Alexander Street: Religion

Papasellus

I noticed that the History blog here at Alexander Street Press put up some political cartoons.  I noticed because they were strutting around the office bragging about it for weeks afterward.  Well, now it's time to show them that we have political cartoons too, except that ours are hundreds of years old and require paragraphs of explanation.  That'll show 'em.

What we have here is what you'd call an allegorical representation of the Catholic Church.  I don't know who drew it, but it's found in Martin Luther's Miscellaneous Writings, 1523-1524.

See the flag with the crossed keys in the top left corner?  That's how you know this is about the Papacy.  Anyway, a helpful guide to the puzzling symbolism is included.  I summarize:

• The head is a donkey's because it represents the Pope, who is head of the church.  The implication is clear.
• "The right hand is similar to an elephant's foot, signifying the Pope's spiritual authority, with which he overpowers and destroys all terrified and fragile souls."
• "The left hand is a man's, which signifies the civil power of the Pope, even though Christ clearly forbade this."  This is explained as having something to do with the Devil.  I don't know if there's a theological equivalent of Godwin's Law, but I'm guessing this would be it.
• "The right foot is a cow's hoof, which signifies the ministers of the spiritual authority, who like pallbearers support and sustain the papal regime in the oppression of souls."  Why a cow?  He doesn't say.
  
• "The left foot is similar to a griffin's which signifies the ministers with civil power." "For just as griffins grab what they want with their claws and don't easily give up, so do these papal cronies seize the goods of all Europe with their canonical talons."  Leading cryptozoologists inform me that that's exactly what griffins do, so the story checks out.
• "The stomach and chest are a woman's, signifying the body of the Pope, i.e., the cardinals, bishops, priests, monks, and other holy men, martyrs, and that type similar to pimps and a well-stuffed herd of Epicurean pigs . . ." After this is gets pretty nasty.  I'm not even going to leave it in Latin.  Suffice it to say that the author believes that the behavior of the clergy is wanting.
• "The fish scales that cover the arms, legs and neck . . . represent princes and lords.  For in Scripture the sea signifies the world, and fish represent worldly men, just as Christ himself represented St. Peter with a net in Matthew 4 when he said: 'I will make you fishers of men.'"  We're almost done.  Just a couple more to go.
• "The old man's head by the hip signifies the decline, the old age, and the death of the Pope's reign."  This is cheating, if you ask me.  Up until this point, the Popemonster has at least had only body parts that real people have.  Giving it a head on its hip is making it hard for me to suspend my disbelief.
• "The dragon looking out from the rear end of the monster, threatening a torrent of flame from its open maw, represents the threats, insults and horrible bulls as well as the hateful writings which the Pope along with his cronies vomits over the whole world."  This isn't realistic either, but it's cool enough that I don't mind.

It's not exactly thoughtful discourse.  But thoughtful discourse lends itself neither to hilarious caricatures nor to punchlines.

Cadaver Synod

The late 9^th and early 10^th centuries were tough times for the Papacy. The office was a tool in the Machiavellian arsenals of various political leaders, and the so-called “Pornocracy” saw . . . wait, this is getting us away from the point here: corpse on trial!

In 891, the Holy See was entrusted to one Formosus. The fact that his name means “Good-Looking” puts him on my very select list of Awesomely-Named Popes, along with Sixtus V and Lando. Formosus’ papacy isn’t as interesting as his post-papal career, which coincided with his post-being alive career. Stephen VI, who took the job after a brief reign by a non-entity named Boniface, thought some things needed to be set straight, specifically the fact that Formosus was bishop of Portus at the time of his election, which should have disqualified him from another bishop job. I quote Caesar Baronius quoting Luitprand of Cremona (the translation is mine and terrible):

With this decided, [Stephen], so impious and so ignorant of holy doctrine, decided to drag Formosus from his tomb and to set him up on the Papal seat dressed in his priestly vestments. And to him he said: ‘When you were Bishop of Portus, why did you with ambitions spirit usurp the universal Roman See?’ This done, [Formosus] was straightway stripped of his sacred vestments, and three fingers, with which it was his custom to bless, were cut off. They threw him headlong into the Tiber, and all those whom he ordained were relegated to their previous positions.

The world had to wait until 1870 for a heavy metal album cover-worthy depiction of the Cadaver Synod, when Jean-Paul Laurens obliged.

Formosus’ defense is not recorded here, although it is said in other sources that when Stephen asked his question, a young cleric kneeling behind Formosus’ seat responded, “because I was evil.” That’s the kind of thing that would get a conviction overturned on appeal these days, and that’s more or less what happened with Formosus. A monk fished his body out of the Tiber, and he was buried again in St. Peter’s. At some point the church decided that Formosus was OK, and now Stephen’s the bad guy. Which just goes to show you.

