppositions, blurring them by means of, in Kruger's words, an "emphasis on process" and forcing the reader "back into the undecided historical 'now' of the poem."44 In this fashion, the distinc tions between the Egyptians and the Israelites begin to lose integrity: "The poet's undermining of strict oppositions allows us to see the common-human-ground connecting the two enemies. We see both nations together, as human actors playing out a human story."45 As Moses' words raise the inevitable conditional qualification ( "if" ) , they also open the poem, unfold its action so that its patterns provoke paral lels with the larger, ever-replicating rhythms of the populus Israhel mythos. Exodus is one of the most puzzling of Old English poems; reading it against the populus Israhel context certainly does not solve its manifold problems . However, it does allow us to understand somewhat better its overall shape and narrative rhythm. Exodus certainly appears to incorpo rate some sort of figural aspect; to what extent and purpose has long been a subject of debate . However, the poem has also always been recognized for its "historiographic dimension" : Tolkien notes that the poem "is at once an historical poem about events of extreme impor tance, an account of the preservation of the chosen people and the fulfillment of the promises made to Abraham; and it is an allegory of the soul, or of the Church of militant souls, marching under the hand of God, pursued by the powers of darkness, until it attains to the promised land of Heaven."46 Irving, the staunch defender of the poem 44· Kruger, "Oppositions," I 6 8 ; cf. Frank, "What Kind of Poetry Is Exodus? " I 9 5 - 9 6 . 4 5 . Kruger, "Oppositions," I 6 8 . 4 6 . Tolkien, Exodus, 3 3 · Shippey draws attention to the Exodus-poet's "natural bent towards history" ( Old English Verse, I 4 I ) and notes that " [ t ]he four poets of the earlier part of this manuscript [i.e., the authors of Genesis A and B, Exodus, and Danie{j seem more willing to allow their stories to speak for themselves, drawing only such conclusions from them as are

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qua poem, noted in his edition that the "impression the poet gives throughout [is] that he is soaked in the Old Testament atmosphere and is familiar with the somewhat primitive psychology of the earlier books of the Pentateuch. "47 In his work on "migration myth," Howe draws attention to the "ancestral history" found in the verses of Exodus)· he argues that " [ t ]he poet's sense of history was shaped by the practice of drawing parallels between events in the Old and New Testaments. The belief that events repeat themselves at different times and in different places enabled the poet to use the model of Exodus for envisioning the ancestral migration according to a central pattern in Christian his tory."4 8 What is common here in all this critical work is the sense that, as Irving put it, the "tme heroic protagonist of the poem is not in fact Moses, but a collective hero : the children of Israel. "49 The process of history, the shape it takes under the populus Israhel mythos, and the interpretation it requires, all define the true subject of Exodus. so most obvious from the events recorded. They are all 'devoted to the story as story,' concerned less with the 'Why?' of events than with the 'How? ' It is this quality which has made the poems resistant to allegorical or figural readings" ( Old English Verse, I 5 3 ) . Shippey is drawing on Irving's well-known dictum from his edition of Exodus: "Whether or not the poet was aware of the widespread allegorical interpretation of the exodus as man's progress to salvation-there is some definite evidence that he was-the effect of the poem as a whole almost inevitably suggests something of the kind. Yet what is perhaps more import
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Old English Scriptural Poetry: Daniel The mythos of the populus Israhel perhaps appears most clearly in the 0 ld English poem known to modern editors as Daniel. Daniel is a 7 64line adaptation of the Old Testament story ofDaniel and Nebuchadnez zar. It has some characteristics reminiscent of hagiography, appears to speak to the medieval fascination with magic, marvels, dreams, and portents, and also borrows from the populus Israhel tradition. The very opening of the poem sounds the dignified notes of epic Israel : Gefrxgn ic Hebreos eadge lifgean goldhold dxlan, in Hierusalem, cyningdom habban, swa him gecynde wxs, si66an }mrh metodes mxgen on Moyses hand wear6 wig gifen, wigena mxnieo, and hie of Egyptum ut aforon, mxgene micle . I>xt wxs modig cynY [ I have heard tell of the Hebrews living happily in Jerusalem, dividing a gold hoard and possessing a kingdom, as was natural for them, after a host, a company of warriors had been given into the hand of Moses through the might of the Creator, and they had departed from out of Egypt by a great miracle. That was a brave race . ] These initial verses exhibit the quality Thomas Greene attributes to epic poetry: [Epic] language must become, in whatever way the poet finds, the language of awe; it must itself register awe, and it must invite original and remarkable moments as the sudden vivid flash of description, in Exodus, of the unplumbed sea-bottom revealed by the parting of the waters but never seen by men before or since. Even at this moment of crisis the poet is fascinated by the instant of discovery set against an almost completely hidden past" ( Shippey, Old English Verse, I 5 4 ) . 5 1 · Daniel I - 7 ; i n his edition o f the Junius poems, Krapp aptly calls this opening a "conventional epic formula" (Junius Manuscript, xxxi) . Farrell states that this opening section has no biblical source ( Daniel, 27, 3 I , 3 4 ) ; however, cf. Jost, "Biblical Sources," who adduces possible parallels ti'om Chronicles and Jeremiah. Remley calls these lines an "exordium on the fortunes of Israel" ( Old English Biblical Verse, 2 5 5 ; see 2 5 5 - 7 3 for a summary of the critical scholarship on the opening of Daniel as well as an analysis of its relationship to source texts) . Citations ti'om Daniel are from tl1e edition by Krapp in The Junius Manuscript, ASP R I , I I I 3 2, by line numbers. I have regularly consulted the edition by Farrell and have adopted his readings and interpretations at several points.

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the audience to awe . It must remind the audience that the story told is no ordinary story, concerning no ordinary men; it must withdraw into its heroic remoteness, with its own uncommon rhythms and diction and tropes . . . The language must emulate the weight of the story with its own austere solemnity."F These Hebrews, like those in Genesis A) Judith and Exodus are also pre sented in a "Germanic" idiom. From the opening gefr¥Jnan-formula, placing the action in the deep poetic past and creating a traditional narra tor "who re-creates, who re-enacts, who remembers the sayings (utter ances) of the past and through his own acts of poetic discourse makes them present again";53 to the dividing and sharing of a "gold hoard" ; to the citation o f a powerful founding father o f myth ( in this case, Moses ) ; to the final pithy half-line, curt with the stark understatement dignifying so many Old English poems and marking an end to the open ing movement-all these devices allow the Anglo-Saxon audience to see the noble protagonists of Daniel in terms of a living epic tradition . 54 In the poem, as long as the Hebrews kept faith with God, they mled successfully and enjoyed his favor; he gave them "spirit and strength" [ mod and mihte] to destroy their enemies, so that "hie oft fela folca feore gesceodon [they often cut short the life of many peoples] who were not loyal to God ( I 4a, I 5 ) . They are the chosen, and this is the way the Anglo-Saxon tradition depicts status : the Daniel-narrator ex horts us to attend to the gesta Hebraeorum in the same way that the Beowulf-poet calls upon his audience to hearken to the "power of the spear-Danes, of the tribal kings, how those noble princes did coura geous deeds" [ Gar-Dena . . . I ]Jeodcyninga ]Jrym . . . I hu oa £jJelingas ellen fremedon) I - 3 ] . However, the Hebrews turn their backs on God after their time of glory, when "hie wlenco anwod xt winpege I deofoldxdum, dnmcne gedohtas" [pride invaded them, their drunken thoughts, at the banquet in their devilish deeds] ( I 7- I 8 ) . Once again, 5 2 . Descentfrom Heaven, 24; see also Greenfield, "Bemvulfand Epic Tragedy," I O I . 5 3 . Parks, '"I Heard' Formulas," 4 7; on the poetic function of these formulas, see also (in ter alia) Raw, Art and Back�qrmmd, 3 0- 3 3 · On the construction ofthis type of narrative voice, see Greenfield, "Authenticating Voice," and Clemoes, Interactions, I 69- 8 8 , esp . I 69 - 7 3 . 5 4 · Farrell notes that this introductory section of Daniel "introduces central themes about which the action of the poem revolves" ( Daniel, 3 4 ) . Cf. Beowulf,' I - I I , ending the opening movement of the poem with the half-line "pxt wxs god cyning" ( I I b ). Citations to Beowulj'are from the edition by Klaeber, by line numbers; I have also regularly consulted the edition by Mitchell and Robinson.

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it is pride (wlenco) that provides the catalyst for ruin. In the same manner (to continue the Beowulfcomparison for a moment), when the Scyldings succumb to despair in the beginning of Beowu!£ worn out by the long feud with Grendel, they also fall prey to evil thoughts and diabolic influence : Hwilum hie geheton a:t ha:rgtrafum wigweor}mnga, wordum ba:don, geoce gefremede pa:t him gastbona wio peod}Jreatum. Swylc wa:s peaw hyra, ha:penra hyht; helle gemundon in modsefan. [At times they (i.e . , the Danes) vowed praise to idols in temples, asked in words that the soul-slayer might give them help in their nation's disasters . Such was their custom, the hope of heathens; they remembered hell in their minds . ] The narrator follows this description of pagan rites with an explanation of the Danes' separation from God, explaining that they were ignorant of true divinity, did not know the Lord, nor how to worship the "King of Glory" [ wuldres Waldend] ( r 8 3 a ) . The text then concludes this "exem plary moment" with a generalized hortatory comment: Wa bio pa:m oe sceal lmrh slione nio sawle bescufan in fYres fa:pm, frofre ne wenan, wihte gewendan . Wei bio pa:m pe mot a:fter deaoda:ge Drihten secean ond to Fa:der fa:pmum freooo wilnian. [Woe shall be to the one who must, in terrible affliction, cast his soul into the fire's embrace, expects no help, no change at all. Well will it be for the one who is allowed, after his death-day, to seek the Father's bosom, ask for peace . ] The Daniel-poet presents the same sequence of thought: like the Scyld ings, the Hebrews divorced themselves from God's essential protection;

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in the Hebrew case, through devilish gluttony and feasting-eating excessively, rather than being eaten excessively, one supposes. In turn, according to the following passage the Daniel-poet tells us that they too "knew not the Lord" and likewise then seals the passage in a similar hortatory fashion : l>a hie xcrxftas ane forleton, metodes mxgenscipe, swa no man scyle his gastes lufan wio gode dxlan. ( 19-21 ) [Then they abandoned the ways of the Law and the power of the Creator: so must a man never separate his soul's love from God. ] As Shippey notes, the Beowulfpoet and the Daniel-poet "share a view of life . " 5 5 This is a narrator familiar to Old English heroic poetry, one that watches peoples come and go, dynasties rise and fall, earthly fame and glory flare and die : l> a geseah i c p a gedriht in gedwolan hweorfan, Israhela cyn unriht don, wommas wyrcean. l>xt wxs weorc gode . ( 2 2- 24 ; emphasis added) [Then I saw that nation, the race of Israel, turning to error, doing evil and committing sins . That was a hardship to God . ] The Hebrews in Exodus inherited mtegburga riht and landriht) establish ing their claim to be a people onriht godes)· here the fallen Hebrews of Daniel turn to error and begin to do unriht. "l>xt wxs weorc gode" [that was a hardship to God] : echoing the brief pithiness of "pxt wxs modig cyn," but presenting the opposite sentiment, the populus Dei begins the familiar and inevitable downward spiral . God sends divine messengers to the Hebrews, but the people cannot deny the pleasures of this world ( eordan dreamas) 3 oa) . 5 6 As the poet describes the onslaught against Jerusalem leading to the 5 5 . Shippey, Old English Verse, 1 4 6 . 5 6. Earthly pleasure also overthrows the Babylonians at the end of Daniel, as it does the Assyrian forces of Holofernes in Judith.

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Babylonian captivity, he gives us a picture of the former exalted status of Israel. God becomes angry with the people to whom he had given a great "possession" [ tehte) 3 4b ] . The narrator explains that the Jews had been the Lord's chosen people : Wisde him a::t frymoe, oa oe on fruman a::r oon metode dyrust, wa:: ron mancynnes dugooa dyrust, drihtne leofost; herepoo to pa::re hean byrig, eorlum eloeodigum, on eaelland pa::r Salem stod seanvum afa:: s tnod, weallum geweorood. [ In the beginning he directed them-a foreign people who once, long ago, had been the most beloved by the Creator, the most loved of all nations, dearest to God-onto the road to the high city, into a homeland where Jerusalem stood defended skillfully and adorned with walls . ] The "race of the Chaldeans" [ Caldea cyn] surrounds Jerusalem; as the tempest builds, Nebuchadnezzar mulls over "hu he Israelum eaoost meahte / purh gromra gang gum an oopringan" [ how he could most easily capture and lead away those men from Israel by fierce attack] ( 42a; so- 5 I ) . The poet builds the tension in this section; within the imagina tive structure ofthe populus Israhel mythos the Jerusalem ofthe Jews is, as always, doomed. But, as the forces advance on the city, we have one last picture of gleaming Jerusalem, home of God's chosen, before the Jews are cast out: Gesamnode pa suoan and noroan wa:: lhreow werod, and west foran to pa::r e hean byrig. herigte ha:: oencyninga eoelweardas Israela penden hie let metod. ha::fdon lufan, lifwelan, [Then he gathered from the north and south a cruel army, and they advanced westward with a mass of heathen kings to the high

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city. The guardians of the homeland of the Israelites had love and prosperity as long as the Creator allowed them. ] As the enemy forces head west with fire and sword, the sun sets, metaphorically speaking, once again, as always and forever, on the populus Israhel.57 The destruction of Jerusalem echoes the accounts we have seen in Orosius and others. The poet begins a scene of plunder and chaos ( 5 77 8 ) with a summary statement that again sets the action in an epic, overheard past: ":Pa eac eoan gefrxgn ealdfeonda cyn jwinburh wera" [ I then heard tell that the race of ancient enemies smashed the capital city of those men] ( 5 7- 5 8a) . The unbelievers plunder Solomon's temple, stripping it of treasure and carrying away the "treasure of the hoard-guardians" [ hordwearda gestreon] ( 6 5 b ) and the Hebrews them selves to Babylon. The narrator tells us that the children of Israel, the "remnants of the sword" [ w,epna laft] ( 7 4a) were Nebuchadnezzar's slaves and that their divinely appointed land was given over to the forces of the enemy: Onsenda pa sima pegna worn pxs werudes west to feran, land geheolde, pxt him para Ieoda eone eoel, xfter Ebreum. [He ordered his own thanes, a large detachment of his host, to fare into the west and to take possession of the land of that nation, the desolate homeland, after the Hebrews . ] As Robert Finnegan notes, Daniel) "in a sense, i s a poem about cities, about Jerusalem and Babylon" ; s 8 the poem's energies lean toward "na tional" and "civic" history, universal chronicle, sweeping epic-not allegory or "typology." The transfer of treasures, the resonant sack of the temple, the displacement of the Israelites, an enemy now walking in the desolate Jewish homeland: the poet manipulates stock elements 5 7 . On the balanced symmetry of the beginning and end of Daniel ( opening with the fall of the Hebrews and ending with the fall of the Babylonians) , see Farrell, "Structure of Old English Daniel," 5 3 7, and Daniel, 3 r - 3 2 . 5 8 . Finnegan, "Old English Daniel," 204 .

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deriving from the populus Israhel mythos, experimenting with an adapta tion of the "Matter of Israel. " In the aftermath o f the great destruction, the conflict has left the Israelites only broken fragments of their former glory. After the sack, Nebuchadnezzar commands his retainers to search for learned young men "geond Israel a earme lafe" [among the wretched remnant of Is rael ] ( 8o ) . 59 Broken and at the nadir of its fortune, the populus Israhel finds a spokesman in Azarias, as he later in the poem prays to God: Siendon we towrecene geond widne grund, heapum tohworfene, hyldlease; is user life geond Ianda fela fracoo and gefrxge folca manegum, to pxs wyrrestan ]-,a us ec bewrxcon xhta gewealde, eorocyninga and we nu hxoenra on hxft heorugrimra, peowned poliao . l>xs pe pane sie, wereda wuldorcyning, pxt lm us pas wrace teodest. ( 3 00- 8 ) [We are dispersed throughout the wide world, scattered in groups and deprived of any mercy; in many lands our way of life is de spised and rumored abroad among many people who also exile us as property into the power of the worst of kings upon the earth, into the company of bloody men; and we now endure the oppres sion of heathens . For this, thanks be to you, glory King of Hosts, that you have devised this torment for us . ] Azarias's grim song of his people should remind us of Gildas's and Bede's tale of the native Britons, crushed and scattered into exile by the Anglo-Saxons-an "old Israel" replaced by a younger, mightier people functioning as God's agent of retribution. The cycle of the rise and fall of kingdoms continues near the end of the poem with the passing of Nebuchadnezzar. God takes him in death, and his kingdom eventually passes away : 5 9 · They are also the "remn<mts of the sword" [ mepna laft] ( 74a, above) . Later Daniel is described as the "chief of the wretched remnant" [ ordfruma earmre laft] ( r 5 2 ) .

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Siooan pxr his aferan ead bryttedon, welan, wunden gold, in pxre widan byrig, ealhstede eorla, unwaclice, heah hordmxgen, pa hyra hlaford lxg . Da in pxre oeode awoc his pxt pridde cneow. Wxs Baldazar burga aldor, weold wera rices, oopxt him wlenco gesceod, oferhyd egle . Da wxs endedxg oxs oe Caldeas cyningdom ahton. Da metod onlah Medum and Persum aldordomes ymb lytel fxc, let Babilone blxd swiorian, pone pa hxleo healdan sceoldon. [Afterward his descendants well enjoyed prosperity there, happi ness and spun gold, an enormous treasure in that mighty city and stronghold of men when their lord lay dead. And then a third generation arose among that people. Balthazzar held the city, ruled the kingdom of men until arrogance and overweening pride grew within him . That was the end of the Chaldean rule over the kingdom. Then for a little while the Creator granted the royal power to the Medes and Persians; he allowed the glory of Baby lon to vanish, which those heroic men should have held. ] We then have a description of the greatness of Babylon as the translatio imperii begins again. 60 The mighty transfer of power among history's great peoples continues . 61 The end of Daniel is missing in the manu script, but one might speculate, as J. R. Hall does, that the return to 6o. Compare the wealth of Babylon with the hard-won wealth of Scyld at the beginning of Beowulf: his death ship is laden with the "wealth of nations" [peodgestreonum] (44a) . As the Babylonians t:
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Jerusalem comprised the final, triumphant episode of the poem. 62 If so, this would be in keeping with the narrative rhythm of the populus Israhel mythos: desolation and triumph, exile and return. Thus, I see a conceptual unity to Daniel) like much relatively recent critical commentary on the poem. 63 Shippey calls the theme of Daniel the "cycle of prosperity, arrogance, and downfall. " 64 Here, as so often in criticism of Old English poetry, Daniel's modern editorial title is misleading: perhaps De casibus Hebraeorum or De excidio et conquestu Israhel might serve to describe the poem's basic subject better than ((Daniel. )) Claire Fanger, in her study of the miraculous in Daniel) departs from the long critical history of reading the tale as an exemplum of this or that moral virtue; she instead asks, "How well does the story work, viewed simply as a narrative? How does its design attempt to excite our interest, hold us in suspense, move us to pity and fear? " 65 In her particular focus on the "story as story," she notes that the fact that "Daniel is written in poetry and not prose seems sufficient evidence that the writer was aiming to delight as well as instruct; he must have seen in his source text a tale that could be adapted to the designs of Anglo-Saxon narrative and to the exigencies of poetry."66 By placing Daniel within the populus Israhel tradition, we can see not what the unifying moral or didactic intent of the story might have been, but rather trace the powerful traditions at work that enable those emotions of pity, fear, and epic awe .

Excursus: Beowulf By now, it should be apparent that the populus Israhel mythos provides a productive context for understanding certain surviving specimens of Old English biblical poetry; more generally, it allows us to apprehend a powerful source of particular Old English poetic narrative conventions . The complex of images and narrative rhythms associated with the rise and fall of Israel enables us to define one traditional element in the 6 2 . Hall, "Old English Epic of Redemption," 202. 6 3 . See Farrell, "Structure of Old English Daniel" and Daniel, 22- 3 6. 64 . Old English Verse, r46; Farrell calls this pattern "the basis of the poet's moral theme" ( "Structure of Old English Daniel," 5 4 2 ) . 6 5 . Fanger, "Miracle as Prophetic Gospel," r 24 . 6 6 . Fanger, "Miracle as Prophetic Gospel," r 24 .

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Anglo-Saxon poetic imagination, one possible well-traveled path an author might take when narrating the great movement of history as it sweeps over peoples and lands . As Kennedy notes: "Over and over in the Junius poems, as an epilogue to tales of swift and tragic catastro phe, are heard . . . the words of the poet: 'For they had striven against God."'67 Frye defines this elemental shape as the "rhythm of process" : "The fundamental form of process is cyclical movement, the alternation of success and decline, effort and repose, life and death which is the rhythm of process. "68 What we have here is a partial answer to the question that always seems to follow the criticism of Old English po etry, whether stated or unstated: in what context should these poems be read? The biblical poems under scrutiny here derive their inspirations and narrative structure from, at least in part, the "matter of Israel," the populus Israhel mythos. But, to drive the analysis even further, it is possible to refine our sense of what is at stake in these poems. Loosely applied, and with all due caveats reserved, the term "epic" would seem to describe aptly the emo tional sensibility at work in this tradition. 69 J. R. Hall, in his influential study, described the Junius poems as constituting an "epic of redemp tion," arguing that "the course of sacred history is the organizing prin ciple behind the compilation. "7° Epic and historiography merge here, in 67. Kennedy, Gedmon Poems, lx. Cf. Farrell, vvho defines the central theme of both Exodus and Daniel as the "Help of God": "B[ o ]th stories are developed as conflicts between Old Testament heroes and their heathen enemies, ending in the triumph of those who are the possessors of a special kind of counsel (rted) because they were steadfast and loyal to God in the face of adversity" ( "Reading of OE. Exodus," 4 1 7 ) . 6 8 . Frye, Anatomy rf Criticism, I 5 8 ; see, fi.m:her, I 6o: "Poets, like critics, have generally been Spenglerians, in the sense that in poetry, as in Spengler, civilized life is frequently assimilated to tl1e organic cycle of growth, maturity, decline, deatl1, and rebirtl1 in anoilier individual form. Themes of a golden or heroic age in the past, of a millennium in the future, of the wheel of fortune in social affairs, of the ubi sunt elegy, of meditations over ruins, of nostalgia for a lost pastoral simplicity, of regret or exultation over the collapse of an empire, belong here." On the narrative art and aesthetic behind repetition, see also Alter, Art of Biblical Narrative, 8 8 - I I 3 , I 8 o- 8 2. 69 . Irving describes Moses as speaking ( 2 5 9 - 9 8 of Exodus) in "f(mnal epic style" ( Exo dus, 7; see also 29 ). He also notes the poem's "abundance of epic terminology" (Irving, Exodus, I 6 ) . Greenfield and Calder note tlut Exodus "begins epically in a complex passage" ( NCHOEL, 2 I 2 ) . They go on to state that " [ a]llegorical or not, Exodus everywhere exhibits an epic tone and grandeur in its account of the flight as a battle between armies" ( NCHOEL, 215). 70. Hall, "Old English Epic of Redemption," I 9 0 : "[T]he editor both planned his book according to ilie course of salvation history and selected his poems according to iliis particu lar tradition" ( 208 ). Lucas seems generally to concur: "some overall conception of the whole

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the sense that both attempt to provide shape to the past and a sense of continuity with the presentJI The very act of composing these poems in Old English, biblical narratives brought to life in the idiom and form of Old English poetry, testifies to the living continuity that the populus Israhel mythos had for Anglo-Saxon England. These poems, in their epic adaptation of bibli cal time and event, serve the purpose of preserving and defining the borders of a latter-day Christian populus. Bloomfield notes: "Behind epic is the notion of following a pattern, serving one's destiny (overtly or covertly presented) , and making use of all the clues and advantages the world offers us."72 The Old English biblical poems map out a path traversing past, present, and future, constmcting a past in a distinctive narrative rhythm .73 One of the effects of this "repetitious pattern" is obviously consolation: to make sense out of what seems nonsensical, to promote the feeling that we lie, in Dylan Thomas's phrase, "bound by a sovereign strip . " I f the populus Israhel mythos informs the hermeneutic stmcture of these Old English biblical poems, endowing them with meaning at the point where epic and sacred history meet, then it seems only natural to suggest a few possible parallels with "secular" epic, specifically Beowulf ( Please note my tentative formulation here : "suggest a few possible paral lels . " ) Beowulf and the populus Israhel mythos follow strikingly similar narrative rhythms . To an extent, this is to define Beowulf as having an epic rhythm, or a combination fi1sed somewhere between epic and his tory: this is not a new observation on the poem .74 Andersson, for ex ample, convincingly links the "scenic consciousness" of Beowulfto the narrative traditions of early medieval epic, particularly to the AeneidJs book must have preceded the compilation of MS Junius I I " ( Exodus, 27- 2 8 ) . See also the elaborate argument of Karkov in Text and Picture in AnJJlo-Saxon En;_qland. Cf. Herbison, "Idea of the 'Christian Epic,'" for a cautionary study of the term Christian epic and its application to Old English poetry. 7 r . As Morton Bloomfield noted, the significance of "epic" in Old English poetry con cerns its function of preserving and handing down historical traditions : see "Understanding Old English Poetry,'' 6 8 - 7 r . 7 2 . "Episodic Motivation," r o s - 6; emphasis in original. 73 . See also generally Toliver, Past That Poets Make, ro6- 3 7 (chapter 4, "Ancestral Gloom and Glory" ) . 74 · E . g . , see Stanley Greenfield's excellent essay "Bemvulfand Epic Tragedy." The similar ity of the characters in Beowulf to Old Testament figures has also been noted: see Donahue, "Beowulf, Ireland and the Natural Good" and "Beowulfand Christian Tradition. " 7 5 . Early Epic Scenery (see esp . chapter 4, "The Virgilian Heritage in Beowulj,'" I 4 5 - 5 9 ; quotation from r 8 2 ) .

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How does this model work in the poem? The openings of poems such as Exodus and Daniel resemble Beowulf not only in their stately epic tones, but also in their narrative focus on the rise into glory of a people led and, indeed, personified in the might of a new leader. Scyld leads the Danes out of obscurity to glory, just as Moses leads the Hebrews . This success also finds expression in the materials of wealth as an index to their fame : in Genesis-A Abraham wins the right of treasure at Sodom; in Judith the Hebrews carry their booty captured from the Assyrians into Bethulia; in Exodus the Hebrews pull the Egyp tian treasures from the sea; in Daniel) Jerusalem and Babylon shine with wealth. Likewise, at his death Scyld's hard-won wealth is piled about his body; his death ship is laden with the "wealth of nations" [peodgestreonum] ( 44a) . The "Lay of the Last Survivor" (lines 224767) laments in moving elegiac tones, the "enormous legacy of a noble race" [ eormenlaft £1Jelan cynnes] ( 2 2 3 4 ) left for the dragon to inherit. In Beowulf and the populus Israhel mythos the rearing of the lofty structures of civilized habitation symbolize the rearing up of hopes and aspirations that are only fated to come dashing down in corruption. The building of Heorot signifies a high point in the fortunes of the Danes, a monument to earthly glory. Into Hrothgar's mind comes the idea to build a great mead hall, "ponne yldo beam xfre gefnmon" [which the children of men would remember forever] ( 70) . Like the Tower of Babel in Genesis A or the lofty citadels of Babylon in Daniel) the gleam of Heorot comes to be known "throughout this world" [geond ]Jisne middangeard] ( 7 5 b ) . However, in a well-known moment of death-in-life, the narrator of Beowulf points to the eventual fiery doom of Heorot, even as he finishes the tale of its creation:

Sele hlifade heah ond horngeap ; heaoowylma bad, laoan liges; ne wxs hit lenge pa gen, pxt se ecghete apumsweoran xfter wxlnioe wxcnan scolde. ( 8 r b- 8 5 ) [The hall towered high and wide-gabled-it awaited the fires of battle, the hated fla mes; it was not yet long before the sword-hate of son-in-law and father-in-law would awaken after deadly strife . ]

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Does this not seem similar to the rhythms of the populus Israhel mythos? Does it not call to mind the raising of Babel, a moment of glory overshadowed by the implications of the act itself, what it im plies for the future, a clear case of, to borrow Ahab's words, topmost greatness residing in topmost grief? Perhaps it is not coincidence that hard upon the heels of this somber moment of foreshadowing, the "clear song of the scop" ( 9 0 ) rings out from the happy hall, telling of creation even as it stirs the evil of Grendel. It is as if the Beowulf-poet, while on the one hand carefully constmcting an episode in the cycle of northern legends of the bygone past, is doing so partially under the matrix of the populus Israhel mythos. 76 This would be in keeping with a well-traveled, much-disputed aspect of the poem: its fusion of Chris tian and "pagan" traditions.?? At the moment of great happiness and achievement, change inevitable and terrible-arrives, made concrete in the form of Grendel in Beowulj; but in the sin of gluttony in Daniel) as detailed above .7 8 In both cases, those favored by God and fortune backslide : the Hebrews, as detailed above, are afflicted by "devilish thoughts" in their pride; the Danes turn to the hope of heathens and the fires of pagan idols even as they are tormented by an animate demonic force . In the world of the Beowulf-poet the fate of the Danes-a "nydwracu nip grim, nihtbealwa m�st" [ an awful, horrid feud, greatest of night-evils ] ( 1 9 3 )-ever awaits the chosen people, whether that fate is played out in the north ern world of beasts of battle, blood-oaths and monsters, or in the antique thought-world of the populus Israhel tradition . When Beowulf comes to Denmark, he personifies the agent of change for the afflicted Danes. Beowulf explains to the coastguard that only his strong Geatish hand can aid Hrothgar against Grendel. He states in no uncertain terms what is at stake : only he can help Hrothgar conquer his enemy and turn the tide of history, to see gyf him edwenden �fre scolde bealuwa bisigu bot eft cuman-, 7 6 . Frank speaks of the poet's imaginative "reconstruction of a northern heroic age" ( "The Beowulfpoet's Sense of History," 5 4 ) . 7 7 . For the most nuanced and convincing expression of this subject see Robinson, Beo wulfand the App ositive Style. 7 8 . The feasting of the Danes, even though presented by the poet as a joyous event, has a whiff of disrepute and sin about it, when viewed fi·om this standpoint.

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and pa cearwylmas colran wuroap; oooe a sypoan earfooprage, penden p;rr wunao preanyd polao, on heahstede husa selest. ( 2 8o- 5 ) [if a change of fortune should ever come to him, a relief for the evil of his afflictions, and his seething sorrows turn colder; or forever afterward he shall suffer a time of trouble, dire necessity, while the best of houses stands there in its lofty place . ] In this passage one can feel the lament of the Hebrews exiled by the waters of Babylon, their joys and music silenced. As in Alcuin's poem on the sack of Lindisfarne, the image of the ruined windswept hall signifies the inevitable cycle of change in the world, a cycle endemic to the populus Israhel mythos . One could continue tracing these cycles : when Beowulf presents his challenge at the court, resolving to defeat Grendel or die trying, the tone shifts from doom to the gleam of hope: I>a wxs eft swa ;rr pryoword sprecen, sigefolca sweg . . . .

inne on healle oeod on s;rlum,

[Then, as before, brave words were again spoken there in the hall ; the people were happy, the sounds of a victorious people . . . . ] Light following darkness, defeat moving relentlessly in the track of victory: these are the well-defined narrative rhythms of Beowulj; and of the populus Israhel tradition.79 Andersson aptly summarizes : "The orga nizing principle in operation throughout the poem is mutability . . . . No sooner is one mood established than it is superseded by its opposite . Hope gives way to disappointment, joy to grief, and vice versa. It is not just a question of occasional tonalities; the main lines of the poem as a whole can be analyzed according to this alternation."80 Hrothgar's cen7 9 . Cf. Beowulf's prediction of failed alliance between the Danes and the Heathobards ( 2029b- 3 I ) . 8 o . "Tradition and Design," 2 2 5 ; see 2 2 5 - 3 4 for further analysis of this rhythm, esp . the summary of scholarship on this aesthetic, 22 5 , note I 9 .

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tral speech to Beowulf is provoked by the sword brought back in victory from Grendel's lair; on its hilt is depicted the fall of a race of giants alien to God, destroyed by a divine cataclysm-an outline of the populus Israhel mythos. The cycle of glory and destruction is presented through the eyes of one ruler, standing alone, surveying the fate of nations, and speaking the wisdom and sadness of history. Hrothgar speaks : Wundor is to secganne, hu mihtig God manna cynne snyttru bryttad, lmrh sidne sefan eard ond eorlscipe; he ah ealra geweald. Hwilum he on lufan l.:Eted hworfan monnes modgeponc m.:Eran cynnes, selea him on eple eorpan wynne to healdanne hleohburh wera, gede5 him swa gewealdene worolde d.:Elas, side rice, p.:Et he his selfa ne m.:Eg his unsnyttrum ende gepencean. [ It is a wonder to say how almighty God grants wisdom, nobility, and a homeland to mankind in his magnanimity: he has the power over all things . Sometimes he allows the mind of a man born to a noble race to revel in delights, gives him a stronghold of men to hold, joys of the earth to possess in his homeland, gives him such power, a part of the world, a broad kingdom, with the result that he himself in his folly cannot imagine the end of it all . ] Perhaps the Beow u?fpoet ' s unique talent and originality reside in the way he depicts human actions caught in the play of history. Some of his characters, placed on the borderline between history and myth, can almost see the movement of history as it works about them, reaching deep into their lives and actions, the past feeding the present, the present guiding the shape of the future . 8 I Only the wisest of the characters ( such 8 I . Alter notes a similar purpose in the skill of the author of the "David Story" ( I and 2 Samuel) : "The story of David is probably the greatest single narrative representation in antiquity of a human life evolving by slow stages through time, shaped and altered by the pressures of political life, public institutions, ±:unily, the impulses of body and spirit, the eventual sad decay of the flesh. It also provides the most unflinching insight into the cruel

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as Hrothgar) can look deeply enough into the nature of things to see clearly the patterns at work; yet once able to see, through the wisdom of age and time spent in the world, his ability to impact wyrd has left him, rendering him only an observer and sad commentator, like the voice of the poetic narrator himself. In a complex use of character, the poet pulls down the focus from sweeping historical actions to the lives of human beings alive to the press of history. It is when Beowulf, bleeding out his life in Wiglaf 's arms, turns to gaze on the wall of the dragon's barrow that we also sense the deep structure of the populus Israhel mythos the poet has captured in the lives of Hrothgar and Beowulf: Da se x6eling giong, pxt he bi wealle wishygende gesxt on sesse; seah on enta geweorc, hu Da stanbogan stapulum fxste; ece eor6reced innan healde .

( 27 r s a- r 9 ) [Wise in thought, the nobelman then moved so that he sat down on a seat by the wall. He looked upon the work of giants, saw how the ancient earth-hall held up the stone arches with pillars . ] As he looks upon this image of ruined, corrupted civilization, it reflects his rapidly approaching end and, by extension, the end of the Geats as a chosen populus: he knows that his brief time in the world is over ( 27 2 5 b- 2 8 ) . It has generally been recognized that the long, drawn-out passing of Beowulf in this part of the poem represents more than the death of one man . In his constant juxtaposition of Beowulf 's death with digressive historical events, the poet lets us know that there is more at stake : an entire way of life is passing away, the Geats to be changed forever. Beowulf, near death, recounts the glories of his race, but after his death, as the poem extends its moment of anguish to digress further on the Geat-Swede wars, Wiglaf and the Messenger both explain that a processes of history and into human behavior warped by the pursuit of power" ( David Story, ix) ; and further: " [T]he writer brings to bear the resources of his literary art in order to imagine deeply, and critically, the concrete moral and emotional predicaments of living in history, in the political realm" ( xvii- xviii) .

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time of darkness approaches for the Geats, a period when they too shall mourn the passing of their world. Wiglaf berates the cowardly retain ers, who had abandoned Beowulf in his moment of need: Nu sceal sincpego ond swyrdgifu, eall eoelwyn eowrum cynne, lufen alicgean; londrihtes mot p;rre m;rgburge monna ;rghwylc idel hweorfan, syooan ;roelingas feorran gefricgean fleam eowerne, domleasan dxd.

[Now the rece1vmg of treasure and the g1vmg of swords, joy in a homeland, all beloved things must vanish for your people ; each man of that tribe must wander deprived of land-right, once princes from afar learn of your fli ght, your infamous deed. ] The loss of their londriht links this judgment to the similar emphasis on inherited riht ( expressed in various compounds) we have seen in the Old English biblical poetry. Wiglaf 's voice blends almost without dis tinction into the long grim report of the messenger. After digressing on the history of the Geat-Swede conflict, and predicting the resumption of those times of trouble, the Messenger's speech ends in a focus on the fate of the treasure, the hard-won riches of a nation-a common motif in the populus Israhel mythos. What will become of this tainted wealth? The Messenger explains that the treasure will be burned and buried with their noble leader, and he ends his report with a striking collage of Images: :Pa sceall brond fretan, xled peccean, nalles eorl wegan maooum to gemyndum, ne m;rgo scyne habban on healse hringweorounge, ac sceal geomormod, golde bereafod elland tredan, oft nalles xne nu se herewisa hleahtor alegde, gamen ond gleodream. Foroon sceall gar wesan

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mundum bewunden, monig morgenceald nalles hearpan sweg hxfen on handa, wigend weccean, ac se wonna hrefn fus ofer fxgum fela reordian, hu him xt xte speow, earne secgan, wxl reafode . penden he wi6 wulf [The flame must devour it, the fire engulfit-no man will wear the treasure as a remembrance, no maiden possess a ring-ornament around her neck. Instead, sad of mind, bereft of gold she must walk-not once, but often-in a foreign land now that the war leader has put aside laughter, joy and happiness . Thus many a spear, cold in the morning, must be grasped in fingers, lifted in hand; the song of the harp shall not at all wake the warriors, but rather the dark raven, eager for slaughter, shall speak many things, ask the eagle how he fared at the feast while he plundered corpses with the wolf. ] The cold image of this maiden, walking alone in the paths of exile and diminished hope, is the poet's concrete figure for the fate of the populus Israhel. He embellishes and deepens the image of national loss and the cycle of change by adding mournful details : silent hall-joys, forgotten songs, the cold grasp of the spear, and the greedy chatter of the gath ered beasts of battle. The poet seems to take the sweeping outlines of historical forces at work and give them concrete form in personal im ages: Scyld's death-ship sliding forth into the great unknown; Hroth gar raising the gabled roof of Heorot and filling it with song, Grendel splashing it in blood and filling it with the cries of torment; Beowulf arriving as the unlooked-for agent of change; Hrothgar bent over the inscribed hilt of the giant sword, reading the history of a doomed race; Beowulf, prone before the ruined wall, gazing at the treasures of a long-forgotten people ; and the maiden, walking alone-all stand for a land and a people whose way of life has fallen into the sere . These "characters," and the images they etch so indelibly upon our minds, represent the rhythms of history. Roberta Frank notes that the poet has taken care, in the construc tion of the poem's hero, to generate a man who stands for more than himself: "The Beowulfpoet does his best to attach his pagan champion

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to as many peoples as possible-Danes, Geats, Swedes, Wulfings, and W;:egmundings-as if to make him the more authentically representa tive of the culture and traditions of central Scandinavia: an archetypal Northman." 82 The characters might thus, in a sense, be abstract, styl ized personifications, northern "archetypes" representing in their singu larity peoples, time, and the process of history under God's hand-a God distant and unknown to the participants in these earthly strivings . Stanley Greenfield senses this feeling of great design in Beowulj; the idea that vast forces are at work beyond the ken of most of the mortals fighting and dying in the poem: For the Messenger's harangue has something in it of vatic wis dom which, coupled with the poet's foreshadowings of Beow ulf 's wyrd and the accretion of historical dooms, impresses us with a sense of destinal force . Although all epics do not present an identical relationship between man and cosmic forces, they real a hero who, however much he may, like Gilgamesh and Adam, rebel, is conscious of his bond with and sometimes bondage to those forces. Destiny seems to brood over the vast abyss of epic life and subsume human will to its purposes. 8 3 Andersson likewise rightly argues that in the poem the "mood is always at the center of the poet's preoccupation. Indeed, the mood becomes the substance of the work and when we explore the structure of the narrative, we should focus not on the sequence of events, but on the construction of atmosphere. " 8 4 Beowulf is, in part, a meditation upon the populus Israhel mythos-a new addition to that ancient tradition, but employing it to inform a history of the heroic North ingeardagum. 8 2 . "The Beowulfpoet's Sense of History, " 64 ; Virgil employs a similar method in the Aeneid: "Both the Aeneid and Beowulf are in some sense historical novels, mythically pre sented, philosophically committed, and focused on the adventures of a new hero" ( "The BeowulFpoet's Sense of History," 64 ) . Andersson similarly describes the poem as "heroic biography," also citing the Virgilian parallel (Andersson, "Tradition and Design," 2 2 5 ) . 8 3 . Greenfield, "Beowulj' and Epic Tragedy," 9 5 - 9 6; further, "The many historical allu sions and digressions contribute, furthermore, to the impression of historical destiny that binds human activity to its wheel" ( 9 6 ) . Frank makes a related point, when, by quoting Bloomfield's essay "Chaucer's Sense of History, " she notes: "The sadness, the poignancy, the lacrimae rerum we associate with Beowulfcome from the epic poet's sense of duration, of how 'time condemns itself and all human endeavor and hopes'" ( "The Beowulfpoet's Sense of History," 64 ) . 8 4 . Andersson, "Tradition and Design," 224.

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Yes, we have some of these stories i n other forms, fragments of heroic lays, and so on. But do we have another example of this northern material pulled into such a vast canvas of time and place, such a scale of time and cycle? The poem is, in this sense, an experiment. 8 5 I also do not wish to claim too much: at best, the populus Israhel mythos was part of the informing intention behind the poem's design, or part of the way in which the poet understood history; but it also at least provides a provocative context for an Anglo-Saxon reception and understanding of the poem.

Conclusion We began with Bede, who described the fifth age of the world in this manner: Quinta quasi senilis aetas a transmigratione Babylonis usque in aduentum domini saluatoris in carnem, generationibus et ipsa XIIII, porro annis DLXXXVIIII extenta. In qua ut graui senec tute fessa, malis crebrioribus plebs Hebrea quassatur. 8 6 [ Likewise the fifth age, the old epoch, from the Babylonian captiv ity to the advent of the Lord Savior in the fle sh, consisted of fourteen generations and extended over 5 89 years; in which, as if exhausted by age, the Hebrew people were afflicted by a succes sion of evils . ] The plebs Hebrea stand in the foreground of the stage of their era, an important but doomed player, fated to function as metaphor, image , and exemplum in the mythological imagination of the Christian West. Southern notes that one of the important themes of medieval historiog raphy was "the lesson that the destiny of nations is the noblest of all historical themes"; for the nations of the Christian West, the Jews provide a primary model for the understanding of historical destiny. 8 7 In its Anglo-Saxon manifestation, the populus Israhel mythos was adapted seamlessly to the Germanic inheritance of the Anglo-Saxon 8 5 . As Frank suggests, in the later tenth century, " [n]ew syntheses were becoming pos sible. " ( "The Beowulfpoet s Sense of History," 63 ) . 8 6 . Bede, De temporum ratione 4 64 . 3 6- 4 0 . 8 7 . Southern, "Aspects," r 8 8 . '

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Weltanschauung, to the extent that the Jews become simply another people buffeted by the harsh reality of the world. Thus, along with the Scots, Picts, and Scridefinnas (and many other races and nations ) , it is not surprising to find the Jews folded effortlessly into the catalog of peoples and places in the short Old English poem Widsith: ond mid mid Lidwicingum ic w;rs ond mid Leonum Longbeardum, mid hxanum ond mid hxlelmm ond mid Hundingum. Mid Israhelum ic w;rs ond mid Exsyringum, mid Ebreum ond mid Indeum ond mid Egyptum . Mid Moidum ic w;rs ond mid Persum ond mid Mygmgum 0 . . . 88 [ I was with the Lidwicingas and with the Leondas and with the Longbeardan, with the Hcrthenas and with the Hcrlethas and with the Hundingas . I was with the Israelites and with the Assyri ans, with the Hebrews and with the Indians and with the Egyp tians. I was with the Medes and with the Persians and with the Mygingas . . . The act of inscribing the Jews into the northern context of the early Middle Eages is a powerful testament to the desire to see the past in terms of the present, and the ability of texts to reformat tradition in a new shape, giving it new life : as Frye notes, the "written word is far more powerful than simply a reminder: it re-creates the past in the present, and gives us, not the familiar remembered thing, but the glittering intensity of the summoned-up hallucination. " 8 9 The past can have meaning only if we see it through the lens of analogy and appre hend the self in that "glittering intensity" of the other. And the Chris tian tradition of seeing the self in the ancient tales of the ever-chastised Jews had a long life in England; it opens Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel: 8 8 . Widsith, 8o- 84 ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, ASPR 3 , 149- 5 3 ) . At line 8 3 a the manuscript reads Indeum ( "Indians"), but many editions, assuming a common minim error, print Iudeum ( "Jews " ) . I have retained the manuscript reading, but either option seems to be equally possible : see the note to lines 8 2 - 8 7 in J. Hill, Old English Minor Heroic Poems, 2 8 - 29 . For an excellent recent essay analyzing Widsith and its construction of the past see Niles, " Widsith and the Anthropology of the Past. " 8 9 . Frye, Great Code, 227.

