Peter Comestor and Biblical Chronology

564553 research-article2015 ITQ0010.1177/0021140014564553Irish Theological QuarterlyLuscombe Article Peter Comestor and Biblical Chronology Irish ...
Author: Cecily Mills
14 downloads 2 Views 376KB Size
564553 research-article2015

ITQ0010.1177/0021140014564553Irish Theological QuarterlyLuscombe

Article

Peter Comestor and Biblical Chronology

Irish Theological Quarterly 2015, Vol. 80(2) 136­–148 © The Author(s) 2015 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0021140014564553 itq.sagepub.com

David Luscombe University of Sheffield, UK

Abstract The Historia scholastica of Peter Comestor (d. 1178) was for centuries the main work of reference for the study in the Latin West of Biblical history, just as Peter Lombard’s Four Books of Sentences were for the study of systematic theology and the Decretum of Gratian of Bologna for the study of canon law. Hundreds of manuscript copies of each of these manuals survive, and the Historia scholastica was conspicuous for the attention it gave to the details of the historical events narrated in the Bible, to such matters as places, names, and dates. The work does not offer moral or spiritual interpretation of the Bible. Some examples of Peter’s presentation of biblical chronology are presented in this essay.

Keywords Andrew of St Victor, Augustine of Hippo, Bede, Daniel, Gloss, Gospels, Jerome, Peter Comestor

A

well-known medieval legend represented Peter Comestor, Master of the Histories, as one of three brothers, the others being Peter Lombard, author of the Four Books of Sentences, and Gratian, author of the Decretum.1 Their three greatest works, all produced  1 For the legend see Joseph de Ghellinck, Le mouvement théologique du XIIe siècle, new ed. Museum Lessianum, Section historique, 10 (Bruges: Editions ‘De Tempel’, 1948), 213–14, 285. I am grateful to the Editor of ITQ for encouraging me to make a contribution on an aspect of the work of Peter Comestor that is not covered in the valuable collection of studies recently edited by Gilbert Dahan, Pierre le Mangeur ou Pierre de Troyes. Maître du XIIe siècle. Bibliothèque d’histoire culturelle du moyen âge, 12 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013).

Corresponding author: David Luscombe, Department of History, University of Sheffield, Jessop West, 1 Upper Hanover Street, Sheffield S3 7RA, UK. Email: [email protected]

Luscombe

137

around the middle of the 12th century within a span of little more than 30 years, were the most enduring manuals produced in the Middle Ages for teaching and learning biblical history, theology, and canon law. Peter Comestor (d. 1178) in his Historia scholastica shared the dedication of Hugh of St Victor (d. 1142) to the study of the Bible as history, seeing in this the foundation on which other meanings could be established.2 During the 12th century the great Gloss, later to be named the Glossa ordinaria, was in the making3 and lectures on the Bible multiplied in the schools.4 But Peter, along with Hugh and Andrew of St Victor (d. 1175),5 was largely responsible for the ‘historical turn’ in contemporary teaching of the Bible.6 In the preface to his Historia Peter wrote: ‘The reason why I took up this task was the request that my colleagues pressed upon me. When they read in the glosses about biblical history, they found that its sequence was spread widely but too briefly and with little explanation, so they made me undertake this task so that they could get back to following the truth of history.’7 However, a younger Parisian master of theology, one who knew the Historia well, Peter the Chanter, was to complain that an ad litteram interest in historical details such as places, dates, genealogies, and buildings diverted attention away from the moral teaching of the Scriptures.8 Nonetheless, the  2 Historia scholastica, PL 198, 1053–644. Cf. Beryl Smalley, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983), 87–90, 198. See also my contribution in Pierre le Mangeur ou Pierre de Troyes on ‘The Place of Peter Comestor in the History of Medieval Theology,’ 27–45 at 34–37. In citing the Historia I have relied on the edition printed in PL 198; for the prologue see note 7 below.  3 Cf. Lesley Smith, The Glossa ordinaria. The Making of a Medieval Bible Commentary (Leiden: Brill, 2009) and ‘The Glossed Bible’ in New Cambridge History of the Bible, 2: From 600 to 1450, ed. Richard Marsden and E. Ann Matter (Cambridge, 2012), 363–91. For an early printed copy of the Gloss, one on which I have relied for the purpose of this communication, see Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria. Facsimile reprint of the editio princeps Adolph Rusch of Strassburg 1480/81. 4 vols. (Turnhout: Brepols, 1992). Vol. 1 has an introduction written by Karlfried Froehlich and Margaret Gibson.   4 Luscombe, ‘The Place of Peter Comestor in the History of Medieval Theology,’ 28–30 with further references.   5 Cf. Rainer Berndt, André de Saint-Victor (†1175), exégète et théologien. Bibliotheca Victorina, 2 (Paris: Brepols, 1991).   6 Cf. Beryl Smalley, ‘Peter Comestor on the Gospels and His Sources’ in The Gospels in the Schools, c. 1100–c. 1280 (London: Hambledon, 1985), 37–83.   7 ‘Causa suscepti laboris fuit instans petitio sociorum, qui cum historiam sacre scripture in serie et glosis diffusam lectitarent, breuem nimis et inexpositam, opus aggredi me compulerunt, ad quod pro ueritate historie consequenda recurrerent’, Petri Comestoris Scholastica Historia, Prologus, ed. Agneta Sylwan. CCCM 191 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2005), 3; PL 198, 1053–54.   8 See Beryl Smalley, The Gospels in the Schools, 101–18 at 102 (citing the Chanter, Verbum abbreviatum, PL 205, 27–28) and 103 (citing the Chanter, Summa de sacramentis et animae consiliis, ed. Jean-Albert Dugauquier. Analecta Mediaevalia Namurcensia, 16 (Louvain: Nauwelaerts, 1954–67), 163). Peter the Chanter does not mention Peter Comestor; he mentions sancti expositores. So examples of what he had in mind might include Jerome, Liber interpretationis hebraicorum nominum, ed. Paul de Lagarde and others. CCSL 72, 57–161; PL 23, 771–858, and Liber de situ et nominibus locorum hebraicorum, PL 23, 859–928; Eusebius, Onomasticon, ed., with Latin trans. by Jerome, Erich Klostermann in Eusebius. Das

