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The Gospel of the Marriage Feast of Cana and Marriage Preaching in France*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2016

David d’Avray*
Affiliation:
University College London
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Extract

The history of attitudes to marriage is a fashionable subject and has been so for some time. This does not mean that it is an overworked subject, for the field is large enough to provide work for many labourers. A corner of it which has scarcely been touched is the development of marriage doctrine in bible commentaries and sermons, two types of source which medievalists will always associate with Beryl Smalley. This paper deals only with the second class of source, but it is nevertheless about exegesis, since the sermons which will be examined have the pericope or Gospel reading of the marriage feast of Cana as their starting-point.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1985 

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to Julia Walworth for helpful suggestions. The essay was completed during leave of absence which the Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung made possible.

References

1 Cf., for example. Love and Marriage in the Twelfth Century, ed. W. Van Hoecke and A. Welkenhuysen [Colloquium, Louvain, 1978] = Medievalia Lovanensia, series I/studia viii (Louvain, 1981); Settimane di Studio del Centro italiano di studi sull’alto medioevo 24: Il matrimonio nella società altomedievale [Spoleto, 1976] 2 vols. (Spoleto, 1977); Marriage and Society. Studies in the Social History of Marriage, ed. R.B. Outhwaite (New York, 1982) (especially C.N.L. Brooke, ‘Marriage and Society in the Central Middle Ages’, pp. 17-34, and K.M. Davies, ‘Continuity and Change in Literary Advice on Marriage’, pp. 58-80); Duby, G., Le Chevalier, la femme, et le prêtre. Le mariage dans la France féodale (Paris, 1983)Google Scholar; Stone, L., The Family, Sex and Marriage in England 1500-1800 (London, 1977)Google Scholar. Medieval preaching has also become a popular subject. For a survey of recent work see Delcorno, C., ‘Rassegna di Studi sulla Predicazione Medievale e Umanistica (1970-80)’ in Lettere Italiane (1981), pp. 235–76Google Scholar. The best introduction is Bataillon, L.-J., ‘Approaches to the Study of Medieval Sermons’, Leeds Studies in English, ns. xi (1980), pp. 1935Google Scholar. On seventeenth-century preaching see Bayley, P., French Pulpit Oratory 1598-1650 (Cambridge, 1980).Google Scholar

2 In England, however, the Gospel of the Marriage Feast at Cana seems to have been read on the third Sunday after Epiphany according to the Sarum use.

3 BN, lat. 14952, f. 24va/b: ‘A prima dominica adventus usque modo secundum consuetudinem matris ecclesie cessaverunt nuptie, quia tunc fiebat sollempnitas et memoria de regalibus nuptiis, scilicet filii dei cum humana natura, et indecens erat, sive inhonestum, rusticum, celebrate nuptias quando deus pater celebrabat (col. b) nuptias filio suo. Nunc ergo secundum consuetudinem matris ecclesie redit tempus nubendi et amplexandi. In signum huius ad instructionem nubentium hodie evangelista Iohannes proponit verba de nuptiis …’ (from a sermon by Peter of Tarentaise, O.P., on the text Nuptiae factae sunt (John, ii. 1), Schneyer, Repertorium, iv, p. 803, no. 8). Cf. the opening words of a sermon for the second Sunday after Epiphany in Clm 2702, f. 22v: ‘Nuptie fade sunt et cetera. Io. Quia hoc tempore homines maxime cogitant de nuptiis, igitur hoc modo ewangelium legitur de nuptiis …’ (Schneyer, Repertorium, viii, p. 573, no.32). Cf. also a remark by Jacques de Vitry about the times when it was forbidden to get married, cited in d’Avray, D.L. and Tausche, M., ‘Marriage Sermons in ad status collections of the Central Middle Ages’, AHDLMA, xlvii (1980), pp. 71119 at p. 112, n. 9.Google Scholar