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But Life can never be sincerely blest: Heaven punishes the bad, and proves the best. The feJvs) a Headstrong, Moody, Murmuring race, As ever try'd th' extent and stretch of grace; God's pamper'd people whom, debauch'd with ease, No King could govern, nor no God could please .9° The urge to build Jerusalem in England's green and pleasant land was a powerful one, an important body of thought and source of ideological narrative . For what we have been calling a "mythos," or perhaps the "Matter of Israel," also bears all the features of an ideological "master narra tive . " To use the populus Israhel as a metaphor, an image, or an exemp lum, while its inner dynamics are in essence literary, is also to deploy an ideology, a founding narrative for societies in the Christian West.9I To shape the past is to also write the fi1ture and to pull the world into shape around the present moment; in Frye's words, to "draw a circum ference around a human community and look inward toward that community."92 What is at stake in the use of the populus Israhel mythos is nothing less that the authenticity of the religious self in the early Middle Ages: "No one in the Judea- Christian tradition can ignore history, and the claims of Christianity and Judaism as religions rest upon the historicity of certain happenings in the past."93 As we have seen, like ideology the mythos provides a stable core of assumptions, an inherited lexicon, while it also adapts itself to a variety of conditions .94 All in all, the populus Israhel mythos displays the intersection of the earthly and the divine, the temporal and the timeless, in a lofty poetics of blood and fear: 9 0 . Absalom and Achitophel: A Poem, lines 4 3 - 4 8 . 9 r . Howe notes the ideological use o f the populus Israhel mythos : "The belief that the history of the Israelites stood as model for the history of the Anglo-Saxons provided the necessary biblical warrant for the migration myth throughout its long history. At times, as in the Sermo ad Anglos, this conjunction lies beneath the work's articulating theme; at others, as in the OE Exodus, it becomes the animating subject. Whether implicit or explicit, this vision of the English as a new Israel redeemed the migration myth from mere insularity" ( Migration and Mythmaking, 2 2 ) . 9 2 . Frye, Great Code, 3 7 · 9 3 · Bloomfield, "Medieval Idea of Perfection," 5 2 . 9 4 . A s Toliver summarizes, "In brief, acts o f fictive making may reduce the ontological density of an actual world and still enable the imagination to seize upon it and rework it under new arrangements, classifications, relations" ( Past That Poets Make, 3 ) .

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And the Lord being angry against Israel delivered them into the hands of plunderers, who took them and sold them to their ene mies that dwelt round about. Neither could they stand against their enemies, but whithersoever they meant to go, the hand of the Lord was upon them, as he had said, and as he had sworn to them. And they were greatly distressed . ( Judges 2: I 4 - I 5 )

PA R T T H R E E

Jews) Fury) and the Body

Introduction

Except they meant to bathe in reeking wounds Or memorize another Golgotha, I cannot tell. -Shakespeare, Macbeth "Rut I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked . "Oh, you ca'n't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here . I'm mad. You're mad. " "How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice. "You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here. " -Lewis Carroll, Alice)s Adventures in Wonderland

he philosopher John Scottus Eriugena's (fl. 8 5 0- 70 C.E. ) Latin poem Postquam nostra salus depicts a despondent Satan after the Harrowing of Hell; the proud Adversary bemoans (in tones not unlike the Satan of the Old English poem Genesis B) his dark: ruined kingdom and the sight of the blessed entering the heavenly paradise he had long ago lost. In his own words, Satan grasps at his only comfort:

T

Vnum confugium superest, solamen et unum: Est antiqua domus mortis noctisque profundae : Iudaicum pectus, uitiorum plena uorago, Fraudis et inuidiae semper possessio larga, I9 5

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Luminis exosi radios irata repellens. Illic sola patens ypocrisis perfida regnat; Illa putet nimium nimiaque putredine corda Carnalis populi corrumpit nescia ueri : Illuc confngiam gentilia pectora linquens, Odibilis Christo dominabor gentis auarae, Omne meum uims fundam blasphema per ora Ligna suspensum dominum regnare negando . I [A single refuge remains, a single consolation: there is an ancient house of death and deepest night-the heart of the Jew-a whirl pool filled with vice, ever a broad estate of fraud and envy, reject ing with rage the rays of hated light. There faithless hypocrisy rules unrivaled; it stinks to high heaven and corrupts with its foulness the hearts of a carnal race ignorant of truth. I shall quit the breast of the Gentile and take my refuge there; I shall lord it over a greedy race that is hateful to Christ; I shall spread all my poison through blasphemous lips and deny the rule of the Lord who was hanged on a tree . ] Somehow, one does not expect such virulently anti-Judaic emotion from the same hand that composed the great philosophical treatise De divisione naturae. One of the enduring questions of Christian anti Judaism is : How can a faith based on love and forgiveness incorporate such a tradition of powerful hate? How can a sophisticated philosophi cal mind such as Eriugena's sustain such irrational emotion? In the next two chapters we cannot, of course, begin to solve such a question of long-standing urgency. What we will do in the pages that follow is isolate the fiercest, most emotional aspects of the anti-Judaic tradition active in Anglo-Saxon England. Bede, as we saw, displays an extremely complex understanding of the Jews, ranging from anger to qualified sympathy. We have also seen the "positive" epic and elegiac tradition of the populus Israhel mythos. Now we descend to the more disturbing textures of early medieval anti-Judaism, selected moments bound to gether by a common web of associations, genres, images, and other concerns . One generally links the virulent, emotional expression of hatred I . Eriugena, Postquam nostra salus, 62- 73 ( "Poem 9," Carmina, ed. Herren, 90- 9 5 ) . Translation is by Herren, with minor modifications by me.

Introduction I97

toward Jews with the later Middle Ages and beyond; the texts under focus here cannot really compare with the later hair-raising European and insular expressions of antisemitism. However, the tradition we will define, trace, and analyze does take one aback in its intensity, once exposed to prolonged analysis. Take the example of two authors from late antiquity, the Christian Latin poets Avitus of Avienne (ca. 4 5 0 - ca. 5 1 8 C.E . ) and Arator (fl. 5 1 3 44 C .E . ) . Avitus and Arator (along with the similar poets Juvencus, Caelius Sedulius, and Prudentius ) were the Christian Latin poets par excellence in late antiquity; their works be came standard educational curriculum texts in the early Middle Ages and were widely known in Anglo-Saxon England.2 In book 4 of Avitus's epic versification of Old Testament history De spiritualis histo riae gestis ( "De diluvio mundi"), Noah releases the raven once the flo od-rains have subsided, in order to find dry land. The biblical verses simply tell us that Noah sent forth a raven "which went forth and did not return, till the waters were dried up upon the earth" ( Genesis 8 : 7 ) . In Avitus's hands, this becomes something rather different, charged with an unexpected interpretation: -

Tunc interposito producens tempore corvum Scire cupit senior vacuumque interrogat orbem. Ales ut extensis nitidum petit aera pinnis, Adspiciens plenis stipata cadavera terris, Carnibus incumbens et mox oblita reverti Rectorem placidum communi in sede reliquit. Sic nescis, Iudaee, fidem servare magistro, Sic carnem dimissus amas, sic gratia numquam Custodi vitae dominoque rependitur ulla. Mente vaga sic laxus abis, sic foedera legis Rupisti et primum violasti perfide pactum . 3 [ Mter an interval o f time had passed, the old man then brought out a raven, for he wanted to examine the empty earth and learn more about it. When the bird stretched its wings and made for the shining air, it looked down at the earth filled with corpses and, settling down on the fle sh, soon forgot about going back 2. See NCHOEL, 7. On the representation of Jews in Juvencus see Poinsotte, Jttvencus et Israel. 3 · Avitus, De spiritualis historiaegestis 4 . 5 6 3 - 7 3 ·

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and abandoned his patient master in their common home . In this same way, 0 Jew, you do not know how to keep faith with your master. In this way, although freed, you too love the flesh; in this way you render no thanks to the protector and lord of your life . In this way, weak in mind and distracted, you wander off; in the same way you have broken the covenant of the Law and violated perfidiously its pact. ] The sudden turn to anti- Judaic rhetoric catches the modern reader off guard; yet we shall see that this connection between Jews, flesh, glut tony, mental instability, and transgression constitutes a coherent early medieval tradition of understanding Jews, one that we must place next to the populus Israhel mythos.4 In his Latin versification of Acts of the Apostles, the poet Arator provides us with a similarly flamboyant example of this hermeneutic. In Acts 2 r - 2 3 Paul is held captive by the Jews in Jerusalem and beaten; the Romans take over and are about to torture the apostle, but they cease when they discover he is a Roman citizen. The Jews are enraged: "Some of the Jews gathered together and bound themselves under a curse, saying that they would neither eat nor drink, till they killed Paul" (Acts 23 : r 2 ) . Paul, however, escapes. Now compare Arator's versifica tion; he first begins with an exaggerated invocation: Agmina supplicii ferventia corpore Pauli Poenarumque graves evolvere versibus iras Causa monet, sed lingua pavet. Fugiamus ab ista Parte, dolor, veritique nefas tam triste premamus Eloquium, ne forte legens sua fletibus ora Compleat et largis humescat pagina guttis . [The occasion impels me to unfold in verses the ranks of torment burning on Paul's body, and the grave violence of the punish ments, but my tongue fears. Let us fle e from this part, 0 grief, 4 · In Genesis A 1 4 3 6 - 4 8 , Noah sends f(ni:h the raven, which does not return, alighting instead on a "floating corpse" [jleotende hreaw] ( 144 7b ); see Doane's excellent note on this tradition ( Genesis A, 2 1 7 , note on 1 4 3 8 b - 4 8 ) . The Genesis A-poet does not mention the interpretation of the raven as the Jews. Becl.e also does not interpret the raven and the dove as the Jews and Christians: see In Genesim 2 . 1 7 5 9 - 1 8 4 6 .

Introduction I 99

and hiding from so sorrowful a crime, let us suppress eloquence, lest perchance the reader fills his eyes with tears and the page be moistened with copious drops . ] Having gathered his poetic powers together and established the regis ter of high emotion, he then truly castigates the Jews and their plot to kill Paul : Nee tamen haec poterant animos satiare cruentos; Ardet amor scelerum cupiuntque in sanguine Pauli Sacrilegas versare manus. Quae dura malorum Vota ! Quarter deni vesanae stirpis alumni Imposuere sibi non ullum sumere potum Primitus atque cibum quam parta caede daretur; Hinc magis esse dapes. 0 pallida cordis imago ! Pocula sunt, Iudaea, tibi meliora cruoris Quam laticis, nullasque volens contingere mensas Esuris ad facinus saturamque cadavere iusti Quaeris habere famem. [But nevertheless these things could not satisfy their bloodstained minds; they were afire with love for crime and wished to lave their sacrilegious hands in the blood of Paul. What cruel vows of evil deeds ! Forty sons of insane lineage imposed (a vow) upon themselves not to take any food and drink until it was given first from this accomplished slaughter. 0 pale semblance of a heart! Cups of gore are better for you, 0 Judaea, than cups of water, and not wishing to come to the table, you hunger for crime and seek to have the hunger sated by the corpse of a righteous man. ] s Through the next two chapters these motifs and their connections will become familiar: Jews, madness, fle sh, hunger. We saw glimpses of this 5 . Cf. Bede's far less exotic interpretation of the same passage ( Expositio Actuum Aposto lorum 23 . r 2. 2 5 - 2 8 ) : "Cum dominus dicat: 'Beati qui esuriunt et sitiunt iustitiam,' isti e contrario iniquitatem esuriunt et sanguinem adeo sitiunt, ut cibos etiam corpori abdicent donee iusti morte satientur" [While the Lord said: "Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice," these people on the contrary hungered for iniquity and thirsted as much for blood, so that they even gave up food for the body until they might be satiated by the death of a just man ] .

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tradition in Bede's exegesis, but in this section we shall see the full force of this tradition Lmfettered. We have already seen in the previous two chapters that one of the complex of images that would arise in Chris tian Anglo-Saxon minds at the mention of Jews would be the populus Israhel mythos and its tradition; in these chapters we trace another set of related images that would spring to mind-the insane , raging Jews and their link to the dreaded body. Moving to Anglo-Saxon England we find that the poet and ecclesias tic Aldhelm of Malmesbury ( ca. 640- 709 C.E. ), for example, has few references to Jews in his corpus . But in his poem on St. James the Lesser he accesses this image of the raging, bestial, insane Jews : Nee non Jacobus Christi matertera cretus Et consobrini felici nomine fretus Hanc aedem Domini de summo servat Olimpo; Quem plebs Iudaea scaevo bachante tumultu Pulsum de pinna fullonis sude necavit, Quod Christum populis scandens fastigia templi Concionaretur crebro sermone sacerdos. 6 [So too Saint James, who was born the son of Christ's aunt and who enjoyed the happy distinction of being Christ's cousin, pro tects from the highest heaven this house of God. The Jewish people , raging in insane fury, threw him from the battlements of the church, and he was killed by a laundryman's club-all because after climbing to the top of the roof of the temple, the priest ( i . e . , James) had preached Christ to the people with insistent words. ] We shall explore this cathexis-this concentration of emotional en ergy-upon the Jews in the chapters to follow. How does this process explore the boundaries of the human? In order to give shape to the study of this hermeneutic in Anglo Saxon England, this part concentrates in the main on the representa tion of Jews in two Old English manuscripts : the Vercelli Book and the Blickling codex.? Vercelli and Bliclding are both late-tenth-century 6 . Aldhelm, "In Sancti Iacobi Apostoli," I - 7 ( Opera, ed. Ehwald, 2 5 - 27 ) ; trans. by Lapidge and Rosier, Aldhelm: The Poetic Works, 5 4 · 7 · Vercelli, Biblioteca Capitolare, I I 7 ( Ker 3 9 4 ) ,

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Each time, the Passion surfaces as a narrative model, the Jews fall into the formula as deicidal enemies of the church. 8 As we saw in a preliminary fashion with Bede, the image of the Jews as the murderous villains of the passion constitutes the core of anti-Judaic sentiment in the early Middle Ages. Christology and anti-Judaism go hand in hand, as Ruether has shown in Faith and Fratricide)· where we find a focus on Christ and his blood, there we can also expect to find anti-Judaism and its powerful emotions .9 Jews will encounter Christ again at the blast of the last trumpet, paying for their crime at the end-time . Eschatology is an ongoing concern of Vercelli and Bliclding, but in Vercelli Homily 8 the Jews do not even make it to judgment: "And pa pe her nellao hyra synna andettan and betan, Iudeas ponne and sylfcwalan and hxoene men, ne ourfon hie to pam dome, ac hie bioo sona fordemde mid py pe hie deape sweltap" [And those here who do not wish to confess and atone for their sins, the Jews, suicides, and heathen men, there is no need of them at judgment, but they are immediately damned when they die ] ( 8 , 3 9 - 4 2 ) . However, i n Vercelli 2 , a s the cross streams with blood across the skies, Christ will appear to the Jews as he appeared at the crucifixion: "And on pam dxge bio drytnes rod blade flowende be tweox wolcnum, and in pam dxge bio drytnes onsyn swioe egeslicu and ondryslicu, and on pam hiwe pe he wxs pa hine Iudeas swungon and ahengon and hiora spatlum him on spiwon" [and on that day the rood of the Lord will be flowing with blood among the clouds, and on that day the form of the Lord will be terrible and dreadful, and in that appearance which he was in when the Jews struck him and hanged him and spat their spittle on him] ( 2, 7- r o ) . In a flash, the interval between crucifixion and judgment disappears . In subsequent lines of Vercelli 2 , the Jews are forced to look upon the bloody body of Christ, the gory "evidence" of their supposed crime : On pam dxge siteo ure dryhten in his pam myclan mxgen prymme and his onsyne a:tyweo and his lichoman; ponne bio seo wund gesewen pam firenfullum , and pam soofxstan he bio hal gesewen. And ponne Iudeas magon geseon pone pe hie xr cweal8 . See also Blickling 6 ( Dominica Sexta in Q;tadragesima) , 7 3 , among many other basic examples. 9 · Ruether, Faith and Fratricide, 264 (summary) and passim .

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 2II

don and hengon. And se soofa:sta dema ]:mnne demeo ealra man na gehwylcum a:fter his sylfes gewyrhtum. ( 2, I 5 - 20 ) [ On that day our Lord will sit i n his great majesty and show his form and his body; then the wound shall be seen by the sinful ones, and to those steadfast in faith he will appear whole. And then the Jews may see him whom they previously killed and hanged. And the righteous judge then shall judge each of all men according to his own works ] . Note the symmetry of the apparition: to the soofost Christ will appear whole and unsullied; to the Jews and other sinners he will appear com promised and incomplete, physically rent just as they are wounded and torn spiritually; in much the same way the dreamer in the Dream ofthe Rood is "forwunded mid wommum" [wounded with sins] , just as he sees the cross alternately streaming with blood and shining with treasure . r o There is a somatic context for this cathexis. The Jews and their culpabil ity are brought to focus before the bloody body of Christ-gory prima facie evidence of their guilt. We can examine this further through attention to one image : the spitting Jews . Vercelli 2 I draws on Vercelli 2 as a source and, with more or less identical wording, notes the spitting of the Jews, and blames them for Christ's death. r r Likewise in Vercelli I) a narrative of the Passion adapted from the various gospel accounts, the Jews condemn Christ to death "and pa spiwon hie hi ora spat! on his andwlitan" [and then they spat their spittle on his face] ( I , 7 8 ) . This detail, drawn from Matthew and Mark, 12 finds elaboration in Elene's accusations : Ge mid horn speowdon on pa:s ondwlitan pe eow eagena leoht, fram blindnesse bote gefremede edniowunga ]:mrh pa:t a:oele spald, 1 0 . Dream ofthe Rood, 14a ( The Vercelli Book, ed. Krapp , ASPR 2, 6 1 - 6 5 ) , hereafter by line numbers only. The cross is sometimes "mid wa:tan bestemed, / beswyled mid swates gange, hwilum mid since gegyrwed" [soaked vvith wetness, drenched by the coursing of blood, at times adorned with treasure] ( 22b- 2 3 ) . I I . Vercelli 2 I , 1 64- 68, 1 74- 77. 1 2 . Matthew 26: 6T "Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him." Mark 1 4 : 6 5 : "And some began to spit on him, and to cover his face, and to buffet him. "

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ond fram uncla:num o ft generede deofla gastum. Ge to dea]Je pone deman ongunnon, se oe of deaoe sylf woruld awehte on wera corpre in pa:t a:rre !if eowres cynnes. I 3 [With filth you spat into the face o f him who, through that noble spittle, made afresh a cure for the light of your eyes, a cure for your blindness, and who often saved you from the unclean spirits of devils. You doomed him to death who awakened the world from death itself among a company of men in the earlier life of your race . ] One cannot proceed too far, it seems, in the Vercelli Book without running across the image of the "spitting Jews. " We find the same image in Blickling 2 ( Dominica Prima in Quinquagesima) : the Lord "a:t pa:m unla:dum Iudeum manig bysmor geprowade" [ suffered many shamefi1l acts from the wicked Jews ] ; they "hine swungon, and btm don, and spa:tledon on his onsyne" [ struck him, and bound him, and spat in his face] (2 3 ) . And in Blickling I9 ( S. Andreas) the Lord asks Andrew to remember the torments he suffered at the hands of the Jews when "hie me swungon, and hi me spa:tla:don on minne ondwleotan" [they struck me, and they spat in my face ] ( 2 3 7 ) . This image links the Jews to the base fluids o f the body and heightens the emotional cathexis of the Passion narrative : they add insult to injury with the expectoration of a foul fluid. Christ dies in a state ofhumiliation and shame : Blickling 2 notes the "bysmra pe he mid Iudeum adreogan wolde" [ shame he would suffer among the Jews ] ( 1 5 ) . The cross in the Dream of the Rood says of his union with Christ in the crucifixion, "Bysmeredon hie nne butu a:tgxdere" [they humiliated us both to gether] ( 4 8a) . 14 This motif had a long life. With typical intensity, it opens John Donne's Holy Sonnet XI: "Spit in my face you Jewes, and pierce my side, / Buffet, and scoffe , scourge , and crucifie mee."rs 1 3 . Elene, 297b- 3 0 5 ( The Vercelli Book, ed. Krapp, AS PR 2 , 66- 1 0 2 ) , hereafter by line numbers only. 1 4 . Cf Christ's words in Andreas, 962- 6 3 a ( The Vercelli Book, ed. Krapp, AS PR 2, 3 - s r : "me bysmredon bennum £--cstne / weras wansxlige" [wretched men humiliated me, bound tight in bonds ] . I have also consulted the edition by Brooks, adopting his interpretations when noted; citations hereafter by line numbers only. I 5 . Donne, Complete English Poems, ed. Patrides, 3 4 6 .

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 213

Understanding Culpability In the preceding passage from Elene) Cynewulf melds the narrative detail of spitting with another early medieval anti-Judaic stereotype: the blindness of the Jews to Christ's divinity-in Paul's words "blind ness in part has happened in Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles should come in" ( Romans 1 1 : 2 5 ; cf. Acts 1 3 : 8 - 1 1 ) . Cynewulf 's Elene explains that the spittle of Christ was divine; it would have cured the "blind" Jews . But due to their very blindness, the Jews spit into Christ's face : a shameful act that seals their own fate . Cynewulf thus generates an ironic depth to the traditional, provocative detail of spitting : if only the Jews had accepted Christ's "divine spittle," they themselves would never have been so blind as to spit at him in the first place. But did the Jews kill Christ because they were blind, deficient in spiritual percep tion, possessed of a fatal defect superseded by the new Christian "sight"? ( In Acts 3 : I 7 , for example, Peter explains that the Jews killed Christ through their ignorance . ) Were they more thoroughly evil, kill ing Christ intentionally, because they "envied" and hated his divinity? 16 Or were the Jews-"innocent" or "guilty"-led astray into deicide by the devil? These questions generated a multitude of responses to Jewish culpability, and our Anglo-Saxon texts reflect this muddled issue . In Vercelli I 6) the Jews fail to recognize Christ, as if they were blind and lacked the ability to see and recognize him as the Messiah. Would they not, then, be relatively innocent and deserving of Christian sympa thy rather than hate? Perhaps not: the homily also implies that the rejection of Jesus was a conscious choice on the part of the Jews . How is this contradiction resolved, or at least understood? This homily is an exegesis of Matthew 3 : I 3 - I 7 (the baptism of Jesus by John the Bap tist) , a text for the Feast of the Epiphany. As the homilist explicates the significance of Christ's baptism, he follows Gregory the Great in not ing that all creation, even the very stones of Golgotha, recognized Christ-except the Jews : And swa ure dryhten hine ealle oore gesceafta ongeaton and ondettan. And hine ponne hw;Eore oa forheardydan heortan Iudeas hine ne woldon ongitan, ac hie W;Eron heardran ponne 1 6. E . g . , Acts 5 : 17; 1 3 : 4 5 ; 17: 5 . Any possible distinctions made in Acts between the motives of the Jewish priestly castes and tl1e motives oftl1e Jewish population as a whole were generally not maintained to any degree in the Middle Ages.

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 2 14

a:: nige stanas, ac hie for oan na:: fre to hira ra:: de gecyrran ne meahton. ( r 6, 9 0- 9 3 ) [And so all other created things recognize and acknowledge our Lord . However, the hard-hearted Jews would not recognize him, but they were harder than any stones, and therefore they never could turn to him because of their plan . ] The Jews, defined i n traditional anti-Judaic fashion, are unable to see the divine nature of Christ, and thus they stand alone in a category outside all the creations of the natural world. r 7 But in the very same passage , in contradiction, they apparently have made a choice: they had a plan or intention ( rted) to refi1se his divinity. r s Are the Jews ignorant or malicious? The issues of Jewish understanding and culpability reso nate at the homily's later explanation of the paradox of the Trinity. In this model, true understanding is a defining characteristic of a good Christian, not a Jew. The homilist recognizes that the paradoxical na ture of the Trinity is a difficult doctrine for the audience to understand, much less to believe in wholeheartedly: Brooor mine, us is ponne nu mycel neodpearf pa:: t we geleornian Godes geleafan swa us riht sie and we mid rihte cunnan and mid rihte ongitan magon and moton. Brooor mine, ic ne wat butan hwylc man sie se oe ungela::redra sy and he pus on his modgepanc and on his heortan geleafan be pa::re halgan prynesse pus cweoe : 'Hu ma:: g ic pa:: t ongitan be oa::re halgan prynnesse, pa:: t syndon ]xeo hadas and hwa:: ore an God is and an godcund sped? ' ( r 6, 1 3 9-46) [My brothers, we now have an important duty to learn about faith in God, as it may be true for us, and we can and must know it correctly and understand it correctly. My brothers, I know that I 7. In the homily even the river Jordan turns backward in recognition of Christ: see T. Hall, "Reversal of the Jordan. " I 8 . In discussing how the homilist adapts the passage from its source in Gregory the Great, Szarmach notes that the additions of the homilist implicate the Jews in their crime even fi.Irther: "These elaborations . . . heighten the eflect so that the Jews appear all the more horrendous for their disbelief. It is clear that the Vercelli homilist is primarily interested in evoking an emotional response from his audience" ( "Vercelli Homilies: Style and Structure," 2 5 5 ) . Cf. Acts 20: I 9 .

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 215

there may be one who is more ignorant, and in his mind and in the faith of his heart speaks thus about the holy Trinity: "How can I understand that about the holy Trinity, that there are three persons, but only one God and one divine power? " ] When the homilist refers to "someone who is more ignorant," the reader calls to mind the obstinate, "ignorant" Jews from the earlier lines of the homily, the Jews who, in their puzzling and unnatural way, refuse to do homage to the divine nature of Jesus . Similarly, the homilist then uses the example of fire to explain how something can be unified, yet have distinct aspects kept separate and in suspension. 19 This example will open new vistas of understanding for the true Chris tian : "ac we hwxdre magon for pxs lytlan pinges bysene pxt mxste eac geseon, and pxt an ymbpencendlice bean pxt we py ed oncnawan and ongytan magon" [But we , however, can see the greatest thing from the example of this little thing, and being mindful of it, we can more easily recognize and understand it] ( I 6, I 5 o- 5 2 ) . This emphasis on thinking and understanding stands in contrast to the Jews' steadfast inability to understand and perceive a divine truth earlier in the homily. Good Christians will shun the path of ignorance ( exemplified by the Jews ) , and a s men "pe nu her in worulde sod and riht don willa()" [who now here in the world wish to bring about truth and right] , they will instead open up to understanding ( I 6, I 67- 6 8 ) .20 The correlation of Jews with blindness, ignorance, and a general spiritual and intellectual defi ciency thus serves a useful rhetorical purpose in an exegetical homily that itself demands understanding from the reader. The Jews perform a heuristic and rhetorical function, helping readers of the homily to un lock the keys of understanding within themselves. But in the tradition of Jewish culpability that ascribes motives of intentional hatred and envy to the Jews, the anti-Judaic rhetoric gener ates more heat of passionate anger than light of understanding . In the Gospel ofNicodemus) the Jews charge Jesus with "many evil deeds" [ multis 1 9 . See Scragg, Vercelli Homilies, 276, note to 1 4 2 ff. 20. Cf. the discussion of blindness in Blickling z , which includes many of these elements: blindness, Jews, Christ's passion, belief. Even the lowly soldiers guarding the tomb of Christ in the Gospel uf' Nicodemus apparently know that the Jews are blind, saying in exasperation, "Tanta mira miracula facientem Iesum uidistis et audistis et non ei creditis" [You saw and heard Jesus working so many miracles and you did not believe ] ( I 3 .2. 17 4 ) .

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accusationibus malis] ( r . r . I 40) .21 Consequently, since these evil deeds include healing the sick as well as breaking the Sabbath, the Jews thus accuse Jesus of being a "sorcerer" [ malpcus] ( r . r . I 4 o ) . 22 The Gospel of Nicodemus combines these motivations again at the end of the text: Pilate's final letter to Claudius focuses on the Jews and their culpability. Pilate writes that when they delivered Jesus to him and "dixerunt ilium magum esse" [ said that he was a sorcerer] , "Iudaeos per inuidiam suos posteris crudeli condempnatione punisse" [the Jews through their envy have punished their descendants with a cruel condemnation ( 2 8 . 244; emphasis added) . Pilate apologizes for his "mistake," relates the subse quent attempts of the Jews to suppress the truth of the Resurrection, and ends with the admonition : "Ideo suggero regi ne quis aliter mentiatur et estimes credere mendaciis Iudaeorum" [ I advise the king not to let anyone lie in any other manner and not to consider believing the lies of the Jews ] ( 2 8 . 24 6 ) . The emphasis here is on the fact that the Jews are not trustworthy; in their envy they fabricated lies about Jesus and tricked Pilate . Likewise, in the Avenging ofthe Savioulj the traveler Nathan tells TyrusjTitus that the Jews were "moved by envy" [ inuidia cummoti] when they killed Christ ( 7 . 2 5 4 ) . Titus in turn explains to Vespasian that the Jews killed Christ "through envy" [per inuidiam] ( I r . 2 6 2 ) . This tradition is certainly behind the sentiment of Vercelli I) which tells us that " [ w ]iste he, Pilatus, genog geare pxtte hie, pa Iudeas, for xfste anum Crist hatedon" [ Pilate knew well enough that they, the Jews, for envy hated Christ alone ] ( I , I 3 6- 3 7 ) . 23 The letter of Pilate to Claudius is also expanded in Blickling IJ ( Spel Be Petrus and Paulus) , where Peter, in his struggle with Simon Magus, advises Nero to read the missive . 24 The letter notes that the Jews were motivated "purh xfeste him betweonon" [through envy among themselves] ( I 77 ) . It emphasizes that even though all the people of Judaea recognized Jesus as the son of God, "genaman him xfest to pa ealdormen para sacerda and hine sylfne oferfengon" [envy gripped the chiefs of the priests and they seized him] ( I 77) . Pilate turned Jesus over to the Jews, who hung 2 1 . The Old English translation adds the amplification that this was unjust since "he ne wean) na:fre nane wyrcende" [he had never done any of them] ( r . r . r 4 r ) . 2 2 . Note that the Jews in Andreas are accused o f using "sorcerous ways" [galdorcnzftum] ( r 66 ) . Cf. Acts 1 3 : 6. 23 . The homilist is also following Matthew 27: 1 8 : "For he [i. e . , Jesus] knew that for envy they [i.e., the Jews] had delivered him." 24 . For Paul's encounter with Nero see also Fates (rfthe Apostles r r - 1 4 .

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him on the cross, and then because their "nio tooon swioe barn" [hatred burned so much] , they attempted to suppress the truth of the resurrection ( 1 77 ) . In his conclusion Pilate explains that he wrote this letter: "lm ne wene pxt pu I udea leasungum gelyfan purfe" [ so that you should have no need to believe the lies of the Jews ] ( 1 77 ) . Blickling I (Annunciatio S. Mariae) states that "Drihten com on middangeard mid Israhela cynne . . . . Ond hie nu his lare forhogodan, and him xfest to genaman, and hine on rode ahengon" [the Lord came into the world among the race of Israel. . . . And they despised his teaching, and gave themselves over to envy, and they hanged him on the rood] ( 7 ) . Like the spitting of the Passion scenes, the malevo lent envy of the Jews heightens the cathexis of these homilies, infect ing the Christian representation of the Jews with a passionate hatred. And surely it is no accident that the most vehemently emotional anti Judaism claims that it is the Jews who were raging in maniacal fury. One does not need to be a Freudian to see some sort of transference at work in this symmetry. However, fl1rther complicating the hermeneutics of culpability, homilists needed to be careful that they did not imply that evil tri umphed over good : Christ was always in control, and the Jews were destined to betray Jesus and turn him over to heathens for death: "Sceolde pxt word bion gefylled, ptet he, dryhten htelend, ter sylfa CJV£0, pxt Iudeas, pa pe xfter his lichamlicre gebyrde his agene leode wxron, pxt hie hine sceoldon hxoenum mannum to deaoe gesyllan" [That word must be fulfilled, which he, the Lord Savior, previously said himse!j; that the Jews-those who according to his bodily birth were his own people-must give him to heathen men for death] ( r , 9 5 - 9 8 ; empha sis added) . In this passage , the Jews appear to simply follow the great design of Providence. Blickling 7 ( Dominica Pascha) dwells on the fact that Jesus allowed this to happen: "Nxs he mid nxnigum nede gebxded, ac he mid his sylfes willan to eorpan astag, and her manige setunga and searwa adreag xt Iudeum xt pxm unlxdum bocemm" [He was not in any way compelled by necessity, but he descended to earth according to his own will, and here suffered many traps and plots from the Jews and the evil scribes] ( 8 3 , 8 5 ) . But if the Jews were acting according to God's wishes, how are they to blame? Were they not carrying out God's will, acting as agents of salvation? One might be able to reconcile these contradictions : perhaps the Jews were destined to remain blind to Jesus' divinity; possibly they were also destined to hate

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and envy him. Thus, perhaps their fate rests in their potential for incorrect responses to Christ, and not simply in the act of deicide itself. However, for the texts of Vercelli and Bliclding, the problem does not seem to be a pressing issue . The emotional response to the Passion overrides the finer distinctions of logic . And finally, if it is not divinity that shapes the ends of the Jews, perhaps it is the devil himself: Jesus says to the Pharisees, "You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do" ( John 8 :44 ) . This third tradition of culpability maintains that Satan could have struck the Jews blind: in Blickling I] (Assumptio S. Mariae Vir ginis) , Peter says to the high priest of the Jews, "we witan pert pysses menniscan cynnes fynd ablende eowre heortan pert Crist ne werre sop God, and ponne bist pu geherled fram him" [We know that the enemy of mankind blinded your hearts so that you did not believe that Christ was the true God, and that you would be healed by him ] ( I s r ) . Satan could also have provoked the Jews to envy and anger: the Gospel of Nicodemus, as we saw above, details the envy and deceit of the Jews, but in the descensus ad infernos portion of the narrative , Satan explains that he "populum meum antiquum Iudaicum excitaui zelo et ira aduersus eum" [incited my ancient people the Jews with jealousy and anger against him] ( 2o. 2. 2 I o ) . Regardless of exacdy why it was thought that the Jews committed their crime, they end up accursed in any case. When Pilate abdicates his responsibility for Christ's death in Vercelli I, the Jews call down a curse on themselves-a pervasive gospel citation from Matthew ( 2 7:2 5 ) uti lized in a long history of persecution: "l>a cwerdon hie, pa Iudeas : 'Sanguis eius . . . Sie his blod ofer us and offer ure beam"' [Then the Jews said, 'Sanguis eius' . . . May his blood be upon us and upon our children"' ( I , I 8 8 - 9 0 ) . The homilist adds, "Berdon swi6e unlerdlicre bene, swa him syppan eall unlerdlic on becwom" [They asked for a wretched reg uest, since afterward all sorts of misery fell upon them] ( I , I 90-9 I ) . 2 5 In these overlapping arguments of motive and blame, one can sense the awful potential available for Christian fantasies . Since the question of Jewish culpability remained contradictory or paradoxical in the traditions available to Anglo-Saxon England, a dark space, like a Rorschach blot, opened for the free play of the imagination . 2 5 . Cf. Acts I 8 : 6 and the Old English Gospel of Nicodemus: "Sig hys blod ofer us and ofer ure beam" [Let his blood be upon us and upon our children] ( 4 . I , I 6 I ) .

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Poetic Variations: Elene The poetry of the Vercelli Book shows the workings of this hermeneu tic circle: where there is ambiguity, poets leap in with imaginative elaboration. The more complex the traditions of culpability, the deeper the poetic possibilities as authors such as Cynewulf and the Andreas poet seize upon this cathexis and give it their own imaginative expres sion. The anti-Judaic rhetoric of the homilies provides the common place background for the poetic texts. Imagine the phenomenology of reading the Vercelli manuscript: assume that the basic tropes of the anti-Judaic tradition might be set in the mind of the reader; the homi lies thus strike the accustomed anti-Judaic background notes in their expository, prosaic fashion; a reading encounter with the poetry, as it arises, gives the reader up to further sensations-the register of Old English poetic vocabulary, the metrical line, variation, and so on. All these produce an intense aesthetic experience of the anti-Judaic tradi tion. As we have seen, in Cynewulf 's Elene the Jews are culpable for Jesus' death. Elene is an Old English poetic adapation of the apocryphal story of the discovery of the cross by Constantine's mother Helena. In the poem Judas Cyriacus, representative of the antagonistic Jews of the narrative , knows that Elene seeks the cross peoda waldend, on oam prowode godes agen bearn, eallra gnyrna leas, pone orscyldne eofota gehwylces purh hete hengon on heanne beam in fyrndagum fxderas usse . [ on which the Lord of nations suffered, guiltless of all crimes, God's own Son, he whom, innocent of all sins, our fathers in days gone by hung upon the high cross through hate . ] These Jews killed Christ because they did not recognize him as the son of God; their deficient mental faculties could not recognize his divin ity; as Elene charges, they are "spiritually blind" [ modblinde] ( 3 o6a) . As we have seen, this is a traditional motivation for the Jews, but the poetic representation enhances the common tropes we traced in the homilies above . Christ is rendered with variation (Peoda waldend) godes agen bearn) and the action happened in a poetic past ( in ftrndagum) .

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Wisdom is an important theme in Elene) and its prominence is a direct embellishment of latent ( or not so latent) aspects of the anti Judaic tradition. There is a great deal of emphasis in the poem on the fact that, in her quest for the cross, Elene searches out the wisest of the Jews in the land, "In de deoplicost dryhtnes geryno I purh rihte x reccan cudon" [those who knew how to explain most deeply the mys tery of the Lord, according to the right Law] ( 2 8 0- S I ) . In response, three thousand elders gather "de Moyses x I reccan cudon" [who could explain the Law of Moses] ( 2 8 3 b- 84a) . This is the first signal that, as Elene sends out this proclamation, the Jews who respond only can understand the Old Law, the Law of Moses, and not the deeper myster ies of Christianity. 26 Mter confronting them with the deicide accusa tion, Elene sends them back to pare down their number and bring back only weras wisfxste, wordes crxftige, ]Ja de eowre x xdelum crxftige on ferhdsefan fyrmest hxbben, secgan cunnon, pa me sodlice ondsware cydan for eowic ford tacan gehwylces pe ic him to sece . [wise men skilled in words, able in noble qualities, who hold your Law firmest in their hearts, and who truly can tell me and give me an answer on your behalf for each of the marvels which I seek from them . ] The focus on "your Law" [ eowre £] signals Elene's strategy to expose the limited and inadequate nature of the Old Law. We see this agenda again when the Jews, troubled in their hearts but nevertheless "men 2 6 . On the theme of wisdom in the poem see T. Hill, "Sapiential Structure," 2 I 7 - I 7 ; Regan, "Evangelicism"; Stepsis and Rand, "Contrast and Conversion"; E. Wright, "Cyne wulf's Elene and the 'Singal Sacu"' ; Anderson, Cynewttlf, I 6o- y s . In his reading of the poem, Hill sees Judas as a figure of the unbelieving Synagoga opposed by the divine Ecclesia, represented by Elene ( see "Sapiential Strucn1re," 2 I O- I 4 ) . This figural aspect of the poem has been well established: in addition to the references above, see Campbell, "Cynewulf's Multiple Revelations," 23 s - 3 6, 244; Fish, "Theme and Pattern in Elene"; Whatley, "Figure of Constantine"; Bridges, Generic Contrast in Old English Hagiographical Poetry, y6-yy. For an important critique of figural readings of Elene see Hermann, Allegories of War, I O I - I 8 .

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learned in the Law" [ eorlas .ecleawe] , turn away from the queen to seek "the wisest of word-mysteries" [ pa wisestan wordgeryno] ( 3 2 r a, 3 23 ) . They find a thousand men "ferhogleawra, pa pe zyrngemynd / mid Iudeum gearwast cuoon" [wise in spirit, those who most clearly knew the memory of ancient times among the Jews ] ( 3 27- 2 8 ) . However, this group is still not select enough : Elene commands them to go back and return with pa pe fYrngewri tu purh snyttro crcrft selest cunnen, crriht eower, pert me ondsware purh sidne sefan secgan cunnen. [those who, through the skill of wisdom, best know the ancient writings and your Law, so that by their ample understanding they can answer to me . ] Elene is setting a trap : she wants to defeat and convert the very wisest representative of the Jews, the Jew who is at the absolute pinnacle of Jewish intellectual and spiritual capacity, so that she may show the utter insufficiency of the Old Law. Like Portia in Shakespeare's The Mer chant of Venice) Elene is going to use the Jews' reliance on the letter of the Law-their bounded intellectual horizons-against them. Cynewulf establishes the nature of Jewish understanding by repeat ing, again and again, that the Jews were wise in their Law, in their ancient traditions, in their Scriptures . Tedium sets in with this formula, as the Jews then find five hundred men forpsnottera pa oe leornungcrxft alesen leodmxga, purh modgemynd mxste hxfdon, on sefan snyttro . [very wise, chosen from their people, who because of their intel ligence possessed the greatest learning in the wisdom of their understanding. ]

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Cynewulf is playing against audience expectations; as we saw in the homilies and their surrounding traditions, the usual stereotype is that the Jews are blind or ignorant. The reader does not expect a constant refrain of how learned the Jews are; but as they pile up , these descrip tions of exalted intellectual achievement begin to ring hollow, and the reader senses Cynewulf's hand preparing to pull the carpet out from under Jewish feet. The game continues as Elene again harangues the Jews for their deicide; in a quick flash of irony, they explain to her that Hwxt, we Ebreisce x leornedon, pa on fyrndagum fxderas cuoon xt godes earce, ne we geare cunnon purh hwxt ou ous hearde, hlxfdige, us eorre wurde . [ Indeed, we have learned the Hebrew Law, which in days long past the fathers knew at the ark of God, and we do not completely understand why you, lady, have become sternly angry with us. ] The Jews do not understand, but the reader steeped in the anti-Judaic rhetoric of the early Middle Ages, the Anglo-Saxon reader perusing the Vercelli Book, understands the futility of the Jews' words . They say that they do not understand her anger, but their misunderstanding goes far deeper-the Jews ever move in a world of darkness, bereft of Christ. However, Elene will have none of their excuses, and again sends the Jews back to find "]Ja oe snyttro mid eow, / mxgn ond modcrxft, mxste hxbben" [those who have the greatest wisdom, strength and intelligence among you] ( 4 07b- 8 ). And, of course, they finally happen upon Judas, a man "gidda gearosnotor" and "wordes crxftige" [very wise in lore (and) skilled in words ] ( 4 I 8a, 4 I 9a) . 27 Elene eventually "educates" Judas beyond his current abilities by starving him in a pit, but it is clear that Cynewulf, writing from within an expected tradition, is using a form of irony: the Christian audience knows that the Jews are 2 7 . See also lines 5 4 I b- 4 6. Camp bell tracks the changes Cynewulf made to his source in the emphasis on Judas's wisdom ( " Cyne;vulf's Multiple Revelations," 24 1 - 4 2 ) . For the sources behind Elene see Gradon, ed., Cynewu!j' 5 "Elene, " r 5 - 22; and Allen and Calder, trans . , Sources and Analogues of Old En;_qlish Poetry: The Major Latin Texts i n Translation, 5 9 - 69 .