138

Irish Theological Quarterly 80(2)

Historia became firmly established as the encyclopaedic and standard reference work for biblical history. Peter Comestor looked back to a long tradition of study of the Bible as a historical source. He did not re-shape this tradition but he used it comprehensively, and the purpose of this essay is to illustrate with two examples—one from the Old Testament and one from the New—some of the ways in which Peter, in his Historia scholastica, explained biblical chronology with the aid of this tradition. In chapter 10 of his History of the Book of Daniel Peter explains the eighth of Daniel’s visions (Dan. 9), the one in which Daniel receives the message which Gabriel brought him in the first year of the reign of Darius (Dan. 9:1).9 It came while Daniel was at prayer, reflecting on the 70 years which were to pass, according to the prophet Jeremiah (25:11–12), while Jerusalem lay in ruins (Dan. 9:2). Gabriel told Daniel that after 70 shortened weeks (hebdomades abbreviatae) Israel’s iniquity will be abolished and God will allow Jerusalem to be restored and rebuilt. From then until the coming of Christ there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks but after the 62 weeks Christ will be slain and a people will come with their leader (populus cum duce suo venturo, Dan. 9:26) and destroy the city. A covenant will be made with many in a week (the 70th). Half way through this week all sacrifice will have stopped and Jerusalem will again be desolate (Dan. 9: 21–7). Peter explains that the weeks are weeks of years, not of days; a week of seven days corresponds to seven lunar years. Thus, the 70 weeks amount to 490 years, each of 12 lunar months and thus (according to the Vulgate) ‘abbreviated,’ a lunar year being shorter than a solar year by 11 days. Bede, whom Peter both mentions and follows, had explained the 70 prophetic weeks in this way and, using regnal years, had counted them from the successful petition of Nehemiah to King Artaxerxes in the 20th year of his reign for the restoration of Jerusalem (Nehemiah, 2:1–8) to the suffering and death of the anointed prince who is Christ that took place in the 18th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar.10 The half week (in the 70th week) before all sacrifice ceases corresponds to the years of Onomasticon der biblischen Ortsnamen (Hildesheim: Olm, 1966, reprint of the 1904 Leipzig edition) and Bede, Nomina regionum atque locorum de Actibus Apostolorum, ed. Max L.W. Laistner. CCSL 121, 165–78; PL 23, 1297–305 and PL 92, 1033–40.  9 Historia scholastica: Historia libri Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1447–76 at 1459–62. 10 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1459D-60A. Peter notes (1460D) that Africanus and Bede concur on the first date but Africanus had brought the 70 ‘weeks’ to an end in the 15th year of Tiberius, the year of Christ’s baptism. Cf. Bede, De temporum ratione, ed. Charles W. Jones, Bedae opera, VI, 2. CCSL 123B (1977), 304–7; Faith Wallis, trans., Bede, The Reckoning of Time. Translated Texts for Historians, 29 (reprinted with corrections, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2004), 36–37, with a commentary on pp. 279–80 where Wallis writes that Bede relied upon a quotation from Africanus found in Jerome, In Danielem, c. 9: ‘Africanus in quinto Temporum volumine’ (ed. Fr. Glorie, CCSL 75A (1964), III.ix.24a, lines 144–223, 865–69; PL 25, 542C-4B). Julius Africanus Sextus (c. 180–c. 250) was the author of Chronographia, a world history which survives in excerpts (printed in PG 10, 63–94); see xvi in PG 10, 80B-84B, excerpted from Eusebius, Demonstratio evangelica, III, 46 (PG 22, 1180A-4B). Cf. also Bede, De temporum ratione, c. 66, ed. Jones, p. 486; trans. Wallis, p. 185; and Bede, In Ezram et Neemiam prophetas allegorica expositio, 3, ed. David Hurst, CCSL 119A (1969), p. 342, l.132–p. 343, l.157; PL 91, 884D-6A.

Luscombe

139

Christ’s public ministry, beginning with his baptism and ending with his death on the Cross when the sacrifices of the Old Law came to an end and the Temple was rendered desolate.11 The destruction of the city by the Romans fell outside this period of 70 weeks, although Peter records that Tertullian included the destruction of the city within the 70 weeks and had them begin in the first year of the reign of Darius.12 For clarification of the ordering of 70 weeks into a period of seven weeks followed by one of 62, Peter turns to the Hebraei who in bringing together a smaller numeral and a larger one placed the smaller one first whereas Peter’s readers would place the larger number first. The one remaining week, the 70th, may be divided between Vespasian and Hadrian because, Peter writes, Vespasian and Titus ‘made peace with the Jews’ for three and a half years and Aelius Hadrian did likewise for another three and a half years when Jerusalem was again destroyed before being rebuilt as Aelia.13 The Hebrews counted 172 Olympiads (Olympiads being four-year periods commencing in 776 BCE) from the first year of Darius’s reign to the final suppression of Jerusalem under Hadrian. But, Peter writes, they did not do this carefully (non magnopere curantes) as they made the total not 688 but 696 years or 99 Hebrew weeks plus three years.14 The Gloss mentions 174 Olympiads which amount to 696 years. Most of this Peter found in the Gloss.15 The Gloss presents the text of the Vulgate and adds numerous interlinear and marginal glosses. The marginal glosses are not infrequently long and substantial extracts based upon or taken, with acknowledgement, from previous biblical commentaries and other works. Other marginal glosses which are not attributed to a named author may include material provided by the compilers of the Gloss themselves. Peter does not reproduce the Vulgate text in full. He makes selections and, as he does so, he picks freely from the interlinear and marginal glosses found in the Gloss, copying material that he wants to keep while also re-working and shortening it, adding some comments himself and producing in the process an unbroken exposition in place of disjointed jottings and notes. His enumeration of the abbreviated weeks, where we find the first of two mentions in this chapter of Bede’s name, is based on some 26