4 On this genre see d’Avray and Tausche, ‘Marriage Sermons’.

5 Delumeau, J., La Civilisation de la Renaissance (Paris, 1967), pp. 442–4Google Scholar (my trans.).

6 Schücking, L.L., Die puritanische Familie in literar-soziologischer Sicht (Bern and Munich, 1964), p. 30Google Scholar: ‘… dem Mittelalter war die Ehe mehr oder weniger eén notwendiges Übel gewesen…’; Tavenaux, R., Le Catholicisme dans la France classique, 1610-1715 (Paris, 1980), ii, pp. 349–50Google Scholar; cf. too Stone, The Family, p. 135. Paris, C. B., Marriage in XVIIth Century Catholicism. The Origins of a Religious Mentality: the Teaching of ‘L’Ecole française’ (1600-1660) (Tournai and Montreal, 1975)Google Scholar, leaps from Augustine to Trent and the seventeenth-century ‘Ecole françhise’.

7 Sic.

8 mut or nuit MS?

9 BN, MS lat. 15946 f. 6va/b. Schneyer, Repertorium, ii, p. 759, no. 18.

10 Bériou, N. and d’Avray, D.L., ‘Henry of Provins, O.P.’s Comparison of the Dominican and Franciscan Orders with the “Order” of Matrimony’. AFP, xlix (1979). pp. 513–17, at p. 514.Google Scholar

11 Schneyer, Repertorium, ii, p. 283, no. 10. It is from his collection of Sermones de tempore et de Sanctis. For his ad status sermons to wives see d’Avray and Tausche, cited above, n.3.

12 hic MS.

13 Sic.

14 In margin with omission signs.

15 BN, MS lat. 15941 f. 83ra.

16 Molinier, E., Sermons pour tous les dimanches de l’année …, 5th ed. (Paris, 1639), i [BN call no. D. 44936], p. 226Google Scholar: ‘Les nopces sont honorables … dit l’Apostre. Dieu les a instituées dans ie Paradis terrestre. Jesus-Christ, la Vierge, & les Apostres les out honorées de leur presence, & Jesus-Christ de son premier miracle …’.

17 Cf. d’Avray and Tausche, ‘Marriage sermons in ad status collections’, pp. 92-3.

18 Prover. followed by space in MS, perhaps for chapter number. ‘Ne des fornicariis animam tuam in ullo …’ is Eccli., ix. 6, but cf. Prov., v. 2 and ff, vi. 24 ff., and xxix. 3.

19 pernotatis MS.

20 Ecc, xxxii MS.

21 BN, MS lat. 15946 f. 6vb-7ra (from sermon on the text Nuptiae factae sunt (John., ii. 1), Schneyer, Repertorium, ii, p. 759, no. 18).

22 Clm 14702, ff. xxvira-xxviira: ‘Secunde nuptie sunt sacramentales, que sunt in matrimonio carnali, et isle nuptie sunt ad literam [sic] de quibus agil presens ewangelium. Docemur autem in isto ewangelio quo modo debent iste nuptie conservari et fieri in hoc quod lesus fuit ibi vocatus. Ad hoc enim debet fieri matrimonium ut sit ibi Iesus, id est salus. Ad hoc autem quod sit ibi salus tria sunt necessaria, scilicet rectitudo intentionis in contrahendo, fidelitas in conservando, inseparabilitas in vivendo. Primo dico debet esse rectitudo intentionis in contrahendo, ut sit bonum prolis, quod fit quando intentione prolis procreande et ad cultum dei educande contrahitur, non sicut usurarii vel cupidi qui propter divitias aggregandas contrahunt. … [f. xxvi rb) … Secundo debet esse fidelitas in matrimonium contractum conservando, ut sit ibi bonum fidei. Ista autem fidelitas in iiii attenditur. Primo (prima ms.) in mutua cordium dilectione.… [f. xxviva] … Secundo consistit ista fidelitas in temporalium mutua amministratione. … Tertio (Terci MS.) consistit in mutui honoris impensione. … Quarto consistit in mutua inviolabi-[col. b] li iuris thori conservatione. … Tertio requiritur inseparabilitas in vivendo, ut scilicet sit ibi bonum sacramenti. … In talibus nup-[f. xxviira]-tiis in quibus ista tria concurrunt est Iesus …’. From a sermon on the text Nuptiae factae sunt (John, ii. 1), Schneyer, Repertorium, ii, p. 484, no. 17.