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not "wise" in the grand scheme of things; they can operate only in the limited capacity defined by the Old Law. The more the Jews search for their wisest representative, the more the reader sees their limitations . The entire process serves as a contrast to the council of Constantine in the beginning of the poem : searching for the meaning of the cross, Constantine speedily receives the correct answer to his query from the wisest of his advisors . 28 The Jews stand exposed as blind in a spiritual and intellectual sense; we saw this idea developed in the prose texts, and Elene repeats it in her first encounter with the Jewish elders, berating them for their cnme : Swa ge modblinde mengan ongunnon lige wid sode, leoht wid pystrum, a:fst wid are, inwitpancum wroht webbedan. Eow seo wergdu fordan scedped scyldfi1llum . Ge pa sciran miht deman ongunnon, ond gedweolan lifdon, od pysne da:g. peostrum ge}Jancum, ( 3 o6- I 2 ) 29 [Thus spiritually blind, you began to mix falsehood with truth, light with darkness, envy with honor; maliciously you fabricated a slander. Therefore the curse will crush you guilty ones. You condemned the bright power and have lived in heresy with dark thoughts to this day. ] Living in these "dark thoughts" []Jeostrum ge]Jancum] is not, strictly speaking, a literal statement: thoughts are not literally dark or light. The poetic expression of the tradition of blindness guides the metaphor here-they reject a "bright power" [sciran miht] and live with "dark thoughts" because Jews are always blind in this tradition. As we dis cussed earlier, the Jews "rejected the cure for blindness" [ blindnesse bote forsegon] ( 3 8 9 ) and spat in the face of Christ, who tried to heal their malady with his own spittle . Cynewulf equates their blindness with ignorance and error. Although this passage also speaks to the intentional 2 8 . See Calder, Cynewulf, 1 0 8 - 9 . 29 . For a stylistic analysis o f Elene's invective, see Van der Wurff, "Cynewulf 's Elene. "

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motives of the Jews (they maliciously fabricated lies ) , their life of error seems to depend on their modblinde state . Cynewulf takes the blindness/ignorance motif a step fi1rther through the process of Judas's conversion. When Judas's father passes down the story of the crucifixion and its aftermath, he also sketches the salient early events of Acts : he tells of the stoning of Stephen Protomartyr ( Elene 49 r b- s ooa) and Saul's persecution of Christians . Then, in a curiously vague passage , Cynewulf relates the conversion of Paul on the road to Damascus from Acts 9 : r - 3 o : Swa peah him dryhten eft miltse gefremede, pxt he manegum wean) folca to frofre, syooan him frymoa god, nioa nergend, naman oncyrde, on he syooan wxs sanctus Paulus be naman haten. ( s oob- s a ) [ But the Lord later showed him mercy so that he became a com fort to many people, after the God of new beginnings, the savior of men, changed his (i.e . , Saul's) name, and he was afterward called by the name of Saint Paul. ] But Cyne\\<'lll f omits the most famous detail of Paul's conversion: the Lord strikes Saul blind, and only after three days without food or drink does he regain his sight by the touch of Ananias : "And immediately there fell from his eyes as it were scales, and he received his sight; and rising up , he was baptized" (Acts 9 : r 8 ) . Since Judas, like Saul, will also be deprived of food, convert, and change his name (to Cyriacus : Elene r o s 8b- 6oa ) , it follows through analogy that Judas, like Saul, is also "blind" at this point, as are all the Jews . By setting down a rather abstract description of Saul's conversion, Cynewulf raises the complete model of Paul's conversion in the mind of the reader, allowing him or her to view the subsequent action of Elene through the prism of Acts . The omission of Saul's blindness, therefore, changes the literary import of the allusion : the Jews in Elene do not "know" they are blind; it is only after conversion that they may see . Also, the omission alerts the reader to its absence, highlighting blindness as a theme of the early action of the poem. It is a strategy parallel to Cynewulf 's laborious

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construction of the Jews' limited understanding under the Old Law. In both cases, the text calls attention to the absence of an important hermeneutic element-a Christian illumination achieved only through conversion. We see the result of this enlightenment in the change in Judas's character. When he relents in his opposition, and a miraculous white vapor reveals the location of the cross, Judas is now a man "blessed and wise in the Law" [ eadig ond tegleaw] and "wise in thought" [gleaw in ge]Janc] ( 8o sa, 8 o 6b ) . He is the "herald of truth" and "wise of spirit," "a deep thinker" [ rihtes wemend ( 8 79a), JYrhogleaw on f£0me ( 8 8 oa) , deophycgende ( 8 8 r a ) . When the "wise-minded" [gleawhydig] ( 9 3 4a) con vert "fl1ll of wisdom" [ wisdomesfu[j ( 9 3 8 b ) confronts the enraged devil, he is no longer blind and ignorant but is now endowed with the understanding imparted by the Holy Spirit, a divine possession famil iar from Acts . Upon him the Holy Spirit was "befolen fxste, fyrhat lufu, j weallende gewitt Jmrh witgan snyttro" [firmly bestowed, a fiery hot love, and an overflowing intelligence, through the wisdom of a prophet] (9 3 6- 3 7 ) . As Judas blasts the devil with his newly inspired rhetoric, Elene looks on in satisfaction "ymb pxs weres snyttro" [at the man's wisdom ] ( 9 5 8b ) . 3 ° Cynewulf aestheticizes the tradition of Jew ish ignorance and mental deficiency, playing with the anti-Judaic tradi tion in order to achieve literary effects of a subde nature . Cynewulf grasps the basic cathexis of the anti-Judaic tradition and elaborates the issues of culpability and understanding with a poet's sensibility. Yet Cynewulf also uses the other traditions of culpability: active intention and diabolical influence . Elene manipulates the tradition of malevolent Jewish intentions . The Jews were not innocendy blind to the truth; rather, they meant to reject Christ, "rejected" [forst27on] ( 3 8 9 b ) the remedy for their blindness, and "denied" [ wiOsocon] ( 3 9oa) the truth. Judas regales his puzzled comrades with the story of the crucifixion, handed down to him through his family, explaining that their ancestors hung the guildess Christ on the cross "through hate" 3 0 . For an analysis of the contrasting rhetoric of Elene and Judas, demonstrating how their different styles of speech relate to the sapiential theme of the poem, see Bjork, Old English Verse Saints) Lives, 62- 8 9 ; Bjork shows that Elene's speech in the poem is character ized by a controlled use of indirect discourse, while Judas "displays a lack of profound spiritual understanding by using indirect discourse as mere ornament" ( 7 6) . When Judas converts, his speech becomes more like Elene's. See also Bridges, Generic Contrast) 2 3 4 - 5 2, for a stylistic analysis of the language used to describe the Jews.

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[jJUrh hete] ( 4 24a) . Like the envy detailed in the homilies, here hate guides the actions of the Jews . Judas's grandfather makes it clear that he wanted to keep his soul pure and not follow the "intention" [ge]Jeahte] ( 468a) of the Jews . Subsequent to the crucifixion, the Jews have aggra vated their crime by hiding the cross and their role in the deicide . Note the illogicality of this position: apparently Elene and the rest of the Christian world "know" that the Jews killed Christ, yet the Jews in Elene are accursed for successfl1lly hiding their participation-but they apparently have not hidden anything, since the whole world "knows" they crucified Christ. Judas's grandfather said that if the cross were found, and the crime's perpetrators exposed Ne m;:Eg ;:Efre ofer p;:Et Ebrea peod r;:Edpeahtende rice healdan, dugudum wealdan. [Never after that can the Hebrew people, deliberating, hold power and govern the multitudes . ] Only those who believe in Christ will find joy and power in the world. By hiding the location of the cross, the Jews are, in a sense, reenacting the crucifixion, extending their original crime . Elene knows they are persisting "mid fxcne gefice" [with a deceitfl1l lie ] ( 5 77a ) ; she demands that the Jews uncover the tmth "pe ge hwile nu on unriht I wrigon under womma sceatum" [which you have now for a while unjustly concealed under the garments of sins] ( 5 8 2b- 8 3 a) . She must defeat their evil intentions and inevitably will : as she promises, "ne magon ge pa wyrd bemidan I bedyrnan pa deopan mihte" [you cannot conceal the events nor keep secret that deep power] ( 5 8 3 b- 84a) . Clearly, the rhetoric here posits the Jews as active antagonists, and this apparently can coexist, in contradiction, alongside the notion that the Jews are blind, limited, and unable to understand the fabric of the true spiritual world around them, much less actively campaign against it. However, the Jews cannot be too incapacitated; rhetorically, they need to be dire and effective enemies: 3 r . C f. early medieval laws against Jews holding public oflice; see Linder, jnvs i n the Legal Sources, "Index of Subjects: State Otlicials, Holding State Office, Vassals," 7 1 6.

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Heo wa:ron stearce, stane heardran, noldon pa:t geryne rihte cyaan, ne hire andsware a:nige secgan, torngenialan, pa:s hio him to sohte, ac hio worda gehwa:s wiaersa:c fremedon, fa:ste on fyrhae, pa:t heo frignan ongan . [They were stubborn, harder than stone; they would not rightly make known that secret, nor, as her bitter foes, give her any answer about that which she sought from them, but, firm in spirit, they contradicted each of the questions that she asked them . ] Like the Jews in Vercelli I 6 who would not recognize Christ-even though the Jordan itself reversed its flow in homage to him-these Jews are hard-hearted, like stones, possessed of deadened spiritual senses, but all by their own choice . The poem uses the collective anti Judaic tradition, but subordinates it to a larger design. The Jews are "hard-hearted" (yes, we have seen that before ) , but they are also "firm in spirit" [J.este on JYrh6e] . Is this phrase ironically heroic, meant to nod toward the traditions of secular, heroic Old English poetry? Here is a complex poetic enhancement of the traditions exemplified in the prose texts of Vercelli and Blickling, but not without residual ambiguities, even after being rendered into poetry. And like the homilies, diabolical influence is another mode Cyne wulf deploys to understand the motives of the Jews . With the help of his councilors in the beginning of the poem, Constantine finds out where Christ had been crucified and learns that the devil "forla:rde ligesearwum, leode fortyhte, / Iudea cyn" [with his deceits seduced the Jewish nation and led the people astray] , so that they hanged God himself ( 2o 8 - 9a) . The narrator tells us that the cross was hidden "through the trickery of the enemy" [Purh feondes searu] ( 7 2 r a ) . Once more the logic is not consistent here : again and again the text maintains the congenital spiritual defects and the malicious intentions of the Jews, locating blame among the Jews themselves; but apparently a diabolical hand also directs their actions . The Jews "had raised up enmity" [ ni6 ahofun] ( 8 3 7a) against Jesus, a crime they would not have dared "pa:r hie leahtra fruman !arum ne hyrdon" [had they not listened there to the teachings of the author of sins] ( 8 3 8 ) . After the location of

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the cross is discovered, the devil makes a personal appearance ( 8 9 8 9 3 3 ) , and when the Jews convert at the subsequent sight o f the nails of the cmcifixion, they rejoice ealle anmode, peah hie xr wxron purh deofles spild in gedwolan lange, acyrred fram Criste . [with one mind, even though before, through the destruction of the devil, they had long been in error, having turned away from Christ. ] Again, we see a tradition, exemplified in the commonplace rhetoric of the homilies, that ascribes the actions of the Jews to the devil ; when it is subtly folded into the poetic mix of Elene) where it melds-often illogically-with other contradictory explanations of Jewish culpabil ity, it is much more powerful . The effect is a turbulent, onmshing attack of emotional anti-Judaism, appealing to several aesthetic levels . The more intellectually discerning reader could see how subtly Cyne wulf plays with the trope of deficient Jewish perception, building the dynamic into the conversion of Judas . Another, perhaps more political, reader could relate to Cynewulf 's development of the malevolent, group-based intentional tradition: the Jews chose and plotted to assassi nate Christ, and they did so to "maintain their political power," what ever that might be. The reader fond of diabolus ex machina readings would certainly nod in assent to the flamboyant ascription of the Jews' actions to the devil. But again, regardless of the specific reason, the Jews are ultimately doomed to wander through history as a defeated, accursed people : "I>xs hie in hyndum sculon / to widan feore wergdu dreogan" [because of this they must suffer a cursed existence in humilia tion through a long-enduring life ] ( 2 I ob- I I ) , the poetic equivalent of Vercelli I 's pithy summary: "swa him syppan eall unlxdlic on becwom" [since afterward all sorts of misery fell upon them] ( I , I 9 I - 9 2 ) .

Poetic Variations: Andreas The long Old English poem Andreas ( I , 722 lines) exhibits a very similar cathexis of traditional anti-Judaic rhetoric; Andreas) adapted

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 22 9

from one of the apocryphal Acts of the Apostles, tells the story of the apostles Matthew and Andrew and their exotic adventures among the cannibals of Mermedonia. Following the form of a traditional saint's martyrdom, Andreas also is indebted to the romance structures and imagery of Luke-Acts Y With deliberate narrative echoes, the poem calls to mind the audience expectation generated by Acts : noble apos tles travel the world, advancing the work of the Lord in the face of faithless evil opposition . In both texts apostles are imprisoned by unbelieving enemies; the Lord appears to them in some fashion, and they are then set free or otherwise comforted. For example, in Acts Peter and the apostles incur the wrath of the chief priests in their healing of the sick: "And they laid hands on the apostles, and put them in the common prison. But an angel of the Lord by night opening the doors of the prison, and leading them out, said: 'Go, and standing speak in the temple to the people all the words of this life"' (Acts 5 : I 8 - 2o ) . Because it "pleased the Jews," Herod incarcerated Peter, but the angel of the Lord "stood by him and a light shined in the room" (Acts I 2: 3 , 7 ) . The angel strikes off Peter's chains and delivers him from bondage; as Peter says, "Now I know in very deed, that the Lord hath sent his angel, and hath delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from all the expectation of the people of the Jews" (Acts I 2: I I ) . At Philippi, Paul and Silas are imprisoned, but God hears their prayers and delivers them with a tremendous earthquake (Acts I 6: 2 3 - 2 6 ) . Similarly, i n Andreas the cannibal Mermedonians imprison Mat thew, and in response to his prayers the Lord sends down to Matthew "wuldres tacen / halig of heofenum, swylce hadre sigel" [a holy sign of glory from the heavens, like a bright sun ] ( 8 8b- 8 9 ) . B The Lord offers Matthew " health and comfort " [hcelo ond frofre] ( 9 5 b ) , as he tells him that help is on the way from his fellow apostle Andrew. Likewise, Andrew falls into the clutches of the Mermedonians, who throw him into prison-an Acts-inspired captivity filtered through the moody sensibilities of Old English elegiac poetry: 3 2. I will concentrate on the poetic Andreas here, but cf. also Blickling I9 ( S. Andreas) , which consists of a condensed prose version of the same legend. For translations of the Old English homily and the Greek and Latin analogues behind the Old English texts, see Boenig, trans. , Acts ofAndrew in the Countr_v of the Cannibals. 3 3 · On the emendation of the manuscript segl ( "sail") to sigel ( "sun") see Brooks, An dreas, 64, note to line 5 0 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 23 0

under heolstorscuwan, l>a se halga wxs eorl ellenheard, ondlange niht searopancum beseted. Snaw eoroan band wintergeworpum . Weder coledon heardum hxgelscurum, swylce hrim ond forst, hxleoa eoel hare hildstapan, lucon, Ieoda gesetu. Land wxron freorig cealdum cylegicelum, clang wxteres prym ofer eastreamas, is brycgade Blioheort wunode blxce brimrade . eorl unforcuo, elnes gemyndig, prist ond prohtheard in preanedum wintercealdan niht. [Then the saint, the brave man, was encompassed by deep thoughts the whole night, under the shadows of darkness . Snow bound the earth in wintry heaps. The sky froze with harsh hail storms; likewise rime and frost, grey stalking warriors, chained the land of men, the dwellings of people . The lands were freezing with cold icicles; the rush of water shrank in the rivers; ice tra versed the shining path of the flood. Happy of heart, the man above reproach, mindful of courage, remained bold and patient in great affliction, throughout the winter-cold night. ] This is a striking example of how the narrative motif of captivity con structed originally in Acts and in apocryphal texts telling of the mission ary activities in the East finds refinement and amplification in the idiom of Old English verse, landscape reflecting both internal emotion and theological texture .34 But the Lord finally appears to Andrew in prison and delivers him, healing his wounds ( 1 4 5 8 - 7 7 ) . Andrew and his companions also undertake a dangerous sea voyage and endure a ter rible storm, just as Paul endures a storm and shipwreck on his journey to Rome ( 3 69 - S r ; Acts 27) . 3 5 Andreas is an imaginative response to 3 4 · Cf. the wintry elegiac mood of exile in The Wanderer I - 5 , I 9 - 2 5 , 3 7 - 4 8 , 99- I 0 5 ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, AS PR 3 , I 3 4 - 7 3 ) ; The Seafarer I - 3 3 a ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, ASPR 3 , I 4 3 - 4 7 ) ; and Hengest's brooding winter with Finn in Beowulfl l25-4l . 3 5 . Both sea journeys also include discussions of eating; see Acts 2 7 : 3 3 - 3 6.

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 23 1

Acts, an extension of the familiar outlines of apostolic adventure narra tive; it is a text that extends and augments the tradition of apostolic romance even as it conjures the generic expectations of the tradition when its narrative unfolds . In Acts, the Jews constantly frustrate the work of the apostles; in Andreas) the cannibals serve the same narrative function-the two groups occupy analogous positions in a comparison of the narrative structures . As Cynewulf does in Elene) the Andreas-poet plays upon anti-Judaic audience expectations : within the narrative paradigm the Mermedonians are to Andreas as the Jews are to Acts . Andreas opens with the terrible society of the cannibals, their wit-obliterating magic potion, and their capture of Matthew. We will return to the similarity between anti-Judaic traditions and the representation of the cannibals below, but here note that the grim depiction of the cannibals' society opens the narrative ( I - I 6o) before the scene switches and we meet Andrew in Greece . The next large movement of the poem concerns Andrew's sea voyage and his encounter with the disguised divine pres ence of the Lord aboard ship ( I 6 I - 8 2 I ) , and then the rest of the poem features Andrew's struggle with the cannibals. The Mermedonians and their terrors thus bracket the middle section of the poem, and on this central sea journey Andrew and the Lord engage in a discussion of the Jews, a dialogue expanded from the source by the Andreas-poet and rife with anti-Judaic rhetoric . 3 6 The Lord bids Andrew: Saga, pances gleaw pegn, gif ou cunne, hu oxt gewurde be werum tweonum, pxt oa arleasan inwidpancum, Iudea cynn wio godes bearne ahof hearmcwide . Hxleo unsxlige no oxr gelyfdon in hira liffruman, grome gealgmode, pxt he god wxre ; peah oe he wundra feala weorodum gecyode, sweoltulra ond gesynra. Synnige ne mihton oncnawan pxt cynebearn, se oe acenned wean) 3 6. This anti-Judaic dialogue is absent from the Old English homily: see Blickling I9 ( S. Andreas) , 2 3 2 - 3 4 . It is present in the Greek and Latin versions of the legend, but in a somewhat shorter form: see Boenig, Acts ofAndrew, 7- r r , 3 6- 3 9 .

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to hleo ond to hroore ha:leoa cynne, eallum eordowarum. lE ]Jelinge we ox word ond wisdom, ah he para wundra a, domagende, da:l a:nigne beforan cyode? fra:tre peode [Say if you can, thane wise in thought, how it came to pass among men that the impious ones, the nation ofthe Jews, raised up slander ous speech against the son of God with evil intentions . Wretched men, hostile and bloody-minded, there they would not believe in their life-lord, that he was God; although he revealed many mira cles to the people, clear and manifest, the sinners could not recog nize the royal child, he who was born as a comfort and refuge for humanity, for all the earth's inhabitants . Word and wisdom grew in the Prince, but did he, the possessor of glory, ever reveal any por tion of those miracles before that perverse people? ] In response Andrew details a number of Christ's miracles, apparently agreeing with his disguised Savior that yes, it does seem impossible that the Jews could have denied the evidence of Jesus' divinity. Christ there fore concludes : Me pa:t pinceo, oa:t hie for a:fstum inwit syredon purh deopne gedwolan . Deofles larum ha:leo hynfi1se hyrdon to georne, Hie seo wyrd beswac, wraoum wa:logan. forleolc ond forla:rde . Nu hie lungre sceolon, werige mid werigum, wra:ce prowian, biterne bryne on banan fa:ome . [ It seems to me that out of malice they plotted treachery, because of their profound heresy. Those death-doomed men too eagerly lis tened to the teachings of the devil, to the fierce enemy. Fate betrayed them, deceived and perverted them. Now accursed among 3 7. I retain manuscript

£n

igne ( 5 7ob ), following Brooks.

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 23 3

the accursed, they must soon endure torment, bitter fire, in the embrace of the slayer. ] As it explores the motivation and culpability of the Jews in their deicide, this dialogue prepares Andrew for his own torments among the Mermedonians. Like Christ in the Harrowing of Hell (and echoing similar miraculous scenes in Acts ) , Andrew will bring imprisoned souls up from the darkness. 3 8 In order to effect a conversion, both Christ and Andrew work a miracle with a stone structure ( Christ with a statue at 727- 6o; Andrew with a stone column at 1 4 8 9 - 1 5 5 3 ) . Andrew's tor ments echo Christ's Passion : indeed, before Andrew ventures into the city of the cannibals, the Lord warns him that the saint's blood will flow in torment in the approaching struggle, but urges him to take heart and remember p;rt me bysmredon bennum f;rstne weras wansxlige . Wordum tyrgdon, slogan ond swungon; synnige ne mihton lmrh sarcwide soo gecyoan. [that wretched men humiliated me, bound tight in bonds. They insulted me with words, they struck me and scourged me; the sinners could not reveal the truth with their bitter speech . ] We are meant, obviously, to connect Andrew to Christ, and it therefore also follows that the cannibals are meant to be seen "as" the Jews . Christ explicitly connects his torments "among the Jews" [ mid Iudeum] ( 9 66 ) and Andrew's imminent torture : Ic adreah feala yrmpa ofer eoroan . Wolde ic eow on oon bysne onstellan) purh blione hige swa on ellpeode ywed wyroeo . ( 9 69b-72; emphasis added) 3 8 . O n Andreas and the Harrowing o f Hell, see Earl, "Typological Strucmre o f An dreas," 8 6- 8 8 . The figural quality of Andreas, although rather elusive and inconsistent, has been established: see T. Hill, "Figural Narrative in 'Andreas'"; and Hieatt, "Harrowing of Mennedonia. "

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[I suffered many miseries on earth. In this I wanted, with kindly intention, togive you an example as will be revealed in this foreign nation] The Jews and the cannibals share the same position in the narrative structure of the poem. By including the anti-Judaic dialogue of the sea voyage, the Andreas-poet augments the analogous connection between the Jews and the cannibals, allowing the reader to drift easily between the two groups, ascribing the characteristics of one to the other. The culpability-traditions outlined in Luke-Acts and the Vercelli and Bliclding homilies, and then elaborated in Elene) reappear in a familiar form in Andreas. For example, the Jews cannot recognize Christ, be cause they do not have the intellectual/spiritual faculties. As narrated by Andrew on the ship , the animated stone statue describes the Jews as unlxde, earmra gepohta searowum beswicene, oooe sel nyton, mode gemyrde . [ miserable ones, deceived by the traps of unhappy thoughts, or you do not know better, being of confused mind. ] This explanation depends upon the tradition of Jewish blindness or mental fogginess . The Jews' fault is endemic: their actions are explained with respect to innate mental states. They are led astray by unhappy thoughts, do not know any better, or simply have confused minds . As we saw in the dialogue above , Christ says that the Jews "no oxr gelyfdon in hira liffruman" [would not believe in their life -lord] ( 5 62 ), even though he performed many miracles, "clear and manifest" [ sweoltulra ond ge synra] ( 5 6 sa) . They just "ne mihton / oncnawan pxt cynebearn" [ could not recognize the royal child] ( 5 6 5 - 6 6a) . The Lord seems to lean at first towards a mental explanation for the Jews' refusal : they could not recog nize him because they were "hostile and bloody-minded" [gromegealg mode] ( 5 6 3 a) . The Lord addresses Andrew as a man "wise of thought" [.Pances gleaw] ( 5 5 7 a), a clear opposition to the Jews, who make their way in the world unable to recognize the presence of the Lord. ( Of course, the poet plays here on the irony of the situation, for it is the "dear-minded" Andrew who sits in blissful ignorance as he chats with

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 23 5

his Savior. ) Even after the statue animated by Christ castigates the Jews for their unbelief, they still "did not acknowledge the truth" [so6 ne oncneovvan] ( 764b ) , but instead they skeptically ascribe the talking statue to "sorcery" [ drycneftum] ( 76 s a ) and illusion. This characterization of the Jews bears obvious similarities to the sentiment expressed in the wide tradition exemplified by Vercelli I 6 ( discussed above ) : lacking the ability to understand and recognize God, the Jews deny Christ, even in the face of miraculous, "empirical" evidence . But in Jesus' same discussion with Andrew, the Jews also seem to be active participants : the "impious" [ arleasan] Jews plotted against Christ with "evil intentions" [ invvidpancum] ( 5 5 9 ) . Again, in Christian anti Judaic rhetoric malevolent intention and unwitting ignorance can exist side by side . The Andreas-poet moves back and forth : the Jews do not recognize the truth (with the implication that if they could see it, maybe things would be different), but they also actively hate Christ, out of all proportion to simple doubt: Man wridode geond beorna breost, brandhata nio weoll on gewitte, weorm blxdum fag, attor xlfxle . :Pxr wxs orcnawe tweogende mod, lmrh teoncwide mxcga misgehygd morore bewunden. [ Evil grew in the breasts of men, a flaming hatred surged in their minds, the worm marked with blasts of fire, an all-destructive venom. There, through insulting speech, the doubting mind, wound with deadly evil, was revealed-the perverse thoughts of the men . ] The "perverse thoughts" [ misgehygd] and "doubting mind" [ tweogende mod] both derive from the tradition ofJewish blindness, the anti-Judaic rhetoric of spiritual and mental deficiency, but the hatred welling in their minds and writhing in their hearts implies an intentional betrayal. As Andrew narrates the events of the passion, he explains that the high priest "with evil intent" [purh invvit6anc] ( 67oa) 39· I have adopted Brooks's interprettion of bLendum fag ( 769b) and his reading of line 770 (Brooks, Andreas, 8 8 , note to line 769 ) .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 23 6

Huscworde ongan herme hyspan, wroht web bade .

hordlocan onspeon,

[began maliciously to mock with insulting words; he opened his word-hoard and fabricated an accusation. ] As he emphasizes the evil schemes of the high priest, Andrew assigns blame unambiguously; he tells Christ that the priest on gewitte oncneow p;rt we soof;rstes swaoe folgodon, l;rston larcwide . He lungre ahof wooe wioerhydig wean onblonden. [ knew in his mind that we followed the path of the righteous one and fulfilled his teaching; he quickly raised a cry malevolent and mingled with evil . ] In his dialogue with Andrew, Christ also ultimately places more weight on his theory of an intentional plan. Although it appeared that the Jews could not understand the miracles, Christ (as we have seen ) concludes: Me pxt pinceo, oxt hie for xfstum inwit syredon purh deopne gedwolan. [It seems to me that out of envy they plotted treachery, because of their deep heresy. ] The pattern is familiar: the anti-Judaic rhetoric of Andreas moves with grim speed between the poles of ignorant blindness and malicious intention. The paradox of Jews who are blind, but as evil enemies can see all too well, develops the paradox of this cathexis to the point where it moves beyond logical apprehension to the irrational. Something

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 23 7

about the paradoxical, contradictory aesthetic of this tradition renders the Christian hatred of Jews more disturbingly powerful as it enters the area of unreason. In Andreas) the distinct traditional theories of Jewish culpability ex pressed in individual homilies fall together in a montage . The Andreas poet also uses our third tradition of culpability-satanic urgings . In the lines immediately following Christ's conclusion above, the Lord ex plains to Andrew that the Jews committed their crime under the influ ence of the devil : Deofles larum hxled hynfuse hyrdon to georne, wradum wxrlogan. ( 6 r r b- r 3 a)4° [The doomed men listened too eagerly to the teachings of the devil, to the fierce enemy. ] The devil also makes a physical appearance in Andreas: he is black and terrifYing, accursed and "perverse of mind" [ widerhy£ijende] ( r r 72a) . Judas applies the same epithet to the devil in Elene ( 9 5 r a ) ; it also describes the cannibals in Andreas: while awaiting their ghastly meal, they are widerhycgende ( r o72b ). Like Jews, the devils and the cannibals are "perverse" in the deeper, etymological sense of the word: they are turned thoroughly the wrong way, moving in an unnatural, opposite direction against the proper order of nature . And so the devil in Andreas incites the cannibals to attack Andrew, just as he moved the Jews against Christ.41 The devil makes this paral lel between Andrew and Christ explicit as he addresses the apostle: Hafast nu pe anum eall getihhad swa clyde lareow pin? land ond leode, Cyneprym ahof, pam wxs Crist nama, 4 0 . The statue informs the Jews that they are "earmra gel)Qhta / searowum beswicene" [deceived by the traps of unhappy thoughts ] , which also seems to imply devilish influence (Andreas 7 44b-4 s a ) . 4 1 . See Andreas, 1 1 79- 8 3 , I 296- r 3 o r . O n the christological character o f the poem see Bjork, Old English Verse Saints' Lives, r r o - 2 4 ; Earl, "Typological Structure," 7 1 - 76; Hieatt, "Harrowing of Mermedonia," 5 I- s 6 .

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ofer middangeard, pynden hit meahte swa. Pone Herodes ealdre besny6ede, forcom xt campe cyning Iudea, rices berxdde, ond hine rode befealg, pxt he on gealgan his gast onsende . Swa ic nu bebeode bearnum minum, pegnum pry6fl1llum, 6xt hie 6e hnagen, gingran xt gu6e . ( r 3 20- 3 oa) [Have you all alone now claimed land and people, as did your teacher? He whose name was Christ exalted his royal power on earth while he was able to do so. Herod deprived him of life ; the king of the Jews overcame him in battle, took his kingdom, and consigned him to the cross, so that he sent forth his spirit on the gallows . Thus I now shall order my children, mighty thanes, my followers in the fight, to humble you. ] In the heroic idiom of the comitatus) the devil directly compares his role in Andreas with his earlier role in the death of Christ, who was "over come in battle" by the "icing of the Jews. " Andreas and Elene both end i n baptism and conversion: Judas and the cannibals are transformed from their former contrary nature to true believers, all harsh traces of difference smoothed away in the abiding light of Christian understanding.42 In summary, how does the expres sion of anti-Judaism in Vercelli and Blickling differ from what we have surveyed so far? Bede, for example, expresses many of the same senti ments (though he does not seem to promote the devil as an inspiration for the Jews' crime ) ; but consider for a moment how different the texts of Vercelli and Blickling "feel." There is a rush and play of emotion here quite different from the more measured grid of Bede's exegesis, even when he is expressing anger or outrage . The power of the poetic under standing of Jews resides in the way the poetry unfolds the traditional rhetoric of anti-Judaism-represented by the homilies in both Vercelli and Blickling-and then plays upon the tradition for aesthetic effects, amplifies through paradox the cathexis of horror, fear, awe, and outrage 4 2 . On baptism in Elene see T. Hill, "Sapiential Structure," 220- 2 r ; and Regan, "Evan gelicism," 2 5 9 - 7 6 . On baptism in Andreas see T. Hill, "Figural Narrative" and "Sphragis as Apotropaic Sign. "

Anti-Judaic Rhetoric 239

clustering about the Jews in the Christian imagination. To say the least, this results in a disturbing dialectic: a medieval reader of the Vercelli Book would find very familiar theological anti-Judaism in the course of reading the relatively unadorned, hortatory, and discursive prose texts, but then would find those same points of doctrine taken up by the poetry, extended and augmented through all the various techniques of Old English verse, and then inserted into highly emotional and intense narratives. The anti-Judaic rhetoric of Vercelli and Blickling swells and grows as it oscillates between prosaic commonplace depictions and florid poetic development. We will also see in the next chapter that there is a deeper level of fear and hatred represented in the traditions ofVercelli and Blickling, a somatic anxiety that also distinguishes these texts from both Bede and the populus Israhel mythos .

S IX

Anti-Judaism and S omatic Fiction

Vercelli 7) Jews and the Body ews comprise an important part of the Vercelli Book and the Blickling manuscript; anti-Judaic rhetoric accompanies the christological, es chatological, and penitential concerns ofthe codices. I This is not surpris ing in that, as Ruether has demonstrated in Faith and Fratricide) anti Judaism inevitably accompanies Christology, like a constant shadow. As the previous chapter demonstrated, the understanding ofJews exempli fied by these manuscripts represents a highly imaginative, emotionally wrought response to New Testament apocrypha and related traditions. Following the Augustinian understanding of Jews, the accusation of deicide stands out in these texts as the source for anger against the Jews ; in both prose and verse, the authors try to answer the question, "Why did the Jews kill Christ? " In trying to understand the problem, ambigu ities arise, contradictions clash, and anger flowers as the Christian hermeneutic circle struggles to understand the nature ofJewish culpabil ity and falls into a hopeless cathexis .

J

I . On the penitential orientation of the collections, see Fr<mtzen, Literature of Penance, 1 5 2- 5 7; on eschatology see Gatch, "Two Uses of Apocrypha" and "Eschatology in the Anonymous Old English Homilies"; for discussion of both eschatology and penance in Vercelli see O'Carragain, "How Did the Vercelli Collector Interpret The Dream ofthe Rood?"

Anti-Judaism and Somatic Fiction 24 1

However, another level of understanding moves within this imagina tive elaboration of the deicide charge . In the Bliclding and Vercelli texts and related early medieval traditions we find a connection between Jews and the body, a connection much more apparent in the antisemi tism of the twelfth through fifteenth centuries and beyond. This is, as Gavin Langmuir would put it, an irrational response to Jews, one not proceeding from empirical observation, but from the dark currents of sublimated doubts and fears. In the later Middle Ages, these irrational responses consisted of attributing nonempirical characteristics to Jews, elements that could not be verified by direct observation: that Jews poisoned wells, that Jews spread the plague, that Jews desecrated the host in secret ceremonies, that Jews engaged in ritual murder, that Jews had horns, tails, and other inhuman physical deformities. We can dis cern the beginning of this somatic transformation of the Jews, this understanding in potentia) by focusing on the traditions informing a short, apparently unremarkable homily in the Vercelli Book, Vercelli 7 . Vercelli 7) described by Scragg as a "general appeal to toil, harsh living and temperance,"2 is an excoriation of gluttony and all carnal pleasures; it opens by extolling the interrelated values of education and hard work, touching upon the concerns that will occupy the rest of the homily-the general peril of the earthly world and the suppression of idleness and desire : Butan tweon, Jar is haligdomes dxl, and ealles swioost gif hio hyre gymeleste framadrifeo and xlce gitsunge afYrreo and pissa woruldlicra pinga lufan gewanige and pxt mod to Godes lufan gehwyrfeo, and gedet pxt hit ealle oa lustfulnesse pysses and weardan lifes onscunao . Soolice sio Jar mid geswince hio sceal pa forenemnedan ping forobringan. ( 7, r - 6 ) [Without a doubt, learning is a part of righteousness, and most of all if it drives out carelessness and expels each greedy desire, dimin ishes the love of worldly things, turns the spirit to the love of God, and brings to pass that we shun all the desires of this present life . Truly, learning with work must bring about these aforemen tioned things. ] 2 . Scragg, Vercelli Homilies, 1 3 3 ; Scragg also notes that " [t]he item has many of the hallmarks of a literal translation from Latin but no source has yet been found" ( I 3 3 ) .

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The homilist then goes on to cite biblical example of hard workers : e . g . , Noah, Abraham, Moses . Mter ultimately throwing i n the apostles, the homilist's point is that given the great suffering these figures endured, how can anyone possibly think their toils can compare? Hard work and learning, not laziness and vanity, are the true paths to salvation . Having finished with ideal models, the text then moves on to nega tive examples; in this passage, food and sexual activity constitute the chief seductive pleasures of the world. As the homilist flings biblical examples of dangerous depravity at the reader, the Jews fall suddenly and momentarily into focus as the angry warnings churn by: Gemunao eac pa oe eall hira lif on pisse worulde on olehtungum lifedon. Gepenceao ponne Ladzarus and pone welegan pe her dxghwamlice symlede and is oxr nu singallice cwelmed. And gemunao Iudeas pe hira lif eall hyra wambe to forlore forgeafon. Be oam wxs gecweden pxt hyra wamb wxre hyra god. Gepenceao eac para pin Sodome for hira unalyfedum gewilnungum fo rwurdon, and para pe on Noes dagum wxron . ( 7, 3 4 - 4 0 ) [ Remember also all those who lived their life o n this earth i n soft pleasures. Think upon Lazarus and the rich man who feasted here every day, and now is tormented there (in hell) constantly. And remember the Jews, who gave their stomachs over to destruction all their lives . Concerning them it was said that their belly was their god. Also think about those who perished in Sodom because of their unlawful desires, and those who were in the days of Noah. ] 3 I wish to focus on this strange aside : "And remember the Jews, who gave their stomachs over to destruction all their lives. Concerning them it was said that their belly was their god." The Jews are apparently an obvious example of corrupt living : their god is the belly. The source of this notion is Paul's letter to the Philippians, invective originally aimed at Judaizing Christians harassing the nascent Christian community at Phi lippi . As is often the case in first-century Judea- Christian confli cts, cir cumcision is an important part of the problem. Paul warns: "Beware of 3 . On the meaning of olehtung ( "pleasure") in this passage and elsewhere in the homily, see Harbus, "Use of the Noun olehtung. "

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dogs; beware o f evil workers; beware of mutilation of the flesh. For we are the circumcision, who in spirit serve God and glory in Christ Jesus, not having confidence in the flesh" ( Philippians 3 : 2- 3 ) . The source for our citation in Vercelli 7 follows, as Paul completes his admonition : "For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping ) that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction, whose god is the belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things" ( Philippians 3 : I 8 - I 9 ) . The original specific ideological context of Paul's comment is, of course, left far behind, and the notion that it is the Jews whose "god is their belly" passes easily into Christian tradition and thence to Anglo-Saxon England. Alcuin, for example, uses this Philippians passage in the course of explicating Paul's letter to Titus; the biblical texts reads : "For there are also many disobedient, vain talkers and seducers, especially they who are of the circumcision; who must be reproved, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake" (Titus I : I o- I I ) . Alcuin explains that this passage from the letter to Titus signifies that bishops and priests need to be well-versed in Scrip ture, able to combat heresy with a thorough knowledge of the Bible : Sunt plurimi et non pauci qui bonam sementem Verbi Dei inani persuasione corrumpunt; hi etiam perversis doctrinam sanctarum scriptuarum sententiis confirmare nituntur: ideo doctorem Ec clesiae decet scripturas sanctas discere diligenter, ut si percussus fiat in dexteram maxillam, mox praebeat percutienti alteram. Hi sunt de circumcisione Judaei, qui tunc temporis nascentem Christi Ec clesiam subvertere conati sunt, et introducere praecepta legalia, circumcisionem scilicet et sabbata et caetera legis praecepta. Tales homines doctor Ecclesiae, cui animae populorum creditae sunt, scriptuarum debet ratione superare, et silentium testimoniorum pondere imponere : qui non unam aut paucas domos sed universas cum dominis familiasque subvertunt, docentes de ciborum differ entiis, cum omnia munda sint mundis . Verum quia Deus est venter ipsorum) turpis lucri gratia volunt proprios facere discipulos, ut quasi magistri a sectatoribus suis fallantur et honorificentur. Omnis itaque haereticus qui quibusdam praestigiis homines fallit, et fallitur, loquitur quae non oportet turpis lucri gratia.4 4· Alcuin, Explanatio in epistolam Pauli ad Titum ( PL IOO: I o i 6 ) ; emphasis added.

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[There are many and not a few who corrupt the good seed of God's word with empty argumentation. They also strive to support their wicked doctrine with perverted quotations of the holy Scriptures. So it befits a teacher of the church diligently to learn the holy Scriptures, so that if struck on the right cheek, he may at once turn the other toward the striker. These are the Jews of the circumcision who then tried to overthrow the newly born church of Christ and to bring in the teaching of the Law, namely, circumcision and the Sabbath and other teachings from the Law. Such men the teacher of the church, to whom the souls of the people have been en trusted, ought to master by means of the Scriptures and to silence them by weight of witnesses. They are upsetting not one or a few homes, but all the families with their masters, teaching about differ ences offoods, when all foods are clean to the clean. But since "their god is the belly) " for the sake of base gain they wish to make their own disciples, so that, as if they were schoolteachers, let them be received and honored by their followers . So every heretic who deceives men by any tricks and is deceived, speaks what he should not for the sake of base gain. ] Jews are the model for those who promulgate false doctrine; they are led by their belly, by carnal motives, and not by aspirations closer to God. In commenting on Titus r : r 3 - 1 4 ( "Wherefore, rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith, not giving heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men who turn themselves away from the truth" ), Alcuin cites the Philippians passage again, explaining that the apostle says "rebuke them sharply" mendaces quippe sunt et malae bestiae et ventris pigri, qui falsa suadent, qui ferarum ritu sanguinem sitiunt deceptorum; et non cum silentio operantes suum panem manducant, "quorum Deus venter est) et gloria in confusione eonim."s [ because they are liars and evil beasts and lazy bellies, who argue for what is untrue, who in the manner of wild animals thirst for the blood of people they have deceived, and not working in 5 · Alcuin, Explanatio in epistolam Pauli ad Titum ( PL IOO: I O I ? ) ; emphasis added.

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silence eat their bread, (they are those ) "whose god is their belly and whose glory is their shame . " ] Behind the moral imperatives o f Vercelli 7) the stern warnings against the dangers of overindulgence and soft living, resides a tradition in which Jews find a link to gluttony, a link to the body: their god is the belly. 6 As we begin to delineate this tradition in the following pages, we will find that in its structure, Vercelli 7 seems to work in a free associative manner: the sinful dangers enumerated are not linked by a complex, logical argument ( as Bede or JElfric, for example, might treat the same subject) , but rather they are connected by traditions of associa tion, contiguous strands of understanding linked by the body: the body is the common denominator. The Jews have a "natural" place in this associative chain. There are similarities between those who are stmk deep into the sin of gluttony and the objects of anti-Judaic rhetoric. There is a deep-set tradition of "unhealthy body, unhealthy mind" in late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Gluttony comprises both excessive eating and excessive alcohol consumption. It results in a loss of control, a type of disgusting madness, not only through immoderate portions of wine or mead, but simply in the idea that too much food addles the wits .? In his influential 6. Further insular uses and echoes of this Philippians quotation might be cited. In lamenting the general corruption of his day, Gildas notes that there are still a tew he considers good, upstanding Christians. Thus he wishes to make clear that he is not condemning these noble few in his treatise, but only those who are "slaves to the belly": "si qua liberius de his, immo lugubrius . . . qui serviunt non solum ventri sed diabolo potius quam Christo, qui est benedictus in saecula deus" [if l speeak freely, even sorrowfully, of those who are slaves of the belly, slaves, too, not of Christ, who is God, blessed for ever, but of the devil J ( DEB 26.4; trans. 2 8 - 29 ) . Also, at the end of a long denunciation of corrupt priests, he asks, "Quid hi , intdix popule, a tali bus, ut dixit apostolus, bestiis ventris praestolaris? [What do you expect, unhappy people from such beasts of the belly, as the apostle said? ] ( DEB 6 8 . 1 ; trans. 5 4 ) . Bede also cites the passage in his commentary on the Revelation; he explains that eating and f(xnication are sinful: "Haec duo sunt principalia, quibus carnales quique militant, 'quorum deus venter est, et gloria in confusione ipsorum . ' Sed et omne opus malum idolatria est, et fornicatio spiritalis" [These are the two principal things in which all the carnal occupy themselves, "whose god is their belly, and their glory is their shame. " But besides this, every evil work is idolatry and spiritual f(Jrnication] ( Explanatio Apocalypsis [PL 9 3 : 1 3 8 ] , comment ing on Revelation 2 : 1 4 . 7 · For background on gluttony and the seven deadly sins see Bloomfield, Seven Deadzv Sins, esp . 1 0 8 - 1 9 on the seven deadly sins in Old English literature. See also Howard, Three Temptations, 4 3 - 7 5 .

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discussion of the mortal sins, the monk John Cassian (ca. 3 6o-ca. 4 3 5 C.E . ) ascribes the following effects to gluttony: Quibuslibet escis refectus uenter seminaria luxuriae parit nee praeualet mens discretionum gubernacula moderari ciborum pon dere praefocata. Non sola crapula uini mentem inebriare consu euit: cunctarum escarum nimietas uacillantem earn ac nutabundam reddit omnique integritatis ac puritatis contemplatione despoliat. Sodomitis causa subuersionis atque luxuriae non uini crapula, sed saturitas extitit panis. 8 [When filled with any sort of food, the stomach gives birth to the seeds of lust, nor can the mind maintain control of the thoughts while it is burdened with the weight of food. It is not only the intoxication of wine that is accustomed to inebriate the mind : an excess of all kinds of food renders it weak and uncertain, and robs it of all purity and clear thought. The reason for the overthrow of the Sodomites and for their lust was not an excess of wine, but a surplus of bread . ] It i s an idea familiar to modern minds that too much wine, of course, scrambles the wits; however, in the tradition deriving from Cassian, too much food also dulls the workings of the brain. In his Liber de virtutibus et vitiis) Alcuin explains that De qua gula nascitur inepta laetitia, scurrilitas, levitas, vanilo quium, immunditia corporis, instabilitas mentis, ebrietas, libido : quia ex saturitate ventris libido corporis congeritur, quae per jejunia et abstentiam, et operis cujuslibet assiduitatem optime vincitur.9 8. John Cassian, Institutes, 5 . 6 . 8 s - 8 6 ( Opera, ed. Petschenig, by book, chapter, and page numbers) . On Cassian and the seven deadly sins see Bloomfield, Seven DeadZv Sins, 69 - 7 2 . 9 · Liber de virtutibus e t vitiis ( PL I O I : 63 3 ) . O n Alcuin and the seven deadly sins see Bloomfield, Seven Deadly Sins, 8o- 8 I . Many examples of this commonplace could be cited: for example, a ninth-century hymn by Regio, abbot of Priim, deriving from Gregory the Great notes: "De ventris ingluvie propagatur inepta laetitia, scurrilitas, immunditia, multilo quium, hebetudo sensus" [From gluttony are produced senseless merriment, scurrility, impu rity, loquacity, heaviness of the senses] ( "De ecclesiasticis disciplinis et religione Christiana" ; Latin cited from Messenger, Ethical Teachings in the Latin Hymns ofMedieval England, 9 5 note 2. Cf. Aldhelm, De virginitate, 24 87- 89 ( Opera, ed. Ehwald, 3 5 0-47 I ) : "Quam sequitur

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[From gluttony comes unsuitable happiness, buffoonery, fickle ness, idle talk, an unclean body, instability of mind, intoxication, and sexual desire : because from the fi1llness of the stomach sexual desire is imposed upon the body, which can best be overcome through fasting and abstinence and the constancy of any work] .

Instabilitas mentis: Alcuin probably drew upon Isidore of Seville, who merges the effects of gluttony and lust in his interpretation of the seven tribes of Israel as allegories of the seven deadly sins : "De gastrimargia namque nascuntur comessationes, ebrietates. De fornicatione turpilo quia, scurrilitas, ludicra, atque stultiloquia" [From gluttony comes rev elry, drunkards . From fornication comes filthy speech, buffoonery, silly displays, and foolish speech] . r o Therefore, only abstinence will cleanse both the body and the mind. Blickling 3 ( Dominica Prima in Quad ragesima) explains that during Lent we must "on forh;rfdnesse lifgean, urne lichoman and ure heortan clxnsian from yflum gepohtum pxs pe we magon; foroon seo blis and seo oferfyll pxs lichoman getyhp pone mon to synnum, and seo forh;rfdnes hine geclxnsap and gelxdep to forgifnesse " [live in abstinence and cleanse our body and heart from evil thoughts as we can; because the bliss and gluttony of the body leads a man into sin, and abstinence purifies him and leads him to salvation ] ( 3 7 ) . r r The Old English poem The Rewards ofPiety gives us a very similar sentiment: wio p;rre wambe fylle, Warna pe georne ealle gesomnao forpan heo pa unpeawas swioost deriao, pe pxre saule pxt is druncennes and dyrnegeligere, scelerata falanx luxusque ciborum I Ebrietasque simul necnon et crapula cordis, I ingluviem dapibus quae semper pascit opimis" [A polluted army follows ( gluttony), excess of food, drunkenness and intoxication of the heart, which always feeds gluttony with rich feasts] . I O . Quaestiones in Vetus Testamentum-In Deuteronomium ( PL 8 3 : 3 66 ) . I I . C f. JElfric, Memory of the Saints ( Lives of the Saints, I , I 6. 3 I 5 - 20 ) on the virtue of temperance or moderation: "]xet is, ]n::t man beo gemetegod and to mycel ne oicge on xte and on wxte ne xr timan ne gereordige. Nytenu xtao swa xr swa hi hit habbao, ac se gesceadwisa man sceal cepan his mxles, and oonne swa mid gesceade his gesetnysse healdan; ponne mxg he oferswioan swa oa gyfernysse" [that is, that a man be moderate and not consume too much in food or drink, nor take his meals before the proper time. Beasts eat as soon as they have it, but the discreet man ought to keep to his mealtime, and then, also with discretion, hold to his regular custom; thus may he then overcome gluttony] .