11 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1460A-C. 12 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1460CD. Tertullian may not have been the author of Adversus Iudaeos where (at VIII, 9–16) the length is enumerated of the reigns of the rulers of empires between the first year of Darius and the destruction of Jerusalem under Vespasian: ‘Unde igitur ostendemus quoniam venit Christus intra LXII, et dimidiam ebdomadas? Numerabimus autem a primo anno Darii, quomodo in ipso tempore Danielo visio ipsa ostenditur … Vespasianus anno primo imperii sui … debellat Judaeos … atque ita in die suae expugnationis Judaei impleverunt ebdomadas LXX praedictas in Danielo’, ed. Emil Kroymann. CCSL 2, 1337–96; PL 2, 612A-616B at 613C-616A. 13 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1461C-62A. Vespasian and his son Titus crushed the Jewish revolt between 67 and 70 CE. Hadrian did likewise in the second Jewish war between 132 and 135 CE. For Vespasian and Titus Peter refers to Josephus whose history covers the first Jewish war. Peter claims (1461C) that Hadrian’s suppression of the Jews occurred seven ‘weeks’—49 years—after Vespasian’s death, but this took place in 79 CE. 14 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1462A. 15 Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 3, 339–42.

140

Irish Theological Quarterly 80(2)

lines in the Gloss which are based on Bede (Beda in libro de natura rerum).16 A little later, when Peter juxtaposes what Bede and Africanus say about how the 70 weeks will end, he reproduces in summary form a longer unattributed Nota, also 26 lines long, which is found in the Gloss.17 And when he moves on to Tertullian he once again summarizes, but does not reproduce verbatim, a passage he finds in the Gloss attributed to Tertullian in libro contra iudeos.18 Rainer Berndt has meticulously listed ten passages where Peter has tacitly drawn upon the commentary on Daniel written earlier (c. 1155– 62) by Andrew of St Victor but the two parallels he has found in this chapter are very faint.19 Peter’s handling of Daniel’s eighth vision with its complex chronology thus appears to be almost entirely informed by what he lifted from the Gloss and then re-arranged. My second example of Peter’s representation of Biblical chronology is taken from his Historia evangelica—the part of the Historica scholastica that is devoted to the Gospels. This example shows how Peter could break away from the Gloss. He was teaching from 1159 until his retirement in 1178, becoming chancellor of Notre Dame in 1168 following Peter Lombard’s election as bishop of Paris. His lectures on each of the Gospels survive— the first to do so from Paris—in the form of unprinted reportationes.20 These are based on the Gloss which by the mid-12th century covered almost the whole Bible. The content of the lectures overlaps with the Historia which was finished in 1169–73. However, the lectures, like the Gloss but unlike the Historia, engage closely with mystical and allegorical interpretation. The Historia, on the other hand, gives more focused attention than do the lectures to the literal sense which is, however, by no means neglected in the latter. I shall consider Peter’s handling in his Historia of the chronology of Christ’s life and work on earth and on its significance in the unfolding of universal history as well as his unravelling of differences of interpretation. These matters do not loom large in the Gloss. Obvious but scanty starting points are found in the opening narratives of Jesus’ birth and infancy in Luke’s Gospel. At 3:1–3 and 23 Luke writes that John the Baptist began baptising penitents in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, and these included

16 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1459D, l.4–1460A, l.11 and Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 3, p. 341, col. 2. Cf. Bede, not De natura rerum but De temporum ratione, ed. Jones, p. 305, l.19–p. 307, l.57; trans. Wallis, pp. 36–37. 17 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL. 198, 1460D, l.3–7 and Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 3, p. 342, col. 2. 18 Historia … Danielis, c. 10, PL 198, 1460D, l, 7–14 and Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 3, p. 341, cols.1–2. 19 ‘Pierre le Mangeur et André de Saint-Victor. Contribution à l’étude de leurs sources,’ Recherches de théologie ancienne et médiévale, 61 (1994): 88–114 at 110. 20 Cf. Smalley, ‘Peter Comestor on the Gospels,’ 37 and (for the MSS) 58–62. For the commentary on Matthew I have used a digitized copy of Troyes MS 1024 (13th century from the abbey of Clairvaux) which was kindly made available to me by the Médiathèque in Grand Troyes. For the commentary on Mark I have consulted Cambridge, Pembroke College MS 7, ff. 228–67v (late 12th/early 13th century from Bury St Edmund) and for those on Luke and John Cambridge, Pembroke College MS 75, ff. 1–88 and 88–138 (early 13th century, also from Bury St Edmund).