23 To borrow the phrase of Dronke, P., Poetic Individuality in the Middle Ages. New Departures in Poetry 1000-1150 (Oxford, 1970), p. 11.Google Scholar

24 Boucher, J., Sermons, ou Thresors de la pieté chrestienne, cachez dans les Evangiles des dimanches de l’année. Nouuelle édition … (Paris, 1627) [BN call no. D. 26737) pp. 56–7.Google Scholar

25 The phrase is used by Stone, The Family, p. 135, to characterize Bellarmine’s view of marriage.

26 BN, lat. 12423, f. 83rb: ‘Tamen sicut solet dici: Vinum bonum non eicit aliud bonum de domo, nec, secundum Philosophum, Bonum bono est contrarium, licet ergo virginitas et viduitas maiora bona sint, nichilominus tamen matrimonium est bonum et sanctum’ (from a sermon on the text Nuptiae factae sunt (John, ii. 1) by Odo de Castro Radulphi (= Eudes de Chateauroux), Schneyer, Repertorium, iv, p. 400, no. 78).

27 Stone, The Family, p. 135 (though it is a little unfair to use as Aunt Sally a book which is so valuable when taken as a whole).

28 Leclercq, J., ‘L’amour et le mariage vus par les clercs et les religieux’, in Love and Marriage, ed. Hoecke, Van and Welkenhuysen, , pp. 102–15Google Scholar, with further references in the notes.

29 diligit MS.

30 Clm 23385 f. 141va/b; from a sermon on the text Nuptiae factae sunt (John, ii, 1), Schneyer, Repertorium, ii, p. 535, no. 21. In this manuscript, no. 21 seems to be divided into two sermons. The second (from which this passage comes) has, confusingly, a similar incipit to the sermon which follows it in the manuscript, and also to no. 22 in Schneyer’s list.

31 For the evidence of ad status sermons on this point see d’Avray and Tausche, ‘Marriage Sermons in ad status collections’, pp. 78, 80, and 114-16. I hope to extend the discussion to the Nuptiae factae sunt genre. Van Hoecke and Welkenhuysen (eds.), Love and Marriage, and Brooke, ‘Marriage and Society’, both approach the problem from the point of view of different kinds of source. For the doctrine of the canonists, see Noonan, J.T., ‘Marital Affection in the Canonists’, in Collectanea Stephan Kuttner, ii = SGra , xii (1967), pp. 479509Google Scholar. The bibliography on courtly love is considerable: see, for example, Dronke, P., Medieval Latin and the Rise of the European Love Lyric, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 1968)Google Scholar, especially i, ch. 2.

32 Discussion with Eleanor Searle convinced me that my original antithesis between a medieval and a modern concept of love should be turned into an antithesis between two medieval concepts of it.

33 Camus, Jean Pierre, Premières Homélies dominicales (Paris, 1619) [BN call no. D. 27707], p. 66Google Scholar: ‘Ce fut Dieu qui de sa main paternelle et visible, façonna vne Conforte à nostre premier Pere, & la luy donna pour compagne, & c’est ce mesme Dieu qui de son inuisible main vous a choisi celles que vois possedez: ô Maris c’est luy qui a fait le saint noeud de vostre liaison, ô Femmes pourquoy done, ô Mariez, ne vous cherissez vous d’vn amour tout diuin, & que ne recognoissez vous l’honneur & le bon-heur que vous receuez de main liberate de Dieu en ceste association, qui vous ioint vne ayde semblable à vous, pour vous soulager és trauerses de ce mortel pelerinage’. The punctuation looks wrong. It could be emended by making ‘Maris’ and ‘Femmes’ each the end of a clause, and making ‘pourquoy’ the beginning of a sentence.

34 Sermon LV. Pour le second dimanche d’après les Rois, Sur les devoirs de personnes mariées, Quodcunque dixerit vobis, facite (Joan., II)’, Migne, J.P., Collection intégrate et universetle des orateurs sacrées, xxxii (Paris, 1853), col. 744Google Scholar: ‘Dans cette diversité d’états il y a de différentes graces, et Dieu, outre les devoirs généraux, en demande de particutiers…. Mais que faut-il aux personnes mariées? Un esprit d’amour et d’union’.