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ungemet wilnung a:tes and sla:pes; ]Ja man ma:g mid fa:stenum and forha:fdnessum heonon adrifan, and mid cyricsocnum cealdum wederum eadmodlice ealluncga biddan heofena drihten pa:t he pe ha:l gife swa him gemet pince . 1 2 milde mundbora, [ Carefully take heed against filling the belly because it comprises all the sins that most injure the soul-that is, drunkenness and fornication, unlimited desire of food and sleep ; those ( sins ) can be expelled with fasts and temperance and with attendance at church in cold weathers to ask the Lord of Heaven, the gracious protector, humbly, earnestly, that he grant you salvation as seems to him meet. ] The gullet is the source of contamination, the font of bodily sins . Gluttony has a close traditional relationship to lust, another sin that represents a loss of bodily control. Cassian teaches, "Numquam igitur poterit ardentis concupiscentiae stimulos inhibere, quisque desideria gulae refrenare non quiuerit" [He who cannot restrain the desires of the appetite will never be able to restrain the motions of a burning lust] . r 3 Ben Jonson would later express the connection with concision : Gut eats all day, and lechers all the night, So all this meat he tasteth over, twice : And, striving so to double his delight, He makes himself a thoroughfare of vice . Thus, in his belly, can he change a sin, Lust it comes out, that gluttony went in. r4 I 2 . The Rnvards 11_{Piety was once thought to be two separate poems : An Exhortation to Christian Living and A Summons to Prayer ( The Anglo-Saxon Minor Poems, ed. Dobbie, ASPR 6, 67- 69, 69 - 70 ). Fred Robinson has shown, however, that in its manuscript context ( Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, manuscript 201 ), it is in fact one unified poem. The edition and translation here are fi·om Robinson, "Rewards of Piety," 1 8 8 - 9 5 , 4 1 - 5 1 . One might also compare this section of the poem and its emphasis on temperance with Vainglory 9 - 2 3 ( The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie , ASPR 3 , 1 4 7 - 4 9 ) and The Seasonsfor Fasting ( The Attqlo-Saxon Minor Poems, ed. Dobbie, AS PR 6, 9 8 - 1 04 ) . 1 3 . Cassian, Institutes, 5 . 1 I . 8 9 . 1 4 . "On Gut" ( Complete Poems, ed. Parfitt, S o ) .

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Such sins of the body merge and blur together: the sickly, overripe contamination of a burgeoning gullet blends with the uncontrollable urgings of sexual bodily fluids . As Alcuin explains, "[d]e qua [fornica tione ] nascitur caecitas mentis, inconstantia oculorum vel totius cor poris amor immoderatus; saepe periculum vitae , lascivia, joca, petulan tia, et omnis incontinentia; odium mandatorum Dei, mentis enervatio, et injustae cupiditates; negligentia vitae futurae, et praesentis delectatio" [From fornication comes blindness of the mind, wandering of the eyes, or excessive love of the entire body; also a life-threatening danger, licen tiousness, jests, impudence, and all sorts of dubious things; hatred for the commands of God, weakening of the mind, and unjust desires; negligence for fuhlre lives, and pleasure for those here now] . I5 Although she is a figure of sexual indulgence, the personification of Luxuria in Prudentius's Psychomachia is also a distracted composite of gluttony and pride . I 6 We find her with delibuta comas, oculis uaga, languida voce, perdita deliciis, uitae cui causa voluptas, elumbem mollire animum, petulanter amoenas haurire inlecebras et fractos soluere sensus. I? [ her locks perfumed, her eyes shifting, her voice listless, aban doned in voluptuousness, she lived only for pleasure, to make her spirit soft and nerveless, in wantonness to drain alluring delights, to enfeeble and undo her understanding . ] Luxuria, i n her feeble spirit and wandering mind, represents the conse quences of not following the healthy regimen described in Vercelli 7)· with the loss of control over her body, she has also lost the order of her mind. As Luxuria staggers off to fight the Virtues, Sobrietas rallies the troops when they begin to fall under her spell, asking, " Quis furor insanas agitat caligine mentes? " [What blinding madness is vexing your disordered minds? ] ( 3 5 1 ) . I 8 Sexual overindulgence and I 5 . Liber de virtutibus et vitiis, PL I o I : 6 3 4 . I 6 . See Bloomfield, Seven DeadZv Sins, 6 5 . I 7 . Prudentius, Psychomachia, 3 I 2- I 5 ( Carmina, ed. Cunningham, I 4 8 - 8 I ) , hereafter by line numbers only. I 8 . Prudentius continues to play upon the consumption motif in the ensuing struggle. Sobrietas mocks the desire of the Virtues to wear soft, fine clothes and to indulge in the orgiastic pleasures of the wine-feast; she implores them instead to remember the food that

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gluttonous consumption overthrow the mind and leave the wits disor dered and fragmented. I 9 Turning back to Vercelli 7) the homily also drifts from the Jews and their gluttonous stomachs to the closely related dangers of sexual over indulgence; we pick up in the homily right after the condemnation of the Jews, "whose god was the belly" : Gepenceao eac para pe in Sodome for hira unalyfedum gewil nungum fo rwurdon, and para pe on Noes dagum wxron. Witod lice be oam pe oam yoan life lyfedon on Sodome hit wxs gecweden oxtte on hlafes fylnesse flowen. "P onne sio fylnes oxs hlafes unriht wyrceo, hwxt is to cweoanne be oam mxnigfealdum smeamettum? Gemunao hu Esaw his dagas on ehtnesse lxdde, and hu oa oe xr in pam ryne Godes bearn wxron purh xnlicra wifa sceawunga to fyrenlustum gehxfte on helle gehruron. Gemunap eac hu pa fo rwur don pe mid wodheortnesse willan to wxpnedmannum hxmed sohton, and eallra Babilone and Egypta cyninga ealle hie swioe ungesxliglice hira lif geendedon and nu syndon on ecum witum. ( 7, 3 8 - 4 9 ) [Also think about those who perished in Sodom because of their unlawful desires, and those who were in the days of Noah. In deed, concerning those who lived the easy life in Sodom, it was said that they flowed in the abundance of bread. When the abtm dance of bread produces wickedness, what is there to say about the manifold delicacies? Keep in mind how Esau led his days in tribulation, and how those who were previously the children of God in that time fell bound into hell through lustful glances at beautiful women. Remember also how they perished, those men who with mad desire sought sexual intercourse with men, and all "edit populus de corpore Christi" [the people eat from the body of Christ] ( 3 76 ) . Sobrietas throws Luxuria from her chariot and smashes her visage with a great stone, causing the vice to choke on her own teeth and tongue in a grimly appropriate "strange meal" [ insolitis dapibus] ( 4 2 5 ) . 1 9 . See Miller, "Gluttony," 9 5 : "If in a post-Freudian world we have learned to eroticize food, privileging sex and lust as the prime movers and motivators of virtually all desire, premodern people rather astutely inverted the order. They alimentarized lust. It was food, ingestion, and alimentation in all its forms that provided the dominant metaphors and explanations of motive and desire. "

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of the kings of Babylon and of Egypt; they all ended their life miserably and are now in eternal torment. ] We can see this easy movement of associations in Vercelli 7 : the focus glides effortlessly from the Jews, whose god is their belly, to the abun dance of bread and unlawful desire in Sod om and the exotic sensuality of Babylon and Egypt. 2 0 The homilist is carefully constructing a paradigm of dangerous carnality in the world, a type that finds expression in manifold examples : Jews, gluttons, the lustful-all distinguished by the madness deriving from their disgusting entanglement with the body. The gluttons of Vercelli 7) including, by extension, the Jews, possess these same qualities; their minds too are unbalanced by ingestion : Sume men synt de him pyncd pxt nawder ne xt ne drync ne ge nihtsumige, xr he od da hracan ful sie, and ponne pa oferfylle hyra gemynd forleosad . . . . Wyrse is pxt mon dxs ofer riht bruce ponne hine mon on feltungrepe wiorpe. On pxre grepe he wior ded to meoxe. Butan tweon, pxs lichoman sceada on pxre wambe he wiorded to pam ilcan, and each dam lichoman to mettrym nesse . Eal pxt man ofer riht pyged mid unydnesse, hit him mon sceal framadon. Ac pysses nu feawa gymap . Forneah ealra manna mod sint on oferflowende willan onwended. Fedad iowre licho man on riht and forlxtad pa oferfylle . Ne sceal man swidor etan ponne se maga gemyltan mxge . ( 7, 84- 8 6, 8 8 - 9 5 ) [There are certain men who think that they are not at all sated with food or drink until they are full up to the throat, and then those gluttons lose their mind . . . . It is worse when a man enjoys food beyond what is right; then he throws himself onto a dung heap . On a pile of shit he becomes like excrement. Without a doubt, because of the enemies of the body he will become like shit 20. Esau and Sodom both fall under Isidore's discussion ofthe five types of "desire of the belly" [ concupiscentia lftdae] : "Quarto modo, si viles escas nimium quisque sumat. Unde et propheta Sodomam de panis saturitate accusat. Quinto modo, si quis ex desiderio quod cumque sumat, sicut Esau pro lenticulae concupiscentia perdidit primogenita sua" [The fourth type is when someone consumes an excessive amount of base food. Thus the prophet condemned Sod om because of the excess of bread. The fifth type is if someone eats anything only out of desire; just like Esau lost his own birthright because of his desire for lentils] ( De dijferentiis rerum, PL 8 3 : 9 6 ) .

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in the belly, and also this will become a weakness for the body. All that one eats with difficulty beyond what is right, one must put away from himself. But few take heed of this . The hearts of almost all men are overturned into overflowing desires. Feed your body properly and shun gluttons. One must not eat more than the stomach can digest. ] Gluttony was always a potential state of being; the Christian faced always the temptation to accept this disgusting complex ofbodily fimc tions, his or her belly, as a god. As William Ian Miller states, "In a moral order that sets great stock by what it calls the spiritual, the glutton poses against it not just general corporeality, but the most vulgar and unseemly corporeality: not the arms and legs, not muscle, but organ meat, the gut . . . . by thus incarnating God in such a low status organ [the glutton] also reduced himself to mouth, guts, and anus, a mere tube fueling a feel-good machine . "2I In Vercelli 7, moderate eating nourishes the body, but excessive con sumption brings sickness : Se goda mete �goer deo, ge pone lichoman fedeo ge p�t mod gladao to �lcere h�lo, and �lee untrymnesse he flymeo �goer ge oam innooe ge oam mode . Helpeo p�t se mete hreoe and wel mylteo pe se maga oygeo . And of o�re oferf)rlle cumao manige mettrymnessa. Nis sio oferf)rll pon betere pe se hunger. We fli oo pone hunger and lufiao p�t no betere nis, oa oferfylle . Se hunger pone lichoman sona acwelleo and alyseo of oam witelican life . Sio oferfyll pone lichoman untrumnessa fylleo and gedeo p�t he afulao and hine ponne �t nyxstan mid swioe hreowlice deaoe fornimeo . ( 7, 9 5 - 1 0 3 ) [ Good food does two things : it feeds the body and it gladdens the mind, for the health of each. It also puts to flight every sickness, both inside the body and in the mind. It helps that the food which the stomach receives digests quickly and effectively. And from gluttony come many illnesses . Gluttony is not any better than hunger. We flee from hunger and love it no better than gluttony. Hunger quickly kills the body, and releases it from this 2 I . Miller, "Gluttony," I 0 2 .

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onerous life . Gluttony fills up the body with sickness and makes it rot, and then at last it carries it away with a miserable death. ] Gluttony has mental effects, distracting and scrambling the wits, but it also has physical effects, rotting the body from surfeit. 22 As .!Elfric would later note, gluttony "fordeo crgoer ge sawle ge lichaman, foroan pe heo macao pam menn mycele untrumnysse" [destroys both the soul and the body, because it brings much sickness upon the man] . 23 IfJews are associated with gluttony, it follows also that they lurch along in the imaginative associations of the homily as a mass of contagion, disgust, and disease.

Andreas Jews, eating, gluttony, madness: all form the associative matrix of Vercelli 7; and these are also the fantastical connections replicated in the contiguous poetic texts of the Vercelli Book. The images of Vercelli 7 call to mind the cannibals in Andreas, who, in a crazed fashion, not only gorge themselves upon the flesh of strangers, but before their grisly feast blind their victims and then reduce them to madness with a sorcerous drink se onwende gewit, heortan on hreore,

wera ingepanc, hyge wxs oncyrred,

2 2 . This theological/medical notion had a long life : Chaucer's Parson cites our Philippi ans passage ( "their god is the belly") in his Tale, preaching that, through drinking, gluttony "bireveth hym the discrecioun of his v\':it" ( r o . 8 24 ; Canterbury Tales citations hereafter by fragment and line numbers only) . Drinking causes "foryetelnesse" ( r o . 8 27 ) and overeating allows "the humours in his body" to "been distempred" ( r o . 8 2 6 ) . Cf. also Langland, Piers Plowman 8 . 270-77 ( C-text, ed. Pearsall, by passus and line numbers ) . Spenser combines these two dangers in book r of The Faerie Queen: Gluttony is one Whose mind in meat <md clrinke was drowned so, That from his frend he seeldome knew his fo : Full of diseases was his carcas blew, And a dry dropsie through his flesh did flow: Which by misdiet daily greater grew. (i.iv. 2 3 ) And remember Orsino's metaphor in the opening of Twelfth Night: "If music be the food of love , play on; / Give me excess of it, that surfeiting, / The appetite may sicken and so die" (I. r . r - 3 ) . 23 . Memory ofthe Saints ( Lives ofSaints r , r 6. 2 7 1 - 7 2 ) .

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pa:: t hie ne murndan a::fter mandreame, ha::lep heorogra:: dige, ac hie hig ond ga::rs for meteleaste meoe gedrehte . [which overturned their wits, the inner minds of the men, the heart in their breast, their reason was perverted, so that the blood thirsty men, they no longer cared for human joys; but weary from lack of food, the taste of hay and grass tormented them . ] The cannibals in Andreas make their belly their god; even worse, like heretics spreading false doctrine, they forcibly convert others to inhu man appetites; as Matthew laments, he must eat unnatural food and act like an "dumb beast" [ dumban neat] ( 67b ) . 24 Food, eating, and Jews form a set of related, recurrent motifs in Andreas. The poem contrasts the pure, divine sustenance provided by the Lord for the hungry who seek him, with the unnatural, perverse appetites of the Mermedonians . In the land of the cannibals, as in the Antipodes, everything is topsy-turvy: eating is a terrifying ritual of unnatural gluttony: Na:: s pa:: r hlafes wist werum on pam wonge, ne wa:: teres drync to bruconne, ah hie blod ond fel, fira fla:: s choman, feorrancumenra, oegon geond pa peode . [Neither the sustenance of bread, nor the draught of water was to be enjoyed by the men of that land, but instead all of them in that nation fed upon blood and fle sh, the bodies of men, those come from afar. ] The cannibals have an affinity with the mirabilia of the Orient, races like the Donestre of the Wonders of the East) who lure traveling strang2 4 . Cf. Isidore of Seville's distinction between men and beasts ( De dijjerentiis rerum, PL 8 3 : 77 ) : "Homo est animal ex corpore animague vivente compositum, atgue spirituali com pactione formatum, sibsistens ratione, liberique arbitrii voluntate, vitiorum capax, atque virtutum; at contra pecus est animal irrationale, mortale, motu carnis et sanguinis animatum" [Man is an animal composed of a body and a living soul, formed with a spiritual union, living according to reason, with a free and independent will, capable of vices and virtues; but the beast is an irrational animal, mortal, animated by the motion of the flesh and blood] .

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ers into their grasp and consume them.25 It is the custom of the Mermedonians to seize any foreigner seeking their exotic home and "dydan him to mose metepearfendum" [prepare him as a meal for the hungry] ( 2 7 ) . Andreas opens with this sudden, bloody flourish, depict ing a world of grotesque terror. Before we return to the horror with the arrival of Andrew in Mermedonia, the poet gives us a contrasting, benevolent vision of consumption on the sea journey. As Andrew and his followers set foot on the ship that will take them to Mermedonia, Christ (disguised as a mariner) asks : N afast pe to frofre on farodstrxte hlafes wiste ne hlutterne drync to dugoae . [Do you not have the food of bread, or a clear drink, as comfort and sustenance on the sea voyage? ] Although Andrew takes this question as something of a taunt, unlocking his own word-hoard [ wordhord onleac] ( 3 r 6b ) in a reply reminiscent of similar oral challenges in heroic poetry, 26 this "captain" allows Andrew to come aboard without any tangible rations, only with the vague idea that God will watch over them all . In one of the poem's structural ironies, the Lord/mariner gives food to Andrew and his companions as a storm arises ( 3 64- 69a) ; in gratitude, Andrew prays for the captain to receive "sustenance," "the heavenly bread" [ wist . . . heofonlicne hlaf] as a reward for his kind deed ( 3 8 8 b, 3 8 9a) . The Lord offers to put Andrew's terrified companions onto shore , rather than continue the tempestuous journey into the storm, but they protest that they will be alone, lordless, "starved of goodness" [gode oifeorme] ( 4 o 6b ) . When God asks Andrew how the Jews possibly could kill Christ ( 5 5 7- 7 1 ; see discussion above ) , Andrew details the well known miracles of Jesus, most notably his miracle of the loaves and fishes. As the apostle recounts the feast, the hungry people fed by Jesus sound like the weary travelers of Andreas: 2 5 . See The Wonders of the East in Orchard, Pride and Prodigies, appendix I a, I 79; I b , I 9 6; I C , I 9 7 • 26. E . g . , Beowulf, 2 3 4 - 5 9 , 3 3 I b - 4 2, 499 - 5 2 8 .

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reonigmode, reste gefegon, werige xfter waoe, wiste ]Jegon, menn on moldan, swa him gemedost wxs [ sad at heart, weary after the journey, the people on the ground ( i . e . , those fed by Jesus) enjoyed rest, received food, which was more pleasant for them . ] These "weary-spirited" [ reon�mode] ( 5 9 2a) people await the suste nance of the Lord, just as the followers of Andrew fear their depriva tion if they remain "sad-minded" [geormormode] ( 4 o6a) and deprived of the Lord [ hlafordlease] ( 4 o 5 b ) . (Might we also detect an ongoing pun on "loaf" and "Lord" here? ) In this dialogue on the journey, eating has divine associations, an understanding of food parodied in Mermedonia. After arriving in Mermedonia, Andrew's "rescue mission" seems rather intimidating. Andrew crouches behind a pillar as the cannibals gather: Wendan ond woldon pxt hie on elpeodigum weotude wiste .

wioerhycgende xt geworhton, ( r o72-74a)

[ Perverse of mind, they expected and intended to make a meal out of the foreigners, an appointed feast. ] The cannibals are "perverse of mind" [ wi6erhycgende] ; their minds move in ways contrary to the laws of nature . When they find the prison guards dead, the people "cannot think of a better plan" [ (n)yston beteran ned] ( r o 8 8 b ) than to eat their now-deceased fellow cannibals. They are thrifty, but in a perverse fashion, especially in contrast to the more conventional, divine nourishment of the loaves and fishes de scribed on the sea journey to Mermedonia. The poet then presents the preparations for the cannibals' grotesque feast ( r 09 3 - I 1 3 4 ) , which parody both the secular communal feasts found in Old English poetry and the Last Supper. 27 Rather than eating 27. See Clemoes, Interactions, 269 - 7 I .

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only their fallen comrades and resting in satiety, the cannibals irratio nally decide to keep to their lottery and randomly choose a further victim among themselves. In a parody of Christ's sacrifice, the canni bals decide who shall "to foddurpege feores ongyldan" [ give up his life as sustenance ] for the others ( I I o I ) . 28 The poet pushes the parody even further as the selection falls upon a distinguished leader of the cannibals; as soon as he is bound, the noble victim begins to fear for his life : Cleopode p a collenferho cearegan reorde, cw;ro he his sylfes sunu syllan wolde on a:htgeweald, eaforan geongne, lifes to lisse .

( I I08- I Ib) [Then the courageous man cried out in a sorrowful speech, said that he would give his own son into their power, a young child, in order to save his life . ] Although this chosen one is supposedly "courageous" [ collenferho) , his epithet alliterates with the "sorrowful speech" [ cear�an reorde] he sends out, a cry echoed in the additional alliteration of cleopode and cw£0 . Stuttering and squawking in alliterative terror, he parodies the noble sacrifice of Christ; the poet highlights this caricature by reducing the number of victims chosen by lot from seven men in the source of the poem, focusing instead upon only one "noble" sacrifice .29 As the ravenous band accepts the man's child as a substitute, the poet lingers over their mindless hunger: "Peod w;rs oflysted, metes modgeomre, n;rs him to maome wynn, hyht to hordgestreonum. Hungre w;rron pearle gepreatod, swa se oeodsceaoa reow ricsode . ( I I I 2a- I 6b ) 2 8 . For interpretations of the figural significance of food in the poem see Hamilton, "Diet and Digestion" ; and Earl, "Typological Stmcture," 7 8 - 7 9 . 29 . See Brooks, Andreas, IOO, note to line I I 04 ff.

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[The people were filled with desire, sorrowfully thinking of meat; there was no joy in wealth nor happiness in treasures . They were severely overcome by hunger, for that harsh ravager of nations reigned supreme . ] The poet gives the impression that nothing truly satisfies the gaping maw of the cannibal; in their frenzy of consumption they have lost all human sense of perspective, becoming not unlike the once-human crea tures they drug senseless and throw in their larder. In chapter 5 we saw the narrative equivalence between the Jews and the cannibals in Merme donia. Here, further cementing the comparison, the cannibals, like the Jews, serve only their belly. The source of their corrupt, frenzied mad ness is their enslavement to carnal appetites. God intervenes and does not allow the Mermedonians "dxl onfen gon / lifes to leofne" [to receive a portion to support their life ] ( n 22b- 2 3 a ) . Apparently, the denial o f even this one perverse meal causes great pain to the community: l>a wxs wop hxfen in wera burgum, Hreopon friccan, hlud heriges cyrm. mxndon meteleaste, meoe stodon, Hornsalu wtmedon, hungre gehxfte . weste winrxced, welan ne benohton beornas to brucanne on pa bitran tid .

( r r s s - 6o ) [Then lamentation was raised up in the cmes of men, a loud clamor of the multitude . Heralds shouted out, lamented the fam ine ; weary men stood, shackled by hunger. Gabled halls and wine halls remained deserted; the men could not enjoy wealth in that bitter time . ] In another almost satiric description of their plight, the halls stand empty like the wind -swept surface of an Old English elegy. 3 ° Like addicts deprived of a drug, the Mermedonians cannot function; they 3 0 . This extended attention to the hunger of the cannibals is absent from the poet's sources: see Boenig, trans. , Acts !({Andrew, r 5 - r 6, 4 6 - 4 7· It is also not included in Blickling 19 ( S. Andreas) .

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are bound by the worship of the stomach. But when the cannibals eventually capture Andrew, they swarm about him; they are "hungry for battle" [ wiges oflysted] ( r 22 6b ) and "ravenous for carrion" [ W£/gifre] ( r 27 r a ) . The bloody descriptions of Andrew's torments, in their lov ingly grotesque detail, literally embody the poem's portrait of an inhu man world of gluttony, where flesh is only fle sh:

]mrh bancofan, hatan heolfre .

Swat youm weoll blod lifrum swealg, ( 1 27 5 - 77 ) 3 1

[The gore welled out in waves from his body, the blood poured forth in thick streams with hot guts . ] The same associative structures at work in Vercelli 7 permeate Andreas. The terrible malleability of the body, the desperate hunger of the glut tonous maw, the mad inhumanity inspired by the rule of the flesh, Jews and Christ's sacrifice : all fall together into a crazed tumult.

Elene We also find the question of diet linked to Jews in Elene: when given a choice between life and death, Judas replies with a gastrointestinal conceit: pe on westenne Hu mxg pxm geweoroan meoe ond meteleas morland trydeo, hungre gehxfted, ond him half ond stan on gisihoe bu samod geweoroao, streac ond hnesce, pxt he pone stan nime hlafes ne gime, wio hungres hleo, gewende to wxdle, ond pa wiste wiosxce, ponne he bega beneah? beteran wiohyccge, (6r r- r 8 ) [ How can it come to pass that someone in the desert, weary and hungry for food, who strides across the wilderness oppressed by

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hunger, and a loaf and a stone both together appear in his sight, hard and soft, that he take up the stone as a relief from hunger, not heed the bread, turn back to hunger and scorn the food, refuse the better thing when he has both at his disposal? ] Gordon Whatley explains the literal level of narrative logic here as a subversive reply on Judas's part: in response to Elene's stern command, Judas is in effect saying "of course I'll tell you everything; who wouldn't" even as he is in the process of deceiving her. And his deception carries the irony that l ) Judas will soon be "choosing the stone over bread" as he languishes in a pit, and 2 ) the Christian audience knows, as Judas speaks his words, that the Jews always "choose the stone" rather than nourish ing "bread" every hour that they live without ChristY To these associa tions we can add the complex of imagery connecting the Jews with gluttony; this produces other subtle twists of irony. First, the very terms ofJudas's question, based on the control of hunger and who can resist its demands, call to mind the lack of mastery the Jews have over the body, ruled as they are by the belly. From this perspective, and given all the other anti- Judaic strains of Elene and the Vercelli Book, this is a particu larly apt question for Judas to ask: the Christian could understand that refusing the call of the body is possible , but for Judas, a character con structed by overlapping anti-Judaic stereotypes, the question can only be a rhetorical one for him, since Jews are not able ever "to refuse the bread. " Judas's conversion in the poem depends upon accepting the demands of privation, but in the tradition represented by Vercelli and Blickling Jews cannot refuse food-in fact they are mastered by the belly. And of course this interpretation falls into further irony as Judas, after expressing his inability to refuse any food, is thrown into a pit and denied any sustenance at all except its cold stone walls. As Judas, in 3 2 . See Whatley, "Bread and Stone. " Whatley's article was in response to T. Hill's more abstract interpretation that tl1e motif of desert starvation is a "figure of ilie process of purification and conversion through physical hardship" ( "Sapiential Structure," 2 1 9 ; Hill reiterated his position in "Bread and Stone, Again " ) . Catherine Regan ( " Evangelicism," 2 6 1 - 67 ) generally concurs with Hill in seeing broader, more abstract allegorical meanings behind this episode . Hill concludes that "if we grant that Cynewulf was attempting to depict larger truths in terms of symbol and figure in this scene, then the poem is fi·ee fi·om the kind of vulgar anti-semitism which it might otherwise appear to countenance" ( "Bread and Stone Again, " 2 5 7 ) . Given the deep implication of the text and manuscript in anti-Judaic traditions, such optimism is untenable. For a rhetorical analysis of this passage, see Bjork, Old English Verse Saints) Lives) 8 o- 8 I .

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effect, plays dumb about the location of the cross, Elene educates his gluttonous sensibility through the torture of starvation, until cleopigan ongan sarum besylced on pone seofeoan d;rg, meoe ond meteleas, ( m;rgen w;rs geswiorod ) : "Ic eow healsie purh heofona god p;rt ge me of oyssum earfeoum up forl;rten, heanne fram hungres geniolan. [he began to cry out on the seventh day, exhausted by pain, weary and without food ( his strength was diminished ) : "I beseech you through the god of the heavens to allow me to come up out of these torments, wretched from the afflictions of hunger. ] Behind this scene, one can feel the figural association of physical suste nance with the Eucharist. In his unbelief Judas lacks spiritual nourish ment; he chooses to "heed the bread" ( i . e . , remain a Jew) , refuses the hard privation of stone ( i . e . , the Christian life ) , thinks too much of his body, makes his belly his god, and thus, like the gluttonous man of Vercelli 7) he sullies body and spirit and requires purification and conver sion in the pit. Like the cannibals and their victims in Andreas) when Judas "rejects" [ wiohyccge) 6 r 8 ] the better thing, he shows us that he is not thinking correctly; his mind lacks the capacity to understand God, until his purging starvation. Andrew is "r;rdum snottor, I wis on gewitte" [learned in counsel, wise in understanding] (Andreas 4 69b70a ) ; Judas cannot find this state of mind until after his body is purged. This complex of associations had a long life, raised into much higher relief in the later Middle Ages, when, with the growth of affective piety and a host of other social and cultural changes, the bodies of Jews transformed in the Christian imagination, taking on the crazed shapes of nightmare familiar from a wide range of antisemitic texts of the high and late Middle Ages . In Chaucer's Pardoner)s Tale) a riotous company in Flanders spews forth a steady stream of curses, such that, as the Pardoner tells us, "Oure blissed Lordes body they totere I Hem thoughte that Jewes rente hym noght ynough" ( 6.4 7 4 - 7 5 ) . Then se ductive dancing girls appear, who step side by side with the purveyors of fruit and tempting bakery goods . These figures are there " [ t ]o

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kyndle and blowe the fyr oflecherye, / That is annexed unto glotonye" ( 6.4 8 I - 8 2 ) . Here again is our familar web of associations : Jews, food, the body of Christ, gluttony, and sexuality. As the Pardoner continues his seriocomic sermon, he connects gluttony to excrement, citing our familiar telltale passage from Philippians: The apostel wepyng seith ful pitously, "Ther walken manye of whiche yow toold have I I seye it now wepyng, with pitons voysThey been enemys of Cristes croys, Of whiche the ende is deeth; wombe is hir god! " 0 wombe ! 0 bely! 0 stynkyng cod, Fulfilled of dong and of corrupcioun! At either ende of thee foul is the soun.

In the medieval Christian imagination, mention Jews and gluttony quicldy follows, with excrement close behind. The Prioress)s Tale comes to mind: there the Jews throw the "litel clergeoun," of course, into a privy "Where as thise Jewes purgen hire entraille" ( 7. 5 7 3 ) . Vercelli 7 exemplifies, in a much earlier period and in somewhat different form, this dark, psychologically twisted flow of associations .

Paschasius Radbertus and the Avenging of the S aviour We can see parallel imagery in two Latin texts perhaps roughly contem porary with Vercelli 7: Paschasius Radbertus's ( 7 8 6- ca. 8 6o C.E . ) De corpore et sanguine Domini (composed between 8 3 I - 3 3 C.E. ) and the apocryphal Avenging ofthe Saviour. 34 Paschasius Radbertus of Corbie's treatise on the Eucharist is a text of the so-called First Eucharistic 3 3 . See Yeager, "Aspects of Gluttony in Chaucer
Anti-Judaism and Somatic Fiction 2 63

controversy of the ninth century. 3 5 In the debate between Paschasius and his fellow monk Ratramnus of Corbie, Paschasius advances the more literal interpretation of the Eucharist: in the sacrament the bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of Christ in an actual, physical sense; Ratramnus saw the bread and wine as more symbolic than literal, a commemoration of the actual body of Christ. Paschasius's emphasis on the physicality of the Eucharist led to fantasti cal ideas in his treatise about a Jewish threat to that eucharistic body, much in the same way that the affirmation of transubstantiation and the literal physicality of the Eucharist at the Fourth Lateran Council ( I 2 I 5 C.E . ) also eventually produced a wave of irrational antisemitism, as Langmuir has shown. Paschasius's text is not a direct source for the confluence of images in the Vercelli and Bliclding manuscripts, al though it might have had some influence on the composition of An dreas)·3 6 rather, Paschasius's theology, directly concerned with the issues of Christology, shows how a text with subject matter similar to Vercelli and Bliclding could produce comparably illusory ideas about Jews . 3 7 According to Paschasius, the manna in the desert prefigured the saving grace of the Eucharist. 3 8 In order to rhetorically bolster his argument, he uses the Jews to make convenient distinctions . Although at times the Jews died in their biblical desert travails, even with the nourishment of the manna, Christians follow a different path when they perish, nourished as they are by the Eucharist: "Moriemur autem, sed non sicut illi in anima, quia illi carnalia manducantes mortui sunt in aeternum. Nos autem dum nihil carnale in eo sapimus, immo spiritales tatum spiritaliter intelligentes in Christo manemus" [However, we too shall die, but not as they did, in the soul, because by eating carnal things, they died eternally. And since we know nothing carnal in it ( i . e . , 3 5 . See Laistner, Thought and Letters in Western Europe, 29 2 - 9 4 ; Macy, Theologies of the Eucharist, I 8 - p ; Rubin, Corpus Christi, I 4 - I 6. 3 6. See Boenig, Saint and Hero, 5 5 - 77 . Boenig argues that the sources of Andreas had a propensity for development of the Eucharistic metaphor, and that the Paschasius Radberms/ Ratramnus controversy had a direct influence on the Andreas-poet's adaptation of the source material. Boenig sees the influence of Paschasius's doctrine in the poem's depiction of the "cannibalistic" nature of Christ and the Eucharist. 3 7 · Paschasius's treatise had a wider readership and subsequent influence than Ratram nus : see Macy, Iheolr!!Jies ofthe Eucharist, 4 4 - 7 2 . On the k.nowledge of Paschasius in Anglo Saxon England see Leibaugh, "Paschasius Radbertus," in Biggs et a!. , eds . , Sources ofAnglo Saxon Literary Culture, I 4 3 - 4 4 . 3 8 . Paschasius Radbertus, De corpore et sanguine Domini 5 . 3 I , ed. Paulus; citations by chapter and page numbers.

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the Eucharist), but on the contrary, in understanding everything spir itual, we shall spiritually remain in Christ] ( 5 . 3 3 ) . The Jews represent the carnal world; they did not perceive and accept the Lord's body in a spiritual fashion. However, the sinning Christian, by virtue of his stained soul, can understand the Eucharist only like a Jew would. All men consume the sacraments at the altar, "sed alius carnem Christi spiritaliter manducat et sanguinem bibit, alius uero non" [but one man eats the flesh of Christ spiritually and the other does not] ( 6. 3 5 ) . This "guilty man" [ reus] , this "sinner" [peccator] who takes the sacrament "unworthily" [ indigne] , is guilty of faulty perception; he does not "per ceive the [Lord's] body" [ diiudicat corpus] , and thus like a Jew he does not truly participate in the power of the sacrament ( 6 . 3 5 ) . Paschasius's concern is for the proper understanding of the Eucharist in the Chris tian community, but the tradition of blind, carnal Jewish understand ing aids his didactic purpose : once again, Jews are a perfect example of how not to behave . To illustrate and prove his point Paschasius relates the story of a man without faith ( de quodam infideli) who did not understand the mystery of the Eucharist ( 6. 3 6 ) . As Paschasius tells us, this is the story of a Jew who intruded upon the Eucharistic service of Syrus, bishop of Pavia, in his newly dedicated church. This Jew boldly entered the church at the instigation of an evil spirit ( maligno spiritu) to take the body of the Lord into his mouth and spit it out into a dunghill ( in sterquilinium) ( 6. 3 6 ) . As the Jew accepts the Eucharist "ausu nefario, immundo ore" [with wicked daring and unclean lip ] , he suffers the consequences of his ignorance : . . . digna ultione perculsus sine effectu uerborum cunctis audien tibus et uidentibus clamare caepit. Volebat labia iungere nee ualebat. Cupiebat uerba edere, sed lingua rigida loquendi offi cium non praebebat et quasi ignitum iaculum in ore portans immensis torquebatur doloribus . ( 6. 3 6 ) [ . . . struck with an appropriate vengeance, he began to cry out to all those listening or looking on, but without the intelligibility of words. He tried to shut his lips, but he could not. He wanted to speak, but his rigid tongue would not permit the business of speaking, and, as if he carried a burning dart in his mouth, he was tortured with immense pains . ]

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Like the drugged human fodder of the cannibals in Andreas) the Jew in this anecdote loses the power of speech, finding himself reduced to a bestial state of unintelligibility. Blocked as he is from any human com munication, now no one can understand him, just as he refused to understand and recognize the Lord-a common facet of the anti Judaic rhetoric we have seen in Vercelli and Blickling. When the Jew is brought before Syrus, the bishop castigates him as having " [i]ncredula et perfidiae mens plena" [a mind unbelieving and full of faithlessness ] , ascribing his actions to the instigation of the devil ( 6. 3 6 ) . The Jew writhes in agony, voicing inarticulate cries ( 6. 3 7 ) . The source of his pain is the divine presence of the host, suspended in shining torment amid the pollution of unbelieving fle sh: "Nam subti liter aspicientibus mirabili libratione corpus Dominicum in ore uideba tur Iudei dependere, ita ut nee linguae subter compagi insideret nee desuper immundo adhaereret palato" [ For to those looking on carefully, the body of the Lord seemed to hang in the mouth of the Jew in a miraculous suspension, and thus it did not settle under the articulation of the tongue, nor stick to the unclean palate above ] ( 6. 3 7 ) . Syrus removes the host and the Jews converts, bringing with him in his bap tism other Jews from the community. As he ends the miraculous tale, Paschasius makes the rhetorical purpose of his story clear: he has in serted the story lest any "infidelis . . . aut mortali crimine reus" [ unbe liever . . . or anyone guilty of a mortal crime ] presume to take the sacrament "temere ac neglegenter" [rashly and carelessly] ( 6. 3 7 ) . In De corpore et sanguine Domini) we see the same mixture of emotionally charged narrative elements-Jews, understanding, eating, excrement, conversion, and baptism-that characterizes the representation ofJews in the Blickling and Vercelli manuscripts . Jews can also find a link to the gluttonous body in terms of bodily deformity and disease-a side effect, as we have seen, of excessive con sumption. We can see this link to disease in the Avenging ofthe Saviour. At the beginning of the narrative, the Roman emperor Tyrus (later "Titus" ) is afflicted with a "cancer" [ cancrum] that has destroyed his face from the right nostril to the eye ( 1 . 24 8 ) . But when Tyrus hears from Nathan of the evil crimes of the Jews, in his torment he rages that he will avenge the murder of Christ, hanging their bodies on a dry tree ( 8 . 2 5 6- 5 8 ) . As soon as Tyrus voices his threat, his cancer miraculously falls off his face, "et restituta est caro eius sicut caro pueri paruuli . . . et ecce factus est san us" [and his flesh . . . was restored like the flesh of a

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small boy; and behold he was made whole ] ( 9 . 2 5 8 ) . Tyrus, now bap tized and renamed Titus, plans to avenge the death of Christ with his father Vespasian : as he states, "eamus et uindicemus et deleamus ini micos eius de terra uiuentium" [let us go and avenge ( Christ) and de stroy his enemies from the land of the living ] ( I I . 2 62 ) . Consonant with our web of imagery, Titus and Vespasian starve the Jews of Jerusalem into submission. As a famine strikes the besieged Jews, "cepenmt omnes pro necessitate panis terram comedere" [ everyone began to eat the earth for need of bread ] , reminiscent again of the drugged victims of the cannibals who eat hay and grass rather than human food ( I 4 . 2 6 6 ) . Like the torment of Judas Cyriacus, starvation defeats the Jews, who lament that "Christum tradidissent ad mortem et morte dignos morituros esse" [they would be deserving to die a death because they had delivered Christ to death] ( I 6.266- 6 8 ) . 3 9 The final imperial punishment is hideous, with grimly appropriate echoes of the Passion; as such, it calls to mind the very crimes of which the Jews are accused, their obsession with rending the physical body of Jesus . The Romans seize and bind the Jews, " [ e ]t ex parte lapidauerunt, et ex parte in lignum aridum suspenderunt capud uero deorsum et ex parte lanceauerunt, et ex parte alios tradiderunt in uenditione, parteque ex eis diuiserunt in quattuor partes sicut et ille fecerunt de tonica Iesu" [ and some they stoned, some they hung on a dry tree, indeed, head down, some they speared, some they handed over for sale, and some they divided into four parts as they had done the tunic of Jesus ] ( I 7. 270 ) . The vicious drawing and quartering calls to mind the bloody world of the Mermedonians and their tortures. Titus and Vespasian send a message to the ailing emperor Tiberius, who seeks the healing power of the Lord . Tiberius's envoy, Volosianus, reports the revenge taken on the Jews and reiterates their crimes, pounding away again at their evil nature with a grim satisfaction : And pa Iudeas hyne pa acwealdon butan xlcum gylte and hyne on grenum treowe ahengon . And Titus and Vespasianus heom pxt 3 9 · In the Old English version this lament has a greater rhetorical immediacy, as it is not rendered in the third person, like the Latin, but in the collective voice of the Jews themselves, crying out their guilt as the walls close in: "Eala, l m we syndon geomrigende and swyoe aforhtigende be myclum ge"yrhtum, for]Jam oe we pone hxlend to deaoe gesealdon, and we nu pxt geseoo, pxt we for pig yfdum deaoe sweltan sceolon" [Alas, how we grieve and are greatly afi·aid because of great events, since we handed over the Savior to death, and now we see that because of that we shall die an evil death] ( I 6. 2 69 ) . See also I 7 . 2 6 8 - 7o.

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wraoe forguldon pa oa hig pa Iudeas ahengon, pa fet up and pa:t heafod adun. Se ha:lend wa:s ofslagen butan a:lcon gylte, and pa Iudeas wa:ron ofslagene pam fulostan deaoe and heora naman syndon adylegode ofer ealre eoroan, swa swa hig sylfe geearno don. ( 3 0- 3 I . 29 I ) 4° [And the Jews killed him without any sin and hung him on a green tree. And Titus and Vespasian cruelly repaid them for that, when they hung the Jews feet up and head down . The Savior was slain without any sin, and the Jews were slain with the foulest death, and their names are obliterated over the whole earth, just as they themselves earned. ] With the fulfilment of the revenge Titus promised at the beginning of the text, Tiberius looks upon the face of the Lord in Veronica's gar ment, and (like Titus's cure earlier in the text) "cecidit lepra eius de eo et mundata est caro eius sicut caro pueri paruuli" [the leprosy fell from him and his flesh was cleansed like the flesh of a small boy] ( 3 3 . 29 2 ) . The obliteration o f the Jews results i n the healing o f his own diseased bodyY In the Avenging of the Savioury the Jews are a malignant cancer of the social body; in an obvious connection, the disfiguring disease of Titus and Tiberius is removed from their bodies when the Jews are obliterated. The connection between Jews, hunger, disease, and rend ing of the body is, as we have seen, a commonplace association. Through all the texts discussed thus far in this section, there is a constant frame of reference for the Jews, established through a series of hermeneutic patterns. The Jews begin as the murderers of Christ, but this raises the inevitable questions of motive and culpability. The tradi tions employed to fill this gap clash, some merging, others rebounding away or residing together in contradiction and paradox. These tradi tions summon other associations . If the Jews were simply unable to see Jesus as the Messiah, then they must be deficient in some congenital way : blind or simply too carnal, too much of the world. If the Jews meant to kill Jesus, then they must be filled with hatred or envy, leading 4 0 . The Old English text is more concise here than the Latin text: see 3 o- 3 1 . 290. 4 I. Blicklin�q 6 ( Dominica Sexta in Q.Jtadragesima) relates the same vengeance of the Lord through Titus. After his death, vvhen the Lord saw that the Jews did not repent, "]n sende on hie maran wrxce ponne xfre xr xnigu opru gelumpe, buton Sodomwarum anum" [then he sent upon them a greater vengeance than any other that had previously happened to anyone, except to the inhabitants of Sod om alone ] ( 79 ) .