Luscombe

141

Jesus who was then, according to Peter, 13 days into his 30th year,21 having been born in the 42nd year of the long reign of Augustus Caesar.22 Other ‘parallel’ dates which Peter, like Bede, gives briefly for Christ’s birth are: the 30th year of Herod’s reign, the 3rd year of the 193rd Olympiad, and the 752nd year from the foundation of Rome.23 That Christ’s birth also took place on a Sunday night at the kalends of January, Peter writes, may be established from a computistic table (tabula computi). Here, as Hubert Silvestre noticed, Peter summarizes tacitly a short passage in the De divinis officiis of Rupert of Deutz, a monk of St Lawrence outside Liège who wrote the work between 1109 and 1112.24 But there are uncertainties about the length of Augustus’s reign which render it difficult to state in which year of the reign Jesus was born.25 Further difficulties are presented by the number of years that had passed since Adam—5,196 or 5,199—and since Abraham—2,012 years according to the Septuagint but far fewer according to the Hebrew Old Testament.26 In Chapter 30 Peter writes that at the time when John began baptising and preaching redemption—in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar—5,225 years had elapsed since Adam according to the Septuagint, but 4,000 according to Jerome’s translation of the hebraica veritas.27 The 16th year of Tiberius’s reign was the 81st jubilee year when, according to some, with the replacement of circumcision by baptism, the sixth age or chiliad commenced and the fifth came to an end.28 Some see the incarnation as the turning point when ancient ways of counting years—for example in Olympiads—were replaced by a new numbering.29 Yet others make the passion of Christ the turning point

21 Historia … evangelica, c. 30, PL 198, 1552A and c. 33, PL 198, 1554CD. 22 Historia … evangelica, c. 5, PL 198, 1540A. 23 Historia … evangelica, c. 5, PL 198, 1540B. Cf. Bede, De temporum ratione, 66, ed. Jones, p. 495; trans. Wallis, p. 195. See on this also C. Philip E. Nothaft, Dating the Passion, The Life of Jesus and the Emergence of Scientific Chronology (200–1600), (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 165–66. 24 Historia … evangelica, c. 5, PL 198, 1540B. Cf. Rupert of Deutz, De divinis officiis, III, 16, ed. Rhabanus Haacke. CCCM, 7 (Turnhout, 1967), 86–87; PL 170, 74D-75A ; Hubert Silvestre ‘Le jour et l’heure de la nativité et de la résurrection pour Rupert de Deutz’ in Pascua mediaevalia. Studies voor Prof. Dr. J.M. de Smet. Mediaevalia Lovaniensia, Series 1/ Studia X (Leuven, 1983), 619–30 at 619–27. The De divinis officiis, was well known in the 12th century although Peter may not have known the name of the author. 25 Peter writes that Augustus reigned for 57 years, six months, and ten days, but some think that he ruled for only 56 years, and others, who call the six months and the following days a full extra year, for 58, Historia … evangelica, c. 26, PL 198, 1550D. Fifty six and a half years according to Bede, De temporum ratione, 66, ed. Jones, p. 494; trans. Wallis, p. 194 and Eusebius, Chronica, trans. Jerome, ed. Rudolf Helm, Die Chronik des Hieronymus, in Eusebius Werke VII. 1. Die Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten Jahrhunderte, 47 (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 19562), 157; PG 19, 346C and 522; PL 27, 103A and 539. 26 Historia … evangelica, c. 5, PL 198, 1540C. 27 Historia … evangelica, c. 30, PL 198, 1552B. 5,228 years from Creation according to Bede, De temporum ratione, 66, ed. Jones, p. 496; trans. Wallis, p. 196; 2,015 years from Abraham to the birth of Christ, 2,044 years from Abraham to Tiberius’s 15th year, according to Eusebius, Chronica, trans. Jerome, ed. Helm, p. 174; PG 19, 529–30 and 324AB; PL 27, 559. 28 Historia … evangelica, c. 30 PL 198, 1552BC. 29 Historia … evangelica, c. 30, PL 198, 1552C.

142

Irish Theological Quarterly 80(2)

for the commencement of both the sixth age and of the seventh age of rest (septimam quiescentium).30 In chapter 33 Peter claims that at the time of his baptism Jesus was just 13 days into the start of his 30th year.31 He states that one year later on the same day as his baptism Jesus changed water into wine, that at the Passover in the following year—the 32nd—John was beheaded, and that at the next Passover—the 33rd year—Jesus himself suffered death. Thus Jesus lived for a total of 32 full years and for part of a 33rd year—deemed a half year—between his nativity and passion. However, Peter records that John Chrysostom, in his tenth Homily, had written that Jesus had completed his 30th year when he was baptised, an opinion which results in a life of 33 full years and part of a 34th that runs from the nativity to the passion.32 Some clarification of the 13 extra days and of the part- or half-year from the nativity to the passion is provided later in chapter 37 where opinions are given. One opinion is that the turning of water into wine at the marriage feast at Cana occurred near the first Passover following Jesus’ baptism.33 But church custom stands in the way of this and holds that the coming of the Magi, the baptism of Jesus, and the changing of water into wine, all occurred at the Epiphany—the 13th day—although in different years, namely the first, the 30th or the 31st, and the next.34 Peter cites in support part of a sermon by bishop Maximus beginning Cum plura nobis, fratres, and observes that older books show that each of these events is an illustratio, an epiphany, of Christ.35 But there 30 Historia … evangelica, c. 30, PL 198, 1552C. Peter adds that the Chronica dates the new age from the reign of Tiberius, but if this was the Chronica of Eusebius of Caesarea, translated into Latin by Jerome, it does not seem to be Peter’s only source. It presents tables of dates for Roman and Jewish history in parallel columns, but lacks the seven ages of the world and does not start a new age in the lifetime of Christ. See Chronica, II, ed. Helm, pp. 169–75; PG 19, 531–35. In chapter 5 of the Historia … evangelica (PL 198, 1540BC) Peter had noted that the beginning of the seventh age was thought by some to have been the birth of Jesus, by others his baptism, and by others his passion. 31 Luke 3: 23 does not say as much: ‘Jesus himself was beginning about the age of thirty years.’ 32 Historia … evangelica, c. 33, PL 198, 1554C–5C. See Chrysostom, Homily 10 on Matthew III.1, 2, PG 57, 183–84; trans. in the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 10: Saint Chrysostom: Homilies on the Gospel of Saint Matthew (New York: Christian Literature, 1888), 61–63. 33 John 2:12–13. Historia … evangelica, c. 37, PL 198, 1558A; cf. an addition to the Historia … evangelica, c. 37, PL 198, 1558D, where the marriage feast is said to have taken place after Jesus called his first disciples; they stayed at Capharnaum for a few days (non multis diebus) and then as the Jewish Passover drew near they went up to Jerusalem. 34 Historia … evangelica, c. 37, PL 198, 1558B. For a similar discussion see Peter’s commentary on Matthew, Troyes MS 1024, f. 18va+b and on John, Pembroke MS 75, f. 97rb. In an addition to the Historia, c. 37, PL 198, 1558D, it is stated that, according to Bede, the miracle of the five loaves and two fish also took place on the same day, the 13th, one year after Cana; John is cited although according to John 6: 4, the miracle of the five loaves and two fish occurred as Passover was coming (Erat autem proximum Pascha). 35 Historia … evangelica, c. 37, PL 198, 1558BC; also Peter’s commentary on Matthew, Troyes MS 1024, f. 18va+b and on John, Pembroke MS 75, f. 97rb. Cf. Maximus II, bishop of Turin, c. 451–65(?), Homilia XXIX, PL 57, 289A. Peter shortens the passage so that in the Historia it reads: ‘Sicut posteritatis suae fidelis mandavit antiquitas, hodie Salvator a Chaldaeis adoratus est, hodie fluenta Jordanis benedictione proprii baptismatis consecravit, hodie invitatus ad nuptias aquas vertit in vinum.’

