A MEDITATION IN SOLITUDE OF ONE WHO IS POOR

A MEDITATION IN SOLITUDE OF ONE WHO IS POOR

[MEDITATIO PAUPERIS IN SOSLITUDINE]

Anonymous Author of Thirteenth Century

[Translation of the Edition prepared by Fr Ferdinand M. Delorme, O.F.M. in 1929]

CONTENTS

Preface to the critical edition 2

Introduction 14

Part I

1 How Christ in his passion showed the highest degree of poverty 15

2 How blessed Francis wished to adopt the highest degree of Christ’s poverty 20

3 How Christ in his passion showed the highest degree of love 21

4 How Francis wished to adopt the highest degree of Christ’s love 29

5 On the praises of love and an exhortation to love 31

6 How Christ in his passion showed the highest degree of humility 40

7 How blessed Francis wished to adopt the highest degree of Christ’s humility 42

8 How it is a duty for a Lesser Brother to adopt these virtues as did blessed Francis 43

9 What it means for a Lesser Brother to adopt these three virtues in their highest

Degree 49

10 On the degrees of the virtues 57

Part II

1 John in the sixth seal 62

2 Another angel 64

3 Ascending from the rising of the sun 66

4 Of the living God 68

5 Having the seal of the living God 75

6 Called out in a loud voice 80

7 To the four angels 82

8 To whom it is given to harm 83

9 The earth 84

10 The sea 90

11 The trees 100

12 Till we sign the servants of God on their foreheads 106

Part III

1 I heard the number of those sealed, one hundred forty-one thousand 113

2 First side 117

a. Judah 117

b. Reuben 119

c. Gad 120

3 Second side 121

a. Asher 122

b. Napthali 123

c. Manasseh 125

4 Third side 126

a. Simeon 126

b. Levi 127

c. Issachar 130

5 Fourth side 132

a. Zabulon 134

b. Joseph 136

c. Benjamin 144

Abbreviations 149

English translation used 149

PREFACE TO THE CRITICAL EDITION

As far as I know this volume is the first edition of the Meditation in solitude of one who is poor [Meditatio pauperis in solitudine]. Even though I regard this work as one of the better examples of the early Franciscan ascetical literature, this outstanding tract, for what reason I do not know, has been neglected and, as it were, buried down to our own day, so that no contemporary author seems to mention it, and extremely few moderns speak of it. Hence, anxious to prepare a careful edition of the work, I collected together whatever could help one to understand its features. So something will be said about the Codices in which the work is recorded, the time of writing, the author of the book, its literary sources, and finally an overview giving a summary idea of its contents. I have tried to do this in few but adequate words so that scholars may be able to read the text with more profit. For the rest, I have used much of the material previously published by myself under the title: Elevations théologiques sur S. François l’autre ange au signe du Dieu vivant,[1] but in places I have added to this material.

1. The Codices of the Meditation

From the varied and main texts of Franciscan documents in the town library of Assisi, two concern the present work. I first studied these carefully in 1921 and also on a later occasion and this led me to realize their importance. The two documents are numbered 422 and 439.

The text of Document 439 is divided throughout with headings, sometimes having a larger capital letter to mark the beginning of a section. There are few corrections in the text and it is here referred to as Codex B...

Document 422 has 129 folia. Since it has no cover it has suffered some damage. On folia lr-60v the Breviloquium of St Bonaventure is written and on the top of folium 61a there comes immediately: ‘The meditation of one who is poor begins. I am one who sees . . .’ The whole text has been written by the one person, generally without headings, but divisions in the text are indicated by empty spaces. On the top of folium 127v a later person has written: ‘Of the truth of theology and a meditation of one who is poor by Bonaventure’ as though both works were by the Seraphic Doctor.[2] It is referred to here by the letter A...

2. When was the work written?

Sbaralea claimed, that the Meditation was written about 1270: ‘Anonymous II’, he says in the Supplementum,[3] ‘of uncertain place and time, but certainly ancient, who seems to have lived around 1270, edited the small work with this title Meditatio pauperis in solitudine which is devoted to describing and extolling through texts of sacred Scripture the poverty of blessed Francis’. However, contrary to the esteemed author, I would say that he read the work superficially or looked only at the first two folia of Codex A. On the third folium Nicholas III, who published the Bull Exiit on 15 August 1279, is expressly mentioned; on subsequent pages, as is clear to all, many things other than the poverty of St Francis are extolled.

Before Sbaralea, Bonelli[4] had already noted correctly that the mention of the Bull Exiit necessarily places the work after 1279. But in fact the words against those speaking against the Rule of St Francis illustrate this more clearly: ‘bound their mouths with a most severe bond of excommunication, as is clearly evident in the recent Decree of the Lord Pope Nicholas III[5] on the Rule of the Lesser Brothers’. If the Bull Exiit was said to be recent, clearly the work quoting it was written not long afterwards.

Can we go further and calculate more accurately the year in which the work was written? Certainly. On page 30 below, mention is made of a vision given to a certain devout friar concerning the day and the hour of the imprinting of the sacred stigmata: ‘the imprinting of those sacred stigmata was not made without a sense of immense sorrow and a strong crying out of the voice, as blessed father Francis himself revealed in a definite way to a certain devout Friar’. The name of this Friar, as is clear in the historical records,[6] was Matthew de Castilione, of the Custody of Arezzo. When he went up to mount La Verna in the month of May 1281 the circumstances of that great miracle were revealed to him in a vision of St Francis. The same records add, concerning this vision, that it was examined in an authentic form at Florence on 11 October 1282, on the order of the General Chapter held in Strasburg in 1282.

What then? On the basis of this clear evidence, the author of the Meditation heard of the vision either after the Chapter or after the inquiry. So we conclude with a degree of certainty the work was written in 1282 or 1283. Nothing further can be determined for lack of evidence.