35 François Bourgoing, Homelies chrestiennes sur les évangiles des dimanches et des festes principales de l’année (etc.), (Paris, 1665) [BN call no. D. 15301] pp. 91-2: ‘… que vous suiuiez l’vn & l’autre cét aduertissement de Saint Paul; Maris, aymez vos femmes, comme Iesus-Christ a aymé son Eglise; femmes, soyez soûmises à vos maris, comme l’Eglise à lesus Christ; qu’il n’y ayt entre vous deux (p. 92) qu’vn cceur, qu’vne volonté, & qu’vne ame; sçauoir celle de Iesus’. For other texts on married love from sermons see Paris, Marriage, pp. 108-14.

36 I refer to the passage beginning ‘Il ne s’agit point seuletnent icy d’ime société apparente, mais d’une société de cœur …’, Bourdaloue, Sermons … pour les Dimanches, i (Paris, 1716), p. 61 (from a ‘Sermon pour le second Dimanche après l’Epiphanie, sur l’estat du Mariage. Nuptiae factae sunt …’, p. 61. (I use the Bretonneau version, which is defended by Landry, Jean Pierre, ‘Bourdaloue: l’Etablissement du Texte et ses Problèmes’, in Journées Bossuet. La Predication au xviie siècle. Actes du Colloque1977, ed. Goyet, T. and Collinet, J.-P. (Paris, 1980), pp. 6977, with discussion 77-9.)Google Scholar

37 Ibid., pp. 62-3: ‘… Aimez-vous d’un amour respectueux, d’un amour fidelle, d’un amour officieux & condescendant, d’un amour constant & durable, d’un amour chrestien. Tout cela, ce sont autanl de devoirs renfermez dans cette Joy conjugale, que vous vous estes promise de part & d’autre, & qui vous a unis. Prenez garde: je dis d’un amour respectueux, parce qu’une familiarité sans respect porte insensiblement & presqu’infailliblement au mépris. Je dis d’un amour fidelle, jusqu’à quiter, pour un époux ou pour une épouse, pere & mere, pttisque c’est en termes formels la loy de Dieu; mais à plus forte raison jusqu’à rompre tout autre nœud qui pourroil attacker le cœur, & à se déprendre de tout autre object qui le pourroit partager. Je dis d’un amour officieux & condescendant, qui prévienne les besoins ou qui les soulage, qui compatisse aux infirmitez, qui lie les esprits & qui maintienne entre les volontez un parfait accord. Je dis d’un amour constant & durable, pour resister aux fascheuses humeurs qui le pourroient troubler, aux soupçons & aux jalousies, aux animositez & aux aigreurs. Enfin je dis d’un amour chrestien: car c’est icy que je puis appliquer, & que se doit verifier la parole (p. 63) de saint Paul, que la femme chrestiennie & vertueuse est la sanctification de son mari’.

38 Cf. above n. 22, the passage beginning: ‘Ista autem fidelitas in iiii attenditur …’. The first of the four will serve as an example, Clm 14702 f. xxvirb/va: ‘Primo (prima MS) in mutua cordium dilectione. Eph. v [2$] Viri diligite uxores vestras. Hoc est enim unum quod summe placet deo. Eccli. xxv [1-2]: In tribus beneplacitum est spiritui [f. xxviva] meo, que sunt probata coram deo et hominibus: concordia fratrum, amor proximorum, vir et mulier, scilicet in bono, sibi consentientes. Non enim debent se inordinate diligere, quia omnis vehemens amator uxoris adulter est, initio peior quam adulter, quia de eo quod datum est sibi in remedium, facit venenum. Ad hoc enim institutum est matrimonium ut sit remedium contra incontinentiam. I. Cor. vii [9]: Si non continent, nubant. Melius est enim nubere quam uri’.