Luscombe

143

are two opinions (duplex opinio) held by catholic teachers about the historical sequence, and the Gospels begin to diverge in their accounts of Jesus’ life when he calls his first disciples. Writers in the unum ex quattuor tradition, those who merge the four Gospel accounts into a single, largely harmonized narrative, follow Ammonius of Alexandria, Eusebius of Caesarea, and Theophilus, the seventh bishop of Antioch.36 These agree that Jesus’ fasting in the wilderness preceded his public preaching, his calling of disciples, and his sermon on the mount. The changing of water into wine followed these events, as the disciples were present at Cana.37 However, Peter writes that the more usual and the better opinion is that after the miracle of the water and wine Jesus secretly called his disciples and secretly preached but, once John was put in prison, he began to preach publicly. This sequence is the one Peter prefers but without prejudice, he adds, to the alternative.38 Unlike Peter in the Historia, the Gloss, which provides commentary upon each Gospel separately, provides very little information about the chronology of Christ’s life. It does note when Jesus went up to Jerusalem—once before John was put in prison, and a second time before his passion—but this does not lead to a broader historical discussion. Instead, we read that the Passover is a time for turning away from vice to virtue.39 When the miracle of the five loaves and two fish occurred is of no interest to compilers of the Gloss: the boy with the loaves and fish is Moses, the five loaves are the five books of the Mosaic Law, and the two fish are the Prophets and the Psalms or the royal and sacerdotal aspects of government.40 The Gloss prefers spiritual, allegorical, and moral interpretation. In chapters 147–88 Peter considers the sequence of the events of Christ’s passion, death, and resurrection.41 It is not altogether easy to follow the course of Peter’s 36 Historia … evangelica, c. 37, PL 198, 1558CD. Similar references to Ammonius and Eusebius are made in Peter’s glosses on Mark and on John, Pembroke MS 7, f. 229ra, and MS 75, f. 97va. Jerome, in his Preface to Matthew’s Gospel, in Biblia sacra iuxta Vulgatam uersionem, ed. Robertus Weber (Stuttgart: Württemburgische Bibelanstalt, 1969), 1516, writes that, in his arrangement of the contents of the Gospels in parallel passages (canones), Eusebius (c. 260–c. 340) followed Ammonius (c. 175–242). The canones of Eusebius were widely known and are printed in Biblia sacra, ed. Weber, 1516–26. Theophilus (fl. late 2nd century) is mentioned in Jerome’s preface to his Commentariorum in Mattheum libri IV, ed. David Hurst and Marcus Adriaen, Hieronymi opera, I, 7, CCSL 77 (1969), 4–5; PL 26, 20B, as one of the commentators on Matthew whom he has read and as bishop of Antioch. 37 Cf. John 2: 2 and 1: 37–44. 38 Historia … evangelica, c. 37, PL 198, 1558D. Otto Schmid, ‘Zacharias Chrysopolitanus und sein Kommentar zur Evangelienharmonie,’ Theologische Quartalschrift, 68 (1886): 531–47, 69 and (1887): 231–75, noticed that Peter’s comments are taken anonymously from Zachary of Besanҫon who around 1140–45 wrote a commentary on a conflated text of the Gospels printed in PL 186, 11–619 (see 41). On Zachary and his work see Beryl Smalley, ‘Some Early Twelfth-Century Gospel Commentaries,’ 30–32 and Damien Van den Eynde, ‘Les “Magistri” du Commentaire “Unum ex quattuor” de Zacharias Chrysopolitanus,’ Antonianum 23 (1948): 3–32. 39 ‘Pascha agimus dum a uicijs a uirtutes transimus’; ‘Bis legitur ad pascha ascendisse, semel primo anno predicationis: nondum incarcerato iohanne. unde hic agitur. Secundo cum ad passionem iret,’ Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 228, cols. 2. 40 Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 238, col. 1–2. 41 Historia … evangelica, PL 198, 1614–38.