2. Who was the author of the Meditation?

After publishing an article on the Meditation,[7] I had hoped to receive from those skilled in the literature of the Middle Ages, especially in the history of the literature of mysticism, some probable or even definitive identification of the name of the author of the Meditation. But nothing has come from these scholars to help solve the question. Since the end of Codex A is damaged and lacks the part of the epilogue in which some clue as to the identity of the author could be expected, the question for now cannot be resolved. However while I did not propose any name or a firm opinion in my article, I did investigate the question and I pursue the same inquiry here.

There is no need to prove that the author was a Lesser Brother since the whole work makes this clear. Our task is to determine who he was, his nationality, and his name. Great names have been proposed, such as St Bonaventure, Brother John Pecham who was promoted to the See of Canterbury in 1279, Friar Gilbert of Tournai who must be excluded;[8] but other writers of the end of the thirteenth century and of some significance in exploring mysticism come to mind. While not wishing to exclude others who may have more right to be mentioned, I list for now Brother John of Caulania, Friar Hugo Panziera, Friar Servasanctus, Friar Peter John Olivi and Brother Salimbene of Parma, all of whom wrote on spiritual topics.
Brother John of Caulania is the person to whom are attributed the pseudo-bonaventurian Meditationes Vitae Christi. He is indeed a pious writer, says Sbaralea,[9] but mediocre, not learned, not a theologian; he treats of practical asceticism rather than speculative mysticism, He lived and wrote in the first years of the fourteenth century or even the last years of the thirteenth century. From the Fathers he quotes continually but almost only from St Bernard.[10] I do not see any likeness between our Meditation and his work; the style of each author is so different I cannot attribute the work to him.

Friar Hugh Panziera, eloquent and a good theologian, is honoured as a missionary and also as a writer on mysticism. From zeal for promoting the faith, he set out for the East about 1307 where he is thought to have died about 1330. He wrote songs in the vernacular, letters and also treatises on the spiritual life and contemplation, in which he often took issue with the errors of the Beghards and of the sect of the free spirit.[11] I regard him as having nothing in common with the author of the Meditation, especially since in the years 1282-1283 he was young and could hardly have mastered such high doctrine.

Friar Servasanctus, whose literary merits are well known, deserves more attention. He lived from 1260 to the end of the thirteenth century and so was a contemporary of our author. He wrote many treatises, including one De virtutibus, another De exemplis naturalibus, a third De poenitentia, and a fourth; all of these, even though they are forgotten and unedited (except for the Sermons), point to an eminent writer.[12] However it is clear that he was not a scholastic or speculative writer but rather a moralist adapting teaching to the popular understanding and illustrating it by examples. Certainly his style shows no relation to the style and method of the Meditation.’[13]

The name of Friar Peter John Olivi also comes up. Noteworthy is the opinion that, in imitation of the Seraphic Doctor, he claimed that the reference in Revelation 7:2 to the angel having the sign of the living God is to be understood of St Francis’[14]: ‘It is clear that Francis is truly the angel opening the sixth seal having the sign of the living God, the sign namely of the wounds of the crucified Christ and also the sign of such a transformation and configuration of himself to Christ and in Christ. This is arrived at through a clear and trustworthy revelation, solemnly announced by Friar Bonaventure, the most eminent master of theology and one time General Minister of our Order, at the Chapter of the friars in Paris.[15]

This is the same opinion as in the Meditation; it can be added that, like the author of the Meditation, Olivi was a careful scholar of the holy Fathers. However it is clear that Olivi uses a scholastic methodology, something no one would claim for our theologian; moreover, it is unlikely that in the years 1282-1283, troubled by serious annoyances from the jealousy over disputed doctrinal questions, he could have turned his mind to writing such a book.
A few things need to be said about Friar Salimbene of Parma, famous for his Chronicle. In this work’[16] writing in the year 1284, and referring to Revelation 1:13:
‘I saw . . . one like to the Son of man’, he says of St Francis: ‘The ways that he was like Christ, however, I will not enumerate here since I have written of them elsewhere and since I need to hasten to report other matters’. This reference does not indicate that Salimbene wrote a special book on the likenesses between Christ and St Francis, but only that he has spoken on this topic in some book, and we should not restrict this to a work treating only of this topic. Having said this and given that the time of composition and the matter treated in the Meditation are sufficiently close to the language of Brother Salimbene, is this sufficient for us to close our eyes and attribute the work to him? I do not think so. Certain ideas
common to the Chronicle and the Meditation can well be attributed to two writers who lived at the same time, under the same influences, even though not in the same region.

The Meditation, therefore, is to remain anonymous, until such time as authors competent in this area make known and bring to light the mystical writings of the end of the thirteenth century. This is not impossible. When an author is capable of composing a writing of such value, it would be surprising if either before or afterwards he had not written something else,[17] even though none of his contemporaries make mention of it. Perhaps, if we pay more attention to his sources, we will be able to come to a conclusion with some degree of certainty.

3. Whom had the author of the Meditation read?

As far as distant sources such as the Bible and the holy Fathers are concerned, I refer the reader to the Appendix or to the book itself. There is surely no one who does not admire the surprising skill with which the author of the Meditation draws an abundance of arguments from these and from the Philosopher. He was certainly most learned to be able to collect so many quotations and to construct a mosaic with them. I admit however that he did not derive many of these from original texts, but rather received them through a second hand. He took some statements of Ambrose and Jerome from the Decretales of Gratian as is clear on pp. 35-36; similarly from the Defence of the Mendicants of St Bonaventure or from De perfectione evangelica of John Pecham,[18] he was able to get some quotations of Augustine, for example those from De lapsu mundi, page 103, and from De singularitate clericorum, page 96. Compilations of texts from the Fathers were available like gold mines, whose treasures were readily available to anyone zealous for sacred doctrine.

It is better for us to concentrate on more recent and contemporary sources, namely authors who lived in the thirteenth century or even in a certain region such as France. I do not refer here to the Rule of St Francis nor to the decree Exiit of Nicholas III, which the author on different occasions quotes or on which he comments. These were official texts available to everyone. I want to indicate private writers, whose teaching was more or less the basis of the Meditation, whose words the author explicitly uses, whose influence on him is closer, and who they might be. They opened the way for the author, and were present to him; hence, they surely left some traces guiding us to their region or locality.