39 I have not yet found this topos in a seventeenth-century French sermon, but think it quite possible that there are cases of it awaiting discovery. Cf. (as a German case) the following passage from Bartholomaeus Wagnerus Augustanus, Homiliarum Centuria de Tempore & Sanctis Postill … (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1613) [Munich, Staatsbibliothek, call no. 2° Horn. 524], p. 93: ‘Ich will gleich den anfang machen mit dem ersten Wasserkrug darauss die boese Eheleuth trincken/durch ein vnordenliche Hausshaltung/die zwar wol inn Ehestandt tretten/nicht das sie Gottes Willen ein genuegen thetten/sondern Fleisch vnnd Blut vnd dem leiblichen Wollust koenden ausswarten/die allein betrachten vnnd vor ihnen haben den zeitlichen verdamblichen Wollust/vnd dergleichen sich im eingang boesen religiosen welche allein inn Orden begeren zukommen/das sie im zeitlichen weren benadicti, dem Leib nach durch vnddurch versorgt. Also die boese Eheleuth tretten wol in den Orden dess H. Ehestandts/aber verkehrter weiss/dann sie ein solches leben vnd wandel mit einander fuehren/das alles muss seyn der Welt nach gebenedeyt vnnd gesegnet…’ (the words not in italic are those not in Gothic print). However, in this sermon the idea evolves into something entirely different from the medieval topos, as described in Bériou and d’Avray, ‘Henry of Provins’.

40 Boucher, Sermons, pp. 53-4: ‘… au second la vie spirituelle [p. 54] qui consiste en la grace …’.

41 Molinier, Sermons, p. 229: ‘… ceux qui reçoiuent le Sacremenl du Mariage auec l’intention, & disposition requise, ils tirent de la vertu du Sacrement vne grace, & vne force, qui comme vn vin fort & puissant allege, & soulage toutes les incommoditez d’vne si pesante charge’.

42 Prosnes Catech-Evangeliques (etc.) (Paris, 1651) [BN call no. D. 15529] p. 46: ‘Et le 3. c’est la grace du Sacrement, lequel comme tous les autres Sacremens appellez des viuans, augmente la grace sanctifiante en ceux qui l’ont desia en habitude, & dauantage a vne grace speciale, comme les autres Sacremens qui ont chaqu’vne la leur. Cettegrace consiste en des assistances speciales de Dieu, par lesquelles ceux qui sont conioints par ce lien sacré, reçoiuent vne force particuliere pour supporter auec patience, les trauaux, les peines, & les sollicitudes inseparables de cét estat …’.

43 Migne, Collection intégrale, lxxxix (Paris, 1866), col. 59: ‘… les fiancés doivent prendre garde à trois circonstances de leur engagement. La première, qu’étant une condition pour toute la vie, un moyen de salut, et un sacrament qui confére la grâce; il le faut aussi trailer saintement …’. From ‘Prone VII …. De la bonne vocation au mariage, etc. Nuptiae factae sunt in Cana Galileae; vocatus est et Jesus (Joan., ii, 1.)’. (The sermon is described, col. 56, as being for the third Sunday after Epiphany, rather than the second, but this is probably a misprint.)

44 Migne, Collection intégrale, xxxii, col. 743: ‘Quels sont ses effets? l’un est général, je veux dire l’augmentation de la grâce sanctifiante; l’autre particulier, je veux dire l’infusion des grâces actuelles propres à l’élat de vie que les deux conjoints sont obligés de mener’. (from the sermon cited above, n. 34).

