Sermon,preacher and society in the middle ages

Over the past twenty-five years, studies produced on medieval preaching and sermons have grown so considerably that they now constitute a discipline known as sermon studies. The discipline incorporates various methodologies which include exegesis, liturgy, theology, social history, cultural history, literary criticism, textual criticism, and art history. Therefore, this essay can only be a sampling of some of the literature which has recently appeared. The essay is ordered under the headings: ‘sermon’, ‘preacher’, and ‘society’. The section on sermons isolates methodological issues which form the basis of sermon studies. It outlines the criteria scholars have established to use medieval sermons as an historical tool. The second section investigates the diversity of preachers and considers their role as educators. The third section on society considers those studies which have examined sermons as sources which reflect as well as influence moral and intellectual tendencies in the Middle Ages.     

Sermon,preacher and society in the middle ages

Over the past twenty-five years, studies produced on medieval preaching and sermons have grown so considerably that they now constitute a discipline known as sermon studies. The discipline incorporates various methodologies which include exegesis, liturgy, theology, social history, cultural history, literary criticism, textual criticism, and art history. Therefore, this essay can only be a sampling of some of the literature which has recently appeared. The essay is ordered under the headings: ‘sermon’, ‘preacher’, and ‘society’. The section on sermons isolates methodological issues which form the basis of sermon studies. It outlines the criteria scholars have established to use medieval sermons as an historical tool. The second section investigates the diversity of preachers and considers their role as educators. The third section on society considers those studies which have examined sermons as sources which reflect as well as influence moral and intellectual tendencies in the Middle Ages.     

Sermons,Preaching, and Liturgy: Practices,Research Methods,and the Case of Giordano da Pisa

This article analyses the relationship between sermons, preaching, and liturgy within the Order of the Friars Preachers in late thirteenth- and early fourteenth-century Italy. It provides an account of a specific method for the study of the medieval ‘modern sermon’ by investigating the reportationes of the sermons given by Giordano da Pisa, a Dominican friar who preached in Florence and Pisa between 1302 and 1309. The investigation using this method shows that the sermons’ subjects and arguments, often considered by historians to be a direct consequence and reflection of Florence’s social and economic reality, had in fact also much to do with the evangelical story or epistolary passage assigned to the specific date of the liturgical calendar: there are thus two principal influences rather than just one. This approach to Giordano’s sermons provides a new perspective on his work as a preacher by being more attentive to the internal construction mechanisms of sermon discourse.     

Monks and lay communities in late antique Gaul: the evidence of the Eusebius Gallicanus sermons

The Eusebius Gallicanus sermons reveal the congruity in late antique Gaul between the models of pastoral care for monks and lay Christians. For these Gallic clergy, there was little antagonism between monastery and world. Preachers to both audiences share a common central concern with the defence of community and in this respect they differ from some of their contemporaries. The sermon collection demonstrates that the ascetic world in Gaul was far from monolithic and that pastoral care could be highly individualised and responsive to the demands of local communities.     

The Preacher Facing a Reluctant Audience According to the Testimony of Exempla

Abstract

In spite of the fact that from a theological point of view disobedience can sometimes be positive, in the preachers’ sermons to the people (ad populum), disobedience is always a strongly condemned sin. We focus on the sermones vulgares of Jacques de Vitry and on collections of exempla. In order to analyse the forms of reluctance and contestation to the norms proclaimed by the sermons, we evaluate the steps of this resistance ranging from lack of attention and disrespect to criticism and even hostility. Nevertheless, sometimes one must recognize that it is the preacher’s incompetence that leads to the failure of his pastoral care, for example when the preacher prepares unclear sermons (like Jacques de Vitry when he was a beginner) or is unable to tell a story or to make himself heard. It is even worse when the preacher conveys bad opinions. However, the biggest trouble comes when inattentive and disrespectful listeners are able to interrupt the preacher to contest any inconsistencies in the sermon or mistakes in the doctrine. When the sermon has no effect on the audience, it has clearly failed to get its message across. The preacher can also face competition from singers, jugglers and dancers who can distract the audience from the sermon.     