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to fantasies of Jewish plots and traps. And if they are only fle sh and not spirit, body and not soul, then the spiral of the hermeneutic circle pulls even more base associations into the mix, drawing the Jews into further somatic connections: sickness and disease, consumption, gluttony, and excretion-all the perils of the mere body, the awful vision of Lear's "unaccommodated man," who is only a "poor, bare forked animal. "4 2

The Virgin )s Body and the Jews In Vercelli 7) our Rosetta Stone for these intertwined traditions, Jews fall into a montage of somatic associations, encompassing all the perils of consumption and the body. We have already noted the connection be tween gluttony and lust in the homily, and the traditions that gave that connection meaning. In another "natural association," a well-traveled path stretches from the perils of gluttony to the peril of women's bodies . As with the unhealthy effects ofimmoderate eating, the stomach can also generate the muck of depraved and debased sexuality: Witodlice ne mxg sio hungriende wamb xnne unrihtlust acennan ne sio gemetegode fyl pon rna. Ac of pxre oferfylle cumad pa unrihtan lustas gelice and on meresteallum wyrmas tyddriad, and of dxre gemetegunge god wiorc gelice and of clxnre eon)an gode wxstmas . ( 7, I I O- I 4 ) [ Indeed, the hungry stomach alone cannot bring forth unlawful desire, any more than moderate fullness can. But forbidden de sires come from gluttony in the same way that worms propagate on still water; good works come from moderation like good fruits from clean earth. ] The homilist expounds the danger of immoderate desire by connecting it to the nature of the female body, a rhetorical strategy that then con nects Jews with women along the same continuum. The homilist of Vercelli 7 asks, "For hwon wene ge pxt wif swa sioce syn of hyra gecynde? " [Why do you think that women, by their nature, are so sick? ] ( 7, 5 6- 5 7 ) . Answer: Men work outdoors and thus "toughen" the body with privation, but women "ofhira lid an life hie biod swa tyddre, for pan pe hie symle inne biod and noht hefies ne "''Yrceap and 4 2 . King Lear iii.iv. I O S - 7 ·

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hie oft baoiao and mid wyrtgemangum smyriao and symle on hnescum beddum hy res tao" [are weak from their soft lives, because they are always inside, and they do not do anything strenuous, and they often bathe, and they anoint themselves with spices, and they always rest in bed] ( 7, 5 75 9 ) . As an illustration, the homilist then explains that a tree (i.e., a plant) left outside in the wild is always more beautiful and natural than the tree that is placed inside a house, sheltered from the elements. In fact, women ''Pe cyrliscu wiorc and hefegu on symbel wyrceap" [who always do lowly and heavy work] are "halran and cafran ponne pa weras pe on idelnesse lifiao" [ more whole and strong than the men who live in idleness] ( 7, 64- 66) . Women's bodies do not usually have the impenetrable exterior enabled by harsh privation. The male body, ideally, resists the somatic assaults of desire . The homilist laments : "Eawla, wif, to hwan wenest ou pines lichoman hade geican mid smyringe and oftpweale and oorum lionessum? Of oam cymeo unhxlo, nals mxgen" [Alas, women, why do you expect to augment the health of your body with anointing and fre quent washing and other luxuries? From that comes sickness, not strength] ( 7, 72- 7 4 ) . If the body's desires are indulged, it will always be "sick and unhappy" [sioc and unrot] ( 7, 7 8 ) . What do these elements have in common with the Jews, whose belly is their god? -an obsession with somatic boundaries, physicality, the carnality of the world. Gluttons, Jews, and women are particularly associated with the weakness, permeability, and fluidity of the body, a somatic infirmity that also infects the mind. Compare Pmdentius's Hamartigenia (a didactic poem on the origin of sin) , in which he rails against money and its ability to corrupt women through the excessive use of cosmetics and finery, concluding that "[h ]aec sexus male fortis agit, cui pectore in arto / mens fragilis facili uitiorum fluctuat aesm" [ such are the doings of the feebler sex, in whose narrow mind a frail intelligence tosses lightly on a sea of sin ] .43 Even worse, Prudentius tells us, is that men, the stronger sex, are just as liable to vanity: 4 3 · Prudentius, Hamarti,Henia 277 - 7 8 ( Carmina, ed. Cunningham, r r 6- 4 8 ) , hereafter by line numbers only. Cf. Paulinus of Nola's Carm. 2 5 . 8 1 - 8 2 ; in this epithalamion Paulinus warns against women using too much makeup and other vain forms of bodily adornment: "Talibus ornari fuge dotibus, 0 noua sancti /nupta uiri ; uacuis sensibus ista placent" [Shun the ornament of such endowments, 0 new bride of a saintly husband, for these are pleasing to an empty consciousness] . Outer vanity corrupts the inner mind : Namque ubi corporeae curatur gloria pompae, uilescit uitio depretiatus homo,

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Cernas mollescere cultu heroas uetulos, opifex quibus aspera membra finxerat et rigidos durauerat ossibus artus. Sed pudet esse uiros. Quaerunt uanissima quaeque quis niteant, genuina leues ut robora soluant. ( 2 8 2- 8 6 ) [You see heroic older men grow soft in luxury, though the Cre ator formed hard limbs for them and stiffened their rigid bodies with bones. But they are ashamed to be men. They seek the greatest vanities to make themselves beautiful, so that, light minded, they let their innate strength slip away. ] Soft bodies are permeable bodies, and thus the homilist of Vercelli 7 would have all bodily boundaries and orifices closed off: no excessive eating, no excessive ablutions to weaken the body's integral surfaces. The Jews are a threat to this sort of clean order: either they are envi sioned as gluttons, corrupting the body from the inside with a surfeit of consumption, or else they are a disease, a cancer to be surgically stricken from the body, as in the Avenging of the Saviour. Women stand in a analogous position to Jews as a threat to the impervious yet poten tially vulnerable male body. Gluttony links Jews and women in the associational structure of Vercelli 7) a triad united by powerful somatic anxieties. Thus this paradigm may perhaps shed some light on another tradi tion of Jewish understanding represented in the Blickling manuscript: the connection between Jews and the Virgin Mary. Mary, of course, represents the paradox of virgin conception, sexual productivity with out sexual activity. The interpretative difficulty of this central para dox of Christian doctrine has a long history.44 How could the pure et male mens praui caecata libidine uoti sordescit nitidis corporis exuuiis. ( Carm. 2 5 · 5 5 - 5 8 ) [For when renown in sought by bodily ostentation, one is cheapened and devalued by such a fault. The mind is blinded wretchedly by lust for this depraved aim; the body's gleaming spoils soil the mind. ] 4 4 · For general introductions to the cult of the Virgin in Western culture see Warner, Alone of All Her Sex, and Pelikan, Mary throTtgh the CentTtries. One of the issues in the First Eucharistic controversy was whether the body of Christ at the Eucharist was actually the body given birth by Mary (Macy, Theologies ufthe Eucharist, 2 8 - 29 ) .

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virgin give birth, an act obviously and deeply implicated in the ambigu ities of the fle sh? One hermeneutic strategy used to approach the prob lem involved displacing all the anxiety concerning Mary's body into hatred of the Jews, who stand, in their carnality, in utter contrast and opposition to the Virgin's pristine form . Like the other apocryphal texts we have examined, the Transitus Mariae ( fifth century) was known in Anglo-Saxon England.45 But again, this tradition, represented here by the Assumption homilies in Blickling and in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 4 I ( hereafter CCCC 4 I ) , consisted of a theology tOO speculative and borderline heretical for later ecclesiastics, such as LElfric .46 For example, in his homily for the Assumption in the Second Series of Catholic Homilies) LE!fric keeps his discussion of Mary's fate to the basics : she was taken up to heaven to be reunited with her son. He feels that if one indulges in speculation beyond this "donne beo we dam dwolmannum gelice, pe be heora agenum dihte odde be swefnum fela lease gesetnyssa awriton" [then we shall be like the heretics, who have written many false ac counts according to their own writings or dreams] .47 LE!fric explains that although Augustine, Jerome, and Gregory routed such heresy in their work, " [ s ]ind swa deah gyt da dwollican bee xgder ge on !eden ge on englisc, and hi rxdad ungerade menn" [there are nevertheless yet heretical books, both in Latin and in English, and ignorant men read them] .48 The Assumption homilies in Blickling and CCCC 4 I are based on these "dwollican gesetnysse pe samlxrede men sxdon be hire fordside" [heretical stories that poorly taught men have told about her death] .49 Such "imaginative" accounts of Mary, like the imaginative 4 5 . For an wonderfully comprehensive treatment of the virgin apocryphal texts and the traditions of the Virgin in Anglo-Saxon England see Clayton, Cult rif the Vi1;gin Mary, and Apocryphal Gospels ofMary, I - I 4 9 · 4 6. The edition used for ecce 4 I is Three Homiliesfrom Cambridge, Corptts Christi College 4 I, ed. Grant, "The Assumption of the Virgin, " I 3 - 4 I , citations by line numbers. The homi lies in ecce 4 I also belong to the same general compositional period as Vercelli and Blickling: prior to the second generation of Benedictine ref(mn exemplified by 1Elfric and Wulfstan (see Grant, 5 - 6) . On Blickling I J see Clayton, Cult ofthe Vir;_qin Mwr_)j 2 3 2 - 3 4 , and 2 3 4 - 3 5 for a discussion of the homily in ecce 4 I . However, Clayton sees JEltric's objections to apocryphal stories of the Virgin as exceptional, rather than as representative oflate-tenth-century English theology: see Cult of the Vi�;gin Mary, 2 3 5 - 6 5 . 4 7 · CH 2 . 29 ( Assumptio Sanctae Mariae Vi�;ginis) , I 2 I - 2 3 ; see also CH 2 . 3 I ( Dominica XVI Post Pentecosten) [ "De San eta Maria," 2 7 I , I - I o ] . 4 8 . CH 2 . 29 ( Assumptio Sanctae Mariae Vi�;ginis) , 1 2 5 - 26. 4 9 · CH 2, Assumptio Sanctae Mariae Vir;ginis, 3 - 4 .

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sequels to Jesus' ministry and the missions of the apostles, pulse with the anti-Judaic motifs we have seen again and again in this section. In CCCC 4 I , as Mary awaits her death in her house upon the Mount of Olives, John is miraculously transported from his preaching and deposited before the weeping Virgin, who fears for the fate of her own body: "And ic gehyrde Iudea gedeahtunge; hi cwa:don 'Uton onbidan hwa:nne dios swelte, pa:t we ma:gen hire lichoman mid fyre forba:rnan"' [And I heard the threats of the Jews; they said, "Let us wait until she dies, so that we can burn her body with fire"] ( 5 2- 5 4 ) . She implores John to watch over her burial . When Mary dies, her body does not fall into corruption, but instead it shines with a great light, her face appears like lily blossoms, and "on micelre swetnesse swa:c uteode of hire mude" [a great sweetness went out from her mouth] ( I 24- 2 5 ) . Like many saints, Mary's body is not subject to the laws of earthly decay; she rises beyond the somatic perils detailed in Vercelli 7 . When the apostles carry the inviolate Virgin on her bier i n funeral procession, the Jews attack. In ecce 4 I , the high priest of the Jews is "filled with anger" [ mid yrre gejjlled] , raging that ".Pis is modor pa:s de us gedrefde and ure cyn " [this is the mother of the one who afflicted us and our kin ] ( I 5 I - 5 3 ) . The high priest accosts the bier, intending to overthrow it, but instead finds himself transfixed: "Mid py de he hire onhran, hrade his handa wa:on fa:ste in pa:re ba:re, and he hangode on pa:re ba:re swa he no eordan a:thran, ac micele wite he wa:s dread" [When he touched her, his hands were quickly stuck fast to the bier, and he hung on the bier so that he did not touch the ground, but was tormented with great punishment] ( I 5 4 - 5 6 ) . As the apostles continue their procession with the Jew hanging from the bier, the angels above strike the crowd "with great blindness" [ mid micelre blindnesse] ( I 5 8 5 9 ) . It is only after proclaiming belief in God, "pone peos geba:r in hire innope" [whom this woman bore in her womb ] , that the priest regains the use of his hands and arms ( I 6 5 - 6 6 ) . The blind crowd also con verts, with the help of the now- Christian priest. With predictable regu larity, all the usual elements have fallen into place : the Jew is filled with an unreasoning anger; this frenzy becomes a frenzy of great pain; the Jews are blind, but conversion allows them to see . It is Mary's body that lights this fuse : her body incites the crazed anger of the Jew; her body captures him in suspension; and only by affirming the spiritual tmth of Mary's fmitful womb can the Jew find conversion and release. In the Blickling manuscript, Homily 8 ( Assumptio S. Mariae ViJgJinis)

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is more expansive than the text found in ecce 4 I . On the Mount of Olives, the archangel Michael announces Mary's impending Assump tion; at his divine entrance, complete with a miraculous cloud, the apostles gather closely about Mary and "hie gegripan on hire middel" [they held her around her waist] , as if to keep her from rising into the heavens, even though Michael announces that "l>ys myrgenlican dxge heo bip gongende of lichoman" [this next morning she will leave her body] ( I 4 I ) . 5° Mary's death brings with it a "very sweet smell" [swi]Je swete stenc] instead of the corruption of the flesh ( I 4 5 ) . The Bliclding homily amplifies the pathos of the narrative . The Lord himself directs the preparation of Mary's funeral procession, at which point Mary's body cries out: "Wes ]:m gemyndig, }m gewuldroda Cyning, forpon ic beo pin hongeweorc, and wes pu min gemyndig, forpon ic healde pinra beboda goldhord" [Be mindful, you king of glory, that I am the work of your hand, and remember me, because I keep the golden treasure of your commandments] ( I 4 7, I 4 9 ) . The Lord offers the tender reply, "Ne forlxte ic pe nxfre min mergerot; ne ic pe nxfre ne forlxte, min eorclanstan, forpon pe pu eart soplice Godes tempi" [Never will I leave you, my pearl; I will never leave you, my precious stone, because you are truly the temple of God] ( I49 ) . Like Chaucer's repetition of "litel" and "pitee" in the diction of the Prioress)s Tale) this exchange heightens the emotional substance of the homily.51 When the Jews see Mary's loud funeral procession, "wxron hie swipe erre on heora mode" [they were very angry in their minds ] , wondering what could cause such a commotion ( I 49 ) . Here Bliclding adds the standard anti- Judaic tradition of collusion with the devil . In the com5 0 . This sentiment is echoed on 1 4 3 , 1 4 5 , 1 4 6 . 5 r . C f also the interjection o f the Prioress after she describes the fr<mtic mother's search for her murdered son: 0

grete God, that parfournest thy laude By mouth of innocentz, lo, heere thy myght! This gemme of chastite, this emeraude, And eek of martirdom the ruby bright, Ther he with throte ykorven lay upright, He Alma redemptoris gan to synge So loude that al the place gan to rynge.

The young child's hymn (among other features) specifically connects the Tale with the Miracles of the Virgin,
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pany of "the devil Satan" [ Satanas jJ£t deofo[J , they plot to attack her body: "Uton we nu arisan and acwellan ]Ja apostolas and Marian lichoman geniman and hie ponne mid fYre forb;rrnon, forpon pe heo geb;rr pone biswican" [ Let us now rise up and kill the apostles, and seize the body of Mary, and then burn it up with fire, because she gave birth to that deceiver] ( I49 ) . Armed with swords, the angry crowd of Jews advances on the procession; in a fascinating comparison the hovering angels "wurdon wyldran ponne pa Iudeas and ongunnan slean pa Iudeas" [became more wild than the Jews, and began to kill the Jews] ( I 5 I ) . The Bliclding text extends the details of this scene, embellishing it with greater detail than ecce 4 I : the Jew "pa wurdon sona ablinde and feollan to eor]Jan, and heora heafdu slogan on ]Ja wagas and hie grapodan mid heora handum on pa eorpan, and nystan hwyder hie eodan" [then immediately became blind, and fell to the earth, and struck their heads against the walls, and they clutched the ground with their hands, and did not know where they were going] ( I s r ) . In this mad frenzy, the Jews again call to mind the cannibals in Andreas (and their victims ) . In their physical agony, the Jews display their spiritual condi tion: aimless and blind, thrashing about in the darkness of ignorance . However, the high priest wins through to the recumbent Virgin ; but as soon as he nears the body, "pa wearp he gef;rstnod be p;rre swipran handa to p;rre b;rre, p;rt he hangode to eorpan" [then he became at tached to the bier by the right hand, so that he hung above the earth] ( I 5 I ) . The Jew eventually professes his converted faith several times, in ever-more eloquent terms, as he hangs from the bier; the apostles mar vel , "hwonon him pa wundorlican gereordo coman? " [from where do these wondrous speeches come to him? ] ( I 5 3 ) . Like Judas in Elene) once the Jew finds himself in the terrible grasp of divine power, he is rendered eloquent, the mists clear from his mind, and he sees the outlines of Christian revelation. He carries salvation to the crowd of blind Jews, bringing understanding to them in the same way that Judas led his people into the light and Andrew saved the cannibals, weaning them from their "perverse" ways . 5 2 5 2 . Note that befixe the Jews convert, they bewail the likeness of their situation to that of the doomed inhabitants of Sodom: "Wa us la, forpon be us is nu geworden swa swa on Sodoma byrig w:rs; p:rr w:rs geworden p:rt p:rr com oter hie on fruman mycel broga and hie wa:ron mid blindnesse slegene; ond :rfter pon pa sende Drihten ±yr of heofenum ofer hie and hie mid ealle forb:rrnde" [Woe to us, for it has happened to us just in the same way it was in the city ofSodom. It happened there that a great terror came over them, and they were struck with blindness, and afterward God sent fire upon them from the heavens, and burned them all up ] ( 1 5 3 ) .

Anti-Judaism and Somatic Fiction 27 5

Fig.

2.

The Wirksworth Slab (upper panel, right/center), showing a scene from the an adversarial Jew miraculously affixed to Mary's funeral bier, while other Jews look on. ( © Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Stone Sculpture: photographer, Jane Hawkes. ) Transitus Mariae:

As Mary Douglas has shown, a system of order can define itself only in opposition to disorder, which provides the "materials of pattern. " 5 3 The pure but fecund body of Mary can be understandable only by yoking it to the impurity represented by the Jews . The link of this binary opposition cannot be more concisely represented than in the tableau of the Jew's profane body hanging in agony below the serene, incorruptible body of the Virgin . This image is in fact captured on the Anglo-Saxon Wirksworth Slab ( ca. 700; see figure 2 ) .54 Once again, the anti-Judaic hermeneutic associates the Jews with the carnal, base nature of the world; such a nature can only writhe in frustrated rage in the grasp of divine , but terrible, purity. What strange needs do such texts fulfill? In partial answer, bodies (both physical and metaphoric) need clear boundaries, surfaces nonpermeable; Jews, in this mode of understanding, represent disorder and permeability. Perhaps it is some thing about the very immediacy of the body and food, its ingestion, digestion, and excretion that provides a ready path to such deep emo tions . Some metaphors reach deeply within. 5 3 . Douglas, Purity and Danger, 9 4 · 5 4 . On the slab see Cockerton, "Wirksworth Slab"; Clayton, Cult of the Vir;gin Mary, r 5 3 - 5 5 ; Hawkes, "Wirksworth Slab. "

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Conclusion The homilies of the Vercelli Book and the Bliclding manuscript repre sent a theological sensibility too speculative and sensational for monks hewing close to the Benedictine line, such as JElfric . In this spirituality we see the free play of the imagination, a dynamic that glories in the ambiguity of the hermeneutic circle. The poetry in Vercelli also relies heavily on the legendary apocryphal history of the early church for its subject matter. This pattern is obvious in the composition of the poetry, whether it is the refined modifications to the Acta Cyriaci made by Cynewulfin Elene) the exuberant amplification of the apocryphal acts of Andrew in Andreas, or the startling originality of the Dream ofthe Rood) drawing upon traditions such as the Harrowing of Hell. Although there is no poetry in the Blickling manuscript, one can sense a similar intensely imaginative piety overpowering, at times, the cooler strands of theology. In a well -known example from Blickling I 7 ( To Sanctae Michaheles Mtessan) , the homilist uses a portion of the apocryphal Visio Pauli ( fourth century) with a delight for detail quite similar to the poetic description of the haunted mere in Beowulf Swa Sanctus Paulus wxs geseonde on nor<5anweardne pisne mid dangeard, pxr ealle wxtero ni<5ergewita<5, and he pxr geseah ofer 6xm wxtere sumne harne stan; and wxron nora of 6xm stane awexene swi<5e hrimige bearwas, and <5xr wxron pystrogenipo, and under pxm stane wxs niccra eardung and wearga. And he geseah pxt on axm clife hangodan on axm isigean bearwum manige swearte saula be heora handum gebundne; and pa fynd para on nicra onlicnesse heora gripende wxron, swa swa grxdig wulf; and pxt wxter wxs sweart under pxm clife neo<5an. And betuh pxm clife on <5xm wxtre wxron swylce twelf mila, and <5onne aa twigo forburston ponne gewitan pa saula ni<5er pa pe on pxm twigum hangodan, and him onfengon (}a nicras . ( 209- I I ) [As Saint Paul was looking toward the northern part of the earth, where all the waters flow down, there he saw above the water a gray stone ; and north of the stone very rimy woods had grown up , and there were shadowy mists, and under the stone was the home of monsters and outcast creatures. And he saw that many black souls with their hands bound hung on the cliff on the icy woods; and the devils in likeness of monsters were clutching them

Anti-Judaism and Somatic Fiction 2 77

like greedy wolves; and the water under the cliff was black. And between the cliff and the water there were about twelve miles, and when the twigs broke, then the souls who hung on the twigs fell down, and the monsters seized them. ] 5 5 JElfric would never allow such an expanse of imaginative digression into his own work. The Bliclding homilies, like the poetry ofVercelli, have a talent for metaphorical expansion and flights of theological fancy. With respect to the understanding ofJews, this free-ranging, associative spiri tuality creates a baroque montage of anti-Judaic images, inexorably ac companying the eschatological, penitential, and Christological motifs of the manuscript. Even in a text as short as Blickling 9 ( Crist Se Goldbloma) , we can see this pattern. The text is simply a very brief discursive profession of faith in Christ, with a thumbnail sketch of his life and deeds . The homilist pauses to note the virgin conception, the Holy Spirit dwelling in Mary's womb ( I o 5 ) . In a metaphorical turn of phrase, the homilist calls the newborn Christ "the golden blossom" [ segoldbloma] ( I o 5 ) . As the text spins out its Christology, the obstinate Jews soon follow: although the Lord wished to heal the people and teach them mercy, their "wxron stxnenre heortan and blindre pxt hie pxt ongeotan ne cuoan, pxt hie pxr gehyrdon, ne pxt oncnawan ne mihton pxt hie pxr gesawon" [hearts were made of stone and blind so that they could not comprehend or understand what they heard there, nor could they understand what they saw there ] ( I o 5 ) . But God brought the illumina tion of understanding to the unbelievers : "se xlmihtiga God afYrde him pxt unriht wrigels of heora heortan, and hie onbyrhte mid leohtum andgite, pxt hie pxt ongytan and oncnawan mihton, hwa him to hxle and to helpe and to feorhnere on pas world astag" [the Al mighty God removed from them that false veil from their hearts and illuminated them with bright understanding, so that they could under stand and recognize him who descended into this world for their salva tion, their aid, and as their refuge ] ( I o 5 , I 07 ) . Even in this short text from Bliclding we can see the connections between Christ, Mary's body, Jews, and understanding. Highly wrought metaphors generate intense emotions, emotions that are often split between profound 5 5 · Cf Beowulf i 3 5 7b-76a, 14 2 5 - 3 0a. See Healey, ed. , Old English Vision of St. Paul, 4 1 - 57·

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physical love for Christ and furious hatred for the Jews, the enemies poised in dark intention over the divine bodies of Virgin and Savior. s6 The Vercelli Book probably represents a collection designed for pri vate meditative contemplation, although this is certainly not a settled question . 5 7 The poetry often exhibits an almost Romantic ideal of powerful feelings recollected in tranquility. Cynewulf 's epilogue to Elene exhibits deep emotion, even if it is a conventional topos . s 8 The speaker engages in profound meditation, mulling his thoughts over in the "prison of the night" [ nihtes nearwe) r 2 3 9a] . His revelation consists of a hermeneutic breakthrough: Nysse ic gearwe be dxre rode riht xr me rumran gepeaht ]mrh da mxan miht on modes peaht wisdom onwreah. ( r 2 3 9 b- 42a) [I did not completely know the truth about the cross before wisdom, through the glorious power, uncovered in the thinking of my mind a wider understanding. ] The first-person epilogue establishes a bond between the experience of the narrative "I" and the reader; this is an important feature of the Dream of the Rood: Hwxt! Ic swefna cyst secgan wylie, hwxt me gemxtte to midre nihte, sydpan reordberend reste wtmedon! 5 6. On the appeal to the emotions rather than the intellect in the Blickling homilies, see Dalbey, "Themes and Techniques. " 5 7 . Sisam describes Vercelli as "essentially a reading-book" ( Studies in the History of Old English Literature, I I 8 ) , a conclusion supported by Gatch, who calls the manuscript "a florilegium for pious reading" ( Preaching and Theology, 5 7 ; see also I 0 3 ) , noting that it probably did not have a public, liturgical use . O'Carragain concurs, seeing the codex as a collection of devotional texts designed to stimulate prayer, repentance, and compunction ( "How Did the Vercelli Collector Interpret The Dream of the Roodr'' ) ; see also Scragg, "Compilation of the Vercelli Book. " However, the specific purpose behind the compilation of Blickling is unclear: see Gatch, Preaching and Theology, 5 7- 5 8 , and "Unknowable Audience of the Blickling Homilies . " 5 8 . See the discussion i n Clemoes, Interactions, 273 - 76, 3 9 2- 9 5 .

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[ Lo, I wish to tell of the best of dreams, what I dreamt in the middle of the night after the speakers of the world dwelt in sleep . ] Only alone in the privacy of personal revelation can the tormented speakers of the poems communicate deep mystery, beyond the every day world of rational speech. What they see in this introspection gives them pause ; the speaker of Cynewulf's epilogue writhes in sin and tribulation : Ic wxs weorcum fah, synnum asxled, sorgum gewxled, bitrum gebunden, bisgum be]Jrungen.

( Elene 1 242b- 4 4 ) [ I was stained by my deeds, bound b y sins, tormented b y sor rows, bound and burdened by bitter afflictions . ] Cynewulf opens the Fates ofthe Apostles with the same motif: "Hwxt! Ic ]Jysne sang sidgeomor fand jon seocum sefan" [ Lo, sad from the weary journey, I composed this song in my sick spirit] ( r- 2a) . And the dreamer in the Dream ofthe Rood is similarly despondent: "Syllic wxs se sigebeam, ond ic synnum fah, jforwunded mid wommum" [bright was the victory-tree, and I was stained with sin, wounded by evil deeds] ( r 3 - r4a) . These lines attest to an intensity of personal experience on behalf of the speaker, an ardent piety that, with the aid of the lyric voice, pulls the reader into the understanding expressed by the "I" of the poem.59 This bonding is, of course, an element in all forms of lyric voicing, but the strongly imaginative and hortatory theology of the prose and verse in the manuscripts creates a sense of readerly participa tion very different from, for example , a reading of the Junius manu script of Old English poetry or a collection of JEfric's homilies with a strongly exegetical cast, such as the First Series of Catholic Homilies. In Vercelli and Blickling, the pleasure afforded the reader is most often not the unfolding of narrative or the fine explications of Scripture , but the overpowering emotion of rapture . 6 0 5 9 · Cf the first-person narrative f(Jrmulae in Andreas r - 3a, 1 09 3 - 94a, 1 4 7 8 - 89a, r 626b, 1 706- Sa. See Rice, "Penitential Motif," for an analysis of how the reader is impli cated in the penitential process initiated by the first-person speaker of the epilogues. 6o. Many critics have noted the evangelical, affective nature ofCynewulf's poetry: e.g., see NCHOEL, r 6 5 ; Bzdyl, "Juliana: Cynewulf 's Dispeller of Delusion"; Anderson, Cynewulf,

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In the epilogue to Elene) the Lord gives the speaker learning ( lare) 1 24 s a) , a gift of poetic understanding that unbinds the speaker's body in terms reminiscent of the rending of Andrew's body among the cannibals, except here the force, with the urgency of a metaphysical poem, batters the speaker's heart with divine power : gife unscynde mxgencyning amxt ond gemynd begeat, tidum gerymde, torht ontynde, bancofan onband, breostlocan onwand, leooucrxft onleac. ( r 24 6b- 5 oa) [The mighty king gave out flawless grace and implanted it in the mind, revealed its light, at times extended it, unbound the body, opened the heart, unlocked the art of poetry. ] This violent imagery ( e . g . , bancofan onband) is in keeping with the flamboyant theological expression of the two manuscripts, and in its rapturous possession it also connects to a long tradition of empathic bonding in Western culture . These texts encourage the dissolution of personal identity into the great, all-encompassing vision of God and the church. We see this bonding, for example, in the analogical similarity between the first person dreaming speaker and the first-person speaking cross in the Dream of the Rood. As we have seen, baptism ( so closely linked to conversion) and the Eucharist ( inevitably tied to representations of Christ) are important sacramental modes of understanding in these texts; in Western Christian culture, one way individuals can understand others is through the unity achieved by sacramental bonding.61 For example, in the Paschasian understanding of the Eucharist, the Chris tian becomes God through the ingestion and digestive transformation of the Eucharist; the bread is "caro corporis Christi ex qua Christus manet I 64 - 7 5 . Regan characterizes Elene as a poem written as and for monastic meditation ( "Evan gelicism," 25 2- 5 3 , 276). Campbell sees Elene as a series of structural revelations that each trace an emotional arc from penitence to intense emotional joy, with the epilogue following the same pattern ( "Cynewulf's Multiple Revelations," 24 7 - 4 8 ) . On wisdom, enlightenment, and con version in the epilogue see also Bridges, Generic Contrast, 2 I 3 - I 8 . 6 r . Morrison, "I Am You", 8 - I r .

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i n nobis" [the fle sh of Christ's body from which Christ remains in us] , and through it "transformemur in illo qui nihil aliud factus est quam Deus caro dignatione sua, ut habitaret in nobis" [we are transformed into him who was made nothing else than God's flesh by his own command, in order to dwell in us] ( I . I 9 ) . This bond of unity is recipro cal : "Si ergo habitat in nobis et nos membra corporis eius maneamus in illo, iusmm est, quia in illo sumus, ut ex eo uiuamus . Et ideo carne Verbi pascimur et potamur sanguine" [If, therefore, it dwells in us so that we might remain members of his body in it, it is right that we are in it, so that from it we might live . And therefore we feed upon the flesh of the Word and drink the blood] ( I . I 9 ) . God's flesh will dwell in the body of anyone who participates in the sacrament, changing that person's identity as the recipient is shaped as a "member" of Christ's body. Ultimately, the highly emotional character of the Vercelli and Blickling texts (that is, their anti-Judaic cathexis) renders this irrational and ecstatic paradox all the easier to understand and accept. However, empathic bonding has its darker side . In the high reaches of metaphor, where the theology of Vercelli and Blickling enfolds the reader in the tight bonds of emotion, hatred also becomes an effective strategy for bonding. Morrison calls this "the partnership of love and hatred . . . the acknowledgment that human bonding could be sealed in the violence of ecstasy by hatred masquerading as love."62 Contrast is a form of association, in traditions like the sublime : by sympathy, contrasting terms find unity. 63 Thus, while the hermeneutic at work in Vercelli and Blickling pulls the Christian community, text and reader, together under the rhetoric of baptismal conversion and christological assimilation, it also pulls the community together through hatred: the more intense the rhetoric of hate, the more complete the loss of self to the power of emotion and the bonds of community. Jews are thus a rhetorical effect, a way of understanding personal identity through the cathexis of anti-Judaic hatred. In this particular variation on display in Vercelli and Bliclding, poetic fear and hatred run through the delicate fabric connecting these traditions. Not only are Jews a vehicle for the hate necessary for communal bonding, but also, perhaps, in the oblit eration of identity encouraged by such traditions there was an inevita ble, sublimated trace of hesitation, representing the fear of losing the 6 2 . Morrison, "I Am Yi1u", 3 1 . Morrison terms this "malevolent sympathy" : see 69- 1 3 6. 63 . Morrison, "I Am You", 3 6-40.

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self, a fear that one's personal identity would be swept away by the tides of community. Perhaps, we might see in these texts that Jews at some level represent the human cry for identity and difference in the face of utter, rapturous subjugation.

PA R T F O U R

�lfric) Anti-judaism and the Tenth Century

Introduction

The truth seems to be that we live in concepts of the imagination before the reason has established them. If this is true, then reason is simply the methodizer of the imagination . -Wallace Stevens, The Necessar_y Angel What is a rhetorical trope, what is a psychic defense, and what is the value of analogizing them? -Harold Bloom, A Map ofMisreading

hus far, we have already seen considerable overlap in the varying modes of understanding Jews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon En gland. The separation of traditions in the previous chapters allows a certain concentration and focus to emerge, yet this partition is also, ultimately, only a heuristic exercise, something done to enable a think ing-through, a temporary separation to allow for dissection. When we arrive at the late tenth century in England, and the work of i'Elfric of Eynsham ( 9 5 5 - I O I O C.E . ) , we see how artificial this separation is : i'Elfric's work replicates many of the traditions we have been detailing, moving effortlessly among them as he develops his vernacular projects. In some ways like Bede's corpus, i'Elfric's writings encode, as one would expect, most of the standard lines of thinking about Jews . However, there are also particular local variations, including a more explicit link to

T

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tenth-century sociopolitical contexts. One must always keep in mind LElfric's position as a leading public figure of the tenth-century Benedic tine reform in England. More obviously than with any other author or text examined here, LElfric's understanding of Jews and Judaism occurs within a network ofhistorical, political, and social contexts . Close atten tion to two particular homilies, De populo Israhel and Maccabees) will show, first, the way that the various traditions of anti-Judaic discourse underlie and inform LElfric's thinking on the subject, and second, how the weight of that tradition can be employed in a social context. Jews trouble LElfric . As the prefaces to his collections of vernacular homilies tell us, he is a teacher and therefore worried about the subtleties of the Christian message when rendered in vernacular prose and pre sented to a less learned audience . Gedwild ( "heresy" or "error" ) is his constant concern, and the Jews provide plenty of opportunity for ged wild.1 The basic dilemma: LElfric must explain that the Jews are at once the noble populus Israhel of the Old Testament and also the mad killers of Christ found in the New Testament. For Bede this dichotomy appears to be a more refined, intellectual "problem"; for LElfric, one senses it is a more troublesome contradiction and obstacle. He does not appear to hold the greatest confidence that his audience can maintain the ability to hold several contradictory understandings of the Jews in continual suspension: the Old Testament Jews are noble in their own right, but only within the temporal confines of the Old Law; when viewed through the prism of the New Testament, the rebellious Jews of old are incomplete, unfinished, "lack" incarnate . As always, figural understand ing mediates this contradiction. However, LElfric's ambivalence , his uneasiness over the correct interpretation of Jews, always hovers about these texts. 2 What follows here in this introduction, prior to sustained analyses of LElfric's homilies De populo Israhel and Maccabees) is a sample of LElfrician texts that reference the motifs and traditions we have seen so far.

r . See the Prefaces to the First and Second Series of Catholic Homilies, the Lives of Saints, and the Preface to Genesis, collected in /Elfric's Prefaces, ed. Wilcox. 2. Cf. Stephen Iwger's "Spectral Jew" : " . . . there was, in the basic structure of Christian ity's self� definition in relation to Judaism, a strong ambivalence" ( 1 3 ). Although Kruger's essay treats the understanding of Jews in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, his treatment also seems applicable to JElfric 's ambivalence reconstructed in the following pages: cf his descrip tion of eleventh- and twelfth-century literature that treates Jews as "largely a literature of anxiety-of anxious conjurings away that are also conjurings up, bringing into the present a Judaism consigned to the past, if only to try to reconfirm its pastness" ( 26 ) .

Introduction 28 7

The Augustinian understanding of Jews is evident in JElfric's work, but he shares some particular emphases with Bede, for example . JElfric occasionally plays the role of "cultural anthropologist" in a manner not unlike Bede, explaining the strange customs of an unknown people . Old English texts often express a curiosity about other people and places, and JElfric guides the reader through his understanding of "foreign" Jewish culture .3 An episode in the Chair of Saint Peter con tains just such a digression. JElfric comments on the Jewish reluctance, in the Old Testament, to enter a heathen household: ".Pa iudeiscan wendon pxt hi ana wxron gode gecorene, and forpy swa cwxdon. On ealdum dagum under moyses x, noldon pa iudeiscan genealecan pam hxpenum ne mid him gereordian, and swype rihtlice pa forpan pe hi gelyfdon on pane lifigendan god and pa hx6enan gelyfdon on pa leasan godas, ]Jade nxron godas ac gramlice deofle " [The Jews thought that they alone were chosen by God, and therefore spoke thus. In the old days under the Law of Moses, the Jews would not come near the heathens or speak with them, and rightly so at that time because they believed in the living God and the heathens believed in false gods, who were not gods but rather fierce devils ] . 4 JElfric anticipates questions from his audience we can no longer hear: Why did the Jews worry about eating with pagans? Were the Jews themselves pagans? If they were not pagans, were they beloved of God? We will see similar notes toward a definition of Jewish culture in Maccabees. In the Chair ofSaint Peter JElfric carefully situates the Jewish customs in their proper tempo ral setting "in the old days under the Law of Moses." He clearly demar cates Old Testament Jewish culture in order to prevent his people from reaching any uninformed conclusions that might lead them into heresy. As he teaches the English about Jews in this passage, JElfric notes the righteousness of the Jews in the Old Testament, especially when com pared to their pagan enemies. However, this identification conflicts with JElfric's lesson that the Jews of the New Testament were the 3 . Many texts exemplifY this ethnographic curiosity, including Beowulj,' The Wonders of the East, Alexander's Letter to Aristotle, the voyage of Ohthere and Wulfstan digression in the Old English translations of Orosi us, Widsith, etc . 4 · Chair ofSaint Peter in L'Elfric's Lives ofSaints, ed. Skeat, vol. r , homily r o , lines r y6- 8 3 . All further references to homilies in the Lives of Saints are to this edition by homily title, volume, homily number, and line numbers.

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wicked killers of Christ. The source of JElfric's ambivalence is the paradox that the "iudeiscan wxron fram gode and hi nxron fram gode" [ Jews were from God and they were not from God] . s Take a s another example, a further thorny question for Anglo-Saxon minds : what about Joseph, the husband of Mary? How could he-an ordinary man-be the husband of Mary, if Jesus is the son of God? JElfric explains : "Maria wxs, be godes dihte, pam rihtwisan iosepe beweddod, for miclum gebeorge ; for pan pe hit wxs swa gewunelic on iudeiscre peode, xfter moyses x, pxt gif xnig wimman cild hxfde, buton be rihtre xwe, pxt hi man sceolde mid stanum oftorfian" [Mary was, by God's direction, married to the righteous Joseph, for the greater protec tion; because it was thus customary among the Jewish people, according to the Law of Moses, that if any woman had a child, unless in lawful married union, she should be pelted with stones] . 6 Joseph, therefore, is placed into the picture by God only to "fool" the Jews, to circumvent the demands of "Jewish custom," and protect the mother and divine child: "ac god asende his engel to iosepe pa oa maria eacniende wxs, and bead pxt he hire gimene hxfde and pxs cildes fosterfxder wxre . Da wxs geouht pam iudeiscum swilce ioseph pxs cildes fxder wxre" [But God sent his angel to Joseph when Mary was pregnant and commanded that he should take care ofher, and be the child's foster-father. Then it seemed to the Jews that Joseph was father of the child] ( CH r . 2, 1 9 1 - 9 3 ) . JElfric then hastens to reiterate that Joseph was not the father, but that God was : all this, in essence, a digression exploring the strange customs of a distant people .? JElfric's explanation here does not have a parallel in the sources for the homily. 8 Like Bede, JElfric acts as a learned expositor, in situ, of not only the spiritual sense of Scripture, but also the puzzling aspects of the literal, historical sense. JElfric is also alive to the sense of the Jews as the noble populus Israhel of old; we shall see his encomium to the noble heroes of the Old Testament-and the anxiety that causes-in the analyses of De populo 5 · CH 2 . 1 3 ( Dominica V Q]tadrigesima) , 5 0- 5 1 . Citations from the Second Series arefr om Godden's edition, by homily and line numbers. 6. CH 1 . 2 ( Nativitas Domini) , 1 87-90. Citations from the First Series are from Clemoes's edition, by homily and line numbers. 7· JE!fric repeats this same explanation in CH 1 . 1 3 (Adnuntiatio Sanctae Mariae) , 79 - 8 7 . C f. also JElfric's explanation o f circumcision in CH 1 . 6 ( Octabas et Circumcisio Domini) , initiated by his rhetorical observation that "[ w ]en is pa:t eower sum nyte hwa:t sy ymbsni denys" [ It is to be expected that some of you do not know what circumcision is] (49 ff ) . 8 . See Godden, /Elfric)s Catholic Homilies) 20, note to lines 1 8 7- 9 8 .

Introduction 28 9

Israhel and Maccabees in chapter 7 and 8 , but here we can at least note his knowledge of that typical motif of the populus Israhel mythos : the destmction of Jemsalem. In CH r . 2 8 ( Dominica XI Post Pentecosten) , JElfric explicates the scene in Luke's gospel when Jesus weeps over the fate of Jerusalem as he enters its gates. Luke's text runs as follows : And when he drew near, seeing the city, he wept over it, saying: "If thou also hadst known, and that in this thy day, the things that are to thy peace; but now they are hidden from thy eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee and compass thee round and straiten thee on every side, and beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in thee; and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone, be cause thou hast not known the time of thy visitation . " ( Luke 1 9 : 4 1 -44) I n its first half, JElfric's homily o n this passage details the siege and sack of Jerusalem-the traditional punishment for the deicidal crime of the Jews : "God pa oncneow p
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angered, frenzied madness. I o We also find the trope that the Jews stub bornly refused to recognize Jesus as the messiah, even though all creation did so . I I The Jews, in short, are guilty of deicide : in Saint Apollinaris the "cruel Jews" [ re5an iudeiscan] are condemned for killing Christ and in Abdon and Sennes) Abgarus commiserates with Christ: "Me is eac gesa:d pa:t 5a iudeiscan syrwia5 and runia5 him betwynan hu hi pe bera:dan magon" [ It is told to me that the Jews plot and scheme among them selves how they can betray you] . 1 2 However, l'Elfric is generally careful to head off the mistmderstand ing that Jesus was executed against his will-that he was a powerless man subject to earthly forces, rather than the incarnation of God Al mighty. The Forty Soldiers thus elaborates the deicide motif with a quali fication: the Jews entrapped Christ with evil intent, but only because he allowed this to happen. In this homily, JElfric teaches that Christ turns evil intent to good fortune through his power, and thus the great crime of the Jews-"papa hi syrwdon mid sweartum gepance hu hi crist acwealdon" [when they conspired, with dark thoughts, how they could kill Christ] -became the source of Christian salvation ( r , r r . 3 r 8 - r 9 ) . The Jews are "completely guilty" [ p urhscyld�e] and have been judged for their treachery "peah pe ure drihten pa da:da gepafode" [although our Lord allowed them to do the deeds] ( r , r r . 3 2 1 and 3 2 3 ) . JElfric embellishes this same theme and broadens its application in The Exalta tion ofthe Holy Cross) a narrative of the same basic story behind Elene. In this text, the Jews hide the true cross so that the Christians cannot find it: "l>a iudeiscan hi behyddon mid hetelicum ge5ance; noldon pa:t se ma5m wurde mannum to frofre" [The Jews concealed it with hateful intention; they did not wish the treasure to become a comfort to men] ( 2, 2 7. 4- 5 ) . Like a shadow of later fantasies of a "Jewish conspiracy," the Jews betray and kill Christ and then actively continue their "cam paign" against the Christian community by hiding the instrument of salvation. I3 Later in the same text, JElfric discusses the guilt of Judas I o. CH I . 3 ( Passio Beati Stephani Protomartiris) . I I . CH 1 . 7 ( Epiphania Domini) , 9 2 - Io4; CH I . I 5 ( Dominica Pascae) , I ? I - 8 2 . I 2 . LElfric, Saint Apollinaris I , 22. 6; Abdon and Sennes 2, 24 . 99- Ioo. See also CH I . I ( De initio creaturae) , which tells us that Jews demonstrated "micelne andan ongean his lare, and smeadon lm hi mihton hine to deaoe gedon" [great malice toward his teaching, and contemplated how they could kill him] ( 2 6 5 - 66); the same homily (lines 266- 69 ) tells us that Judas betrayed Christ at the instigation of the devil. I 3 . Cf the efforts of the Jews to keep the location of the cross secret in Elene ( discussed in chapter 3 ) .