45 So far I have found the following. Firstly: ‘quia sciatis certissime quod magna gratia confertur in matrimonio’. BN lat. 16481 f. 87ra. (This is from a sermon on the text Nuptiae factae sunt (John, ii, 1) by André ‘de Caro Loco’, Schneyer, Repertorium, i, p. 286, no. 1. It was preached on the second Sunday after Epiphany at the church of Saint-Leufroi in 1273: cf. Bériou and d’Avray, ‘Henry of Provins’, p. 514 n. 2.) The other two writers in whom I have found the idea are Italians, who do not strictly speaking come within the scope of this essay. Aldobrandino da Toscanella O.P. may mark a turning-point, for he writes at some length about the connection between marriage and grace in two sermons of the genre under review (Schneyer, Repertorium, i pp. 225-6, nos. 46 and 48; BAV, MS Ottob. lat. 557 ff. 61rb—61va, and f. 63va/b. I am not yet certain whether he is referring to the same kind of grace as the later preachers. Remigio de’Girolami O.P. (who belongs as much to the fourteenth as to the thirteenth century), makes at least one clear reference to the grace conferred by marriage, Florence, Bibl. Naz., MS con v. soppr. G 4. 936, f. 25vb: ‘4° in aliis inuenitur vini experientia, in illis scilicet qui gustando sentiunt quod in ipso matrimonio etiam laicali confertur gratia, cum sit sacramentum nove legis’. (From a sermon on the text Deficiente autem vino (John, ii. 3), Schneyer, Repertorium, v, p. 67, no. 31). There may be other such passages in Remigio, on whom 1 have not worked systematically. There may well also be other thirteenth-century preachers who link marriage and grace. My point is that the impact of the doctrine, at least in France, is definitely small by comparison with the seventeenth century.

46 Cf.Burr, D., The Persecution of Peter Olivi = Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, ns, lxvi, part 5 (Philadelphia, 1976), pp. 45–6.Google Scholar

47 Dahmus, J., ‘Preaching to the Laity in Fifteenth-Century Germany: Johannes Nider’s “Harps’”, JEH, xxxiv (1983), pp. 5568, at p. 63Google Scholar. (Nicole Bériou gave me the reference.)

48 I have done no first-hand research on the idea of priestly vocation, but follow Tavenaux, R., Le Catholicisme dans la France classique, 1610-1715 (Paris, 1980), i, pp. 157–9.Google Scholar

49 [Jean Richard, avocat à la Cour du Parlement], Discours moraux sur les évangiles de tous les dimanches de l’année …, i (Paris, 1680) [BN call no. D. 50523], p. 225 (from his ‘Sermon pour le II. Dimanche d’après les Rois. Du mariage. Vocatus est Jesus & Discipuli ejus ad nuptias. Joan. 2…’). Cf. ibid., p. 226: “Toutes sortes de graces peuvent-elles nous meltre dans ce juste milieu, nous détoumer de ces extremitez fâcheuses, nous faire acquitter de ces devoirs? non sans doute, autres sont les graces des Ecclesiastiques, autres celles des Religieux, autres celles des Vierges, autres celles des mariez; il en faut d’immediates, de speciales, de propres à ce dernier état, & elles dependent d’une premiere qui est la grace de la vocation …’.

50 Above, nn. 36 and 37.

51 Sermons … pour les Dimanches, i, pp. 86-8.

52 Ibid., p. 93: ‘Car il vouloit que ce detachement interieur ne vous ostast rien de toute la vigilance necessaire pour la conservation de vos biens & pour l’entretien de vos families. Or de joindre l’un & l’autre ensemble, c’est ce que j’appelle la vertu heroϊque de vostre estat …’.

53 Ibid., pp. 93-4: ‘Et comment en effet, me direz-vous, atteindre à ce poind de pauvreté évangelique? A cela je vous reponds ce que repondoil JésusChrist luy-mesme sur un sujet à peu prés semblable: la chose est impossible aux hommes, mais elle ne l’est pas à Dieu. Elle est impossible à ceux qui s’ingerent d’eux-mesmes & sans la grace de la vocation dans le mariage; ou qui l’ayant cette grace, n’en font pas l’usage qu’ils doivent. Mais à ceux qui y sont fidelles, tout devient [p. 94] possible’.

54 Ibid., p. 55: ‘Or je soutiens qu’on ne peut ni satisfaire à ces obligations, ni supporter ces peines, ni se preserver de ces dangers sans la grace & la vocation de Dieu. D’où je conclus qu’il n’y a donc point d’estat parmi les hommes, où cette vocation divine soil plus necessaire’. This is the central argument of the sermon. Only at the end (ibid., pp. 94-6) does he give some words of comfort to people who have already got married without the appropriate vocation.

55 Berlin, I., ‘The Concept of Scientific History’ [first published 1960] in Concepts and Categories. Philosophical Essays (Oxford, 1980), pp. 103–42, at p. 140.Google Scholar