‘Christ and the soul are like Pyramus and Thisbe’: An Ovidian Story in Fifteenth-Century Sermons

ABSTRACT

The sophisticated ways in which several fifteenth-century preachers used Ovidian stories and their allegorical interpretations prove that late medieval sermons represent a promising but neglected area for classical reception studies. Preachers – whose names are today almost forgotten by scholars but whose sermons circulated at large in early printed books – considered Ovidian allegories as powerful instruments for instructing, entertaining, and moving their audiences. This article begins with a review of the literature on the presence of Ovid in sermons, and discusses the methodology to study the transformation of classical myths in preaching. Then, it focuses on four sermons that incorporated the story of Pyramus and Thisbe, which appears in the sermon collections written by Conrad Grütsch, Johann Meder, and Jacobus de Lenda. The repeated use of this Ovidian myth allows us, therefore, to investigate how different preachers appropriated and re-elaborated this story, and the role that it played in diverse contexts. Finally, the analysis of these texts also sheds light on the use of the Ovidius moralizatus in fifteenth-century sermons.     

Preaching the Cross: Liturgy and Crusade Propaganda

Abstract

This article is an exploration of preaching on the cross very broadly from the time of Ambrose of Milan and Augustine of Hippo onwards. After a brief examination of some early medieval examples, the discussion focuses on Rabanus Maurus and a sermon attributed to Odilo of Cluny. The discussion then centres on the High Middle Ages: sermons by Bernard of Clairvaux, Alan of Lille, an anonymous Cistercian abbot, the vita of Marie d'Oignies, Alexander of Ashby, and model sermons by Humbert of Romans. Before concluding, it explores opposition to the cross, as expressed in inquisitorial documents. The essay also includes crusade preaching, as well as liturgical preaching on the cross or involving the cross, and sermons on the cross that could serve for more than one purpose.     

The Thesaurus Exemplorum Medii Aevi (ThEMA): An Introduction

Abstract

Johannes Borquardi was a priest-brother at Vadstena Abbey from 1428 until his death in 1447. He was a renowned preacher and has left three extant volumes of sermons. At the end of many of his sermons, he writes suggestions for yet another sermon on the same theme or for the same day. There are some 60 such short texts, some mentioning only one or two suitable sources, others listing many books; sometimes they even give a Vadstena shelf-mark. These texts are invaluable for our knowledge of the Abbey library in many aspects. In some cases, we can check how Johannes himself used his own suggestions, since we also have his next product for the same feast. In this paper, I have studied how Johannes used one of his 'endnotes' to compose a sermon for St Matthias by cribbing from Peregrinus de Oppeln and Guilelmus Peraldus. I hope to show just how skilfully he uses his sources and how elegantly he pastes in his quotations, so that the sermon becomes a new, consistent and homogeneous text.     

Dominican Dignitaries and Private Preaching at Papal Avignon Part I: The Sermon by Pierre de Palme (12 March 1340)

ABSTRACT

Private preaching at papal Avignon (or in general, for that matter) has yet to receive much scholarly attention, in part because the texts of private sermons are not always easy to come by. The survival of two private sermons, both by Dominican dignitaries and both delivered to the same audience (a cardinal and his familia) in the same venue during the same Lenten preaching cycle, provide an opportunity to explore the phenomenon of private preaching at the Avignonese curia. In the first article of a three-part series, I present the edited text of the sermon by Pierre de Palme, Prior of the Dominican Province of France; the second text will appear in part II, with analysis and observations in the third and final part.     

Practical Hagiography: James of Voragine’s Sermones and Vita on St Margaret of Antioch

Abstract

In addition to his exceedingly popular Legenda Aurea, James of Voragine wrote in another hagiographical genre: sermons on the saints. The Sermones de sanctis likewise became immediately popular, as his Dominican brothers used James’s model sermons to learn to preach about the saints in a format that would provide the laity with intelligible and practical theological instruction. James’s corpus gives us a rather unusual opportunity to compare the ways in which a single author manipulates multiple hagiographical genres, and his writings on St Margaret of Antioch allow us to explore how a medieval preacher used a historically disputed saint — a dragon-fighter — to provide a practical model of sanctity to his lay audience. I compare the representations of Margaret in James’s sermones and vita, arguing that James adapted certain features of Margaret’s saintly example in the vita to instruct the audience of his sermons about proper Christian virtues and actions. As a point of comparison, I explore a sermon by Évrard of Val des Écoliers in which the Augustinian teaches his audience a practical skill — how to pray — through Margaret’s example.     

Des Professionnels de la Chaire dans la France de L’?ge Classique

Starting in the 1630s, in French towns, the rise of sermons gave an increasing group of clerics the possibility to become preachers. This article analyses this process of professionalization. First, it takes a look at a number of long - and sometimes quite profitable - careers of men as preachers. Second, it analyzes the know-how that was then developed for to make and recite the sermon. Finally, the article focuses on the transformations brought about by the increasing importance of written communication during the 18(th) century.