144

Irish Theological Quarterly 80(2)

discussion of the Last Supper. Peter weaves into this other details such as the room, conversation, clothing, food, transubstantiation, the behaviour of Judas, the time of his exit, and the ways in which these events are remembered in the church’s liturgy. Like the Gloss Peter takes issue with the Greeks who say wrongly that Jesus, knowing that he would suffer, brought forward the paschal meal to the evening before the 14th day of the moon following the spring equinox, to a time, that is, when leavened bread could still be eaten. But if it is true that Jesus ate the paschal meal, he ate lamb, as the Law prescribed, and azymes too.42 Some say, following John (13:5), that Christ dined with his disciples and washed their feet on the 13th day, the fourth feria. But the practice of the church, in the washing of feet before the parasceve—the day of preparation for the Sabbath—is opposed to this. Once again Peter has recourse to a tabula computi: this shows that on the sixth feria the moon was in its 15th day.43 The time when the crucifixion took place is briefly discussed by Peter.44 When Pilate brought Jesus out to confront the Jews, it was, according to John (19:13–15), about (quasi) the sixth hour of the sixth day. But Mark reports (15: 25) that Jesus was crucified at the third hour. Peter here follows the Gloss: Mark refers to the hour when the Jews ‘crucified him with their tongues.’45 Peter places Jesus’ death at some time between the third and the sixth hour, for Mass is usually celebrated by the church between the third and the sixth hour and, if in the morning, Terce should be sung beforehand.46 42 Historia … evangelica, c.169, PL 198, 1615–16. Cf. the Gloss at John 13: 1 (Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 255, col. 2): Greeks say that Matthew (26:19), Mark (14:12– 16) and Luke (22:1–15) are mistaken in writing, unlike John, that at the supper Christ ate lamb’s flesh. 43 The Gloss records that the Last Supper took place on the 14th day of the moon, the following day being the day of Christ’s crucifixion, Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 79, col. 2 at Matthew 26:17; p. 127, col. 1, citing Bede at Mark 14:12; p. 212, col. 1 at Luke 22: 7–8; p. 255, col. 2 at John 13:1. Cf. Bede, In Marci Euangelium expositio, IV, 14, ed. David Hurst. CCSL 120, 608–9; PL 92, 266C-7A; In Lucae euangelium expositio, c. 22, ed. David Hurst. CCSL 120, pp. 373–75; PL 92, 592C-4A. 44 Historia … evangelica, c. 166, PL 198, 1627C-D; cf. Peter’s commentary on John, Pembroke MS 75, f.133rb. 45 Historia … evangelica, c. 166, PL 198, 1627C. According to Bede, Mark thereby put the responsibility for the crucifixion upon the Jews rather than upon the Roman soldiers, In Marci euangelium expositio, IV, 15, CCSL 120, p. 631; PL 92, 288A-C. Cf. Rabanus Maurus, Commentarii in Matthaeum, PL 107, 1141C-2A. The Gloss follows this, Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 86, col. 1 at Matthew 27:46; p. 266, col. 2–p. 267, col. 1, citing Augustine at John 19:14. Likewise B (for which see note 47), PL 162, 1488C. For Augustine, who wrote that much happened between the third and the sixth hour, see De consensu evangelistarum libri IV, III, 13, PL 34, 1183–89. See also the abbreviation known as V, probably made in Laon, of Paschasius Radbertus (c. 790–c. 860) on St Matthew (Expositio in Evangelium Matthaei), PL 120, 951B-2C. On V see Smalley, ‘Some Early Twelfth-Century Gospel Commentaries,’12–15. Another explanation is that the first six hours of the day include three night and three day hours so that the sixth hour is also the third (daytime) hour, Historia … evangelica, c. 166, PL 198, 1627D. Cf. V, PL 120, 952D. 46 Historia … evangelica, c. 166, PL 198, 1627D. Cf. Peter’s lectures on Mark and on Luke, Pembroke MS 7, f. 266rb-va, and MS 75, f. 84ra.

Luscombe

145

Peter follows tradition in denying that the darkness which fell at the end of the sixth hour and covered the whole earth was a solar eclipse.47 He adds that, according to Dionysius Areopagita, the darkness was also experienced at Athens where philosophers could not explain it.48 However, Origen seems to say that the darkness fell only over the land of Judaea since it is not mentioned in the histories of other peoples.49 After Jesus’ death and burial, Jewish priests and Pharisees went to Pilate to ask for a guard to be placed at the sepulchre to prevent theft of the body. According to Matthew 27: 62 this was on ‘the next day, which followed the day of preparation,’ which would seem to indicate the Sabbath.50 The Gloss does not question whether this occurred on the Sabbath51 but Peter reports that ‘Remigius’ explains that this took place after the preparation of the Sabbath had begun, that is, after the first vigil of the night but still on the sixth day.52 Differences between the Gospels regarding the visits made by the women to the tomb and regarding the time when the resurrection occurred had been discussed for 47 Matt. 27: 45–46, Mark 15: 33–34, Luke 23: 44–46; Historia … evangelica, c. 175, PL 198, 1631D. As well as making it clear that this was not a solar eclipse, the darkness that covered the earth from the sixth to the ninth hour is also said in the Gloss to have occurred to remove the possibility of Christ being seen dying, Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, IV, p. 86, col. 1 at Matthew 27: 45; p.134, col. 1 at Mark 15:33. Cf. V, PL. 120, 953A, 955A; Rabanus Maurus, Commentarii in Matthaeum, PL 107, 1140D-1A; Enarrationes in Evangelium S. Matthaei, citing Hilary, PL 162, 1487D-8A. The Enarrationes, printed under the name of Anselm of Laon, sometimes attributed to Geoffrey of Babion, was known to Peter Comestor, but was considered by Beryl Smalley to be anonymous. She labelled it B in ‘Some Early Twelfth-Century Gospel Commentaries,’ 20–30. However, Emmanuel Bain supports the attribution of this commentary to Geoffrey; he dates its composition to the years 1140–45, ‘Le travail du maître dans le commentaire sur l’Évangile de Matthieu’ in Pierre le Mangeur ou Pierre de Troyes, 89–117 at 96–97. Cf. also Zachary of Besançon, In unum ex quatuor sive de concordia evangelistarum libri IV, citing Jerome, PL 186, 580CD. 48 Denis the pseudo-Areopagite in his 7th Letter (to Polycarp) describes a solar eclipse which occurred abnormally and which he observed with Apollophanes at Heliopolis on the day of the crucifixion; see Dionysiaca. Recueil donnant l’ensemble des traductions latines des ouvrages attribués au Denys l’Aréopage, 2 vols (Bruges: Desclée de Brouwer, 1937), 2, 1479–1500 at 1495–1500; PL 122, 1179B-81A at 1180C-81A. Cf. V citing an (unknown) letter from Denis to Apollophanes, PL 120, 955D-6C. The Athenians are briefly mentioned in Peter’s lectures on Matthew, Troyes MS 1024, f. 85v. 49 Historia … evangelica, c. 175, PL 198, 1631D-2A. An added note in the Historia draws attention to the Holy Week service of Tenebrae. Cf. Peter’s lectures on Matthew, Troyes MS 1024, f. 85vb, on Mark, Pembroke MS 7, f. 267va, and on John, Pembroke MS 75, f. 84rb. Also V, PL 120, 953B-5B. Zachary of Besanҫon supports the view of Origen but without naming him, In unum ex quatuor, PL 186, 581AB. See Origen, Series veteris interpretationis commentariorum in Matthaeum, 134, PG 13, 1781D-5B. 50 V wrote that it was the Sabbath, PL 120, 974C. 51 Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 87, col.1. 52 Historia … evangelica, c.182, PL 198, 1634D-35A. Peter’s source, ‘Remigius,’ has not been found.