I begin with Brother John Pecham, whose apologetics are sufficiently well known. Five treatises defending the life and Rule of the Lesser Brothers can be attributed to him. They are: 1. De perfectione evangelica, also known as Tractatus pauperis; 2. Contra Robertum Kilwardby; 3. Epistola de sandaliis Apostolorum (in the Opera omnia of St Bonventure, vol. 8 pp. 386-390); 4. Expositio super Regulam fr. Minorum (in Opera omnia of St Bonaventure, vol. 8 pp. 39 1-437); 5. Canticum pauperis pro dilecto.[19] Take special note of the works referred to in nn. 3 and 4; I hope to vindicate effectively and definitively, as soon as I can, their authenticity as works of John Pecham. The last work, that is Canticum pauperis, merits special attention because it is clearly quoted verbatim in the Meditation.

Meditation, p. 49 ; Canticum, p. 195: This is Othoniel, which means sign of my God, ‘Caleb’s younger brother’, as in Judg 1, 13; Caleb however means dog, representing the Apostles according to the Psalm: ‘the tongues of your dogs’, etc.
Meditation, p. 94; Canticum, pp. 199-200: so take care to see, hear or speak with a woman only when . . . vigils anticipated and drawn out.

Meditation, p. 103; Canticum, pp. 200-201: Despise only yourself and consider that to every person . .. for which you rightly deserve to be esteemed by people.

Meditation, p. 108; Canticum, p. 198: it prescribes not any obedience as other Rules, but that obedience which Jesus Christ our Lord took on, so that human weakness could suffer and obey the Father unto death.

Meditation, pp. 108; Canticum, pp. 198-199: Other religious are accustomed to obey within the limits of stability of place. . . namely from the source of love and the foundation of obedience.

Meditation, p. 112; Canticum, p. 196: This statement would be invalid were it not that for those professed in this way of life, to enter any other Order would be to look back and to serve God less than they have promised to do in this way of life.

Meditation, p. 115; Canticum, pp. 204-205: Three gates face the East. The first is the beginning of the way of life . . . to go among the Saracens or other unbelievers’ etc.

So here are seven texts identical in each work. Because the Canticum is dated about 1275-1277, certainly before 1279, but the Meditation about 1282-1283, one has to conclude that the Meditation, which incorporates whole passages of the Canticum, depends on the Canticum and not vice versa. Once this is agreed on, influences of the Canticum on other passages can easily be seen; for example, p. 63 on the creation of St Francis in the image of God on the sixth day; p. 68 on the bald person who used a rope instead of a sash; p. 78 on the teacher providing higher things for the higher students and lower things for the slower students; p. 81 on the office of preaching in a special chapter of the Rule; p. 95 on Gilead the summit of Lebanon with the goats moving down its slopes. See Pecham, Canticum, pp. 194, 141, 141, 187-189, 139.

As for St Bonaventure, if one looks carefully, it is clear that the author of the Meditation used not just one of his works but at least five. Hence, we can conclude that the author had the golden writings of the Seraphic Doctor before him at all times. What worthier guide could he have had for doctrine, who could be closer to him? Can it not be proposed that it is to St Bonaventure he is referring when he says on p. 78: ‘as I learnt from my genuine and worthy master’?

Indeed whenever he speaks of St Francis or refers to what he did and said, he always has in hand the Major Legend and Minor Legend of St Bonaventure, more than once quoting from them verbatim. Apart from two or three facts handed down by tradition, whatever he repeats as being from the Seraphic Doctor is indeed found there and not in Celano or any other earlier historian. See pp. 20, 30, 31, 42, 44, 46, 58, 67, 76, 78, 80, 81, 89. So I warn, it is a complete misconception to seek in the Meditation for information on the life of St Francis or evidence for theories, perhaps preconceived, about his life.

That our author relied on the commentaries of St Bonaventure Super
Sententias, ‘which are still useful and worthy to the present day’, as Brother Salimbene claimed[20] is sufficiently evident from the teaching on the work of the demons, p. 81. The style and almost the whole composition correspond to the style and formulas of the holy doctor, II Sententiarum, d. 6 a. 3 q. 2 Opera Omnia, vol. 2 p. 169. See p. 82 note 2 and p. 117 note 5.

Our author is perhaps the first person to refer to and quote from the disputed questions in De perfectione evangelica of the same Seraphic Doctor. He copied a large portion of Question 1, which is on p. 103, note 8 and p. 104, note 7. Note the modest introduction which the author gives to this quote on p. 104: ‘For the consolation of simple people like myself some things are added below, from the limits of my understanding, so as to give some knowledge of true humility as well as both its fruits and usefulness’. The words ‘added below’ serve as an indication to the quotation. Probably also, I think, he took two quotes from the body of Article 3 of Question III, one of Jerome and the other of Augustine. See p. 99, note 6, and p. 100, note 2.

However, I do not think there is any work apart from Beniamin by Richard of St Victor, of which the author of the Meditation made such use and to which he owes more than to the Collations on the Six Days; these are the wonderful discourses which in 1273 Bonaventure delivered as conferences to the whole community of the Friars in Paris, to the masters, bachelors and the one hundred and sixty Friars. The author had at hand a text of these Collations which corresponded exactly to the latest published text, but not to the edition of a German friar which is based on Codex U. V. 6 of the library in Senigaglia. Since I will soon publish an edition of this Codex, I can make a sure study of both texts. Whole passages of three of the Collations are quoted literally. So from the second Collation 2, n. 30-32 almost the whole is found on pp. 135-136 beginning with the words: ‘When the affective faculty’ and ending: ‘these are what I ask for in prayer’; from Collation 15, n. 3 the quote is noted on p. 116, note 5; from Collation 23 there are many quotes from n. 14-31 as can be seen in the Index of Sources. I think the general plan of Part II of the Meditation is drawn from numbers 2, 3 and 14 of the twenty third Collation; more will be said of this below; on the other hand the whole outline of Part III is clearly indicated in n. 15-31, but developed by the particular insight of the author with the help of Richard of St Victor.