Introduction 29 1

and the Jews, making clear that although Christ's death meant salvation for humanity, Judas and his fellow Jews are still guilty and did not simply act according to God's will . LElfric does not wish to influence his audience to think that the Jews were therefore innocent instruments of salvation; consequently he seesaws back in the opposite direction: Ncrron pa iudeiscan ne se dyrna lcrwe purh god geneadode to oam gramlican gepeahte, ac pa pa crist geseah, se pe gesiho ealle ping, heora yfelan willan, pa awende pe hit to gode swa pert heora yfelnyss us becom to hxle . . . . Nu synd pa iudeiscan and se sceamlease lxwa cristes deaoes scyldige pe syrwdon be him, peah pe hit us become to ecere alysednysse; and heora nan ne becymo to cristes rice nxfre butan pam pe hit gebettan and gebugan to criste . ( 2, 27. r 6 5 - 69 , r 7 6- 8 o ) [Neither the Jews nor the secret traitor was compelled by God to that horrible intent, but when Christ, he who sees all things, saw their evil will, then he turned it to good so that their evil became our salvation . . . . Now the Jews and the shameless traitor who plotted against him are guilty of Christ's death, although it be came eternal redemption for us; none of them shall ever come to the kingdom of Christ unless they make amends for it and bow to Christ. ] LElfric wants his audience to understand that the Jews did not "defeat" Christ or ultimately do anything beyond the scope of God's power. r 4 Preaching the omnipotence of God on the one hand, and the vulnerabil ity of that same God to Jews on the other, raises the ambiguities of interpretation LElfric worries about in his vernacular projects . The Jews open up a space for gedwild) and LElfric rushes to fill the gap before Anglo-Saxon minds become confused. Two homilies exemplifY the way anti-Judaic rhetoric can appear with disarming speed in LElfric's works . LElfric rails against Jews after extol ling the miracles performed at the tombs of two English saints . At the end of Saint Swithun) LElfric professes his inability to detail all the 1 4 . For the same concern, with almost the same exact wording, see, e.g., CH 1 . 1 ( De initio creaturae) , 269-76; CH 1 . 1 0 ( Dominica in QJ1inquagesima) , 1 89 - 9 1 ; CH r . q ( Do minica Palmarum) , 1 5 9 - 7 8 ; CH r . 2o ( Feria IIII de fide catholica) , 23 5 - 4 5 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 29 2

miraculous events Swithun performed and then notes the importance of miracles as signs of Christ's power on earth: :Pyllice tacna cypao pxt crist is xlmihtig god, pe his halgan geswutelode purh swylce weldxda, peah oe oa Iudeiscan purh deofol beswicene nellon gelyfan on pone lyfigendan crist xroan pe antecrist ofslagen bio purh god. :Ponne bugao pa earmingas on ende pysre worulde oe pxr to lafe beoo mid geleafan to criste, and oa xrran losiao pe xr noldon gelyfan. ( r , 2 r . 4 3 5 - 4 2) [Such signs make known that Christ is almighty God, who re vealed his saints through such good deeds, although the Jews, deceived by the devil, will not believe in the living Christ until the Antichrist is slain by God. Then the miserable ones who are left over at the end of the world shall submit to Christ with belief, and the men of old shall be lost who previously would not believe . ] A very similar invective appears in a discussion of English saints at the end of Saint Edmund: Synd eac fela oore on angelcynne halgan pe fela wundra wyrcao, swa swa hit wide is cuo, pam xlmihtigan to lofe pe hi on gelyf don. Crist geswutelap mannum purh his mxran halgan pxt he is xlmihtig god pe macao swilce wundra, peah pe pa earman iudei hine eallunge wiosocen for pan pe hi synd awyrgede, swa swa hi wiscton him sylfum. Ne beoo nane wundra geworhte xt heora byrgenum for oan pe hi ne gelyfao on pone lifigendan crist, ac crist geswutelao mannum hwxr se sooa geleafa is ponne he swylce wundra wyrco purh his halgan wide geond pas eoroan . ( 2, 3 2. 264- 7 5 ) [Among the English ( as it i s widely known) there are also many other saints who work many miracles as praise to the Almighty in whom they believed. Through his glorious saints Christ re veals to men that he is almighty God who makes such miracles, although the miserable Jews completely scorned him because they are accursed, just as they wished for themselves. No mira cles are wrought at their tombs because they do not believe in the living Christ, but Christ makes clear to men where the true

Introduction 29 3

belief i s when he works such miracles through his saints far and wide across the earth . ] I n both of these cases, iElfric singles out the Jews for special condemna tion even as he presses the validity of these miracles upon his audi ence . 1 5 Miracles at the resting places of the saints are continuing expres sions of God's power and his ultimate triumph beyond death, but such events might stretch the credulity of the audience, especially if they were performed somewhat recently on English soil. The Jews are the archetypal "unbelievers" and will pay for their doubts until the end times. iElfric adds the example of the Jews as a reinforcement to the manifest nature of these divine signs in the earthly realm. He wants to authenticate native English saints and to establish their claim to the kingdom of heaven beyond any shadow of a doubt. The sterility of Jewish sacred places (whatever those might be in iElfric's imagination) is a strong contrast to the overflowing divine presence at the tombs of Swithun and Edmund and thus bolsters the English claims by deflect ing any doubts onto the Jews . A similar pattern is found in iElfric's De fide catholica: at the end of the homily, after explaining the nature of Christ's willing sacrifice in the face of Jewish unbelief (lines 2 3 5 - 4 5 ) , iElfric goes on to explain that, in contrast to Jewish unbelief, miracles constitute the signature of the true Christian faith. Christ and the apostles wrought miracles, and " [n]u eac on urum timan, gehwxr 6xr halige men hi resta6, xr heora deadum banum god wyrc6 fela wundra, to 6i 6xt he wile falces geleafan mid pam wundrum getrymman" [ n ] ow also in our time, every where where holy men rest, at their dead bones God works many miracles, because he wishes to confirm people's faith with those mira cles] ( CH 1 . 20, 2 5 r - 5 3 ) . Jews thus serve as a convenient contrast: "Ne wyrc6 god na pas wundra xt nanes iudeisces mannes byrgene, ne xt nanes o6res gedwolan, ac xt rihtgelyfedra manna byrgenum pa 6e gelyf don on pxre halgan prynnysse and on sopre annysse anre godcund nysse" [ God does not work these miracles at the tomb of any Jewish man, nor at any other heretic's, but at the tombs of faithful men, those I 5 . The passage condemning the Jews is not JElfric's source for his vita of Edmund, the Latin Life of Saint Edmund by Abbo of Fleury: see Abbo of Fleury, Life of Saint Edmund in Three Lives of EnJJlish Saints) ed. Winterbottom.

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 2 94

who believed in the Holy Trinity and in the true unity of one divinity] ( CH r . 2o, 2 5 3 - 5 6 ) . r 6 The chapters devoted here to LElfric draw upon the analysis of the traditions examined in the previous sections . We thus can see how one particular prolific author, whose texts were designed for a broad audi ence, encodes all the traditional discourses on Jews and Judaism . LElfric thus provides an interesting comparison to Bede-two important Anglo-Saxon intellectuals beginning and ending this study. We will approach LElfric, however, not topically as with Bede, but through a close reading of two homilies, De populo Israhel and Maccabees)· such a focus will allow a different angle on LElfric' s anti-Judaism and allow us to examine the interaction of these practices in the reading of particular documents, and how in turn these documents, in their understanding of Jews, respond to tenth-century social imperatives .

I 6. There i s insular precedent fi.>r this sort of thinking; the anonymous author of the Life of Grf{_qory the Great ( 680- 704 C. E . ) follows a similar line : "Miracles are granted for the destruction of the idols of unbelieving pagans, or sometimes to confirm the weak faith of believers; most of all, they are granted to those who instruct the pagans, and so, the more gloriously and fiequently they are manifested in those lands, the more convincing they become as teachers . . . . There are some too who, like the unbelievers, seek after signs ; as the Apostle says, 'The Jews require a sign,' and Christ threatens them with the sign of Jonah which was to come" ( Life of Gregory the Great, ed. Colgrave, 79, 8 1 ) .

S EV E N

LElfric's De populo Israhel

e populo Israhel ( composed between 9 9 8 and r oo 5 C. E . ) is a transla tion of episodes from Exodus and Numbers, condensed into one coherent narrative and augmented by lElfric's own commentary. r lEl fric tells the story of the Hebrew wanderings in the desert, their peri odic grumbling and rebellion against Moses and Aaron, and through them, against God . Among the homily's successive narrative cycles of crime and punishment, lElfric also includes original commentary, as well as material drawn from various sources. As Pope notes, this hom ily has no Latin model for its overall structure and seems to spring out of lElfric's particular concerns. 2 The Old Testament provided lElfric's

D

I . For the date o f D e populo Israhel see Pope, e d . , Homilies of./Elfric, 1 4 7- 4 8 ; Clemoes, "ChronolOl:,'Y," 244 . The homily exists in two extant manuscripts : Oxford, Bodleian Library, Hatton 1 1 5 ( Ker 332) and London, British Library, Cotton Otho C.i. ( Ker 1 8 2 ) . For descriptions of these manuscripts see Pope, Homilies, 5 3 - 5 9 , 8 5 - 8 7, and Ker 3 3 2 and 1 8 2 . Hatton 1 1 5 provides the basis for Pope's edition of the text. Otho C.i. contains only lines r 1 2 8 of the homily; a further discussion of the manuscript can be found in Sis am, Studies in the History rif Old English Literature, 1 9 9 - 2 2 4 . De populo Israhel draws mainly on the following chapters from the Vulgate Old Testament: Exodus 3 2, Numbers r r , 1 3 , 1 4 , r 6, 2 I . 2. Pope, ed. , Homilies of ./Elfric, 6 3 9 . Relative to many of JElfric 's other homilies, De populo Israhel thus exhibits considerable originality: "As often when he makes use of Old Testament material, JEltric allows some of the stories to speak for themselves; but in the middle and at the end there are extended comments, and these seem to spring mainly from his own thorough acquaintance with the Bible and his own reflections on it" (Pope, ed . , Homilies of./Elfric, 640 ) .

29 5

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 29 6

imagination with raw material he molded to his own purpose . Author ity and rebellion seem to be the prime points of focus in the text. As JElfric explains : "God afandode pa p;rs folces anr;rdnysse on oam langsumum fxrelde feowertig geara; he wolde pxt hi wxron mid weorcum gehyrsume his halwendum bebodum, him to ecere hxle" [ God tested the determination of the people in the long journey of forty years; he desired that they be obedient to his healing commands with deeds for their eternal health ] . 3 The motif of divine trial and punishment of course calls to mind the populus Israhel mythos . The homily details the constant murmuring of the Hebrews in the desert, and the continual cycle of rebellion and chastisement. JElfric explains that although God "worhte feala wundra on oam westene" [created many miracles in the desert], the Israelites were "wioerrxde witodlice to oft, and to swyoe gegremedon pone sooan God" [indeed rebellious too often and greatly angered the true Lord] ( 3 8 - 4 0 ) .4 Each time they complain, the vengeance of the Lord in the desert is swift. The ingratimde of the populus Israhel is contrasted with their great deliverance from Egypt: out of the depths of the Red Sea none came out alive "buton Israhela folc, oe ferdon of oam Iande gangende mid fotum, lmrh Godes mihte ealle, ofer oa Readan Sx, swa swa we rxdao on bocum" [ except the Israelite people, who fled from that land moving on foot, through God's great power over the Red Sea, just as we read in books ] ( I I 9 - 2 I ) . "As we read in books" : JElfric here acknowledges the long textual tradition of the populus Israhel mythos . Reminiscent of the dynamic of land inheritance in Genesis A and Exodus) the narrative of De populo Israhel focuses on the search for a rightful home; the Israelites, acting on God's command, scout out the promised land: "for pan oe God wolde his agen word gef)rllan, and pxt folc gelxdan to oam behatenan Iande, swa swa he gef)rrn behet pam heahfxdere Abrahame" [ because God wished to fulfill his own word and to lead the people into the promised land, just as he formerly promised the high patriarch Abraham] ( I 44- 4 6 ) . But they-men of little faith-are dismayed by the formidable foes they face; as the men of the reconnaissance explain, "p;rr synd mycele burga and mxrlice geweallode, and pxr we gesawon 3 . JElfric, De populo Israhel, in Homilies ofLE!fric, ed. Pope, vol. 2, 63 8 - 66, lines 3 5 3 - 5 6 . Further references by line numbers only. 4 · The rebellious, murmuring Israelites of the Pentateuch are illustrated in British Li brary, Cotton Claudius B . iv, a manuscript whose unusual iconographic originality Mellinkoff discusses in "Round, Cap-Shaped Hats" and Horned Moses, 1 3 - 1 7 .

./Elfric�> De populo Israhd 29 7

eac swylce entas, Enaches cynnes pxs ealdan entes" [there are great cities, powerfully defended and we also saw there giants, the kin of the old giant Enoch] ( I 6 I - 6 3 ) . A chosen folc stands poised, ready to drive a surpassed, ancient people from the land; Joshua explains that with the aid of God the Jews can defeat any foe, displace the enemy race, and regain their homeland: all populus Israhel tropes. Foolishly, how ever, they enter the land before they are ready, and the Caananites destroy them because they embarked on their enterprise, "mid gebeote . . . butan Godes dihte, mid dyslicum anginne" [with boastful speech . . . without God's direction, with a foolish beginning] ( 2 I OI I ) . In its overall emphasis on the storied, wandering fortune of the Jews of old, De populo Israhel constitutes a typical reflex of the populus Israhel mythos . Yet even as the homily displays the familiar narrative motifs of the populo Israhel epic tradition, it also utilizes the disturbing somatic tra dition of anti-Judaism, with its frenzied emotion. The Jews in the De populo Israhel homily are blind ( 2 I o ) , and they rage in madness when they rebel ( I 79 , 2 3 0 , 23 4 ) . As we saw throughout chapters 5 and 6, in this somatic tradition the Jews find a link to food and body; correspond ingly, the consumption of food in !Elfric's narrative source materials the problems this eating raises-draws his attention and his worried ambivalence . Feeding opens the homily: !Elfric cites his previous work on the sub ject of the Hebrew wanderings and sustenance in the desert, his analysis of how God led his people out of bondage in Egypt, over the Red Sea, and "hu he hi afedde feowertig geara mid heofonlicum mete, and pxr nan man nxs on eallum pam fYrste furoon geuntrumod" [how he fed them for forty years with heavenly food, and there was not one man in all that time even made weak] ( 5 - 7 ) . s !Elfric explains that in this current work, De populo Israhel) he wishes to "git secgan sum oing be oam folce" [yet say something (further) about that people ] ( 9 ) . He apparently wishes to delve further, at least in the beginning of the homily, into the subject of the miraculous nature of the manna and the inexplicable strife it caused among the Jews . Each time the Jews rise in revolt because of the manna, JElfric feels the occasion merits comment. The manna held the taste of whatever 5 . JElfric's previous treatment of the subject is in CH 2 . 1 2 ( Dominica in Media Quadragesime) .

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sustenance the Jews desired, the substance changing in the mouth of each man, transforming into each individual's favorite food ( I 3 - 2 I ) . 6 Even though the nature of the manna is such that it should be able to satisfY the desire of each man, the Israelites eventually grow tired of the divine food. With grumbling and complaining they become "eefter fleescmettum swyoe oflyste" [ quite lustful for meat] , saying among themselves "Hwa sylo us fleescemete? " [Who shall give us meat? ] ( 8 4 , 8 5 ) .7 They wish they were back in Egypt, where they at least had variety in their diet. Moses and Aaron face a rebellion against their authority inspired by culinary dissatisfaction, but punishment is sharp and swift as God promises to give the people "fleescmeettas genoge, oo6eet him wlatode peere gewilnunge" [enough meat, until they felt loathing for that desire ] ( 9 2- 9 3 ) . 8 God sends them a flock of birds, enough meat to fill the stomachs of the entire host, but their desire kills them : "Ne ateorode him se mete de hi swa micclum gewilnodon, ac peet fleesc cleofode pa gyt on heora to6um, and pa 6a hi fi1lle weeron, pa feollon hi deade, feala pees folces, for pan pe hi fandodon Godes" [The food did not fail them which they wished for so much, but the meat split then yet on their teeth, and when they were full, they fell down dead, many of the people, because they tempted God] ( I oo- I o3 ) .9 !Elfric draws attention to the punishment by rendering the Vulgate text with extra alliterative flourish : "and pa 6a hi fulle weeron, pa feollon hi deade, feala pees folces, for pan pe hi fandodon Godes"; with grim wordplay, they "fell" when they were "nul." As we have seen previously in chapter 6, gluttonous consumption defines the "natural" default habits of the Jews in this hermeneutic, as it is the occasion of their downfall. This episode provokes the first of JElfric's extended interpretations of the text ( I 04- 3 9 ) . He asks the questions that must have been in the mind of his audience: "Hwi woldon hi gremian God swa unoearfes" [Why did they wish to provoke God thus needlessly? ] ( I 04 ) and then details the Hebrews' cruel servitude in Egypt under Pharaoh to show just how fortunate they were to be free in the first place . He also expresses astonishment at their complaints and attributes them to exces sive earthly desires: 6. 7· 8. 9·

Based on Wisdom I 6: 20- 2 I . Based on Numbers I I : 4 . Based on Numbers I I : I 8 - 2o. Based on Numbers I I : 3 3 - 4 .

./Elfric�> De populo Israhd 2 99

Nu wxron hi oflyste purh heora unlustas flxsclicra metta, un mxg6lice swapeah, for pam de se heofonlica mete hxfde xlcne swxc xlcere werodnysse pe xnig mete hxfa, and wxs eac wurali cor ponne aa wyrta wxron pe hi xt ham sudan on heora croccum mid flx sce . ( r 22- 2 7 ) [Now they were lusting after fleshy foods because of their sensual desires, and indeed out of all measure, because the heavenly food had any flavor, any sweetness, that any food has, and was also more honorable than the herbs which they boiled at home in their pots with meat. ] Or, as the somatic tradition of anti-Judaism would sign this : "their God was the belly." Preparatory to a later, more programmatic application of figural thinking in this homily, JElfric establishes the first of many binary oppositions : between earthly nourishment and heavenly nour ishment. The Jews were responding to the base urges of the body rather than following the noble desires of the spirit. JElfric feels there is something important to explain to his audience here, based on the illogicality of the Jewish complaint. This scene of Jews refusing to eat food from God creates an interpretative anxiety: How does he explain such blatantly foolish behavior? He begins by distinguishing between jltRsclicra metta and heofonlica mete) the earthly versus divine sustenance, which sets the terms for a more formal figural explanation. By drawing out the figural implications of the narrative, JElfric resolves the puzzlement and explains their strange behavior: Se heofonlica mete hxfde pa getacnunge ures Hxlendes Cristes, pe com ofheofonum to us, pe is engla bigleofa and ealra manna lifpe on hine gelyfaa, and hine nu lufiaa . I>one acwealdon sy66an pxt ylce Iudeisce cynn, and noldon hine habban heora sawlum to bigleofan; ac we gelyfaa on hine, and lif habbaa purh hine, and he is us inmeddre ponne aa estmettas, for pan ae we xfre habbaa ealle ping purh hine, ge on ayssere worulde ge on 6xre toweardan, and us nanre werednysse ne bya wana mid him, gif we hine xnne habbaa on urum geleafan. ( r 2 8 - 3 9 ) [The heavenly food had the signification of our Savior Christ, who came to us from heaven; he is the nourishment of angels and

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 3 00

the life of all men who believe in him and love him now. After ward, that same Jewish people killed him and would not take him as a nourishment for their souls; but we believe in him, and have life through him, and he is dearer to us than those delicacies, because we ever possess all things through him both in this world and in the world to come, and there shall be no lack of sweetness with him, if we hold him alone in our belief. po The Old Testament Hebrew rejection of the manna prefigures the later New Testament Jewish rejection of Christ: the Hebrews do not recog nize the nourishment of the manna, just as the Jews do not recognize the nourishment of the Son. I I Remember that !Elfric wishes to "iron out" seemingly nonsensical elements of the narrative as well as deliver a simple message . The puzzle : if the manna changed in their mouths, giving them whatever taste they desired, then it does not make sense, on the literal level, that they would desire anything else . The solution: the rejection of the manna should not be understood literally, but rather figurally, as the later rejection of Christ by the Jews. The clus tered motifs of Jews as poor interpreters, the Jews as excessively bound to the fle sh, all serve to deliver a simple !Elfrician call to Christian piety: "If we hold him alone in our belief, there shall be no lack of sweetness with him." A similar scene of dietary revolt occurs in the last rebellion of the narrative . The Israelite misrecognition of the manna again leads to punishment. The people reach Edom and they again complain to Moses: "Hwi l�ddest }m la us of E gipta lande, p�t we her swulton on aysum westene? We nabbaa pone hlafpe us lyste etan, and us nu wlataa wia pysne leohtan mete" [Why did you lead us out of Egypt so that we suffer here in this wasteland? We do not have the loaf we are accus tomed to eat, and now this light fare is loathsome to us] ( 3 r o- r 3 ) . 1 2 As we hear them complain in the desert over the loss of their "accus1 0 . Cf Psalm 7T 24- 5 · I I . !Elfric's interpretation of the manna derives from Jesus' own words : see John 6: 3 03 3 , 4 8 - 5 2. Pope notes the possibility that !Elfric's reading of Isidore is partly behind his interpretation but generally acknowledges !Elfric's originality here ( Homilies of /Elfric, 66263 , note on lines 1 04- 3 9 ) . 1 2 . Eased on Numbers 2 1 : 5 : "Why didst thou bring us out of Egypt, to die in the wilderness? There is no bread, nor have we any waters : our soul now loatheth this very light food. " Note tl1at !Elfric does not tr<mslate Latin aquae ( "waters"), effectively keeping tl1e focus of his narrative specifically on the issue of food.

./Elfric�> De populo Israhd 301

tomed loaf," we call to mind Judas Cyriacus, starving in a pit in Elene) reflecting upon the significance of bread and stones; and we also re member the crazed hunger of the Mermedonians in Andreas: I>eod wxs oflysted, metes modgeomre, nxs him to maome wynn, hyht to hordgestreonum. Hungre wxron pearle gepreatod, swa se oeodsceaoa reow ricsode . ( I I I 2b- I 6a) [The people were filled with desire, sorrowfully thinking of food; there was no joy in wealth nor happiness in treasures. They were severely overcome by hunger, for that harsh ravager of nations ( i . e . , the devil) reigned supreme . ] The dietary rebellion in !Elfric's text again leads to a figural interpreta tion. God sends fiery serpents as punishment, killing many malcontents with poison and forcing the people to repent and crave forgiveness by beseeching Moses. God answers Moses' prayers for clemency and or ders the people to construct a large bronze serpent of brass; this serpent heals all who look upon it. !Elfric interprets this serpent figurally: Se Hxlend sylf sxde on sumum his godspelle hwxt peos deed getacnode on oam diglan andgyte, and we hit gesetton on Englisc on sumum oorum spelle . We wyllao swaoeah secgan sceortlice her nu pxt seo xrene nxddre, pe butan attre wxs, hxfde getacnunge ures Hxlendes deaoes, pe butan xlcere synne sylf prowode for us, and mid his unscyldigum deaoe us fram deaoe ahredde, fram pam ecan deaoe pe us purh Adam becom of oxre nxddran lare pe hine forlxrde. Da terendan nxddran, pe totxron pxt folc, syndon ure synna, pe us tosliton wyllao; ac we sceolon behealdan oxs Hxlen des prowunge mid sooum geleafan, and we beoo sona hale. Dxt folc on oam westene wxs pa gehxled purh oa xrenan nxddran fram pam andweardan deaoe; ac se Hxlend sxde pxt pa sceolon habban pxt ece lif mid him pe on hine gelyfao . Seo gehiwode anlicnys gehxlde oa hwilwendlice, and pxt sock ping nu sylo us pxt ece lif. ( 3 3 3- 52)

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[The Savior himself said in one of his Gospels what this deed signified in the hidden understanding, and we have set it down in English in another writing. Nevertheless, we shall here now briefly explain that the bronze serpent, which was without poi son, signified the death of our Savior, who without any sin him self, suffered for us, and with his innocent death saved us from death, from the eternal death, which came to us through Adam by the teaching of the serpent who led him astray. The gnashing serpents that tore into the people are our sins that shall wound us; but we should contemplate the suffering of the Savior with true belief, and we shall immediately be healed. The people in the desert were saved from earthly death by the bronze serpent, but the Savior said that those who believe in him shall have eternal life with him. The simulated likeness healed them temporarily, and the real thing now gives us the eternal life . ] 1 3 Thus, the conflict between the Jews and God over their food again leads to figural explanation. God's harsh punishment of the stubborn Israel ites affords LElfric an opportunity to apply the binary oppositions of a figural hermeneutic: the Jews must be content with the "simulated like ness" of Christ and temporary healing, while the Christian has access to the "real thing. " The somatic tradition of understanding the Jews drifts in the background here; they refuse to bite into and accept into their bodies something life- giving (the manna) , and so their punishment involves a representation of this rejection (the snakes) biting into them and injecting a life-threatening substance into their bodies. These di etary revolts are also focal points for the conflict of authority in De populo Israhel and serve as a way to open up and trace LElfric's use of figural thinking to understand the Jews . The analogy of Christians iSpirit, Jews iBody informs the somatic tradition of anti-Judaism. This analogy is the basis of LElfric's figural I 3 . Pope discusses LE!fric 's use of sources in this passage in Homilies rrf LElfric, 664 - 6 5 , note on lines 3 3 3 - 5 2 . The interpretation begins with Jesus' own words in John 3 : 1 4 - 1 5 : "And, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him may not perish, but may have life everlasting. " LElfric had previously explained this interpretation in CH 2 . 1 3 ( Dominica V Q;tadra;_qesima) , combining commentary by Augustine and Bede on this gospel passage . Pope concludes that this sum mary in De populo Israhel "is drawn . . . rather from his own homily than from these sources" ( Homilies ofLElfric, 664 ) .

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understanding of the entire narrative , how the story applies to the Christian populus. r 4 The mediating presence of figural understanding renders the Jews and their stories obsolete, a footnote to the overarch ing story of Christianity. Whether the Jews are right or wrong in their Old Testament struggles with God does not ultimately matter from the Christian perspective ; what really matters is that, for good or ill, those were the old ways, the old Law, the former people, while lElfric and his audience are the new chosen people of God: Hi w�ron fl� sclice menn, and underfencgon heora wite on Oyssere worulde, �fter Moyses �; we syndon gastlice menn under Godes gife nu, and ure sawul sceal, gifwe forseoO God, p�t wite underfon on p�re toweardan worulde, buton we swa ges�lige beon p�t we hit sylfe gebeton �r ure geendunge wiO Oone �lmihtigan God. ( 29 7- 3 0 3 ) - 1 5 [They were fleshly men and suffered their torment in this world, according to the Law of Moses; now we are all spiritual men under the grace of God, and our souls must, if we forsake God, undergo torment in the world to come, unless we thus are happy that we ourselves have repented ( our sins) against the almighty God before our death . ] Here, the distinction between Old and New, fle sh and spirit i s used to warn Christians that the consequences of their disobedience will be much greater than they were for the Hebrews ( as terrible as those punishments seemed to be ) . If Christians scorn God like the Jews, they will not just be punished in the here and now, but they will also suffer eternal punishment in the next life . The distinction between the two peoples here is used to show that with the greater rewards of life in Christ also comes the potential for even greater torments, a very ele mentary theme lElfric returns to at the end of the homily. 1 4 . Peter Clemoes notes the importance of figural interpretation of the Old Testament for !Elfric : "To !Elfric, as indeed to all Christians, the primary importance of the Old Testa ment was its preparation for the New. And this in two ways : in the typological relationship between much of its narrative and Christ's redemption of man, and in its numerous prophe cies of the redeemer. And so the exposition of its most significant events was a vital section of !Elfric's homiletic plan" ( "Chronolot,ry," 240 ) . 1 5 . Pope notes that this entire passage ( 274- 3 0 3 ) originates with !Elfric ( Homilies of LE!fric, 664 , note on lines 274 - 3 0 3 ) .

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In JElfric's closing comment, the distinction between Jew and Chris tian reveals the greater potential rewards Christians have for obedi ence. His comment above used the Jews and their difference from Christians to make a point about the negative consequences of disobe dience; this passage invokes the same distinction to illustrate the supe rior incentives awaiting obedience : Dam folce wcrs behaten J:mrh pone heofonlican God pert hi sceoldon habban soolice renscuras and eorolice wxstmas on wuda and on felda, ofxtan and ele, and eac swylce win, and heora fynd oferwinnan, gifhi wuroodon hine, and mid ealre heortan hine xfre lufodon. Ac Crist sylf behet us on his halgan godspelle pxt we sceolon habban, pxr pxr he sylf wunao, pxt ece lif mid him and mid eallum his hal gum, gifwe hine wuroiao on oysum andweardan life, and mid sooum geleafan hine lufiao xfre . He het us swyoost cepan pxs sopan lifes xfre, and cwxo pxt we sceoldon symle eac habban ure eorolican neode pxrtoeacan soolice. ( 3 7 6- 8 9 ) 1 6 [ It was promised to the people ( i . e . , the Hebrews ) by heavenly God that they would indeed have gentle rains and earthly fruits in the woods and fields, fruits, oil, and also wine, and they would overcome their enemy if they honored God, and ever loved him with all their heart. But Christ himself promised us in his holy gospel that we would possess eternal life with him where he himself dwells, with him and all his saints, if we honor him in this present life and ever love him with tme belief. He commanded us most firmly to ever seek true life, and said that in addition we shall ever truly have our eternal desire . ] The contract with the nation of Israel sounds appealing, but the con tract enacted through Christ exceeds it, making the earthly joys pale in comparison to eternal joy. In De populo Israhel narrative conundmms based on eating lead to figural interpretation, which in turn leads to rhetorical application. I 6. As Pope details in his notes to this passage, LElfric is generally indebted to several biblical texts here, including Deuteronomy 1 2 : 1 3 , 1 4 , 2 3 ; John 6 : 4 0
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How does figural understanding and its use as rhetoric interact with historical contexts and imperatives? Such a contextualization suggests how interpretative and representational traditions can be put to a spe cific use in particular historical circumstances; figural interpretation of biblical narrative is not an exercise confined solely to the intellectual realm of the exegetical tradition. The interpretation of Jews in De populo Israhel allows JElfric to construct an ideological support for the acceptance of ecclesiastical and secular authority in England. JElfric draws a parallel between the Israelites and the English, emphasizing the punishment awaiting disobedience and rebellion. Mter an episode of fiery punishment from the heavens in De populo Israhel) JElfric suspends his narrative for a moment and inserts his own comment: Das race we secgad eow nu to rihtinge, pxt nan mann ne sceole ceorian ongean God mid dyrstigum anginne, ne his Drihten gremian, se pe xfre wyle wel pam de hit geearniad , and he da gefrefrad pe his fultumes biddad . ( 7 8 - 8 2 ) [We tell you these stories now as guidance that no man should complain against God with over-bold action, nor provoke his Lord, who always wishes well to those who earn it, and comforts those who await his aid. ] This general comment at the beginning of the text is a warning against crossing God's authority. Indeed, this comment is so universal in tone that it is easy to surmise that JElfric intended Drihten [ Lord] (not capital ized, of course, in the manuscript) to cover several forms of authority to wit, divine, monastic, and secular. JElfric builds De populo Israhel text and gloss-around authority and submission to authority. As the narrative progresses, the punishments inflicted upon the Israel ites grow steadily worse. As we have already noted, the Israelites fool ishly enter the land of Canaan without God's permission. Although warned by Moses, they are slaughtered by the inhabitants of the land and "hi mihton geseon pxt hi swuncon on ydel, swa swa xlc pxra manna ded pe ongean his Drihten wind" [they could see that they struggled in vain, just as any man does who strives against his Lord ] ( 2 I 5 - I 6 ) . After this brief warning, a portion of the Hebrew host, led

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by Korath, Dathan, Abiron, and Hon, questions the authority of Moses and Aaron : "Hi axodon 6a mid graman pa Godes pegnas, Moysen and Aaron, 'Hwi wylie ge swa mycclum eow sylfe ahebban ofer 6ysum folce?' And prafodon hi swy6e hwi hi sceoldon habban anweald ofer hi" [They then asked the thanes of God, Moses and Aaron, with anger, "Why must you so greatly extol yourself over this people? " And they pressed them greatly as to why they should have power over them] ( 2 2 r - 2 5 ) . 17 Moses tries to mollify this group , but they insist on challenging-before the holy tabernacle of God-his authority: Se Chore pa genam, pe we �r fores�don, and ealle his gegadan, Gode to forsewennysse, �lc his recelsf�t �tforan Godes getelde, and ontendon pone star, swa swa man steran sceal, swylce hi mihton hi sylfe gewyrcan Gode to sacerdon, buton he sylf hi gecure, swa swa Aaron w�s, se arwur6a bisceop, pone pe God sylf geceas, and gesette him to bisceope on pa ealdan wisan �fter Moyses �. ( 2 3 7- 4 5 ) 1 8 [Then Korath, who we mentioned previously, and all his compan ions held God in contempt, and each man held his censer before the tent of God, and kindled the incense, just as one should kindle it, and they attempted to establish themselves as priests of God, ex cept that he himself should have chosen them, just as Aaron was, the worthy bishop , whom God himself chose and established as a bishop in the old fashion according to the Law of Moses. ] When the narrative resumes, the rebels are swallowed up by the earth or incinerated by fire from the sacred tabernacle, because, as JElfric comments, in their foolishness "hi ongean Godes willan worhton hi to sacerdum, and pone forsawon pe he him geset h�fde" [they acted like priests against the will of God and rejected him who had established 1 7 . Based on Numbers 1 6: 3 : "Cumque stetissent adversum Moysen et Aaron, dixerunt: Sufficiat vobis, quia omnis multitudo sanctorum est, et in ipsis est Dominus : Cur elevamini super populum Domini?" [And when they had stood up against Moses and Aaron, they said , "Let it be enough for you, that all the multitude consisteth of holy ones, and the Lord is among them. Why lift you up yourselves above the people of the Lord? " ] . Note that LE!tric adds an extra summary sentence ( "And they pressed them greatly as to why they should have power over them") after the final question in the Latin, emphasizing the motives of the rebels and their (misplaced) zeal. 1 8 . Based on Numbers 1 6 : 1 6- 1 9 . See Pope, Homilies ofJElfric, 664 , note to lines 24 1 4 5 on the application of the term bisceop to Aaron.

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them ( as priests ) ] ( 2 5 9 - 60 ) . In these homiletic asides JE!fric lays the foundation for the ultimate rhetorical thrust of the homily: a direct exhortation to the English audience not to be like those Jews of old, rejecting divinely sanctioned authority; instead they should obey their rightful intermediaries between God and man, namely, the proper eccle siastical authorities descended from Moses and Aaron-the monks of the Benedictine reform. This slaughter of Korath and company creates an even more wide spread rebellion; Moses and Aaron must flee for their lives into God's tabernacle until an enormous divine conflagration finally ends the con fli ct. These events provoke an extended commentary by JElfric, directly applying the lesson of the homily to his English audience : On oysum mxg gehyran se oe hxfO xnig andgyt pxt hit byo swyoe hearmlic pam oe huxlice txlo bisceopas and sacerdas, pe syndon Godes bydelas, and to lareowum gesette to lxrenne Godes folc, ponne se lareow him sego Godes gesetnyssa and his beboda, him sylfum to pearfe, and he ponne forsyho, and to forsewennysse hxfO ge pone Godes bydel ge pa Godes beboda, be pam cwxo se Hxlend to his discipulum: Qui uos audit me audit) et qui uos spernit me spernit. Dxt is on urum gereorde, Se pe eow gehyro , he gehyro me purh oa gehyrsumnysse, and se pe eow forsiho , he forsyho me . Hi forsawon Moysen and pone mxron bisceop, Aaron his brooor, mid bysmorlicum hospe, ac God sylf gewrxc heora forsewennysse, for pan oe hi God txldon pa oa hi txldon hi. Swa deo xlc pxra manna pe his ealdor forsyho, pe byo Godes speligend on gastlicere !are, on pam ealdorscype pe him God geuoe; gif he hine forsyho, his sawul sceal prowian pxt ylce wite, buton he hit xr gebete, pe hi oa prowodon on heora lichaman. Hi wxron flxsclice menn, and underfencgon heora wite on oyssere worulde, xfter Moyses x; we syndon gastlice menn under Godes gife nu, and ure sawul sceal, gif we forseoo God, pxt wite underfon on pxre toweardan worulde, buton we swa gesxlige beon pxt we hit sylfe gebeton xr ure geendtmge wio oone xlmihtigan God. ( 2 7 4- 3 o 3 ) [ Concerning these events, he who has any understanding can perceive that it is very bad for the one who insultingly accuses bishops and priests, who are the preachers of God and are estab lished as teachers to teach the people of God, when a teacher tells

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him the decree of God and his commands as a help to him and he then rejects and holds in contempt both the messenger of God and the commands of God; concerning such a one the Savior said to his disciples, "Qui vos audit) me audit) et qui vos spernit) me spernit." That is in our language, "He who hears you, he hears me through obedience, and he who rejects you, he rejects me." They rejected Moses and Aaron, his brother the great bishop , with shameful blasphemy, but God himself avenged their contempt, because God blamed them when they blamed Moses and Aaron. So it happens to every man who scorns his leader who is the representative of God in spiritual teaching, in the authority God grants to him; if he rejects him ( i . e . , the priest or leader) , his soul must suffer the same torment, unless he repents what they previ ously suffered then in their bodies. They were fleshly men and suffered their torment in this world, according to the Law of Moses; now we are spiritual men under the grace of God, and our souls must, if we forsake God, undergo torment in the world to come, unless we thus are happy that we ourselves have repented ( our sins ) against the almighty God before our death . ] Many o f the strands we have been discussing so far come together in this original comment. The figural dichotomy between Old and New appears, but its primary purpose here is not only to clarify the relation ship between Old and New Testament events in a "disinterested," theo logical sense . Instead, LElfric uses this opposition in order to make an explicit connection between disobedient Israelites in the text and (po tentially) disobedient English. As Godden notes: "Both allegorically and literally, the Anglo-Saxon church saw itself in continuity with the priesthood of the Hebrews, similarly faced with reconciling a rebellious people to God. " r 9 LElfric again stresses that if it seems the earthly torments of the people of Israel were bad, imagine what might lie in wait after death for disobedient Christians . LElfric opens this comment by appealing to those who have "tmderstanding" [ andgyt] ; those who possess true understanding constitute true Christians, in contrast to the Jews . He who understands, obeys authority. LElfric then cites Paul to emphasize the behavior of the Jews in this story as a negative example to Christian men: I9. "Biblical Literature," 2 I 6 - I 7 .

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Paulus se apostol, ealra peoda lareow, manode pone leodscipe pe he to geleafan gebigde, and ealle Cristene menn, and cwxo pxt we sceoldon geornlice us warnian wio oa yfelan ceonmge, pxt we swa ne gegremion God !Elmihtigne nu mid urum yfelum peawum, swa swa pxt ealde folc clyde on pam westene pa, wioerrxdlice to swyoe. ( 3 90-96) [The apostle Paul, the teacher of all nations, warned the people he converted to belief, and all Christian men, and said that we must earnestly guard ourselves against evil rebellion in order that we do not now provoke God Almighty with our evil ways, as that elder nation did then so rebelliously in the desert. ] 2 0 To shun the ways of the "elder nation" and obey the spiritual representa tives of God: again, this citation of the Jews develops an application and injunction for everyday English life . !Elfric uses the "figural oppor tunity" to address what must be some sort of concern in his own community: Nu syndon manega menn pe secgao pxt hi nellao Godes lare gehyran, pelxste hi sceolon habban maran wita gifhi witon pa lare , and gif hi nellao don swa swa Drihten bebyt, hi sylfe gerihtlxcan purh pa sooan lare . Nu cweoe we pxrtogeanes, pxt gif se cyning asent gewrit to sumon his pegena, and he hit forsyho swa swyoe pxt he hit nele gehyran, ne his aseon, pxt se cyning ne byo na swyoe blioe him, ponne he geaxao hu he hine forseah. ( 4 o i - I o ) [Now there are many men who say that they do not wish to listen to the teaching of God, lest they shall have greater torment if they know the Law, and if they do not wish to do as the Lord com mands, they themselves can do well enough through the tme Law. Now we say, on the contrary, that if the Icing sent a written command to some of his thanes, and he ( one of the thanes ) just completely rejects it so that he does not wish to hear it or look upon any of it, the result shall be that the king shall not be very happy with him, when the king asks him why he rejected him . ] 20. I Corinthians I o : I o - I I : "Neither do you murmur, as some of them murmured and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now, all these things happened to them in figure ( in figura) ; and they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. "

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In this comment, JElfric is responding to real or potential tenth -century social conflicts. 2 I Social ideology intrudes, in a sense, on the traditional figural motifs of anti-Judaism . We can see here the value of anti-Judaic rhetoric in the realm ofthe real, the everyday notions ofJElfric's worldly, practical imperatives: the presumed squabbling or murmuring against royal authority (with its connections to the Benedictine reform) is placed in a wider system, spread out upon a grid of ancient anti -Judaic rhetoric and related modes of Christian understanding. In a final twist at the very end of the homily, JElfric says a few words about ignorance of the laws of God and proper conduct. This concern springs from his comments above concerning those who think "ignorance is bliss," and thus a justification for disobedience : Se man pe hxfa lare on his leodscype genoge, and mxg Oa gehyran butan micclum geswince, and nele hi gehyran, ne Gode gehyrsu mian, nxfa he nane beladunge wiO Oone leofan Drihten. Se pe lare nxfO, ne lare ne gehyrO, se mihte habban sume beladunge; ac Paulus se apostol cwxO on his pistole pus : Qui sine lege peccabunty sine lege peribunt. Dxt is, on Engliscere sprxce, "Da pe buton Godes x synna gewyrcaO, pa eac butan Godes ;r on ende forwurOaO ." ( 4 1 6- 26 ) [The man who has enough knowledge i n his nation and can understand it without great trouble, and still will not listen to or obey God, he has no excuse against the beloved Lord. The man who does not possess lore, and does not obey, he could have some excuse; but the apostle Paul said this in his epistle: Qui sine lege peccabunty sine lege peribunt. That is, in the English language, "Those who commit sin without the Law of God, also die in the end without God's Law." Let the beloved Lord Christ correct us and ever draw us to his will who is the glory and love and power forever, amen. ] Anyone who hears or reads De populo Israhel is caught and now has no excuse for not acknowledging authority in its various manifestations, 2 I . Seth Lerer has discussed this passage, examining the "links between the written nature of divine and human law"; he sees this passage, and the entire homily, as a meditation upon JElfric's "ideals of a literate engagement with the world" ( Literacy and Power, I 5 3 , I 5 65 7 ) . See also Keynes, Diplomas, I 3 6- 3 7 for a discussion of the gewrit in this passage.

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whether actual belief in God, adherence to his laws and the customs of the church, the personal authority of God's ministers on earth, or even secular rulers. Thus the emphasis of this homily is on authority: its nature and strength, the consequences of acting against authority and the mobility of authority. !Elfric saw the power of God and obedience to that power as important features of the Old Testament. As he explains in the begin ning of the Letter to Sigeweard) God the creator of all living things demands obedience from his creations : Se a:lmihtiga Scippend geswutelode hine sylfne lmrh pa micclan weorc oe he geworhte a:t fruman, and wolde pa:t oa gesceafta gesawon his ma:roa and on wuldre mid him wunodon on ecnisse on his underpeodnisse him a:fre gehirsume, for oam pe hit ys swioe wolic pa:t oa geworhtan gesceafta pam ne beon gehirsume pe hi gesceop and geworhte . 2 2 [The almighty Creator manifested himself through the great work which he wrought at the beginning, and desired that cre ation look upon his mighty works and dwell with him in eternal glory, ever obedient to him in subjection, because it is very shame ful that created things not be obedient to him who wrought and shaped them . ]

De populo Israhel explores how authority originates with God but can be passed on to surrogate figures like Moses and Aaron; further, how it can be passed down to latter-day ( i . e . , English) men; how the narratives of the Old Testament, with their explorations of God's authority over the Jews, still can have authority over tenth-century Anglo-Saxon Christians through proper interpretation. "Jewish eating" is one of a number of conflicts between the people and authority in De populo Israhel. This dietary conflict, so "natural" a link to somatic anti-Judaism, compels !Elfric to explain the question of the Jews to his audience . As expected, !Elfric utilizes a figural hermeneutic to resolve the problem, and this methodology spins off a number ofbinary oppositions . Since their repre sentation is so ambiguous, the Christian understanding of Jews and 2 2 . Letter to Sigeweard, ed. Cravvford, Old English Heptateuch 1 6 . 24 - 1 7 . 29 (page and line numbers ) .

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Judaism can be utilized for various ideological purposes. In De populo Israhel) Jews are caught up in iElfric's preoccupation with authority and its legitimacy. In the next chapter, Maccabees shows a similar pattern of representation and ideological appropriation.