Prester John

Speaking of people called John who never existed: Prester John! This John was a mighty Christian king who ruled . . . well, it depends on whom you ask. Maybe it was in India. Or maybe it was in Mongolia. Or maybe it was Ethiopia. The important thing is that there were too many miles and too many infidels for anyone you’d run into to have ever been there, so who’s going to prove you wrong if you say the place is full of fire lizards and Nestorians?

By the time of the Reformation, the story’s settled down a bit. It seems that the closest thing anyone could find to the legendary kingdom of Prester John was Ethiopia, which was A) Christian and B) cut off from the rest of Christendom by Islam. Apparently the Abyssinians were somewhat taken aback by the European insistence on addressing their king as “Prester John” – it was the first time any of them had heard of it, but that didn’t stop diplomats and cartographers from throwing the name around.

"A Description of the Empire of Prester John, or of the Abyssinians"

In our databases, John and his now non-mythical country serve a variety of rhetorical purposes. Nicolas Caussin tells us to mind our own business:

There are of them who are much disquieted with matters which little concern them, they are curious to know all that passeth in the world in the Indies, in Japonia: How many elephants the great Mogull keeps; who is to succeed the King of China in his Empire; whether the great Turk armeth; whether the Persian stirreth, and what forces Prester John hath for the preservation of his state.

Thomas Harding throws it into a list of places where the gospel has been preached, many of which, you'll notice, have not yet had their spellings standardized.

As we boast not with you, so we render praise and glory to God against you, for that he hath spread the knowledge of his name so farre abroad in the farthest partes of the worlde, where the faith was not heard of before by those catholic preachers, in Peru, in the kingdom of Ignamban, which lieth in the south coaste of all Africa beyond the dominions of Prester John, in the kingdom of Monopotapa, in the great kingdom of Cambaia which lieth about Calicut, in the great Island of Giapan, in the maine countries of Cina and Tartaio which lie farthest east, in the kingdom of Bisnaga about Ganges, in the famous Island Taprobana, in the Island Ormuz lying in Sinu Persico.

Augustin Marlorat, who wrote before the spelling of anything was standardized, mentions John as the kind of monarch who isn’t going to listen to any pope.

Even so there is nothing that can suffise the Popes ravenousness: no not even Peters patrimony, nor Constantines gifte, nor yet all the Spiritualties which he hathe intruded upon, are in any wise inough for him, but that he daily coineth newe feates out of Satans forge, whereby too heape riches upon riches. Also he hathe a Lions mouth, whereby he vanteth himselfe too be Lorde of the City and of the whole worlde. And yet Prester John in the upper and nether Indies: All Greece and Araby, and finally all the East Churche knoweth well inoughe, yea and it is not unknowen too us also, that the Pope lieth moste loudly in this point.

There’s plenty more where this came from; this is only a fraction of the results returned for a simple, English-only search for “Prester John.” There are passages where he’s condemned as a heretic. There are authors who use his example to argue for translating the Bible into vulgar tongues. There are authors who use his example to argue against it.  It's not like he's going to complain either way, right?

The story's too good to die.  Umberto Eco recently wrote a novel involving a quest for John's kingdom (I didn't like it very much).  Amazon's full of fiction and non-fiction about him.  And there's even a comic book character based on him.  Legend-wise, that's when you know you've really made it.

Pope Joan

While working on Caesar Baronius' Annales Ecclesiastici (soon to be added to the Digital Library of the Catholic Reformation), I was surprised to find mention of Pope Joan.  Joan was, according to legend, a woman who managed to hide her sex so effectively that she got herself elected Pope in the ninth century.  The story, which arose some 150 years after Joan was installed, gave rise to a plethora of related myths.  For example, before assuming the throne, a new pope would have to submit to a careful inspection, which if successful was greeted with a cry of "Testiculos habet et bene pendentes!"

Baronius spends a good three-plus pages in his entry for AD 853 refuting this "inanis fabula," as he calls it. The blame is laid the at the feat of an ecclesiastical historian named Marianus Scotus (the first guy here), "asserts most falsely and indeed most stupidly that after the death of Pope Leo a woman called Joan [Ioanna] was elected, who sat for two years, five months, and four days."  Boronius goes on to trace the story's development through the writings of other malicious or merely credulous chroniclers while proclaiming its impossibility.

The story was so popular it even made it onto a Tarot card.

But everyone loves a good story, especially one this juicy (in some versions Joan gets pregnant while in office), and it needed debunking, as it was apparently widely believed for centuries.  We could be seeing a revival of the saga of Pope Joan even now: they're making a movie about it in Austria, which is itself a remake of a quarter-century old Finnish production.