Apart from John Pecham and St Bonaventure there occurs a third Franciscan, a poet, from whom the author of the Meditation takes two quotations. He is Brother Guido of the Marches, a companion of Hugo Egolismensis and a native of the Marches, to whom Nicholas IV sent a letter Apostolicae sedis benignitas (23 January 1291),[21] in which is said ‘he worked daily in a praiseworthy way in the Order, was skilled in letters, upright in conduct and endowed with other gifts of virtues’. For many years he developed his skills and enjoyed a certain fame in the arts.[22] There are two of his poems, one of 580 lines with the title Defensio fratrum Mendicantium[23] written about the time of the Council of Lyons (1274), but certainly before the Bull Exiit (15 August 1279) of Nicholas III. From this poem, lines 333-336 are quoted on p. 93 introduced by the formula: ‘A not unlearned writer said’; similarly the praise on p. 81: ‘there is scarcely a village … voice of the successors’, uses the words of lines 235-236.

Francis of Italy was their patron,

a poor and modest man, but holy and good;
There is hardly a village, hardly a corner of the earth,
in which there is not the authentic voice of his successors.

If to these three you add the Chancellor of Paris, a portion of whose prose is quoted on p. 45, and Adam of St Victor, two of whose lines are referred to on p. 137, we have five authors whose works are quoted; this gives me the strong impression that the Meditation was written not in Italy nor in his Province, but in France where these writers lived and wrote. There in France, their writings would have come into the hands of scholars more easily, more quickly and been better known.[24]

This impression is strengthened for me by two arguments. Firstly, when expounding the virtues of a true Lesser Brother and putting before them poverty, love and humility, which so shone in St Francis, the author never specifically touches on the thorny questions then dividing the Order in other places; secondly in Part III he included so many quotes from the book Beniamin by Richard of St Victor, a leader of theology and mysticism in Paris, that almost the whole teaching seems to be transcribed from there.

5. An overview of the whole Meditation

A concise analysis of the whole work is now given so that the arrangement of its parts, the method, and the order of the text can be understood. Since in the manuscripts the text has no index and few rubrics, it may seem to be nothing more than a forest of texts from the Bible and the Fathers. This is to miss the strong structure and the excellent teaching contained in the Meditation. On the basis of Codex B, I have inserted some titles or rubrics, as is clear in the text; although these divide up the material they are not sufficient on their own to give an adequate idea of the whole work.

The work revolves around three central ideas and can be easily divided into three parts of equal length. In the first part (pp. 15-62) the author shows the close likeness between the virtues of Christ crucified and St Francis marked with the stigmata; in the second (pp. 62-113) he shows that St Francis can fittingly be seen as the ‘other angel’ making known the sign of the living God, of which the apostle John speaks in the book, Revelation; in the third (pp. 113-148) he shows the virtues which should adorn the elect, marked by Francis, namely, his spiritual heirs, the Lesser Brothers, for the building up of the holy Jerusalem, the mystical city built in a square with twelve gates.

Part I: The first part is divided into sections as follows:

1 How Christ in his passion showed the highest degree of poverty

2 How blessed Francis wished to adopt the highest degree of Christ’s poverty

3 How Christ in his passion showed the highest degree of love

4 How blessed Francis wished to adopt the highest degree of Christ’s love

5 On the praises of love and an exhortation to love

6 How Christ in his passion showed the highest degree of humility

7 How blessed Francis wished to adopt the highest degree of Christ’s humility

8 How it is a duty for a lesser brother to adopt these virtues as did blessed
Francis

9 What it means for a Friar Minor to adopt perfectly these three virtues in their highest degree

10 On the degrees of the virtues

It should be noted that the author, using his own terms and theological principles for solving the question of the likenesses of St Francis to Christ, has directly formulated this more clearly than previous historians such as Celano and St Bonaventure, and Bartholomaeus Pisanus who, in the following century, wrote on this topic in a treatise of considerable length.[25] The author proposed a solution which draws its origin from the miracle of the stigmata which he used as the firm foundation; it is a solution which satisfies piety and reason. He says on p. 58: ‘Although, therefore, I cannot examine this from within, let me say some things from the outside in a round about way, so as to give some satisfaction from my poor abilities, and also to offer something to the wise who can consider it more deeply’.

He gives his own solution in the Meditation by establishing clearly: 1. How Christ in his passion showed especially three virtues in their highest degree, namely, poverty, love, and humility; 2. how St Francis cultivated these same virtues to perfection in his life; 3. how he merited for this reason through the imprinting of the stigmata to receive, as it were, a seal configuring and perfecting him in that likeness. This is the whole thesis. He says on p. 55: ‘The highest poverty, eminent love and the deepest humility shone out in Christ especially at the time of the passion, as has been said, and these virtues were most truly in blessed Francis . . . and wondrously transformed into the crucified Christ, as will be clearer further on’; and again on p. 62: ‘Blessed Francis, as shown above, had in the highest degree the virtues which shone forth during the crucifixion of Christ. Because the highest degree of the virtues is that they be models or likenesses of the source of virtues, it was necessary for blessed Francis to become perfectly like Christ in his passion and crucifixion’; and there follows on the same page: ‘And so blessed Francis not only in soul, but in the limbs of his body, namely the hands and feet and side, was decorated with the marks of the wounds of Christ, and so was perfectly conformed to the Crucified. See also p. 78. All these points are refined throughout Part I while at the same time the teaching on the virtues is developed in a wonderful way, especially in sections 5, 8, 9 and 10.