146

Irish Theological Quarterly 80(2)

centuries.53 One of the problems arose from imprecision in the use of the word uesper which can mean the evening of a day coming to its close, the evening and the night of the same day, or the start of the following day. According to Matthew 28:1, the women approached the tomb ‘in the end of the sabbath, when it began to dawn towards the first day of the week’ (vespere … sabbati, quae lucescit in prima sabbati). Mark (16:1–2 and 9) writes more fully: ‘when the sabbath was past …very early in the morning, the first day of the week, (the women) come to the sepulchre, the sun being now risen … But he, rising early the first day of the week, appeared first to Mary Magdalen’ (cum transisset sabbatum …valde mane una sabbatorum, veniunt ad monumentum, orto iam sole … surgens autem mane, prima sabbati apparuit primo Mariae Magdalene).54 However, John (20: 1) writes that Mary Magdalene came ‘on the first day of the week … early, when it was yet dark’ (una … sabbati … mane, cum adhuc tenebrae essent).55 Peter refers to Augustine’s De consensu evangelistarum where the word vesper (found in Matthew) is said to stand in for nox, a case of a part meaning a whole. To us vesper usually means the period before nightfall but here it is used to indicate the night that breaks into dawn on the first day of the week (vespere … sabbati, quae lucescit in prima sabbati), this day being Sunday (Dominica),56 the night being both of the sabbath and of the Sunday.57 Augustine’s reference to synecdoche in De consensu evangelistarum, that is, to the use of a less comprehensive term in place of a more comprehensive one, is a means of explaining how Jesus was dead for three days and three nights: these comprise the day and the night of Passover eve, all the Sabbath, and the night—the same night—which precedes the day which was Sunday (Dominica). 53 Augustine of Hippo, in De consensu evangelistarum, III. 24, 65, PL 34, 1197–99, called this a serious question (non contemnenda … quaestio). Ambrose found that the Evangelists differ but do not conflict (non … contraria, tamen diversa), Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam, 147, ed. Marcus Adriaen. CCSL 14, 387; PL 15, 1841B; cf. Rupert of Deutz, De ecclesiasticis officiis VII, 18, CCCM 7, 245–46); PL 170, 198A. Jerome thought that differences between the times of the visits of the women to the sepulchre showed how sedulous they were in making them, Commentarii in Evangelium Matthaei, IV, 28, ed. David Hurst and Marcus Adriaen, CCSL 77 (1969), 279; PL 26, 216A; likewise V, PL 120, 976C, and B citing Jerome, PL 162, 1493C. 54 Cf. Luke 24:1: ‘on the first day of the week, very early in the morning’ (una … sabbati valde diluculo). Cf. also V on vesper, PL 120, 976A-8D. 55 The Gloss provides no comment on John on this and gives a mystical interpretation of the illumination brought by sunrise and daybreak as recorded in Mark and Luke, Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 135, col. 2, p. 219, col. 2. 56 Historia … evangelica, c. 183, PL 198, 1635CD. The Gloss on Matthew here (Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 87, 1) comments that Matthew’s brevity leads him to be obscure unlike the other evangelists: by vespere … sabbati quae lucescit Matthew means the first part of the night which ended when the two Marys came to the sepulchre (cf. B citing Jerome, PL 162, 1493CD); mystically, the coming of light shows the glory of the resurrection. For this ‘mystical example’ cf. also Bede, In Marci euangelium expositio, XVI, 2, CCSL, 120, p. 639; B, PL 162, 1493D. 57 Historia … evangelica, c. 184, PL 198, 1636A. Cf. Augustine, De consensu evangelistarum, III, 24, PL 34, 1196–1203.

