Old Testament Narratives

350 Pages·2011·8.59 MB·English

by  Daniel Anlezark

Old
Testalllent
Narratives
Edited and Translated by
DANIEL ANLEZARK
'DUMBARTON OAKS
J{EDIEVAL oQ}RARY
HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS
CAM BRI DGE, MAS SAC HU SETTS
LONDON, ENGLAND
20 II
Contents
Introduction Vl1
GENESI S I
EXODUS 205
DANIEL 247
AZARI AS 301
Appendix JI7
Note onthe Texts JI9
Notes tothe Texts 121
Notes tothe Translations 325
Bibliography 333
Index 337
v
Introduction
The five Old English poems edited and translated in this
volume survive intwo separate manuscripts. The first four-
GenesisA, GenesisB, Exodus, and Daniel-are found inJunius
XI in the Bodleian Library, Oxford; Azarias is found in the
Exeter Book.' Another poem inJunius XI, Christ and Satan,
was added to the manuscript in the decades after the Old
Testament narratives were copied.2 BothJunius XI and the
Exeter Book date from the latter part of the tenth century
and were copied at a time when the Anglo-Saxons took a
great interest in their culture's poetic tradition. The authors
of these poems are not known, nor are the original dates of
composition. In the centuries between the renewed interest
in Anglo-Saxon literature during the Reformation and the
development of modern philology in the nineteenth cen-
tury, it was believed that the Anglo-Saxon cowherd Cced-
mon, whose story istold in Bede's Ecclesiastical History, 3had
composed these works. Ccedmon was in the employ of the
great Anglo-Saxon monastery atWhitby in the late seventh
century, where, asaresult ofhis reluctance to join in singing
with others at alate-night party, he received both an angelic
vision and a divine poetic inspiration. When he was pre-
sented to the Abbess Hild, she recognized the gift, accepted
him as a monk, and had him instructed in the scriptures
and doctrine. The resulting corpus of biblical poems-
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INTRODUCTION
apparently still familiar two generations later-were, ac-
cording to Bede, the first to incorporate Christian subject
matter into Old English alliterative verse.
While the Exeter Book has been kept at Exeter Cathe-
dral since it was donated by Bishop Leofric in 1072, we do
not know the exact whereabouts ofJunius XI before 1651,
when it was given byJames Ussher, archbishop of Armagh,
to the Dutch scholar FranciscusJunius.Junius published the
first edition of all the poems in the manuscript in Amster-
dam in 1655, with the traditional attribution to C:rdmon;
the "C:rdmon manuscript" became Junius XI when it was
bequeathed by him to the Bodleian Library.4 The attribu-
tion to C:rdmon was current until Benjamin Thorpe's edi-
tion of 1832,after which scholars established, on avariety of
linguistic and stylistic grounds, that the poems could not
have been written by one author, although critical opinion
continues to favor an early date, probably before 800.5 The
one exception is GenesisB, which probably dates from the
tenth century.
The Old Testament portion ofJunius XI was designed to
be illustrated and presents the poems asacontinuous narra-
tive in numbered sections. However, the cycle of illustra-
tions isincomplete, and not allthe poems' sections (or fitts)
have their numbers. Invarious places pages are missing from
the manuscript, disrupting the text. The first of the poems,
logically enough, isGenesisA. The author's treatment isgen-
erally faithful to the course of the biblical narrative, with
a tendency to eliminate repetitive passages. The poet also
augments the story with material dr~wn from apocryphal
sources, most notably concerning Lucifer's rebellion and
the fall of the angels, which are not found in the book of
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INTRODUCTION
Genesis. Other additions to the narrative derive from the
biblical commentary tradition and commonplace medieval
interpretations of certain episodes. At times t.hepoet's han-
dlingofemotionally charged moments - such asCain's mur-
der ofAbel and Abraham's expulsion of Hagar and Ishmael
-suggests an interest in the characters' psychology beyond
their theological import. Both in these additions and in the
rendering of the Latin text, the poet fully incorporates the
Old English heroic idiom, which serves to emphasize and
draw out the martial aspect of the biblical source. The open-
ing section of the poem (1-14) lauds the creator and closely
echoes the preface to the Canon of the Mass, areminder for
the modern reader that the medieval reader was most likely
to encounter the Bible as a collection of texts used in the
liturgy; the idea of the Bible as asingle book was unknown.1>
In fact, it seems most likely that the structure of the Old
Testament narrative and the selection of texts inJunius XI
were guided by the series of readings set down for the Eas-
ter Vigi1.7Junius XI is itself the earliest example in the En-
glish language of a continuous narrative drawn from books
spread widely across the Old Testament, and as such has an
important place in the historical development both of the
idea of the Bible as abook and of the Bible in English.