Part II: The second part of the work is divided into twelve sections:

1 John in the sixth seal

2 Another angel

3 Ascending from the rising of the sun

4 Of the living God

5 Having the seal of the living God

6 Called Out in a loud voice
7 To the four angels
8 To whom it is given to harm
9 The earth
10 The sea
11 The trees
12 Till we sign the servants of God on their foreheads

It is clear that this part is a continuous commentary on Revelation 7:2-3. I do not know whether there be another commentary so copious, so learned, and written with such judgment. Read it with openness, quietly, not seeking controversy, and it will become evident whether the author is a dreamer or visionary, rather than a wise exegete who, examining the text and context, controls his thoughts according to the norms of sound interpretation. Some holding other opinions have expounded various interpretations with more or less validity; but there comes to mind, whether they like it or not, the opinion of Pisanus who asserted not altogether without reason[26]: ‘Whoever would say that this figure is not blessed Francis, must demonstrate to whom the words having the sign of the living God are to be applied, since blessed Francis had the sign; when they can do this, I will believe them’. Truly golden words which remain and will remain whether the text of John be understood literally or figuratively, as some prefer to say today.

This opinion is not refuted by claiming that it comes from the Joachimites and the Spirituals, or to imply that St Bonaventure condemned it in Gerard de Burgo S. Donnini, or that it is based on a revelation attributed to St Bonaventure, or finally to claim that it is rejected by some theologians.[27] All of these claims are to be taken with much caution and do not prove anything. If the opinion had been condemned in the Joachimites, how could St Bonaventure, and with him the whole Order and the Church, have made it their own in the Major Legend and the Minor Legend, and have it read publicly and in the Divine Office? Moreover no one has ever said, other than quite gratuitously, that Bonaventure had Gerard in mind precisely with regard to this opinion. Concerning the revelation given to St Bonaventure it can be noted that better and earlier witnesses, Brother P. John Olivi[28] and Brother Ubertinus de Casali,[29] hold that the revelation was not given to Bonaventure but to others and it was only recorded and handed on by Bonaventure; it is in no way proven that Bonaventure and the witnesses just named base their opinion on such a revelation, but they record it. The theologians named who hold the contrary opinion should have been free from a partisan point of view, but they were openly hostile to the opinion; they are suspect witnesses if, indeed, witnesses at all.

So the whole teaching of the Meditation endures, supported by the names of St Bonaventure, St Bernardine of Siena, Leo X in the Bull Ite et vos (29 May 1517), and from many learned and holy people who have embraced it over the course of the centuries.[30] Again I say, read it with openness, quietly, not seeking controversy;[31] it contains nothing of dreams or visions.

In the whole third section the author describes symbolically the mystical number 144000 from every tribe of the children of Israel marked by ‘another angel.’ Israel or Jacob is Francis, the children of Israel are all the spiritual children of Francis (p. 115); the number 144000 is the number of the holy city, the new Jerusalem (p. 114); the city, built in a square, with four sides each having three gates, is the holy way of life, that is the Order of Lesser Brothers (p. 114), with a Rule of twelve chapters like the twelve gates (p. 115); the twelve gates inscribed with the names of the twelve tribes represent the twelve virtues with which the new children of Jacob, that is Francis, are marked (p. 117).

Part III: The third section is divided as follows:

1 I heard the number of those marked, one hundred forty-four thousand

2 First side

a Judah = a genuine profession of eternal truth

b Reuben = a humble veneration of the highest majesty

c Gad = a strong protection of inner holiness

3 Second side

a Asher = the main striving to be for lasting beatitude

b Naphthaii = a broad disposition of fraternal love

c Manasseh = a complete contempt for earthly possessions

4 Third side

a Simeon = an affectionate outreach of friendly pity

b Levi = a jealous uprightness of severe discipline

c Issachar = an endurance conquering earthly distress

5 Fourth side

a Zabulon = the peaceful condition of the sublime mansion

b Joseph = a clear vision of wise discretion

c Benjamin = the ecstatic excess of sweet consolation

As the outline stands, the author has taken it from the Collations on the six days by St Bonaventure, coll. 23, n. 15-31,[32] but has added his own material; however, the commentary and full explanation come from the teaching of Richard of St Victor in his work Beniamin; the mystical teaching of our author formally and clearly depends on this famous master.

6. The methodology of the Meditation

Coming toward the end of this preface I think there are still a few points about the author which should be mentioned. He is certainly a person highly skilled in theology, who ‘with flour added by the hand of Elisha’ (p. 148), was able to prepare such a deep comparison between Christ and St Francis, to discourse on the virtues so ingeniously, based On so many arguments from Scripture and the Fathers. He was no less prudent, carefully guarding against the danger of error in himself and in others. Often then he alerts the reader: ‘Do not think’ (p. 22); ‘Do not think here’ (p. 34); ‘Note however how you understand this word’ (p. 52); ‘It is not to be thought’ (p. 58); ‘I say this to you who understand in a bodily way’ (p. 59); ‘Understand however’ (p. 93); ‘See whether what has been said above’ (p. 79). He also warns the reader of Joachim: ‘You too must believe this, lest you seem to favour the condemned writing of the abbot Joachim’ (p. 7).

More than once, as the need arose, he attacks directly the errors of the Averroists condemned in Paris in 1277. Error 176, namely, that happiness is in this life, he overturns with the words, p. 60: ‘They were wrong, however, in thinking that this happiness can be had in the present life; this is clearly false’; he rejects error 157, which claims a person by reason of natural virtues is sufficiently prepared for beatitude, when he says on p. 60: ‘Virtues are not said to be given by God, but a virtuous habit is acquired by frequent acts... This is not completely true’. Lastly he opposes error 144, that every good consists in intellectual virtues, with the following, p. 135: ‘Clearly then, it is wrong to say that every happiness is in the mind, as some have said who are unlearned and caught up in things existing’.
He often refers to himself and in doing so makes his intention to write correctly even more evident: ‘I do not think’ (p. 21); ‘I think the meaning is’ (p. 64); ‘Here I think it should be noted’ (p. 70); ‘I think that each of these points is to be pondered’ (p. 66); ‘I believe without any doubt’ (p. 30); ‘I consider it most important to decide’ (p. 73); ‘I believe it is no other, I understand it to be no other’ (p. 45); ‘And I heard from my seniors’ (p. 30); ‘as I learnt from my genuine and worthy master’ (p. 78); ‘I believe, given the dullness of my understanding, I could not be of service in this but, rather, I would be found wanting. However I draw your attention’ (p. 113). At other times he writes with more feeling: ‘I dare to add that’ (p. 34); ‘I dare to say that the saying is realized in them’ (p. 38); ‘But I boldly deny this, I always refute it’ (p. 66); ‘throughout the entire world, is still heard and, I dare to say, will be heard’ (p. 80); ‘if you do not believe me, ask the Jews’ (p. 81); ‘If you do not believe me, I can prove this copiously from sacred Scripture’ (p. 98). He faced opposition: “We can understand this text in another way because of those who oppose it’ (p. 75). All of these expressions, if they have any meaning at all, indicate a significant attempt to examine opinions and to express them in appropriate language. If he could not say more, he at least was able to say with confidence: ‘Think carefully, note the words, recognize the mysteries’ (p. 64); he applied this advice to himself first.