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LElfric's Maccabees

onored yet derided, repudiated yet ever-present, external yet inter nal, the Jews embody a rhetorical effect of Christian identity. By repudiating Judaism, defining it as lack, Christianity inexorably yokes itself into a tormented relationship with its sibling. This ambivalence gives the Jews a curious ideological mobility, a capacity to be deployed as sheer rhetoric in the flux of everyday life . The anti-Judaism of LElfric's homily Maccabees in the Lives of Saints exemplifies this capacity for the Christian understanding of the Jews to function as a mobile, all purpose political signifier in specific historical circumstances. I Maccabees is a translation and condensed adaptation of the Vulgate historical books r and 2 Maccabees; the story of Judas Maccabeus and his family's rebellion against the tyranny of the Seleucid king of Syria in the second century B . C.E. is arranged in an original order by LElfric and interspersed with brief commentary drawn from other parts ofthe Bible, LElfric's own reflections, and a few other sources . 2 At the beginning of

H

I . Cf the work of Sander Gilman, who describes his investigations of nineteenth- and twentieth-century antisemitism as an attempt to "understand how stereotypes are generated, how they are embedded in cultural artifacts (texts, in the widest sense of the word ) , and, most important, how once sanctioned in this arena they form the basis for action" ( Inscribing the Other, I I ) . 2. For the sources of the homily see Loomis , "Further Sources ofJElfi-ic's Saints' Lives," 2- 3 , and the more comprehensive discussion by Stuart Lee, "1Elfric's Treatment of Source Material in His Homily on the Books of the Maccabees. " 1Elfi-ic's Maccabees is extant in

3 13

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the narrative , Jewish dietary prohibitions provoke JElfric into an "an thropological" digression similar to the one in the Chair of Saint Peter)· here JElfric again explains the puzzling customs of Jewish culture to his audience. The first major episode of the homily is the "martyrdom" of Eleazar from 2 Maccabees 6: I 8 - 3 r . The heathens seize the old scribe Eleazar and "hi bestungon him on mup , mid mycelre 6reatunge, pone fulan mete pe moyses forbead godes folce to picgenne for pxre gastlican getacnunge" [they stuck in his mouth, with many threats, the foul food which Moses prohibited God's people to eat because of its spiritual signification] . 3 Before the narrative can move forward, JElfric inter rupts: "We moton nu secgan swutellicor be 6ysum, hwylce mettas wxron mannum forbodene on Dxre ealdan x pe mann ett nu swa6eah" [We must now speak more clearly about these things, which foods were forbidden to men in the old Law which men eat now nevertheless] ( 3 73 9 ) . JElfric then attempts to explicate Jewish dietary proscriptions in lines 3 7- 84, relying on Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and Pseudo-Bede .4 He first defines the nature of the forbidden food, condensing material from Leviticus I I : 2 - 4 7 : under the Old Law, unclean beasts do not chew their cud and/or they possess uncloven hooves ( 40-4 5 ) . Having established what literally defines "unclean fle sh," JElfric next unfolds the hidden significance behind these distinctions . Clean beasts symbolize men who meditate on God's will and mull over his teachings, like the chewing of cud ( 4 6-49 ) . 5 Unclean beasts "getacnia6 pa De tela nella() ne nella() several copies. London, British Library, Cotton Julius E. vii ( Ker 1 62) is the base manuscript tor Skeat's edition in the Lives of the Saints. Other manuscripts include Cambridge, Corpus Christi College I 9 8 ( Ker 4 8 ) ; Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 3 0 3 ( Ker 5 7 ) ; Cambridge, University Library Ii. I. 3 3 ( Ker I 8 ; an acephelous copy, beginning at line 3 I 9 according to Skeat's edition) . London, British Library, Cotton Vitellius D . xvii ( Ker 222) lacks most of the homily due to fire damage, ending at line 29; Cambridge, Queen's College [Horne ] 7 5 ( Ker 8 I ) i s only a fragment, containing just the first eight lines o f the homily. See also J . Hill, "Dissemination of JElfric's Lives of Saints," 2 5 0- 5 2 . 3 . Maccabees 2, 2 5 . 3 4 - 3 6, hereafter cited by line numbers only. Based on I I Maccabees 6: I 8 : "igitur Eleazarus de primoribus scribarum vir aetate provectus et vultu decorus aperto ore hians conpellebatur carnem porcinam manducare" [Eleazar, one of the chief of the scribes, a man advanced in years and of a comely countenance, was pressed to open his mouth to eat swine's flesh] . Note that JElfric adds the clause "which Moses forbade God's people to taste because of its spiritual signification" to his source in the Vulgate; he immediately begins to explains why this particular meat is anathema to the Jews. 4 · Leviticus I I ; Deuteronomy I 4 : 3 - 2 I ; Pseudo-Bede, In Pentateuchum commentarii Leviticus PL 9 1 : 3 4 5 - 4 6 . 5 . Bede applies the same simile to Caxlmon i n the Historia Ecclesiastica. After displaying his miraculous poetic gifts, Cxdmon is taught sacred history, with the result that "at ipse

./Elfric�' Maccabees 3 I5

leornian hwxt gode leof sy, ne on heora mode wealcan pxs hxlendes beboda" [ signifY those who do not desire properly, neither to learn what may be pleasing to God, nor to revolve in their mind the commands of the Savior] ( 5 1 - 5 3 ) . Immediately, !Elfric overlays the binary opposi tion dean/unclean with an opposition between understanding and not understanding, or proper interpretation and improper interpretation. The Jews are not yet identified with either category in this passage, but !Elfric's binary logic begins to analogically replicate itself, establishing categories he later uses to define the Jews . !Elfric restates the distinction between clean and unclean in slightly different terms, elaborating the interpretation of these categories . Beasts that cleave their hooves and chew cud signifY faithful Christians who accept both the Old and New Testament and "ceowaa godes beboda symle mid smeagunge" [ always chew God's commands with refl e ction] ( 6o ) . Unclean beasts either do not chew their cud or do not cleave their hooves "for dxre getacnunge, pe aa towerd wxs pxt we tocleofan ure clawa on pam twam gecyanyssum, on axre ealdan and on axre niwan, pxt is x and godspel" [ for the signification, which then was still to come, that we cleave our hooves in the two testaments, in the Old and in the New, that is the Law and the gospel ] ( 64- 66) . !Elfric's explanation of the Jewish diet proceeds through three analogical binary oppositions . Why does Eleazar refuse to eat the food? The food is unclean because there are clean and unclean beasts . What do clean and unclean beasts signify? They signify those who understand the word of God and those cuncta, quae audiendo discere poterat, rememorando secum et quasi mundum animal ruminando, in carmen dulcissimum conuertebat" [he learned all he could by listening to them and then, memorizing it and ruminating over it, like some clean animal chewing the cud, he turned it into the most melodious verse] ( 4. 24 ·4 I 8 ) . On the monastic practice of ruminatio in Anglo-Saxon England, see the discussion and extensive summary of secondary scholarship in Crepin, "Bede and the Vernacular," I 7 2- 7 3 , and in Remley, Old En;_qlish Biblical Verse, 404 3. Cf. Faithful's judgment of Talkative in Bunyan's The Pilgrim 's Progress ( 66) : This brings to my mind that of Moses, by which he describeth the beast that is cbm. He is such

./Elfric�' Maccabees 3 I9

land; we soolice feohtao for us sylfe wio hi, and for godes a:: , and god hi eac fordeo a:: tforan ure gesihoe; ne forhtige ge nates hwon. ( 3 08- r 6) [ It is no difficulty for almighty God to help in battle and to support them whom he wishes to, in regard to few men or to a large army, because victory is always from heaven. These people come against us as if they are braver, and wish to destroy us and lay waste our land; we truly fight for ourselves against them, and for the Law of God, and God shall also destroy them before our sight; fear not at all . ] These Jews are certainly not afflicted with the adjectives usually em ployed to describe them in the Lives of Saints and elsewhere : treacher ous, faithless, blind, unbelieving. The Maccabees are closer to the he roic, martial ethos characteristic of the Jews in Judith or Exodus) the noble chosen of the populus Israhel mythos; LElfric encourages his people to appreciate the beleaguered Israelites, a lesson obviously ap propriate to an England harassed by Viking raiders . In the Letter to Sigeweard LElfric explains that he has translated Maccabees into English "for oan pe hig wunnon mid wa:: [p ]num pa swioe wio pone ha:: o enan here, pe him on wann swioe, wolde hig adilegian and adyddan of pam earde, pe him God forgeaf, and Godes !of alecgan," and he encourages the reader to "ra:: don gif ge wyllao eow sylfum to ra:: de ! " [ because they fought mightily with weapons against the heathen army, which fought mightily against them, and wished to destroy them and eliminate them from the land that God had given them, and to suppress the love of God . . . read them (if you wish) for your own instruction" ] . I I LElfric clearly thought that the Maccabees, these Old Testament Jews, were a model for the English to emulate . I 2 I I . Letter to Sigeweard, 4 9 · 7 8 5 - 9 I , 5 I . 8 3 7- 3 8 . I 2 . Godden observes the "interest in military and political parallels at the literal level" of Maccabees and speculates on the political context of the Lives of Saints: "It is probably no coincidence that the collection was commissioned by JEthelweard, the ealdorman responsible for the military defense of the south-west against the Vikings; lEthelweard also commis sioned the translation of the book of Joshua, another account of heroic battles against the heathens" ( "Biblical Literature, " 2 I 9 ) . See also his "Apocalypse and Invasion in Late Anglo Saxon England" for more analysis of the Anglo-Saxon "literary response" to Viking invasion . The tenth cenmry saw a surge of interest in using the Maccabees as heroic models: see Dunbabin, "Maccabees as Exemplars in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries. "

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Although JElfric overtly praises the virtues of the Maccabees, he eventually needs to include the full arc of Jewish character. Before JElfric extols their nobility at too great a length, he hastens to add more information so that his audience does not think that all Jews are worthy of imitation, like the Maccabees . r 3 After describing the divine intervention of five angels on Judas's behalf, he adds an extended discus sion of the Jews : I> a Iudeiscan wxron oa dyreste gode on oxre ealdan x, foroan pe hi ana wuroodon pone xlmihtigan god mid biggencgum symle, op pxt crist, godes sunu sylf, wearo acenned of menniscum gecynde, of pam Iudeiscum cynne, of marian pam mxdene, butan mennis cum fxder. l>a noldon hi sume gelyfan pxt he soo god wxre , ac syrwdon embe his lif, swa swa he sylf geoafode . Wxron swapeah manega of pam mancynne gode, ge on oxre ealdan x ge eac on pxre niwan, heahfxderas and witegan and halige apostolas, and fela ousenda pe folgiao criste, peah pe hi sume wunian wioerwerde op pis . Hi sceolon swapeah ealle on ende gelyfan, ac oxr losiao to fela, on pam tyrste betwux, for heora heardheortnysse wio pone heofonlican hxlend. ( 5 r 4- 29 ) [The Jews were the dearest to God in the Old Law, but they alone ever honored the almighty God with worship , until Christ, the son of God, was himself born of human nature, of the Jewish people, of Mary the maiden, without a human father. Then some of them would not believe that he was the true God, but con spired against his life, just as he himself allowed. However, there were many good men of that race, both in the Old Law, and also in the New, patriarchs and prophets and holy apostles, and many thousands that follow Christ, although some remain rebellious until now. However, they shall all believe in the end, but too many shall perish there, in the period between, for their hard heartedness against the heavenly Savior. ] JElfric vacillates considerably in this comment, moving back and forth between praise and condemnation of the Jews. They were dear to God 1 3 . See Wilcox, "A Reluctant Translator in Late Anglo-Saxon England," 6- 7, for a similar conclusion. Wilcox's study complements my analysis of Maccabees at several points, although he does not specifically address JElfric's anti-Judaism.

./Elfric�' Maccabees 321

in the Old Testament because they were monotheists, yet when Christ was born they did not accept him and conseq uendy murdered him. Some of the Jews were good; some even now refuse to believe . All will repent and believe at Judgment Day, but many hard-hearted Jews will die and suffer damnation until then. JElfric expresses a similar conflict when he relates the death of Antiochus and the tyranny of his son Eupator: "Se wean) eac ongebroht pxt he ofslean wolde pa geleaffullan iudei, pe gelyfdon <Ja on god. Hi gelyfdon pa on pa ealdan wisan on pone xlmihtigan god, peah <Je hi sume wi<Jsocon si<Jpan pone hxlend, and eac swa ofslogon, swa swa he sylf wolde" [He ( Eupator) also was inclined so that he wished to kill the faithful Jews, who believed then in God. Then they believed in almighty God accord ing to the old ways, although some of them afterward rejected the Savior, and also killed him, just as he himself desired] ( 549- 5 3 ) . I 4 The whole point of the homily is to praise the fortitude of the Old Testament Jews, and JElfric applies his considerable aesthetic skills to the task; he intends to write a compelling adaptation of the biblical Maccabees and inspire the English through the power of his work. However, the logic of figural understanding leads him to the New Testament when narrating the Old, to the Jews who spurned Christ when praising the "faithful Jews" of Maccabees. Concerned as he is with misinterpretation, the task of writing an encomium to Jews that also acknowledges their later crimes was a delicate balancing act, one fraught with ambivalence . JElfric does not stop with drawing these binary distinctions between good and bad Jews, Old and New Testaments, as the ambivalence over Jews is only part of JElfric's anti-Judaism. In Maccabees) as in De populo Israhel) this anxiety over the correct assessment of Jews and their cul ture is organized in such a way that it participates in the social conflict 1 4 . See also CH 1 . 7 ( Epiphania Domini) : after explaining that the stubborn Jews refused to recognize Jesus as the Messiah, even though all creation did ( 9 2 - roo) , LElfric backtracks: "And ):leah oa heardheortan iudei noldon purh eallum pam tacnum pone sopan scyppend tocnawan, pe oa dumban gesceaft:a undergeaton, and mid gebicnungum geswutelodon. Nxron hi swa peah ealle endemes ungeleaffulle, ac of heora cynne wxron xigper ge witegan ge apostolas, and fela pusenda gelyfedra manna" [And yet the hard-hearted Jews would not for all those signs acknowledge the true Creator, whom the dumb creation knew, and by tokens manifested. They were not, however, all unbelieving, but of their race there were both prophets and apostles, and many thousands of believing men] ( I oo- I 04 ) . Be de makes the same point in very similar language : see De Templo 1 . 4 2 5 - 2 8 , and De Tabernaculo I . I I I 4 r 8 . According t o Godden, LElfric i s following his source in Haymo's homilies, who i s i n turn following Gregory the Great ( Godden, /Elfric's Catholic Homilies, 5 7 , note to lines 92- I 04 ) .

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of tenth-century England; Maccabees fits Frederic Jameson's character ization of narrative as "a symbolic move in an essentially polemic and strategic ideological confrontation between the classes. " I 5 As we shall see, the representation of the Jew serves JElfric as a strategy to assert a particular vision of society. The death of Judas Maccabeus occasions another long commentary by JElfric that sets the stage for his subsequent exposition of Anglo Saxon society in the text. He begins by praising the might of Judas and his innumerable victories : Ne synd swa peah awritene pa:s oe wyrdwriteras sa:cgap ealle iudan gefeoht for his freonda ware , and ealle oa mihte pe he ma:rlice gefremode his folce to gebeorge, swa swa us bee secgao . Menigfealde wa:ron his micclan gefeoht, and he is eall swa halig on oa:re ealdan gecyonysse, swa swa godes gecorenan on oa:re godspel bodunge, foro an pe he a:fre wan for will an pa:s a:lmihti gan. ( 676- 8 3 ) [Nevertheless ( as books tell us ) , according to historians all the battles of Judas for the defense of his friends, and all the mighty deeds which he gloriously performed in defense of his people are not written down. Manifold were his great battles; and he is as holy in the Old Testament, as God's chosen ones in the Gospel preaching, because he ever struggled for the will of the Almighty. ] JElfric stresses Judas's holiness and right to be considered a "saint" even though he lived and died before Christ, but in the next lines JElfric places Judas's virtue in a specific context and shows how the nature of the heroic Old Testament Jew is historically supplanted by the advent of Christ: On pam dagum wa:s alyfed to alecgenne his fynd, and swipost oa ha:oenan, pe him hetole wa:ron; and se wa:s godes oegen pe oa swioost feaht wio heora onwinnendan to ware heora leoda. Ac crist on his tocyme us cydde oore oincg, and het us healdan sibbe and soofa:stnysse a:fre ; and we sceolon winnan wio pa wa:lhreoI 5 . Political Unconscious, 8 5 .

./Elfric�' Maccabees 3 23

wan fYnd, pxt synd oa ungesewenlican and pa swicolan deofla, pe willao ofslean ure sawla mid leahtrum. ( 6 8 4 - 9 2 ) [ In those days he was allowed to conquer his enemies, and most of all the heathens, who were angry against him; and he was the thane of God who fought most often against their conquerors, in defense of their people . But with his coming Christ taught us another thing, and commanded us ever to hold peace and truthful ness; and we should fight against the bloodthirsty enemies, that is, the invisible ones and the deceitful devils, that wish to slay our souls with sins . ] JElfric again deploys a binary opposition to understand Judas . By con trasting the "old days" with the here and now of the Christian era, he shows that to be a servant of God and a Jew is inherently deficient; only Christians possess the true knowledge of faithful service . Admirable as Judas's deeds are, according to JElfric they designate a Jew who cannot move beyond the literal level of interpretation: for Judas Maccabeus, to be a successful servant of God means to fight battles in the physical world because that is the only understanding available to him. Like the blind Jews who cannot recognize the spiritual significance of the man na in De populo Israhel) the heroic leader of the Maccabees is deficient in understanding, this time in terms of vocation. The ultimate servant of God, according to JElfric, is not a worldly warrior, but rather a spiritual one . Yes, it is a good thing to fight for your people, as Judas Maccabeus did, but Christ irrevocably transformed the ideals of service, and now the real, important battle is the one against the invisible , spiritual foe : . . . wio o a we sceolon winnan mid gastlicum wxpnum, and biddan us gescyldnysse simle xt criste, pxt we moton oferwinnan pa wxlhreowan leahtras and pxs deofles tihtinge, pxt he us derian ne mxge . "Ponne beoo we godes cempan on oam gastlican ge feohte, gif we oone deofol forseop purh soone geleafan, and pa heafodleahtras purh gehealtsumnysse, and gif we godes willan mid weorcum gefremmao . "Pxt ealde godes folc sceolde feohtan pa mid wxpnum, and heora gewinn hxfde haligra manna getac nunge pe todrxfao pa leahtras and deofla heom fram on oxre niwan gecyonysse pe crist sylf astealde . ( 69 3 - 704 )

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[ . . . against them (i.e., the "invisible enemies" ) we should fight with spiritual weapons , and pray continually to Christ for our pro tection, that we can overcome cruel sins and the temptations of the devil, so that he cannot harm us. Then we will be God's champions in the spiritual fight, if we scorn the devil through true belief, and the chief sins through self-control, and if we carry out the will of God with our works . The old people of God had to fight then with weapons, and their struggle had the signification of holy men who drive out sins and devils from them in the New Testament that Christ himself established . ] LElfric carefully puts together his argument: he lavishly praises the Maccabees and their heroism throughout the homily, but then, in a rhetorical turnabout, he surprises the reader by saying that, admirable as they are, the Maccabees were only Jews and could only do so much. The ultimate service to God is carried on by fighting spiritual battles as opposed to physical ones . Who shall therefore lead the spiritual fight? Who is the best servant of God? LElfric gives the answer in his wider discussion of society in the brief exposition entitled Qui sunt oratores) laboratores) bellatores appended to the homily. 16 In this epilogue, LElfric analyzes the three orders of soci ety, one of the oldest examples of the medieval commonplace: "Is swa oeah to witenne pxt on pysre worulde synd preo endebyrdnysse on annysse gesette : pxt synd laboratores) oratores) bellatores. Laboratores synd pa pe urne bigleafan beswincao; oratores synd pa oe us to gode geoingiao; bellatores synd pa oe ure burga healdao, and urne eard beweriao wio onwinnendne here" [ However, it is apparent that in this world there are three orders set in unity: these are laboratores) oratores) bellatores. Laboratores are the ones who produce our food; oratores are the ones who intercede with God for us; bellatores are the ones who protect our towns, and defend our land against an invading army] ( 8 I 2- I 8 ) . I 7 Mter introducing the three orders, LElfric elaborates their I 6. This item follows the text of Maccabees in Julius E. vii, ecce 1 9 8 , ecce 3 0 3 , and Cambridge Univ. Lib . Ii. i. 3 3 · In addition, the item is found independently in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 1 7 8 ( Ker 4 1 ) and Oxf(Jrd, Bodleian Hatton 1 1 5 ( Ker 3 3 2 ) . See ]. Hill, "Dissemination of JElfric's Lives of Saints," 2 5 0 - 5 2 . 1 7 . The analysis by Powell i n "The 'Three Orders' of Society in Anglo-Saxon England" investigates tl1e use of tl1e tripartite motif by King Alfred, JElfric, Wulfstan, and tl1e author of the Vita S. Dttnstani, known as "R." Powell's discussion of the source of this scheme is

./Elfric�' Maccabees 3 25

duties : "Nu swinco se yrolincg embe urne bigleofan, and se woruld cempa sceall winnan wio ure fynd, and se godes ]xowa sceall symle for us gebiddan, and feohtan gastlice wio ]Ja ungesewenlican fynd" [Now the farmer works for our food, and the worldly warrior fights against our enemies, and the servant of God must always pray for us, and fight spiritually against unseen enemies] ( 8 1 9 - 2 2 ) . r s Here, we see the fruit of JElfric's earlier commentary in the homily. r 9 Having previously estab lished that worldly war is the province of the "good Jew" Judas and, in contrast, that spiritual war is the defining element of the Christian, he now proceeds to locate the importance of the monk in this vocation: Is nu for py mare pcrra muneca gewinn wio pa ungesewenlican deofla pe syrwiao em be us ponne sy pcrra woruldmanna, pe winnao wip oa flxsclican and wio pa gesewenlican gesewenlice feohtao . Nu ne sceolon pa woruldcempan to pam woruldlicum gefeohte pa godes peowan neadian fram pam gastlican gewinne, foroan pe him fremao swioor pxt pa ungesewenlican fynd bean oferswyode ponne oa gesewenlican; and hit bio swyoe derigendlic pxt hi exhaustive, but he concludes that LE!fric's direct source (probably Latin and Frankish) re mains a mystery ( I I ? ) . See also Duby, Three Orders, 99- I 0 9 ; Godden, "Money," 5 5 - 5 6; and Constable, Three Studies in Medieval Religious and Social Thought, 24 9 - 3 4 1 . I 8 . Cf LElfric's repetition of the theme in the Old English Letter to Sigeweard, 7 I 7 2 . I 204- 20, and the Latin Letter to Wulfstan, ed. Whitelock et al. , 2 5 2 ) . Powell discusses the changing historical circumstances behind these different versions ( '"Three Orders,"' I I 0 - 24 ) . I 9 . At the end of Maccabees ( 70 5- I 4 ) LElfric also asserts his authority to speak not only about martial conflict in general, but also to demonstrate his knowledge of the peril ofViking attack current in the land: Secgao swa peah lareowas pxt synd feower cynna gefeoht: iustum, pxt is rilltlic; iniustum, unrihtlic; civile, betwux ceastergewarum; plusquam civile, betwux siblingum . Iustum bellum is rihtlic gefeoht wio oa reom1 flotmenn, oppe wio oore peoda pe eard willao fordon. Unrihtlic gefeoht is pe of yrre cymo. l>xt pridde gefeoht pe of geflite cymo betwux ceastergewarum is swyoe pleolic; and pxt feoroe gefeoht pe betwux freondum bio is swioe earmlic and endeleas sorb. [ However, teachers say that there are four types of war: jttstu m, that is, just; injttstum, that is, unjust; civile, between citizens; plusquam civile, between relatives. Justum bellum is just war against the cruel seamen, or against other peoples that wish to destroy the land. Unjust war is that which comes from anger. The third war, which comes from strife between citizens, is very dangerous; and tile fourth war, that is between friends, is very miserable,
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drihtnes peowdom forla:tan and to woruldgewinne bugan pe him naht to ne gebyriao . ( 8 23 - 3 2 ) 20 [Therefore the struggle of the monks against the invisible devils that plot against us is now greater than that of the worldly men, who struggle against carnal foes and visibly fight against the visible enemies. Now the worldly soldiers should not compel the servants of God away from the spiritual struggle to the worldly fight, be cause it will benefit them more that the invisible enemies may be overcome than the visible ones; and it will be very harmful that they leave the service of the Lord and submit to the worldly strug gle that in no way concerns them. ] JElfric makes the final link in his extended argument, which began with Judas Maccabeus, by highlighting his own monastic order and accentu ating its noncombatant role in English society: Nu se munuc pe biho to benedictes regale and forla:t ealle woruldoinge, hwi wile he eft gecyrran to woruldlicum wa:pnum and awurpan his gewinn wio pa ungesewenlican f)rnd his scyp pende to teonan? Se godes peowa ne ma:g mid woruldmannum feohtan gif he on pam gastlican gefeohte forogang habban sceall . N a:s nan halig godes peowa a:fter pa:s ha:lendes prowunga pe a:fre on gefeohte his handa wolde afylan, ac hi forba:ron ehtnysse arleasra cwellera, and heora !if sealdon mid unsca:ppignysse for godes geleafan, and hi mid gode nu lybbao, foroan pe hi furpon noldon a:nne fugel acwellan. ( 8 s r - 6 2 ) [Now the monk who submits to Benedict's rule and leaves behind all worldly things, why will he again turn to worldly weapons and throw aside his struggle against the unseen enemies, to anger his Creator? The servant of God cannot fight along with worldly men if he is to have success in the spiritual combat. There was no holy servant of God after the suffering of the Savior that would ever foul his hands in battle, but they endured the persecution of wicked tormentors, and gave their lives with harmlessness for 20. See Bede, HE 1 . 20 . 64 on the struggle against "invisible enemies," and the very similar argument about earthly vs. spiritual warriors in CH r . 3 5 ( Dominica XXI Post Petecosten) , 5 4 - 7 6 .

./Elfric�' Maccabees 3 27

God's belief, and they now live with God, because they would not even kill a bird. ] Here JElfric argues for the social duties and rights of Benedictine monks . Although Timothy Powell has asserted that JElfric is only ad dressing the infractions of weapon-bearing clergy, the general antago nism or friction betlveen classes is unmistakable. 21 JElfric's elaborate argument answers those who "wish to compel the spiritual warrior to physical battle. " Godden, following a suggestion by Peter Clemoes, notes that this tripartite formulation "seems indeed to have arisen out of a need to distinguish sharply between military and ecclesiastical duties rather than a wish to give a full account of society."22 Is JElfric writing this for the English bellatores who perhaps grumble as they meet the Vikings in battle, exhorted by monks who remain safely behind? Or, if we posit the secular noblemen and patrons of JElfric, JEthelweard, and JEthelmxr, as potential readers of this text, is JElfric rallying the beleagured English bellatores and aristocracy to main tain their support of the Benedictine reform and its vision of society depicted here? Regardless of the specific implications, the figural under standing of Jews allows JElfric to reinforce his social arguments . In this scheme, the insufficient values of the Jews in Maccabees are superim posed on the bellatores of Anglo-Saxon England; the thanes defending England from Vikings are incomplete without the spiritual comple ment of the Benedictine reform. The narrative of the homily functions as an extended exemplum, explicated with reference to JElfric's society in the Qui sunt oratores) laboratores) bellatores appendix. This use of the Old Testament as a way of commenting on current social problems is a common tactic in JElfric's writings . 23 Maccabees and Qui sunt oratores) 2 1 . Powell, '"Three Orders, " ' 1 2 2. 2 2 . Godden, "Money," 5 5 - 5 6 and 5 6 note 5 8 . But cf. Powell's dissenting view ( "'Three Orders,'" 1 2 1 ) . See Dunbabin, "Maccabees as Exemplars," 3 6- 3 8 , for the political use of the Maccabees in the Benedictine reform on the continent. 2 3 . E . g . , see LElfric's reason for translating the Book of Judith, that it should be "eow mannum to bysne, pa:t ge eowerne eard mid wa: [p ]num bewerian wio onwinnendne here" [an example, so that you protect our land with weapons against an invading army" ( Letter to Sigeweard, 4 8 .777- 8 0 ) . See also De populo Israhel, 274- 8 1 , 29 1 - 9 3 , and 3 60-96; Prayer of Moses, in Lives ofSaintS I , I 3 . 14 7 - 77; Dominica VI Post Pentecosten in Pope, Homilies of/Elfric 2, 1 4 . 1 2 8 - 3 5 , 140-46; et alia. Godden is particularly sensitive to this aspect of LElfric's writings : "For the Anglo-Saxons the Old Testament was a veiled way of talking about their own situation . . . . Despite JElfric's insistence that the old law had been replaced by the new,

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laboratores) bellatores together constitute what Alan Sinfield calls a "faultline story," an imaginative narrative response to a pressing social conflict and unresolved ideological issues. 24 The commentary JElfric weaves in and around the narrative of Maccabees allows us to hear the echo of an ideological conflict between secular and ecclesiastical social groups in late-tenth -century England. 25 JElfric's anti-Judaism does not exhibit the more sinister attitudes toward Jews that would emerge in the twelfth century. However, his political use of Jewish stereotypes in Maccabees) the rhetorical conjunc tion of ancient scapegoat and current threats to community, perhaps bespeaks an understanding of Jews peculiar to the reign of JEthelrxd. The breakdown of social bonds and obligations is a distinctive concern at the time, reflected in the Old English texts composed and copied in the period, as Hugh Magennis has shown . 26 The center cannot hold: the ethos of The Battle of Maldon cries out to a half-mythical time of noble comitatus values; Wulfstan rages against the dissolution of all natural obligations in the Sermo Lupi ad Anglos. In such a climate of change and crisis, with a weak ruler and a growing problem of Danish invasion, the representation of Jews rises to the surface of the "political unconscious. " I n Byrhtferth of Ramsey's Vita Oswaldi (written be tween 99 5 and I 00 5 C.E . ) , Jews are used as political analogues just as they are in Maccabees. According to the text, after the death of Edgar ( 9 7 5 C.E. ) , antimonastic sentiment flowers in Mercia; Byrhtferth ex plains that " [ t ]anta dementia in Christiano populo ebullivit sicut olim in Judaea cum persecuti fuerant Dominum, in quo scelere languidum Caiphae caput erectum est, et Apostolicus vir vilis apostata factus est, necne facinorosus Pilatus ad te locutus . Discipuli formidolosi exititerat least in its literal sense, in many ways the old retained its power for the Anglo-Saxons, and gave them a way of thinking about themselves as nations" ( "Biblical Literature, " 2 2 5 ) . In addition, see pp. 207- 8 of the same essay, and "Apocalyps, " I 3 I - 4 2 , on JElfric's growing attention to English political matters in his writings, under the increasing threat of Viking invasion at the end of the tenth century. 2 4 . Sinfield, Cultural Politics-Queer Reading, 3 - 4 . 2 5 . For a general historical overview of the connection between the Benedictine reform and the secular politics of England see, inter alia, John, "The King and the Monks in the Tenth-Century Reformation" and "The World of Abbot lElfi·ic "; Parsons, ed. , Tenth-Century Studies; Gatch, Preaching and Theology in Anglo-Saxon England, 8- I I and I I 9 - 2 8 ; Yorke, "iEthelmxr: The Foundation of the Abbey at Cerne and the Politics of the Tenth Century"; Stafford, "Church and Society in the Age of JElfric" and Unification and Conquest, 24 - 6 8 and I 80- 200. 26. Magennis, Ima;_qes of Community in Old English Poetry.

./Elfric�' Maccabees 3 29

ant prae timore, sicuti his diebus monachi prae dolore" [Such madness boiled up among the Christian people as once in Judaea when they persecuted the Lord, in which crime the feeble head of Caiaphas was raised, and the apostolic man was made a base apostate, not to mention the villainous Pilate . The disciples became timid with fear, just as in these days the monks are with affliction] . 2 7 Byrhtferth narrates the "martyrdom" of the Anglo-Saxon King Edward (d. 9 7 8 C. E . ) as a Passion narrative , with the English conspirators cast as Jews : Acceperunt inter se iniquum consilium, qui ita damnatam habe bant mentem et nebulosam diabolicam caliginem, ut non timerent manus immittere in Christum Domini . . . . Namque cum insidi atores ejus ipsum vallarent, et, velut Judaei summum Christum olim circumdarent, ipse intrepidus equo resedit. Dementia quippe una erat in eis, parque insania. Tunc nequitia pesssima et dementia truculenta Beelzebutini hostis flagrabat in mentibus venenosorum militum; tum sagittae toxicatae facinoris Pilati exsurrexerunt satis crudeliter adversum Dominum, et adversum Christum Ejus, qui erat electus ad tuendum dulcissimae gentis regnum et imperium, derelicta patre . 2 s [Among them they devised a wicked plan, for they possessed minds so damned and such diabolical blindness that they did not fear to lay hands on the anointed one of the Lord . . . . And when his ambushers encircled him, just as the Jews once surrounded Christ, as he sat bravely on his horse. Certainly a single madness was in them, and a like insanity. Then the worst wickedness and the savage madness of the devilish enemy flared in the minds of the venomous thanes; then the poisoned arrows of the crime of Pilate rose up most cruelly against the Lord and against his anointed, who had been elected to defend the kingdom and em pire of this most sweet race on his father's death. ] The anti-Judaism of LElfric and Byrhtferth mixes indiscriminately with ideological rhetoric. In this context, Jews are both an unsettling vari able and a useful rhetorical bludgeon: LElfric does not want a faulty 2 7. Byrhtferth of Ramsey, Vita Sancti Oswaldi, 44 5 . 2 8 . Vita Sancti Onvaldi, 449 - 5 0 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 3 30

understanding (and imitation ) of Jews to further fray the social fabric, but the Jews are also a useful exemplum (both positive and negative ) when the occasion demands .29 This understanding ofJews and Judaism is sheer ideology; it not only provides for conscious intentional strug gles in the sociopolitical realm, but also constitutes "the invisible col our of daily life itself. "3° There can be no Abel without a Cain, no Christianity without Judaism. F For JElfric, Judaism poses an interpre tative conundrum, and his "solution," fraught as it is with contradic tion, enables us to trace a thread in the ideological fabric of late-tenth century England.

2 9 . Bryan Cheyette examines similar sociopolitical uses of Jews in later English history and literature in Constructions of (7he ]ew)J in English Literature and Society; he concludes that "writers do not passively draw on eternal myths of 'the Jew' but actively construct them in relation to their own literary and political concerns" ( 268 ) . As Harold Fisch notes, " [t]he Jew is often (we might even say, most often) a figure of evil [in literature ] ; but more than he is a figure of evil, he is a nuisance, a problem, a difficulty, something one has to come to terms with before one can come to terms with oneself " ( The Dual Image, I 3 ) . See also Panitz, The Alien in Their Midst: Images ofjews in English Literature. 3 0 . Eagleton, Ideology: An Introduction, 2 2 I . 3 I . See !Elfric's figural explication of Cain and Abel: "Abeles siege soolice getacnode ure Ha:lendes siege, ]:>e oa ludeiscan ofslogon, yfde gebroora swa swa Cain wa:s" [The slaying of Abel truly signified the murder of our Savior, whom the Jews killed, evil brethren just as Cain was ] ( Letter to Sigeweard, 2 3 . I 7 5 - 7 8 ) . Bede makes the same connection: see Homeliae I . I 4 . I 3 4 - 5 I . On the Cain and Abel tradition and Christian attitudes toward Jews see Mellinkoff, Mark rifCain; Quinones, The Changes rifCain, 2 3 - 8 3 ; Cohen, Living Letters, 2 8 2 9 . Quinones notes that the Cain and Abel story "reveals an encounter with the lost brother, the sacrificed other, who must be gone but who can never be gone" and that the story has been used through the ages to "address a breach in existence, a fracture at the heart of things" ( 3 ) .

Conclusion

Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her, Alone, shall come fulfilment to our dreams And our desires. -Wallace Stevens, "Sunday Morning" The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. Whoever does not know it and can no longer wonder, no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed. It was the experience of mystery-even if mixed with fear-that engen dered religion. -Albert Einstein, "The World as I See It" . . . for there is figures in all things. -Shakespeare, Henry V

"

emory, hither come" : thus Blake's song invites us, and the traditions of anti-Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England bear witness to the powerful weight of cultural memory as it reaches out from the past to inform the presenU Like the "renovating virtue" of Wordsworth's spots of time, the Christian memory of Jews, by connecting past and present, helps to fuel the insistent Christian perceptions of the world in

M

I . William Blake, "Song" ( "Memory, hither come"), in Complete Poems,

331

29.

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the here-and-now of the early Middle Ages. Bloom's description of the dynamics of the Wordsworthian spots of time applies equally well to the Christian understanding of Jews in the period under review: "The fountain of spectacles and sounds is not a topos but an event stretching across two times and bearing the past alive into the present."2 The particulars of how the hermeneutic traditions defined here manifest in Anglo-Saxon England do not warrant detailed repetition once again: I hope that by now The Footsteps of Israel has assembled a systematic depiction of these traditions, with sufficient detail . However, some broad trajectories and further speculations merit concluding discus sion. Given the assembled data, what are the general trends and tenden cies of thought involved in this discourse? What are the guiding themes here, and how do they reach beyond the research presented in these pages? The diversity of the picture in Anglo-Saxon England is striking : schol arship has always seen the anti-Judaism of the early Middle Ages as less complex in expression-just as it is more moderate and "reasoned" in tone-when compared to subsequent anti-semitic discourse. This sur face uniformity and simplicity, however, disappears under closer analy sis; if Anglo-Saxon manifestations of anti-Judaism are judged according to their adherence to tradition, then yes, they do hold fast to "standard" stereotypes. But if a different relationship between text and source is posited-one of ongoing constmction, collaboration, and conversation with the past rather than simple replication and repetition-then we can see better the vital operation of the understanding of Jews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England. How does this inherited discourse take shape in the "present" of pre Conquest England? There is a fascinating flexibility-part and parcel of what Averil Cameron describes as the "elasticity" of Christian dis course in late antiquity, a practical advantage when Christianity assimi lated new cultures, as it did in Anglo-Saxon England. 3 The study of Bede's exegesis shows him to be a complex thinker on the subject of Jews and Judaism, fully dependent upon the inherited bulk of Christian exegetical thought; however, to look right through Bede's apprehen sion of Jews to the sources-Augustine, Jerome, Gregory the Great,

2. Bloom, Ruin the Sacred Truths, I 3 7 . 3 . Cameron, Christianity and the Rhetoric ofEmpire, 9 .

Conclusion 333

and so on-upon which it is based is to miss the marie 4 Bede provides an index to the hermeneutics of anti-Judaism at a specific, relatively early, point in time in Anglo-Saxon England, even as he simultaneously participates in the wider "conversation" of the Christian Fathers . In his vast intellectual interests, Bede demonstrates the pervasiveness of Jews in the fabric of Christian discourse-it is impossible to practice as a Christian, to conceive of a Christian church, and most importantly, to determine a shape to Christian history and place oneself within that history as a latter-day Christian English populus) without having a theory ( or set of theories) concerning Jews . The analysis of the populus Israhel mythos and its influence in Anglo Saxon England perhaps complicates the standard notions of anti Judaism and demonstrates how the Jews could be understood in a posi tive (if highly qualified and circumscribed) fashion. Consequently, the contours of this tradition give nuance to the Christian understanding of Jews and Judaism-Jews are not simply or unproblematically the de spised embodiment of alterity, the great hated "enemy within" of the Christian West; they are also the model, elder people. Honor and hatred, desire and fear, at every step . This odd juxtaposition is rendered more clear in the placement of the populus Israhel mythos alongside the power of somatic anti-Judaism. In gathering up the strands that comprise that blend of anger and dangerous fascination with the body, the sheer exu berance of the tradition stands out: perhaps what draws the inquiring eye most in this material is the fervor in its expression, the obvious dark energy embodied in its fears . Finally JElfric brings us, in a sense, back to Bede at the beginning of this study. The men have their similarities : both ecclesiastics with im portant extensive projects of writings; both teachers at heart. Yet JElfric is certainly quite different from Bede-less learned, more pragmatic, more rooted and committed to the imperatives of the everyday world. 4 · The scholarly debate over the proper way to read the theoretical understanding be tween text and source had been particularly vigorous in Anglo-Saxon studies. Good starting points for this discussion include the introduction by Thomas Hill in Sources ofAn;_qlo-Saxon Literary Culture: A Trial Version, xv-xxix, and the essay by Lees, "Working with Patristic Sources. " In his discussion of figural or "typological" readings of Andreas, Daniel Calder provides an eloquent qualification; he notes approvingly the growth of scholarly literature on the "typological" background of Andreas but feels that criticism needs to go further: "Identifi cation of a typological system, however necessary, however applicable, should not be equated with analysis; discovery is not the same as understanding" ( Calder, "Figurative Language," I 19 ) .

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His vernacular expressions of anti-Judaism betray, I think, a greater anxious ambivalence than Bede's vast corpus of Latin exegetical com mentaries . LElfric is also a fitting figure to end this study, beyond his chronological position: he also shows how the vast body of material on Jews could "break free" from the simple boundaries of textual tradition and into the realm that influ ences real lives. As such, LElfric's anti Judaism provides the early hints of what was to come, when the thin line between "textual" or "traditional" hatred would fall completely to intense persecution of living Jews . As Kermode states, "It should not be forgotten that literary interpretations may take fictive form, and that fictions, wrongly or carnally read, may prey upon life . " s The unifying thread o fthese elastic, diverse practices i s their function ality: the understanding ofJews does not simply exist, to be passed along as an inert bit of cultural information. Rather, it has direction and pur pose, as Cohen stresses: "From the first stages in its development, the Jew [i.e., the "hermeneutically crafted Jew" ] served a purpose-or a me lange of purposes-in the new religion, purposes that rendered Adversus Iudaeos a basic medium for Christian self-expression. "6 But when Cohen says that the understanding of Jews is a mode of "Christian self-expression," what does this really mean for our pur poses? It has been an axiom of this book that the representation of Jews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England tells us nothing about Jews, per se, but instead more about the self-image of Christian Anglo-Saxon England; distorted mirror, Rorschach blot-pick your metaphor. Jews, though marginal, are somehow also central, or at least essential ; in talking about Jews a Christian culture talks about itself. By building an identity upon a rejection or repudiation of Judaism, Christianity estab lishes an existential flaw at its heart. A paradox is built into the opposi tion Judaism-Christianity: as Robbins puts it, " Christian hermeneu tics, in its very inclusion of the Judaic, also excludes it."7 She details an inherent hermeneutic ambiguity or flaw in the Christian apprehension of Judaism: Christian hermeneutics has to "save"-in every sense-the Old Testament. Yet it also has to throw out any aspect of it that 5 . Kermode, Genesis of Secrecy, 20. 6. Cohen, Living Letters, r 3 ; emphases in original. 7· Robbins, Prodigal Son/Elder Brother, r .

Conclusion 335

implies it is not in need of saving . It thus has to posit the Judaic as a lack-insufficient and partial-and as an excess to be cast out, to inscribe it as outside . But by inscribing it as outside, by thus . . . "binding itself " to the Judaic, the text of Christian her meneutics is in a double bind in relation to its excluded condition of ( im )possibility. 8 Christian hermeneutics constantly strives to divorce or separate itself from Judaism, yet the very figural structure by which Christianity under stands Judaism prohibits this divorce from ever fully succeeding. As Maccoby explains, "while Judaism could be expounded without any reference to Christianity, it was impossible to expound Christianity with out explaining why it involved the rejection of Judaism. "9 Thus, the terms of binary opposition ( Jew/Christian, literal/figural, Old Testa ment/New Testament) deployed by figural hermeneutics do not, in the final analysis, designate terms of absolute difference between two com peting sign systems, but rather they speak to the differences, the contra dictions, within Christianity itself. These contradictions show us that there is more beneath the surface of figural discourse than the neat binary oppositions of its rhetoric. There is a tormented longing embedded at the heart of the binary opposition Jew-Christian; Christian identity, therefore, is most vul nerable precisely at the point where it most aggressively asserts its dominance over Jews, Judaism, and the Old Testament. The constantly renegotiated understanding ofJews and Judaism is an inherent instabil ity of Christian social identity; the Jews are characterized by a semiotic "slipperiness," which allows them to be utilized as a dangerous and subversive yet carefully deployed signifier. Explication of Jews and Old Testament narratives thus allowed Christian writers a certain flexibility to explore and enforce basic points of Christian doctrine . r o 8 . Robbins, Prodigal Son/Elder Brothe1� r o ; emphases in original. 9 · Maccoby, Sacred Executiona; 1 4 9 . r o . Godden notes that Anglo-Saxon reading o f the Old Testament was complex and often moved beyond figural interpretation to a use of these narratives as a repository of culturally significant resonances: "Allegory was used to make the Old Testament safe for Christian readers or to make it consonant with the New Testament by discovering Christian doctrines such as the Trinity hidden within it. But allegorical interpretation soon became a way of using the Old Testament, and the New Testament as well, as a vast store-book of imagery, a source of riddling metaphors
THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 336

Once again, the discussion seems to lead, inevitably, to figural inter pretation, the mode by which all these understandings seem, ulti mately, to be mediated. The importance of figural understanding within this elasticity, this mobility of the hermeneutics of Jews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England, is a common topic in the preceding pages. The Introduction suggested that the various chapters would show in their working out that to talk about Jews and Christians in Anglo-Saxon England was, inevitably, to raise the habit of thought, the mode of reading, known generally to scholarship as typology. The relationship of "good Jews" to "bad Jews" was understood in terms of the dual relationship between the Old Testament and the New Testa ment. Other binaries cluster about: flesh vs . spirit, literal vs. figural, good vs . evil, and so forth . The Introduction noted that "typology" as a concept was perhaps something of a misnomer, a relatively modern term implying a unity of method to materials that in the Middle Ages expressed little such uniformity, simplicity, or regularity. Bede warns his readers that the world of figural interpretation can be a strange one : "Ne mireris lector quod aliquando bona typice malum aliquando bonum mala hominum facta significant" [Do not marvel, reader, that sometimes, figurally the good deeds of men signify something evil, and sometimes their bad deeds signify something good] ( In Tobiam 2 . r o r r . 3 - 5 ) . I I In the prescholastic world of the early Middle Ages, broadly systemic execution of figural interpretation does not seem to exist, at least in this cross-section of practices from Anglo-Saxon England: there is a more dynamic, chaotic, local, associative hermeneutic at work. None of the texts and traditions studied here seems to access a puta tive "typological tradition" in a unproblematic way : there is always a range of possible choices, orientations, congmencies. More work needs to be done, I think, on the dynamics of figural understanding, beyond Auerbach's classic essay and the work of Goppelt, Danielou, Lampe and Woollcombe, de Lubac, and Charity-the usual scholars cited ( often in something of a rote fashion) in discussions of typology. I 2 It is my sense that the work of these great scholars (with the exception of Auerbach) , between moral truths and physical acn1ality, or between spiritual experience and historical events" ( "Biblical Literature," 208 ) . I I . See also in Genesim 4 . I 5 1 5 - 20. 12. Auerbach, "Figura"; Goppelt, T.vpos; Danielou, From Shadows to Reality; Lampe and Woolcombe, Essays on T.vpology; de Lubac, Medieval Exegesis; Charity, Events and Their Afterlife.