The narrative proper begins with an account of the fallof
the angels-Lucifer's envy and arrogance are answered by
God's anger and fury.The reason for the creation of the hu-
man race emerges in this context, as the thrones of heaven
vacated by the fallen angels must be filled; this idea draws
on a medieval theological commonplace. The poem often
explains motivation where this is not found in the biblical
original. The sixdays of creation are described (103-2°5), al-
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INTRODUCTION
though the passage is curtailed by the loss of Old English
text. The creation is followed by a description of the four
rivers flowing from Eden (206-34), after which the text is
disrupted, probably by the loss of manuscript leaves. When
it resumes, it does so abruptly midsentence, and in the in-
terpolated GenesisB, which is discussed below: The transi-
tion back to GenesisA issosmooth at the narrative level that
it reveals the work of an editor splicing the two texts to-
gether. The action resumes with God's visit to paradise af-
ter the sin of Adam and Eve, now aware of their nakedness
(852-71). In a substantial addition to the biblical narrative
(939-66), the poet explains to his audience (the poet's gen-
der isassumed rather than known) that this sin and the con-
sequent banishment are the source of current misery in the
world and, in an equation of paradise with heaven (which is
implicit throughout), explains that no guilty man may jour-
ney there. This homiletic commentary also balances the ac-
count of God's wrath with the observation that God did not
abandon the human race but gave it a rich and beautiful
world to livein, even ifit includes suffering and death. Such
commentary is more characteristic of the earlier parts of
the poem than of the later account of the wanderings of
Abraham. Another homiletic expansion follows soon after,
in the description of the malignant tree that grows from
Abel's innocent blood and the poet's recollection that all
this misery is ultimately to be blamed on Eve (982-IOOI).
The tree of sin is undoubtedly included to recall the Fall,
but it also reveals the poet's knowledge of the motif from
Aldhelm's Carmen de Virginitate, written in the early eighth
century for the nuns of Barking Abb~yHThe emotion of the
"downhearted" Cain's banishment is more intense in the
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INTRODUCTION
Old English, and his exile matches a familiar experience in
the Anglo-Saxon warrior life and its poetry. Anglo-Saxon
taste isalsoevident inthe poetic expansion of the genealogy
ofGenesis 4:17-26 (1055-1247), which considers not just the
passing ofgenerations but also the transmission of heredi-
tarynobility and ancestral wealth.
With the arrival ofNoah the pace of the narrative in both
the biblical source and the poem changes, and the propaga-
tion of the human race gives way to its threatened extinc-
tion, alongwith allother earthly life. In the development of
the poem's ideas athreat becomes apparent to the royal line
ofAdam through Seth, atheme enhanced by the martial lan-
guage inwhich the story of the Flood iscast. The rising wa-
ters are depicted as a menacing army (1375-86), but Noah
and his family are protected in the towering fortress that is
the ark. Noah is a holy man obedient to God, but also a
prince and a father of princes. One recurrent element of
the biblical narrative that the poet emphasizes is sacrifice:
Noah's sacrifice (1497-1510) recalls Abel's, and the poet ob-
serves that Noah's virtues date from his youth and merit the
grace God has given him, though he removes the direct ref-
erence to the sacrifice of animals (Gen 8:20). That this isno
accident isindicated by the fact that the poet does the same
thing by omitting animal sacrifice from his description of
Abraham's sacrifice at Gen 16:9-17. His primary interest ap-
pears to lie in providing an English version of the historical
narrative of Genesis, and such omissions suggest alay audi-
ence for whom the example set by the patriarchs might have
been confusing.