He was moreover a person of great zeal among his brothers. The whole book is for them. He defends the Rule (p. 18) and often interprets it, dwelling so admirably on the virtues contained in it. He says on p. 58: ‘I offer all I have said and will say to the praise and honour of our Lord Jesus Christ and of our father blessed Francis and of all the holy Lesser Brothers who have been, are, and will be’ and he does this ‘to give some satisfaction from my poor abilities’ (p. 58). In another text, while commending humility, he says: ‘For the consolation of simple people like myself some things are added below’ (p. 104).

Sometimes he speaks directly to the reader: ‘You, therefore who, believing in faith, understand the cross of the Lord in this way’ (p. 18); ‘Reflect, therefore, whoever you are, whether you can understand’ (p. 57); ‘Who then are you … Who are you’ (p. 43); ‘You therefore, who call yourself a Minor’ (p. 55); ‘Those should pay most attention to this who’ (p. 89); ‘So you who profess this Rule should note’ (p. 108); ‘But make it your principal care, your diligent watchfulness, to be what your name implies, namely a Friar Minor’ (p. 55); ‘You therefore, whoever you are, who call yourself a Lesser Brother, if you are truly a minor, that is genuinely humble, be as was blessed Francis’ (p. 43); ‘You then, who belong to his army, be especially careful’ (p. 78). These texts indicate a style and writing directed at the living.

It has been argued in what precisely consists the authentic Franciscan spirit;[33] in this discussion the question arises as to what was the genuinely characteristic virtue of St Francis, the virtue which is to be imitated by his followers and which distinguishes them from other religious. Some point to poverty, some to zeal for souls, some to devotion to the Crucified, others proclaim I do not know which virtue. The author of the Meditation proposed his own clear solution some six centuries ago. According to him, St Francis cultivated to the highest degree the three virtues which he saw as most evident in the suffering Christ, virtues by which he merited to be likened to Christ through the stigmata: poverty, love and humility. One can be a spiritual child of Francis to the degree that one possesses these three virtues making one like to him and, through him, to Christ (pp. 49-57). By these virtues the children of St Francis are named ‘poor Lesser Brothers’; this is their proper name, this is their definition.[34] In this sense John the Baptist ‘in truth was a lesser brother’ (pp. 52 and 64), and Paul: ‘he, dare I say it, showed himself to be a minor’ (pp. 146 and 142), and even Christ: ‘This Order has to belong to Christ by a special title, for he is its beginning, author and origin, since he in truth was the first and true lesser brother according to the perfection of the previously mentioned virtues, which shone out in him in a most perfect way’ (pp. 48 and 54). Certainly, it follows from what has been said, that the new Elisha has cooked for us, not a tasteless or harmful stew, but one sweetened in a healthy way and full of the knowledge of the saints (p. 148). My conclusion, therefore, is the theme of the whole Meditation,[35] the truth which the author proposes in the beginning of the book (p. 15) and which I ask the well intentioned reader to meditate with me: ‘It is the main teaching, the first philosophy, the highest theology, and in understanding and possessing it, is the perfection of Christ which is based primarily in poverty’.

P. Ferdinand M. Delorme, O.F.M.

Quaracchi, 28 March 1929.

A MEDITATION IN SOLITUDE OF ONE WHO IS POOR

INTRODUCTION

‘I am one who sees my poverty’ (Lamentations 3:1).[36]

The admirable, the more than admirable lady poverty is put before us, on whom not all are able to look, certainly not one who is a child in understanding needing milk, but one who is an adult who, having become virtuous, can be given solid food. ‘For every one who lives on milk, being still an infant, is unskilled in the word of righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, for those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good from evil’,

as Paul says in Hebrews 5:13-14. ‘As one taken from the breast[37] who plays over the hole of the asp,[38] such should be the weaned child who shall put its hand on the adder’s den’. This is truly what one does who professes evangelical poverty, one who makes ‘the earth full of the knowledge of the Lord’, as written in Isaiah 11:9. For no one can reach perfection unless ‘the partial comes to an end’, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:10. When he was made a preacher of the Gospel, he added what follows immediately in the test: ‘When I was a child, I spoke like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways’. For to ‘whom will’ the Lord ‘teach’ Gospel ‘knowledge and to whom will he explain the prophetic message?’ Surely ‘those who are weaned from milk, those taken form the breast’, as stated in Isaiah 28:9. Such should not be ‘children tossed to and fro’ so that they are ‘blown about by every wind of doctrine’, as the Apostle says in Ephesians 4:14.

I am one

Not even all these are able to take hold of this perfection, but one alone, as stated by the wonderful prophet Jeremiah[39]: I, he says, not another. It is not to be thought that see here refers to the bodily eye, as this would not be singular. All the ‘wise’ and the ‘fools, humans’, namely, ‘and animals’[40] use the bodily eye, and are able to see; but ‘seeing’ here means understanding. And so a husband who, according to the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 11:3, ‘is the head of his wife’, signifies the top of the body intent on ‘contemplating things eternal’ as Augustine says in The Trinity.[41] Whoever truly acknowledges poverty, ‘ought not to have his head veiled, since he is the image and reflection of God’; who contemplating heavenly things seeks the ‘things that are above, not on things that are on earth’.[42] But whoever loves the glory of the world, bearing the likeness of Caesar, is certainly unable to understand the poverty of Christ because the head is covered.