Conclusion 337

absolutely fundamental though it is, nevertheless presupposes a unity to typology that is questionable : e . g . , in the often overstrenuous attempt to separate allegory from typology. The conception of typology in these influential works then finds its way into scholarship on medieval forms of understanding, with, perhaps, the basic premises left unexamined. When a medieval interpretative connection is described as "the use of ty pology" or "typological" in scholarship and criticism, it usually signals the end of discussion rather than the beginning-it is taken as an axiom that typology existed in the Middle Ages; but given the plurality of words and terms, the complexity of the tradition found in The Footsteps of Israel) we might perhaps wish to reexamine this presupposition, to go back, instead, to the early Middle Ages and its practices of reading and interpretation, and work simply from the words ofthe texts on up , with out assuming a system overseeing traditional forms of understanding . What really are the motives and effects of reading and seeing the world through the mimetic correspondences of figural understanding? (Arguing that typology simply references a source or tradition is an inter pretative cul-de-sac . ) To answer the question fully would require an other study; but the material assembled here may be used to suggest some initial orientations . Figural understanding must have different per mutations in the hands of different authors (e.g., Bede vs . Cynewulf vs . mlfric ) ; even authors writing in a tight-knit exegetical tradition on iden tical topics ( often with identical wording ) should not be seen as all essentially composing one great Text. Difference must prevail in inter pretation. Figural understanding also must work differently when em ployed to understand, for example, a New Testament text ( e . g . , Bede's commentaries on the Acts of the Apostles ) and differently when com menting on the Old Testament ( e . g . , Bede, In Genesim ) -iffor no other reason than that the vast differences in the nature of the base texts under examination-the texts' genre, poetics, rhetorical structures, etc. Like wise, figural understanding cannot operate exactly the same way in expression in verse as in prose, in Latin as in vernacular. To read some thing figuraliter (to use one of Bede's favorite adverbs ) in a seventh century social context is surely different than employing the same habit in the tenth. This is all, of course, stating the obvious, and I hope the reader will forgive ; however, it bears repeating, since the term "typol ogy" necessarily implies a greater uniformity than is really there . Au thors in Anglo-Saxon England, as they grapple by necessity with the

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"problem" of Jews, are not downloading set, uniform, ready-made data from a vast (but tidy) "typological database. " r 3 Perhaps we need to move conclusively from noun to verb : figural "understanding" or "thinking," rather than "typology" ; use terms that imply open-ended movement and negotiation, rather than predeter mined stasis and edifice . This is not simply an easy substitution of terms : if typology is discarded as a critical term and replaced by a more dynamic notion of figural hermeneutics, then the critical possibilities blossom . Some possible questions and orientations for further investi gation: How is figural understanding a narrative process? That is, to what extent do the mimetic connections of figural understanding de pend upon a sense of narrative beginnings, middles, and ends? In biblical exegesis, if the text to be commented on is narrative in nature, how do the dynamics of that "base narrative" influence the process of figural perception? If the text is poetic, how does the base-text's poetics influence the process of figural perception? In effect, I am calling for a greater importation of the techniques ofliterary criticism into the analy sis of figural hermeneutics . And what of the mimetic nature of figural understanding? Appar ently, what cements the connection between the two elements in any figural situation is their mimetic character-they resemble each other. Not enough work has been done on the nature of this "resemblance" and its relationship , for example, to theories of metaphor. If we follow this line, then figural understanding suddenly appears closer to a poetic process. Wallace Stevens makes the connection between poetry and imitation: Poetry is a satisfYing of the desire for resemblance . As the mere satisfYing of a desire, it is pleasurable . But poetry if it did nothing but satisfY a desire would not rise above the level of many lesser things . Its singularity is that in the act of satisfying the desire for resemblance it touches the sense of reality, it enhances the sense of reality, heightens it, intensifies it. If resemblance is described as a partial similarity between two dissimilar things, it complements and reinforces that which the two dissimilar things have in com1 3 . In "Symbolism in Medieval Literature" Bloomfield provides an important caveat concerning modern scholarly faith in the medieval "f(mr-fold method" of exegesis and pro vides a survey of scholarship on the question ( 8 8 , 9 3 , note 2 3 ) .

Conclusion 339

mon. It makes it brilliant. When the similarity is between things of adequate dignity, the resemblance may be said to transfigure or to sublimate them. Take, for example, the resemblance between reality and any projection of it in belief or in metaphor. What is it that these two have in common? Is not the glory of any future state a relation between a present and a future glory? The bril liance of earth is the brilliance of every paradise . I 4 Does figural understanding make reality "brilliant" in this fashion? Is the figural imperative a "desire for resemblance" ? From this perspective, jigura has the prophetic beauty of poetry. 1 5 Should this be true-that the pleasure of the figural is tantamount to the search for beauty and the poetics of paradise-then perhaps the motivating forces behind anti-Judaism are as inescapably human as the poetic drive . Dark possibilities reside in this direction. In The Genesis of Secrecy) Frank Kermode suggests that the moment the Old Testament became interpreted in a Christian fashion, in light of the New, this sig naled a momentous change-the domination of the notion that latent meaning was preferred over manifest meaning in the interpretation of narrative in Western culture . 16 If figural understanding is so fundamen tal to perception in the West ( and I would argue it is ) , and further, if figural understanding has such deep roots in the Christian understand ing of Jews and Judaism, is, then, antipathy toward Jews-a sense of them as a surpassed people ( and all that flows from that statement) inevitable in the Christian tradition? Is hatred of Jews as natural in a Christian society as understanding itself? I do not wish to offer a counsel of despair. Perhaps the predicament of humanity, its search for perfection in an imperfect world, does not come fraught with an inescapable dialectic of love and hate, beauty and ugliness. Perhaps the complexity revealed in the understanding of Jews and Judaism in Anglo-Saxon England is not symptomatic of the hu man condition as it has come to be defined in the West. But Stevens I 4 . Wallace Stevens, The Necessary Angel, 77. I 5. Cf. Bloom on the relationship of poetic tropes to literal meaning: "Death is therefore a kind of literal meaning, or from the standpoint of poetry, literal meaning is a kind of death. Defenses can be said to trope �qainst death, rather in the same sense that tropes can be said to defend against literal meaning. . . . " (A Map ufMisreading, 9 I ; emphases in original ) . 1 6 . Kermode, Genesis ofSecrecy, 1 8 - 2 1 .

THE f O O T S T E P S Of I S RA E L 3 40

saw the situation of pleasure, delight, and love as inextricably bound with the driving obsession of imperfection:

I Clear water in a brilliant bowl, Pink and white carnations . The light In the room more like a snowy air, Reflecting snow. A newly-fallen snow At the end of winter when afternoons remrn. Pink and white carnations-one desires So much more than that. The day itself Is simplified : bowl of white , Cold, a cold porcelain, low and round, With nothing more than the carnation there. II Say even that this complete simplicity Stripped one of all one's torments, concealed The evilly compounded, vital I And made it fresh in a world of white , A world of clear water, brilliant-edged, Still one would want more, one would need more, More than a world of white and snowy scents. III There would still remain the never-resting mind, So that one would want to escape, come back To what had been so long composed. The imperfect is our paradise . Note that, in this bitterness, delight, Since the imperfect is so hot in us, Lies in flawed and stubborn sounds . I7 Is the imperfect our paradise ? Is the paradox of Christian love and hate the inevitable consequence of human understanding? Perhaps the never resting mind, hot though it may be, does not necessarily flee the world of purity and beauty, always finding its way back to bitter imperfection . Perhaps the search for love need not find hate . Perhaps. I 7 . Wallace Stevens, "The Poems o f Our Climate," in Complete Poems, I 9 3 - 9 4 ·

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Index

Abel, 3 3 0 Abel, Ernest, r on. 22 Abraham, 8 6, r r 4- r 5 , 1 5 1 , 1 5 4- 5 7 , 1 59 , r 6r - 63 , r 8 o, 242, 29 6 JEitric of Eynsham, 20, 2o r - 2 , 24 5 , 247n. 1 1 , 2 5 3 , 27 1 , 277, 279, 2 8 5 3 3 0, 3 3 3 - 3 4 , 3 3 7 JEthelmxr, 3 2 7 JEthelrxd, 3 28 JEthelweard, 3 27 Albert, Bat-Sheva, r r n. 2 5 Alcuin, 147- 5 1 , 24 3 - 4 7 , 249 Aldhelm of Malmesbury, 200, 246n. 9 Alexander)s Letter to Aristotle, 2 8 7n. 3 Allen, Michael J, B . , 222n. 27 Alter, Robert, r 78n. 6 8 , r 8 3 n. 8 r Ambrosius Aurelianus, 1 4 6 Amidon, Philip R. , r r rn. r Ande�on, Earl, r 7 6n. 6 r , 22on. 26, 279n. 6o Andersson, Theodore M., r 65n. 4 2 , 179, 1 8 2, 1 8 7 Andreas, 2 o r - 2 , 2 r 2n. 1 4 , 2 r 6n. 22, 2 2 8 - 3 9 , 2 5 3 - 59 , 274 , 276, 279n. 59, 3 0 r . See also Bliclding manuscript, Homily 1 9 Applebaum, Shimon, 7n. 1 4 Arator, 4 1 - 4 2 , 5 1 , 6 7 , 1 9 7 - 9 8

Assyrians, r 5 8 - 6o, r 7 2n. 5 6, r 8 o Attridge, Derek, r 8n. 40, 3 4n. 8 Auerbach, Erich, r rn. 26, r 8 , r 6 5n. 42, 336 Augustine of Canterbury, 9 5 Augustine of Hippo, r o- r r , 1 3 , r 8 , 27, 3 5n. 9 , 3 8n. I I , 4 3 n . r 8 , 5 3 n. 2 8 , 5 5 , 5 7 , 7 3 n . r o , 8 on. 24 , ro2, 240, 2 7 I , 2 8 7 , 3 02n. 1 3 , 3 3 2 Avitus of Avienne, 1 3 3 n . 3 4 , 1 9 7 Azarias, 1 7 5 Babel, Tower o f� 1 5 4 , r 6 r , r 64 , r 8 o- 8 r Babylon, 34n. 7 , 7 1 , r o 5 , r 2o, 1 3 4-4 1 , 1 4 9 , I 7 3 - 74 , I 7 6, r 8 o, r 8 8 , 2 50- 5 I Bachrach, Bernard S . , r on. 2 3 Barnard, L. W. , r r rn. r , r r 3 Baron, Salo W. , 7n. 14 Bately, Janet, 202n. r 2 Battle ofMaldon, 3 2 8 Bede, r - 3 , 6, r 8 - r 9 , I06- r r , r 4 4 , 1 7 5 , r 8 8 , 1 9 6, 200, 2 I O , 2 3 8 , 24 5 , 2 8 5 , 28?- 8 8 , 3 02n. 1 3 , 3 3 2- 3 4 , 3 3 7 ; figural vocabulary, r 2 . Works : De Tabernaculo, 2n. r , 5 7 , 64 - 6 5 , 6 8 , 70- 7 1 , 7 4 , 8 rn. 2 5 , 8 rn. 2 8 , 8 2nn. 29 - 3 0, 8 6n. 3 3 , 9 1n. 3 8 , 9 2n. 3 9 ,

INDEX 3 66 Bede ( continued) 9 3 n . 40, 3 2on. I 4 ; De Templo) 3 0n. I , 4 011. I 3 , 6811. 3 , 7411. I I , 7 6 , 8 I - 8 6, 9 I - 92, 9 3 n · 40, 9 4 - 9 6 , 3 2 In. I 4 ; De temporum ratione) I 8 8 ; Explanatio Apocalypsi.s 3 011. I , 3 411. 7 , 5 6- 5 7 , 7on. 4, 72n. 7 ; Expositio Actuum Apmtolorum) 3 l - 3 4 , 3 9 - 4 l , 4711. 24 , 5 I , 5 3 - 5 4 , 5 7- 5 8 , 66- 67, 7 I - 7 5 , 77, 7911. 2 I , 8 6- 8 8 , 90- 9 I , 9 3 - 9 4 , I9911. 5 ; Hi.ftoria Ecclesiastica, 4411. 20, 4 6- 4 7 , 6In. 3 6, 76, 84 - 8 5 , 8 6n. 3 5 , 8 8n. 3 7, 9 5 n. 4 3 , I07- I 0 , 3 I4n. 5 , 3 I 6n. 6 , 3 2 611. 20; Homeliae) I - 2, 24 - 29 , 3 0- 3 3 , 3 5 - 3 8 , 4 011. I 3 , 4 2 4 4 , 5 2 - 5 3 , 5 5 - 5 6, 5 8 - 5 9 , 68- ?0, 7211. 8 , 7 3 , 7 5 - ?6, 7711. I 9 , 79 - 8 I , 8 2n. 3 o, 8 6n. 3 5 , 8 8 -90, 9 4 , 94n. 42, 9 6, 3 3 0n. } I ; In Epi!>tolas VII Catholicas, 7 8 ; In Genesim, I 9 8 n . 4 , 3 3 7 ; In Habacuc) 4 5 - 4 6, 5 I - 5 2 , ? I ll. 5, 7 5 , 79n. 2 I , 84n. 3 I , 9 2n. 3 9 ; In Regum XXX Quae.1tiones) 6311. 40, 7 3 11 . 9; In I Samuhelem) I 09n. 24; In Tobiam, 3 011. I , 47- 5 0 , 5 4 - 5 5 , 6o63 , ? I , 77n. I 9 , 7 8 - 79 , 8 I n. 2 5 , 8 4 , 8 6n . 3 3 , 3 3 6; Retractatio in Actus Apostolorum, 7 211 . 8 Benedictine reform, 20, 202, 276, 2 8 6, 3 07 , 3 I O, 3 26- 2 8 Benko, Stephen, I I 3 n. 4 Ben-Sasson, H . H . , 7 n . I 4 Beowulf,' I 5 4 , I 5 7, I 70-72, I 7 6n. 6o, I 77- 8 8 , 2 3 011. 3 4 , 2 5 511. 26, 276, 2 8 711. 3 Berdyaev, Nicholas, I on. 22 Bethulia, I 6o, I 8o Bible : Acts of the Apostles, 3 3 - 3 4 , 3 9 4 I , 4 5 - 4 6, 5 3 - 54 , 5 7 , 66- 67, 7 I , 7 3 , 77, 8 6- 8 7, 90- 9 I , I 9 8 , 204 - 9 , 2 I 3 , 2 I 411. I 8 , 2 I 611. 2 2 , 2 I 8n. 2 5 , 224, 229 - 3 I , 2 3 3 - 3 4 , 3 3 7 ; I Corin thians, 3 0911. 2o; Deuteronomy, 67, 3 0411. I 6, 3 I4 , 3 I 7n. 8; Ephesians, 7811. 20; Exodus, 64 , I 4 5 , 29 5 ; Gala tians, 77; Genesis, 8 6, I 5 7n. 2 3 , I 9 7 ;

Gospel of John, I , 24, 3 0, 3 5 - 3 9 , 4 2-4 4 , 4 6, 7 3 , 9 6, 2 I 8 , 3 00n . I I , 3 0211. q , 3 0411. I 6; Gospel of Luke, 5 I - 5 2 , 69, 70, 7711. I 9 , 79, 204 - 5 , 229, 2 3 4 , 2 8 9 ; Gospel of Mark, 5 I l1. 26, 77n. I9, I 2 5 , 2 I I ; Gospel of Mat thew, 40, 5 I n. 26, 5 5 , 5 8 , 64 - 6 5 , 7 5 , 7711. l 9 , 8o, 8 8 -9o, lo8n. 2 l , l 2 5 , 2 I I , 2 I 3 , 2 I 611. 2 3 , 2 I 8 , 3 0411. I 6; Habacuc, 4 5 , 5 I ; Isaiah, 3 3 , 7711. I 9 , 7 9 , 9 3 11. 4 0 , 9 4 ; Jeremiah, I 3 o; Job, I, I 4 6n. I o ; Judges, I 0 5 - 6, I 4 7n. I 3 , I 9 I ; 3 Kings, 76, 8 3 - 84 , 9 4 , 9 6; 4 Kings, I 0911. 22; Leviticus, 67, 3 I 4 ; Maccabees ( I and 2), 3 I 3 - I4 , 3 I 8n. I o ; Numbers, 29 5 , 298nn. 79, 3 0011. I2, 3 o6nn. I ?- I 8 ; I Peter, nn. I 9 , 7 8 ; Philippians, 24 2- 4 3 , 24 5n. 6 , 262; Psalms, 69 , 77n. I 9 , 9 3 11 . 4 0 , I 3 4 - 4 I , 3 0011. I o ; Revela tion, 5 6, 24 511. 6; Romans, 4 7 , 5 2 , 5 8n. 3 3 , 7 6n. I 5 , 77n. I 9 , 2 I 3 ; 2 Thessalonians, 5 7 ; Titus, 24 3 - 4 4 , 3 I 6; Tobias, 4 8 , 5 4 , 6 2 , I O I ; Wis dom, 29811. 6; Zacharias, 7 5 Bickerman, Elias J. , I 0 5 n . I I Biggs, Frederick M . , 711. I 5, 20811. 5 Bj ork, Robert E . , 2 2 5 11 . 3 0, 2 3 711. 4 I , 26011. 3 2 Blake, William, 3 3 I Blickling manuscript, 200- 2 8 2 , Homily I , 2 I 7; Homily 2, 2 I 2 , 2 I 5 n . 2o; Homily 3 , 247; Homily 6, 2 I on. 8, 26711. 4 I ; Homily 7 , 2 I 7 ; Homily 8 , 272- 74 ( see also Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 4 I ; Mary, Virgin; Transitus Mariae) ; Homi�v 9, 277; Homily I 3 , 2 I 8 ; Homily I 5 , 2 I 6- I ? ; Homily I ? , 276- 77; Homily I 9 , 2 I 2 , 229n. 3 2 , 2 3 In. 3 6, 2 5 8n. 3 0 Bloch, R . Howard, 3 411. 8 Bloom, Harold, I 3 n. 34, I4n. 3 6, 2 8 5 , 3 3 2, 3 3 911. I 5 Bloomfield, Morton W. , I 02n. 2, I 0 3 n . 4 , I 79 , I 8 711. 8 3 , I90, 24511. 7 , 24 6nn. 8 - 9 , 249n. I 6, 3 3 8 n. I 3

Blumenkranz, Bernhard, I on. 24 Boenig, Robert, 229n. 3 2, 2 3 In. 3 6, 2 5 8n. 3 o, 263n. 3 6 Boethius, I02 Bonding, 279- 8 2 Boniface, 6 I - 62 Bonner, Gerald, 3n. 2, 2 3 nn. I - 2 , 5 5n. 29 , l l lll. l Boyd, Nina, I 5 8 Bridges, Margaret Enid, 22on. 26, 225n. 3 0, 279n. 6o Brooks, Kenneth R. , 229n. 3 3 , 23 2n. 3 7 , 2 3 5n. 3 9 , 2 5 7n. 29 Brown, George Hardin, 2 3 m1. I - 2 , 24n. 3 , 5 5n. 29, 64n. 4 I Brown, Peter, 6 , I 07n. I 7 Bunyan, John, 3 I4n. 5 Burrows, David R. , 7n. I 5 Byrhtferth of Ramsey, 3 2 8 - 29 Bzd0, Don�d, 279n. 6o Gedmon:� Hymn, I02- 3 Cain, 3 3 0 Calder, Daniel G . , I 78n. 69 , I 9 7n. 2, 20Ill. 9 , 202llll. I I - I 2 , 222ll. 27, 2 2 3 n . 2 8 , 279n. 60, 3 3 3 n· 4 Calisch, Edward N . , 7n. I4 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 4 I (manuscript) , 27 I - 74 Cameron, Averil, 3 , 2o8n. 5 , 3 3 2 Camille, Michael, I4n. 3 5 Campbell, Jackson J. , 22on. 26, 222n. 27, 279n. 6o Carroll, Lewis, I9 5 Carruthers, Mary, 3 4n. 8 , 64n. 4 I , 8 In. 27, I 3 6n. 3 6 Cassian, John, I4 5n. 9, 246, 24 8 Cassiodorus, 67, 7 4n. I I Charity, A. C . , 3 3 6 Charlemagne, I 3 9n. 3 9 , I 4 7 Chaucer, Geoflrey, 2 5 3n. 22, 26I - 62, 273 Chazan, Robert, 7n. I 3 Chesnut, Glenn F. , I 02n. 2, I I In. I , I I 3 ll. 5 , I I 4ll. 7 , I I 7ll. I 5 , I 20ll. 2 3 Chester, Andrew, 8 6n. 3 4

Cheyette, Bryan, 3 3 on. 29 Christ I, 77 Christology, 2 I O, 240, 263 , 277, 28082. See also Eucharist Clayton, Mary, 202n. I I , 2 7 In. 4 5 , 275ll. 5 4 Clemoes, Peter, I O i n . I , I 0 3 n. 4, I 09n. 24, l 20ll. 20, l 5 lll. l 8 , l70ll. 5 3 , 2 5 6n. 27, 278n. 5 8 , 3 o3n. I 4 , 3 27 Cockerton, R. W. P. , 275n. 5 4 Cohen, Jeremy, 7- 8 , 9 n . 2 I , I Oilll . 2 2 , 2 4 , I In. 2 5 , 3 3 n. 4, 74, I I 3 n. 4, 3 3 0n. 3 I , 3 3 4 Collingwood, R. G., I 02n. 2 Collins, John J. , 7 m . 6 Conrad, Joseph, 2 3 , I 0 3 Constable, Giles, 3 2 5 n. I 7 Courcelle, Pierre, I I 3 n. 4 Cowdrey, H. E. ]. , I 07n. I 8 Crepin, Andre, 3 I4n. 5 Cross, J. E . , 24n. 3 , 209n. 7, 3 I 7n. 9 , 3 2 5n. I 9 Curtius, Ernst Robert, 34n. 8 Cynewulf, 2 I 3 , 2 7 8 , 279, 280, 3 3 7 · See also Elene; Fates of the Apostles Dalbey, Marcia A. , 278n. 5 6 Daley, Brian E . , 5 5n. 29 Daniel, I 5 I , I 64 , I 67n. 4 6, I 69 - 77, I80 Danielou, Jean, 3 3 6 Davidse, Jan, 3n. 2, I O i n . I Deferrari, Roy J. , I I In. I de Lubac, Henri, 3 3 6 Deshman, Robert, 79 Dionysius the Areopagite, 84 Doane, A. N., I 5 Inn. I 8 , 20, I 5 6n. 22, I 5 8 , I 9 8n. 4 Donahue, Charles, I 79n. 74 Donne, John, 2 I 2 Doubleday, James, 209n. 6 Douglas, Mary, 2 7 5 Dream ofthe Rood, 20 I , 2 I I - I 2, 276, 278 - 8 o Droge, Arthur J. , I I 3 , I I 5nn. 9 - I o Dryden, John, I 89 - 9 0

INDEX 3 68 Duby, Georges, 3 2 5n. I 7 Duckett, Eleanor Shipley, I 20n. 22, I 28n. 3 0 Dumville, David, I 4 3n. I Dunbabin, Jean, 3 I 9n. I 2 , 3 27n. 22 Eagleton, Terry, 4n. 5, 3 3 0n. 3 0 Earl, James, l 62n. 3 4 , 2 3 3 n . 3 8 , 2 3 7n. 4 I , 2 5 7ll. 28 Eating ( and starvation/hunger), 5 2, 8 9 90, I 3 I - 3 3 , I 9 9 , 20 5 - 6, 224, 2406 8 , 297- 3 02, 3 I I , 3 I4 - I 7 . See also Eucharist; Gluttony; Vercelli Book, Homily 7 Edgar (king of England), 3 2 8 - 29 Edmund, Saint, 29 I - 9 3 Edward (king of England), 3 29 Einstein, Albert, 3 3 I Eleazar, 3 I4- I 7 Elene) 20 I - 2 , 2 I I - I 3 , 2 I 9 - 2 8 , 2 3 I , 2 3 4 , 2 3 8 , 2 5 9 - 62, 274 , 276, 278- 8o, 290, 3 0 I . See also Cynewulf Elephants, 3 I7 Eliot, T. S., IOI, I 24- 2 5 Epic, I 7 8 - 79 Eriugena, John Scottus, I 9 5 - 9 6 Eschatology, 4 8 , 5 4 - 6 3 , 2 I O- I I , 240 Eucharist, I 3 I - 3 3 , 2 5 5 - 5 7 , 2 6 I - 6 5 , 2 8 0- 8 2 . See also Eating Eusebius of Caesarea, 76, I 07, I I I - I 8 , I 2 3 , I 2 8 , I 3 3 , I 4 3 , I 5 I . See also Rufinus of Aquileia Exhortation to Christian Living. See Re wards ofPiety Exodus) I 29 , I 5 I , I 6 I - 68 , I 70, I 80, 29 6, 3 I9

Fisch, Harold, 3 3 0n. 29 Fish, Varda, 22on. 26 Frank, Roberta, I O in. I, I03n. 4 , I 5 7n. 24, I 68n. 4 9 , I 8 In. 76, I 8 6- 8 7 , I 8 8n. 8 5 Franks Casket, I 20- 2 I Frantzen, Allen ]. , 240n. I Frye, Northrop, 4 - 5 , l 3 , 5 l n. 26, Io3n. 5 , I o4- 5 , I 4 I , I?8, I 89 - 9 o

Gager, John G., I on. 22 Garrison, Mary, I 3 9 n. 3 9 Gatch, Milton McC. , 20 I , 202n. I I , 24on. I , 278n. 5 7 , 3 2 8n. 2 5 Genesis A) I 29, I 5 I - 5 8 , I 64, I 67n. 4 6, I 70, I 8 0, I 9 8n. 4 , 29 6 Genesis B) I 9 5 Gildas, I07, Io8n. 20, I09, I 4 3 -47, I 7 5 , 24 5n. 6 Gilman, Sander, 3 I 3 n. I Gluttony, I o 8 , I 5 8 , I 70, I 72, I 8 I , I 9 6, 24 I - 5 3 , 2 5 9 , 2 6 I - 62, 2 6 5 , 268- 70, 29 8 - 9 9 . See aLro Eating; Vercelli Book, Homily 7 Godden, Malcolm, I 09n. 24, I I O, I 5 In. I 8 , 20 I , 3 0 8 , 3 I9n. I 2 , 3 2 In. I4, 3 27, 3 3 5ll. IO Godman, Peter, I 3 9 Gotlart, Walter, I I In. I Golb, Norman, 7nn. I 3 - I 4 Goppelt, Leonhard, 3 3 6 Gospel ofNicodemus, 209 , 2 I 5 - I 6, 2 I 8 , 2 62n. 3 4 Gottschalk of Orbais, I 3 8 - 3 9 Gradon, P. 0. E . , 222n. 27 Grant, Raymond ]. S . , 27In. 4 6 Green, William Scott, 5n. 8 Greene, Thomas M . , I 7 , I 69 - 70 Greenfield, Stanley B . , I7onn. 5 2- 5 3 , Fanger, Claire, I 7 7 Farrell, Robert T. , I 69n. 5 I , I 7on. 5 4 , I 7 8ll. 69 , I 79ll· 74, I 8 7, I 9 7n. 2, 20Ill. 9 , 202llll. I I - I 2 , 279ll. 60 I 74ll. 5 7 , I 7 6n. 6 0 , I 7 7llll. 63 - 64 , Gregory the Great, 42, 8 6n. 3 5 , 94n. I 7 8n. 67 4 I , 9 5 , 2 I 3 , 24 6n. 9, 2 7 I , 294ll. I 6, Fates rfthe Apostle.l� 9 5n. 4 3 , 20 I , 207, 3 2 Ill. I 4 , 3 3 2 208 , 2 I 6n. 24, 279 . See also Cynewulf Griflith, Mark, I 5 Ill. I 8 , I 5 8 , I 5 9nn. Finnegan, Robert Emmett, I 74 , I 7 6n. 29 - 3 0, I 6 In. 3 I 6o

Hadrian, emperor, I 2 3 - 24 Jerusalem, destruction of� I I 9 - 2 6, I4950, I 72-74, 266- 67, 2 8 9 . See also Hall, J. R. , I 64n. 3 8 , I 7 6- 7 8 Hall, Thomas N., 7 n . I 5 , 209n. 7, Orosius, Paulus; Vindicta Salvatoris 2 I4n. I7 (Avenging ofthe Saviour) Jews : anti-Judaism vs . antisemitism, 8 - 9 , Hamilton, David, 2 5 7n. 28 Hanning, Robert W. , I 0 3 , I 06, Io8n. I 9 6-97, 24 I , 26 I - 6 3 ; apocalyptic un 20, I I In. I , I I 5 - I 6, I 20n. 22, derstanding of� 5 5 - 63 ; associated with sickness/disease, 2 5 , 2 7- 2 8 , 5 3 - 5 5 , l 28n. 3 0, l43n. l, l44n. 5, l47n. l 3 2 5 2- 5 3 , 2 6 5 - 70 ( see also Eating; Glut Harbus, Antonina, 242n. 3 Hauer, Stanley R. , I 62n. 3 4 , I 63 tony ) ; as blind, 24- 2 5 , 3 5 , 4 6- 50, Hawkes, Jane, 2 7 5 I 4 6-47, 2 I 3 - I 5 , 2I9, 222- 2 5 , 249, Healey, Antonette diPaolo, 277n. 5 5 264, 267, 272, 274 ( see also Jews, defi Herbison, Ivan, I 7 8n. 70 cient understanding); compared to chil Hermann, John P. , I 3 n . 3 4 , 22on. 2 6 dren, 3 6; compared to foxes, 3 4 ; com Hieatt, Constance B . , 2 3 3 n . 3 8 , 23 7n. pared to locusts, 4 2 ; compared to pool 4I ofwater, 27- 2 8 ; compared to Simeon and Anna, 69 - 70; compared to sterile Higham, N. J. , I 4 3 n . 2 , I 44nn. 4 - 6 Hill, Joyce, I 8 9n. 8 8 , 3 I 3 n. 2, 3 24n. I 6 tree, 5 r - 5 2 ; compared to sterile womb, 5 2- 5 3 ; compared to stone, 3 2, Hill, Thomas D . , I 5 8n. 2 5 , 2o8n. 5 , 220n. 26, 23 3n. 3 8 , 23 8n. 4 2 , 26on. 4 I ; compared to white membrane over 3 2, 3 3 3 n· 4 Tobit's eyes, 4 8 - 4 9 ; compared to win ter, 42-4 3 ; connection to devil, 4 r , Hiram of Tyre, 8 3 - 8 6 Holder, Arthur G., 23n. 2, 64n. 4 I , I 9 5 - 9 6, 22 5 , 2 I 8 , 227- 28 , 2 3 7- 3 8 , 8 In. 27 273 - 74 , 3 o r ; deficient understanding, 26, 3 0 - 3 I , 3 5 - 3 9 , 5 2 , I 27 - 2 8 , I 97Holofernes, I 5 8 , I 7 2n. 5 6 9 8 , 2 I 3 - I 5 , 2 I 9 - 2 5 , 2 2 8 , 23 I - 3 5 , Homiletic Fragment I, 2oi 2 6 I , 264- 6 5 , 267, 274, 277, 290, Howard, Donald R. , 24 5n. 7 3 00, 3 0 8 , 3 I 4 - I 7 ( see also Jews as Howe, Nicholas, 6, I 6n. 3 8 , 62n. 3 8 , 9 5n. 4 3 , I 3 6n. 3 6, I 4 3 n . I , I 4 6n. I I , blind ) ; and envy, 2 r 5 - I 7 , 267; and I 4 7 , I 5 I , I 6 8 , I 9 0n. 9 I etymology of"Israel," I 3 o; as hard Hunter, Michael, I O in. I , I 0 3 n . 6 hearted, 3 2- 3 3 , 4 I -4 2 , 227; historical Hyamson, Albert M . , 7 n . I 4 presence in Anglo-Saxon England, 7; and madness, 24 , 3 9 -46, r99- 200, 24 5 - 4 7 , 24 9 , 2 5 I - 5 4 , 272- 74 , 289Imitation, 44-4 5 , I 0 7 Irving, Edward B . , Jr. , I 5 In. I 8 , I 6 Inn. 90, 297; and proselytes, 7 I - 7 2; rela tionship to Gentiles, 5 9 - 6 3 , 70, ? I , 3 2- 3 3 , I 62n. 3 4 , I 63 n . 3 7, I 64nn. 76-97; and spitting, 2 r r - r 2 3 9-40, I 66n. 4 3 , I 67, I 68 , I78n. 69 Isidore of Seville, 24 7, 2 5 I n. 20, 2 5 4n. John, Eric, 3 28n. 2 5 24, 3 00n. I I , 3 2 5n. I9 Jones, Charles W. , 2 3 n . 2, 24n. 3 , 64n. 4 I , 97 Izydorczyk, Zbigniew, 209n. 7 Jonson, Ben, 248 Jacobs, Joseph, 7n. I4 Josephus, 74 Jost, David A., I 69n. 5 I Jameson, Fredric, 4, 3 22 Judas, betrayer of Christ, 20 5 Jenkins, Claude, 23n. 2 Judas Maccabeus, 3 I 3 , 3 I 8 , 3 22-24, Jerome, Saint, 3 4 , 72n. 8 , I 4 6n. IO, 3 26 I 6 In. 3 3 , 2 7 I , 3 3 2

INDEX 3 70 Judith, I S I , I 5 S - 6 I , I 70, I 7 2n. s 6, 3 I9 Juvencus, I 9 7

Karkov, Catherine E . , I 5 In. I S , I y Sn. 70 Katz, Solomon, I In. 25 Keats, John, 3 l4n. 5 Keeter, Sarah Larratt, yn. I 5 Kelly, Joseph F. , 64n. 4 I , S Sn. 3 7 Kendall, Calvin, I oyn. I 9 , I 09n. 24 Kennedy, Charles, I 5 In. I S , I7S Ker, Neil, 2oonn. y- S , 29 5n. I, 3 I 3 n. 2, 3 24n. I 6 Kermode, Frank, I , 3 9n. I2, 59, I O I , I03n. 5 , I04n. 7, 3 3 4 , 3 3 9 Keynes, Simon, 3 I on. 2 I Kierkegaard, S0ren, 2 3 Krapp, G. P. , I 69n. 5 I Krieger, Leonard, 5 9n. 3 4 , I05n. I4 Krieger, Murray, 59n. 3 4 Krinsky, Carol Herselle, S i n. 27 Kruger, Stephen F. , I4n. 3 6, I 7 6, 2 S 6n. 2 Ladner, Gerhart B . , yyn. I S Laistner, M . L. W. , 2 3 n . 2 , 263n. 3 5 Lampe, G. W. H . , 3 3 6 Langland, William, 2 5 3n. 22, 262n. 3 3 Langmuir, Gavin I., 4 , S Lapidge, Michael, 2 3 n . I , I 4 3 n. I , I 4 6n. I I Lee, Stuart, 3 I 3 n. 2 Lees, Clare A. , 3 3 3 n. 4 Leinbaugh, Theodore, 263n. 3 7 Lerer, Seth, 3 Ion. 2 I Lewis, Bernard, I 0 5 nn. 9 , I I Linder, Amnon, I on. 2 3 , 3 4n. 7, 2 2 6n. 3I Little, Lester K. , yn. I 4 , Sn. 20 Loomis, Grant, 3 I 3n. 2 Lucas, Peter ]. , I 5 In. I S , I 6Inn. 3 23 3 , I 62n. 3 4 , I 63n. 3 7 , I 64n. 40, I 6 5n. 4 I , I 66n. 4 3 , I y Sn. 70 Luxuria, I o S , 249- 5 0 . See also Eating; Gluttony

Maccoby, Hyam, I on. 22, 3 3 5 Mackay, Thomas w. , 5 sn. 29 , I 2 5n. 27 Macy, Gary, 2 6 3 nn. 3 5 , 3 7 , 27on. 44 Magennis, Hugh, 3 2S Markus, R. A. , I In. 25, 76, II In. I, I I9 Mary, Virgin, 5 5 - 5 6, 69 , 270- 7 5 , 277- y S , 2 S S , 3 20. See also Cam bridge, Corpus Christi College 4 l ; Transitus Mariae; Wirksworth Slab Mazzarino, Santo, I 2 Sn. 3 I McClure, Judith, I 09 Mellinkoff, Ruth, sn. s , yn. I 5' I4n. 3 5 , 29 6n. 4 , 3 3 0n. 3 I Messenger, Ruth Ellis, 24 6n. 9 Meyvaert, Paul, 3n. 2, 23n. 2, 2 5 , 4 2n. I 7 , 74n. I2 Michelson, Hijman, yn. I4 Milburn, R. L. .P. , I 02n. 2, I 0 5 n . Io, I I In. I, I 20n. 22, I 2 Sn. 3 0 Miller, Molly, IoSn. 20 Miller, William Ian, 2 5 on. I9, 2 5 2 Milo of Saint-Amand, I 3 9 n. 3 9 Milton, John, I 09n. 2 3 , I I4 Miracles, 293 -94 Momigliano, Arnalda, I02n. 2, II In. I Moore, R. I . , Sn. 20, 34n. 7 Morrison, Karl F. , s - 6, 29, I 0 6n. I 5 , 206n. 3 , 2 S o- S I Moses, y S , S y , I I 3 n. 4 , I 27, I 3 I - 3 2, I 6 I - 62, I 64 - 67, 220, 24 2, 2Sy- S S , 29 5 , 29 6n. 4 , 29 S , 3 0 I , 3 0 3 , 3 0 5 - 7 , 3 I I , 3 I4 , 3 I 6 Murphy, Francis X . , I I In. I Murray, Robert, S 6n. 3 4 Nathanael, I - 2, 9 6 Nebuchadnezzar, I 69 , I 7 3 - 7 6 Neville, Jennifer, I 0 3 n . 4 Nicodemus, 3 6- 3 S Niles, John D . , I S9n. S S O'Carragain, E . , 240n. I , 27Sn. 5 7 Olsen, Glenn, S 6n. 3 4 , S S Order of the World, I02n. 3 Orosius, Paulus, 76, I I 9- 2 5 , I 4 3 , I 74 Oulton, ]. E. L . , I I In. I

Index 3 7I

Panitz, Esther L . , 3 3 0n. 29 Parkes, James, I 3 Parks, Ward, I 70 Parsons, D . , 3 2Sn. 2 5 Patrides, C. A . , I 02n. 2, I I 7 Patterson, L. G . , I 02n. 2, I 2 Sn. 3 0 Paulinus of Nola, I 2 5 - 2S , I 3 I - 3 4 , l 3 6- 4 2 , 269n· 4 3 Pelikan, Jaroslav, 2 70n. 44 Pervo, Richard I., 205n. I Poinsotte, Jean-Michel, I 9 7 Poliakov, Leon, 7n. I4 Pollins, Harold, 7n. I4 Pope, John, 29 5 , 3 oon. I I , 3 02n. I 3 , 3 0 3n. I 5 , 3 04n. I 6, 3 o 6n. I S Powell, Timothy E . , 3 24n. I7, 3 2 5n. I S , 3 27 Prudentius, I I 7- I 9 , I 3 5 - 3 7, I97, 249 , 269-70 Psalm I 3 6, I 3 4 - 4 I

Rufinus of Aquileia, I I I - I S , I 2 3 , I 3 3 · See also Eusebius of Caesarea Ruminatio) 79, 3 I4 - I 6

Salvian of Marseilles, I I 9, I 2 S - 3 I , I 4 3 , I44 Sanders, Jack T., 205n. I Sarah (Abraham's wife ), l 5 6- 5 7 Schlauch, Margaret, I 4 n . 3 5 Scragg, D . G . , 20in. S , 202n. I 2 , 2 I 5n. I 9 , 24 I , 27Sn. 57 Seafarery I 5 7, 2 3 on. 3 4 Seasons for Fasting) 2 4 Sn. I 2 Sedulius, Caelius, I 97 Segal, Alan F. , S 6n. 34 Seiferth, Wolfgang S., I4n. 3 5 Shakespeare, William, 4 3 , I 6 3 n. 3 5 , I 9 5 , 2 2 I , 2 5 3 n . 22, 2 6 S , 3 3 I Shepherd, Geoftrey, I o 3 n. 4, I 5 2 Shinar, Plain of� I 5 2- 5 3 , I 59 Shippey, T. A., I 6 5n. 4 I , I 67n. 4 6, I 6Sn. 50, I 7 2 , I 7 7 Quinones, Ricardo J, , 3 3 on. 3 I Sims-Williams, Patrick, 2 3 n. 2, I 4 3 n . I , I44 Radbertus, Paschasius, 262- 6 5 , 2So- S I Rand, Richard, 22on. 26 Sinfield, Alan, 3 2S Sisam, Kenneth, 20in. S, 27Sn. 57, Ratramn us of Corbie, 26 3 Raw, Barbara C . , I 5 In. I S , I 70n. 5 3 29 5n. I Ray, Roger D . , 2 3 n. 2 , 5 S , 63 - 64 , S S , Smith, Barbara Herrnstein, 59n. 3 4 I43n. I Smith, Jonathan Z . , 5n. S Regan, Catharine A . , 22on. 26, 23 Sn. Sodom, I 5 5 , I S0, 24 2, 246, 2 5 0- 5 I , 267n. 4 I , 274 4 2 , 26on. 3 2, 279n. 6o Regia of Pr(im, 24 6n. 9 Soul and Body I) 20 I Remley, Paul G., I 5 In. I S , I 69n. 5 I , Southern, R. W. , I04, I 0 5n. I I , I S S Spenser, Edmund, 2 5 3n. 22 3 I4n. 5 Stafiord, Pauline, 3 2 Sn. 2 5 Rewards ofPiety) 24 7, 24S Reynolds, Susan, I 0 5n. I I Stallybrass, Peter, 5 n . S Rice, Robert C . , 279n. 5 9 Stansbury, Mark, 23n. 2 Ricoeur, Paul, I 04n. 7 Stephen Protomartyr, 4 0- 4 I , 67n. 2, Robbins, Jill, I 4 , 3 3 4- 3 5 20S - 9 , 224, 2 S 9 - 9 0 Roberts, Michael, I 3 In. 3 3 Stepsis, Robert, 22on. 26 Robinson, Fred C . , I 6 In. 3 3 , I S in. 77, Stow, Kenneth R. , 7n. I 4 , Ion. 22 24 Sn. I 2 Summons to Prayer. See Rewards ofPiety Roth, Cecil, 7n. I4 Sutherland , A. C., I 4 6n. I 2 Swan, Mary, I 5n. 3 7 Rubin, Miri, 263n. 3 5 Swithun, Saint, 29 I - 9 3 Ruether, Rosemary Radford, I on. 22, Szarmach, Paul E . , 2 I4n. I S 2 I 0 , 240

INDEX 3 72 Thacker, Alan, I 09n. 24 Thare (father of Abraham ) , I 54 Theodulf of Orleans, I 3 9n. 3 9 Thomas, Dylan, I 79 Thompson, A. Hamilton, 2 3 n . I Three orders of society, 3 24 - 2 8 Titus, emperor, I I 8 - I9 , I 22, 2 I 6, 2 6 5 - 67 Toliver, Harold E . , I O in. I , I 0 6, I 79n. 7 3 , I 9 0n. 94 Tolk.ien, J. R. R. , I 6 Inn. 3 2- 3 3 , I 63 n . 3 7, I 64nn. 3 9-40, I 6 5n. 4 I , I 66n. 4 3 , I 67 Trachtenberg, Joshua, 8n. 20 Trajan, emperor, I 2 3 Transitus Mariae, 2 7 I - 7 5 . See also Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 4 I ; Mary, Virgin ; Wirksworth Slab Treharne, Elaine, I sn. 3 7 Trompf� G. W. , I I 7 Trout, Dennis E . , I 2 5n. 27, I 3 In. 3 3 Typology, I I - I 4 , passim Tyson, Joseph B . , 205n. I

Visio Pauli, 2 7 6 Vortigern, I 4 6

Wallace-Hadrill, D. S . , I I In. I , I I 2n. 2, I I 3 nn. 4- 5 , I I 5n. IO, I I ? Wallace-Hadrill, J. M . , I 09n. 24, I 3 9n. 39 Walsh, P. G . , l 2 5n. 27, l } ln. 3 3 , q 6, I40nn. 40- 4 I , I 4 In. 4 2 Wanderer, I 5 7 , 2 3 on. 4 3 Ward, Bendedicta, 2 3 m1. I - 2, I 07 Warner, Marina, 270n. 44 Waswo, Richard, I O sn. I I Weatherly, Jon A . , 205n. I Whatley, E. Gordon, 22on. 26, 260 White, Allan, sn. 8 White, Hayden, 5 , I 04n. 7 Whitelock, Dorothy, 24n. 3 Widsith, I 89 , 2 8 7n. 3 Wife's Lament, 62 Wilcox, Jonatlun, 2 8 6n. I, 3 20n. I 3 Wilken, Robert L., I I 3 n . 4 Williams, A. Lukyn, I on. 22 Wirksworth Slab, 2 7 5 . See aLm Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 4 I ; Vc£ingfory, 24 8n. I 2 Mary, Virgin; Transitus Mariae Van der Wurfl� W. A. M . , 2 2 3 n. 29 Witke, Charles, I 3 6n. 3 6 Vaughan, Henry, I 2 8n. 29 Wonders ofthe East, 2 5 4 - 5 5 , 2 8 7n. 3 Vercelli Book, 200- 2 8 2 ; Homily I , 2 I I , Woollcombe, K. J, 3 3 6 Wordsworth, William, 2 3 , 3 3 I 2 I 6, 2 I 8 , 2 2 8 ; Homily 2 , 2 I O- I I ; Wormald, Patrick, I 07n. I 8 Homily 7, 240- 4 5 , 249 - 5 3 , 2 5 9 , Wrenn, C . L . , 202n. I I 2 6I - 62, 2 6 8 - 70, 272; HomiZv 8 , 2 I o ; Homily I 6, 2 I 3 - I 5 , 2 2 7 , 2 3 5 ; Wright, Ellen F. , 22on. 2 6 Wright, Neil, I 2 5n. 2 7 , I44nn. 4 , 8 , Homily 2 I , 2 I I . See also Andreasj I4 5n. 9 , I 4 6n. I O , I 4 7n. I 3 Dream ofthe Roodj Elenej Fates ofthe Wulfstan, 3 I 8 , 3 2 8 Apostlesj Homiletic Fragment lj Soul and Body I Vespasian, emperor, I 22, 2 6 5 - 67 Yeager, R. F. , 262n. 3 3 Yeats, W. B . , I Vestigia Israhel, I - 3 , 3 n . 2 Vikings, I 4 8 , I S O, 3 I 9 , 3 2 5 n. I 9 , 3 27 Yorke, Barbara, 3 2 8n. 2 5 Vindicta Salvatoris (Avenging of the Sav- Young, Frances M . , I on. 2 2 , I I nn. 2729 , q , 29 , 4 2n. I 6, 59n. 34, 8 6n. 3 4 iour), I 20, 209n. 7, 2 I 6, 262, 2 6 5 6 8 , 270 Young-Bruehl, Elisabeth, 8n. 20