The poet's fondness for genealogy does not equate with
afondness for lists, and almost all the names found in Gen-
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INTRODUCTION
esis IO are omitted. However, this is balanced by a contin-
ued interest in the royal line that will lead to Abraham and
the passing on of family wealth (1598-1648). The account
of Abraham's wandering life takes up about one third of
the poem as it survives. From the outset, the poet includes
new thematic emphases while developing motifs running
through the biblical story: Abraham's nobility and his place
within a family order; Abraham's desire for a son and heir;
the favor shown by God to faithful Abraham; Abraham's
need of ahomeland; the formation of alasting covenant be-
tween God and Abraham. The result, when augmented by a
focus on Abraham's emotional response to his various ad-
ventures, is a fuller human character than is found in the
biblical text. The same is true of Sarah, and to an extent of
Hagar aswell.The handling of the three-way relationship of
these characters is complex and subtle, and reveals a poet
mindful of the implications of the example of patriarchal
sexual conduct for his Anglo-Saxon audience and aware of a
Christian theological tradition which had long since devel-
oped strategies for explaining the difficult moral detail of
much of Genesis. Abraham, as might be expected, is never
9
condemned directly for his concubinage, and the poet re-
moves any implication of polygamy, or ofAbraham's willing
participation in Sarah's plan to gain him a son by the ser-
vant woman. The overall result, enhancing the same themes
found in the book of Genesis, is the presentation of Abra-
ham and Sarah as a heterosexual married couple producing
legitimate offspring alongside the sexual irregularity prac-
ticed by the Sodomites and by Lot and his daughters, and
the sexual incontinence of Pharaoh and Abimelech.lO
The sacrifice of Isaac, the final episode of the poem,
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INTRODUCTION
echoes the account of Cain and Abel in its emphasis on
Abraham's intention of killing his "kinsman." More signifi-
cant isthe poet's choice to end his epic at this P9int, reveal-
ing an interest in the mystical significance of the Old Tes-
tament text, informed by the commentary tradition. Isaac
isatypological representation of Christ par excellence and
illustrates the dominant Christian method of interpreting
the events of the Old Testament as prefiguring Christ or
the Church. The sacrifice ofIsaac thus foreshadows Christ's
true sacrifice on Calvaryll The final passage, emphasizing
Abraham's thanksgiving (2930-36), is not found in Genesis
but shows apoet returning to where he began, recalling for
his audience their link to these ancient events, through the
lifeof Christ, by their participation in the Eucharistic sacri-
fice of thanksgiving. The skillful inclusion of such learned
theological perspectives in a poem which is most obviously
interested in a historical narrative revealing God's provi-
dence at work in human affairs, along with the lesson that
those who call themselves God's people should obey his
commandments, tells us something about the poet and his
intended audience. The poet-translator enjoyed a Latinity
that extended well beyond knowledge of the biblical text; in
addition to revealing his awareness of biblical typology, he
often develops bilingual onomastic puns.12 However, this
learning iscarried lightly, and informs rather than dominates
apoem probably intended for alay audience that valued an-
cestry, power, land, and wealth aswell as the God who ruled
over them all.
It is not known why GenesisB was interpolated into Gene-
sisA -whether it was part of the original design of the larger
poem, orwas necessitated by the accidental loss of text from
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INTRODUCTION
GenesisA, or was the result of deliberate substitution at an
earlier stage of transmission by acopyist who preferred the
alternative account of Adam and Eve's sin.13 While text is
missing at the transition to GenesisB, the transition back to
GenesisA isseamless at the narrative level, which suggests an
expert hand in placing the interpolation. Unlike GenesisA,
which follows the Latin Vulgate, GenesisB is aclose transla-
tion from an Old Saxon original, as Eduard Sievers deduced
on philological grounds in 1875. His theory was confirmed
bythe discovery of afragment of an Old Saxon Genesisin the
Vatican Library, which corresponds precisely to lines from
the Old English.14One striking difference between the two
parts of the combined Old English Genesis(immediately ap-
parent by the lineation in amodern edition) is found in the
meter. GenesisA employs the normal two-stress alliterative
line; it does not include a single hypermetric line.IS Bycon-
trast, GenesisB carries over an abundance of long verse lines
from the Old Saxon original, some of which may be normal
verses with extra syllables, while others are well-formed hy-
permetric half-lines. The Old English also reflects the in-
fluence of the Old Saxon in its lexicon (for example, the
unusual hearra for "lord") and orthography.16 Another conse-
quence of the interpolation is areiteration of the fall of the
angels, beside a thematically linked account of the fall of
Adam and Eve. Among the most striking literary aspects of
GenesisB beside GenesisA are its relative freedom with the
biblical narrative and the originality of its treatment of both
character and episode. The character of Lucifer/Satan is
more fully developed than in Genesis1, asthe poem explores
his arrogance ~nd insolence, both ofwhich remain intact af-
ter his banishment to hell with his supporters. His attitudes,
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