Who sees

If you ask what is this head, listen to the Apostle in the same text[43]: ‘Christ’, he says, ‘is the head of every man’. Their extreme poverty which has ‘overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part’, as he says in 2 Corinthians 8:2, can only be seen by the attention of a penetrating mind. Does not what makes a person blessed, seem most high to you? The Lord says: ‘’, Matthew 5:3; and blessed is the one who understands this, on the testimony of the Psalm[44] which says: ‘Happy are those who consider the poor’, that is, Christ who is truly our poverty, as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 8:9: ‘For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich’.

My poverty

Therefore, one can understand and contemplate our poverty, which is so high and venerable, and praised by the prophet Jeremiah[45] in the words already quoted. To understand this is not a trifling thing but the highest wisdom; hence the letter put before this verse is Aleph, which means teaching.[46] It is the main teaching, the first philosophy, the highest theology, and in understanding and possessing it, is the perfection of Christ. So he says my, that is, I see it in myself. But what benefit is it for you to understand that Christ was poor for you, unless you see his poverty in yourself so that you too become poor for him?

Our blessed Father Francis strove to understand this poverty with the complete attention of his mind, longing to hold it with all his affection, reaching for it with every struggle and most careful effort; this he used as the deepest foundation for his Rule, this he put before his followers as something to be observed, this he left to his heirs as an inheritance in law and a lasting possession. Although this poverty has several degrees upon which various Orders are founded, he, however, took it to himself in its highest and most perfect degree.

PART I

HOW CHRIST IN HIS PASSION SHOWED THE HIGHEST DEGREE OF POVERTY

Interpretation of the letter Thau

Christ showed during his passion all the virtues to their highest degree, when, as the ‘exalted right hand of the Lord’, he acted ‘valiantly’.[47] For if, according to the Apostle in 2 Corinthians 12:9: ‘power is made perfect’ above all ‘in weakness’, then Christ raised on the cross, showed his weakness in an extreme way; here he was ‘accounted’ as one ‘stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted’, and there he, abandoned by his God, ‘cried out with a loud voice’,[48] and at this point truly perfected all virtues when he said: ‘It is finished’. John 19:28-30: ‘After this, when Jesus knew that all was finished, he said: ‘I am thirsty’; when Jesus had received the wine he said: ‘It is finished’. Then he bowed his head, and gave up his spirit’.

And so Thau, the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, representing an image of the cross of Christ,[49] represents also the fulfilling of the whole Old Testament; the books of the Old Testament contained in the Canon are numbered according to the letters of the Hebrew alphabet, as Jerome says in Prologus Galeatus.[50] Thau, therefore, the last letter shows the fulfilling of all things ‘written in the laws, the prophets and the Psalms’[51] about Christ. So Thau is understood as fulfilment. On the cross Christ, who is the end of the law for everyone who believes’, Romans 10:4, fulfilled all things, just as he said when giving proof after the resurrection to the unbelieving disciples, Luke 24:25-27: ‘O how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?’ Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the Scriptures’, so as to show exactly that all things were to be fulfilled in his passion.

In the brightness of the saints

The day of the passion of Christ is called ‘the day you lead your forces’, on the evidence of David[52]: ‘your people will offer themselves willingly on the day you lead your forces’, that is to say, although you may cry out that you are abandoned by God, although you may commend your spirit into the hands of the Father, yet the divinity which is the source of all things, and the Father also, who is the source of the Godhead itself, were with you unable to leave you because the Father abides in the Son and the Son in the Father. So there follows[53]: ‘from the womb of the morning like dew, your youth will come to you’. The Father is speaking to the Son ‘from the womb’, that is, from his nature, his substance, from within the innermost parts of the divinity. Such is the teaching of Jerome in a homily.[54] You too must believe this, let you seem to favour the condemned writing of the abbot Joachim.[55] Jerome adds in the same place: ‘Christ spoke in a human way, he did not ask out of weakness; in him was the beginning, the divinity; but he asked for help, so that when it was given he might give it to his saints who could then shine forth’.

And that is what is called the brightness of the saints.[56] The crucifixion of Christ is truly the splendour of the strength of the Saints. So Habakkuk 3:4 says: His ‘brightness was like the sun’, a light, namely, ‘which enlightens everyone’.[57] When? Hear what follows[58]: ‘Rays came forth from his hand, where his power lay hidden’. ‘Rays’, however, in ‘the hand’ of Christ, are nothing else than the arms of his cross, where his ‘hidden power’ makes all holy people resplendent in virtues. For this reason the Church sings in the antiphon of the cross[59]: ‘O cross more resplendent than all the stars of the universe!’

The poverty of the living God

While Christ lived in human flesh, he was a ‘stranger in the land, like a traveller turning aside for the night’, as is said in Jeremiah 14:8, and did not have a place of his own ‘to lay down his head’, as he himself testifies in Matthew 8:20. Even though ‘he came to what was his own, his own people did not accept him’.[60] ‘In no way did he have a home, nor even a single palm tree in a place of refuge, not a shoot of a vine, or an extra garment, and he lived in every detail as one from the crowd of poor people,’ as Damascene says in the book De Philoretis.[61] However, he could not be destitute of everything. He had the clothes made by his mother, and purses for use in times of necessity; in appearance he was as one frail so as ‘not to condemn the ways’ of the weak, as he sometimes showed in fleeing.[62] But at the time of the passion he had nothing at all being completely stripped and naked. On the evidence of the Gospel story,[63] the soldiers who crucified him, took his clothes and divided them among themselves, but for the tunic woven in one piece, made by the hands of the blessed Virgin, they cast lots, not daring to divide it. The tunic is the symbol of the bond of love and the unity of faith, which then continued only in the blessed Virgin. On the cross, Christ had only what he had received from the body of his Mother. So he could truly say: ‘Woman, here is your son’, John 19:26.