Luscombe

147

Since the Resurrection, Peter adds, it has become the rule to make any day begin on the night before.58 As for the time of the resurrection itself Peter briefly slips into a scholastic style for classroom discussion of a quaestio: … quaeri solet … Huius quaestionis duplex est solutio … aut enim … aut …. Such a style was very familiar to him as a teacher; usually it is not found in his Historia. But he writes here that a question is usually asked about this because the auctores say different things.59 Jerome, at least in his commentary on Matthew, had maintained that Christ rose in the middle of the night,60 Ambrose late in the night following the Sabbath,61 Augustine at dawn on Sunday.62 Peter offers two solutions. We can reject Mark who writes that Jesus rose ‘early the first day of the week’ (16: 9) but before the women came with spices ‘when the Sabbath was past … very early in the morning (valde mane) … the sun being now risen’ (16: 1–2). This final chapter (capitulum) is missing, Peter tells us, from almost all Greek copies of Mark. Or we should accept both Matthew, who tells us (or so Peter writes) when Christ rose (‘the end of the Sabbath,’ vespere … sabbati) and Mark.63 Ambrose, Peter continues, writes at the end of his exposition of Luke that Christ rose, ‘not on the evening of the day but on the evening of the night’ (Non vesperascente die, sed noctis vespere) and in the Greek version of Luke the word that is used is not ‘evening’ (vespere) but ‘late’ (sero). He rose, that is, not in the evening but in the depth of the night.64 Augustine writes that Christ rose at daybreak (diluculo), and authority agrees: Christ was dead for 40 hours—four hours on Passover eve and 36 hours during two nights and a day—and he stayed on earth for as many days before his ascension into heaven. The church seems to agree with this, with the resurrection having taken place at dawn, for it celebrates the

58 Historia … evangelica, c. 184, PL 198, 1636AB; thus, according to one of the additiones to the Historia Jesus is said to have risen on Sunday night. Cf. the Gloss on Matthew, Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 81, col.1; B, PL 162, 1493D-4A; also Rabanus Maurus, Commentarii in Matthaeum, PL 107, 1147D-8A. 59 Cf. the similar discussion of these differences in Peter’s commentaries on Matthew, Troyes MS 1024, f. 86rb-vb, and on Luke and John, Pembroke MS 75, ff. 84rb-85vb and 134rb. In the Historia, c. 185, PL 198, 1636D, Peter cites Jerome, Liber XII quaestionum. I have been unable to identify this. It is not the Liber XII quaestionum written by Honorius Augustodunensis and printed in PL 172, 1177–86. 60 Jerome, Commentarii in Evangelium Matthaei, IV (25, 6), CCSL 77, p. 237; PL 26, 184C5A. Rupert of Deutz, De divinis officiis, I, 8, CCCM, 7, pp. 9–10; PL 170, 15D-16A follows Jerome on this. Cf. Silvestre, ‘Le jour et l’heure,’ 627–30. 61 Ambrose, Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam, X, 150–51, CCSL 14, pp. 388–89; PL 15, 1842AB. 62 Augustine, De consensu evangelistarum, III, 24, 66, PL 34, 1199. 63 Historia … evangelica, c.185, PL 198, 1636D. Peter does not depend here upon the Gloss which (as has been noted) remarks that Matthew has obscured the matter through his brevity; no comment is made in the Gloss on the differences between darkness and sunlight or the Sabbath and the first day of the week (Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 4, p. 87, col. 1). 64 Historia … evangelica, c. 185, PL 198, 1636D-7A. Cf. Ambrose, Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam, X, 151, CCSL 14, p. 389; PL 15, 1842AB.

148

Irish Theological Quarterly 80(2)

resurrection in the morning with the Office of Lauds.65 Just as Peter considered the fact that Mass is usually celebrated between the third and the sixth hour as giving support to the belief that the crucifixion took place during this time, so here the fact that the Office of Lauds takes place in the morning is an indication that the resurrection took place at dawn. Liturgical practice is thus one of Peter’s criteria for choosing between different interpretations of events. His references to liturgical practice may reflect his responsibilities for the training of priests.66 In his interpretation of Daniel’s eighth vision Peter relies on the Gloss. This is not the only source used by Peter for study of other books of the Old Testament; elsewhere he also used other materials, including the Sentences of Peter Lombard as well as commentaries by Andrew of St Victor.67 But his absorption with the sequence and timing of the events of Christ’s life and work as they are told in the New Testament takes him beyond the Gloss which shows less interest in this. As Peter wrote in his introduction to the Historia, glosses have done little to explain history.68 His own glosses on the Gloss on the Gospels did attract attention from succeeding masters such as Peter the Chanter, between 1187 and 1197, and Hugh of St Cher c. 1230, but his glosses did not enjoy a wide circulation such as was achieved by the Gloss.69 His persistence, however, even restlessness, in pursuing historical enquiries helps to explain why his Historia enjoyed such a wide circulation and for so long into the future. The Gloss too circulated widely but the Historia met a need that was not satisfied by it nor by Peter’s own glosses on the Gospels. Funding This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Author biography David Luscombe is Professor Emeritus of Medieval History in the University of Sheffield and a Fellow of the British Academy. A recent publication is: The Letter Collection of Peter Abelard and Heloise, ed. David Luscombe; trans. Betty Radice, revised by David Luscombe. Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford University Press, 2013), 792 pp.

65 Historia…evangelica, c. 185, PL. 198, 1637B. Augustine, De consensu evangelistarum., III. 24, 66, PL 34, 1199. 66 On Peter’s recourse to liturgy in teaching the New Testament see Smalley, ‘Peter Comestor on the Gospels,’ 69–70; also Smalley, ‘An Early Paris Lecture Course on St Luke,’ 95–96, for a similar occurrence in the lectures of an earlier Parisian master. 67 See Mark Clark, ‘Peter Comestor and Peter Lombard: Brothers in Deed’, Traditio, 60 (2005): 85–142; also n. 19 above. 68 See note 7 above. 69 Cf. Smalley, The Gospels in the Schools, 108, 127.