The poverty of the suffering Christ

Christ wanted especially to entrust this poverty to us. Lamentations 3:19 says: ‘The thought of my affliction and my homelessness is wormwood and gall’, namely, the poverty which was mine when, in the time of the bitter passion, I was made the transgression, that is, sin and curse on your behalf, as indicated by the wormwood and gall. So Galatians 3:13 says: ‘Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us – for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”’; for ‘him who knew no sin’ God the Father ‘made him sin’ for us, so ‘that in him we might become the righteousness of God’, as the Apostle says in 2 Corinthians 5:21. The letter put before this verse is Zayin, meaning ‘go you as far’, that is, come to this degree of poverty, if you wish to be perfect and imitate Christ and be perfectly assimilated into him.

Of the chariot of the apostle Philip

Note also what is said in Acts 8:29: ‘The Spirit’, said to Philip, “Go over to this chariot and join it”’. Philip means ‘the mouth of the lamp’. This is the lamp of which ‘its flashes are flashes of fire’ and flames, namely, a strong and fervent love of Christ, which ‘many waters’ even of tribulation ‘cannot quench nor floods’ of persecution ‘drown’, because ‘love is strong as death’, for which one despises as nothing all one’s possessions, as Song 8:6 says. This is that ‘fire’ of ‘fierce passion’,[64] which, as stated in Proverbs 30:15 ‘never says ‘”enough”’, until it reaches the perfect and final end because passion is as fierce as the grave.[65]

What, therefore, is this chariot which the Spirit orders Philip to reach and mount as if for his own need and perfection? Perhaps this is that ‘chariot of fire’ which carried Elijah and from which he threw off his mantle, as related in 2 Kings 2:11-13. In this chariot is being read how Christ ‘like a sheep was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth’, Acts 8:32. I can think here of no chariot other than the chariot of the Lord drawn by four beasts, namely, the cross of Christ on which like a sheep he was immolated and like a lamb was shorn and stripped naked. This is the ‘splendid chariot’ of the Lord and ‘the disgrace of the master’s house’, as stated in Isaiah 22:18 because ‘the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God’, 1 Corinthians 1:18; because as Paul says in the same place: ‘We proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called both of Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God’.[66] You see, the only chariot of the glory and ignominy of the Lord is the cross of Jesus Christ; here is written, here is read: ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews’.[67]

Of the chariot of the king of Israel

This is the chariot spoken of in 1 Kings 22:35: ‘The king was propped up in his chariot facing the Arameans’, and wounded by the archers, died in the ‘evening’. Our king is the Lord Jesus, hangs on his cross facing the demons and is wounded by the archers, namely, by those Judaeans: ‘Who whet their tongues like swords, who aim bitter words like arrows, shooting from ambush at the blameless; because of their tongue he will bring them to ruin; they shoot suddenly and without fear they hold fast to their evil purpose, shouting: “Crucify, crucify him’.[68] So it is said in Jeremiah 9:8: ‘Their tongue is a deadly arrow, it speaks deceit. He died in the evening’,[69] that is, as the world comes to its evening, or because as he dies ‘the sun’s light failed’[70] and it was evening; hence in 2 Chronicles 18:34 it is said about him that at ‘sunset he died’.

The cross, the chariot of Christ

The Lord’s cross is the chariot which Philip is asked to reach if he wishes to be perfect and complete in virtue. So Augustine in a sermon[71]: ‘Christ wanted to have nothing, and yet a person has everything who comes to the cross for the sake of him who, naked and crucified, had his bones numbered by those insulting him’. And Jerome, in the letter to Heliodorus[72]: ‘The perfect servant of Christ has nothing other than Christ; the servant who has anything other than Christ is not perfect’. In no other place was Christ killed ‘like a sheep, and like a lamb silent before its shearer’, than on the cross where ‘the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world’ was offered, as he so wished, and he did not open his mouth’;[73] when robbed and stripped by those crucifying him he did nothing to resist nor did he object in words to show that the highest poverty must be accompanied by true patience.

Against the opponents of poverty

You, therefore who, believing in faith, understand the cross of the Lord in this way, be careful to imitate it in deeds, otherwise there will be said of you what Philip said to the eunuch, Acts 8:30: ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ Many today who ponder this poverty of the cross of the Lord, are boastful; they imagine, because of their knowledge and piety, that they understand it perfectly; but they show themselves unable to understand it correctly, because they neither have this highest poverty, nor wish to imitate it; and, what is more dangerous for them, they pull down with vindictive barking those who imitate it and wish to embrace it perfectly. Ravens are animals of a kind prohibited by the law of the Lord, Leviticus 11:15, because they are unclean and lacking in affection. This is clear in that the first raven released by Noah from the ark, busy with things outside, did not return into it.[74] Judas is like a raven. When give the title ‘apostle of the Lord’, he stood out against his master and Lord as one ‘far more zealous’ for the poor, not that he ‘cared about the poor, but because he was a thief and kept the common purse’, as stated in John 12:6. Hence the holy Roman Church, whose special care is for the poor of Christ, no longer able to put up with these poisonous bites, bound their mouths with a most severe bond of excommunication, as is clearly evident in the recent Decree of the Lord Pope, Nicholas III,[75] on the Rule which is genuinely for the poor of Christ, the Rule of the Lesser Brothers.

Christ is the true Noah

Ham, one of the children of Noah, received the curse of his father for laughing at his nudity which a younger brother reverently covered, as related in Genesis 9:23. Ham could not be cursed because he had been blessed by the Lord ‘for God blessed Noah and his sons’;[76] Noah would not have dared to curse one whom the Lord had not cursed. The Noah who alone is righteous and blameless[77] is Christ. Noah means rest since at his birth his father said in Genesis 5:29 in the Septuagint text: ‘This one will give us rest from our labours, whereas our translation has: this one shall bring us relief from our work and from the toil of our hands’. By no means did Noah himself give consolation or rest for in his lifetime the anger of God in the waters of the flood spent its fury against the human race; he also was the one to build the ark by which God ‘condemned the world’, as Hebrews 11:7 says. But the true Noah says in Matthew 11:28-29: ‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest