Niorstigningar Saga

by Dario Bullitta

  eum servum sempiternum numquid includes ei quasi avi aut ligabis illum ancillis

  tuis concident eum amici divident illum negotiatiores numquid implebis sage-

  nas pelle eius et gurgustium piscium capite illius pone super eum manum tuam

  memento belli nec ultra addas loqui ecce spes eius frustabitur eum et videntibus

  cunctis praecipitabitur non quasi crudelis suscitabo eum quis enim resistere potest

  vultui meo quis ante dedit mihi ut reddam ei omnia quae sub caelo sunt mea sunt.31

  (Canst thou draw out the Leviathan with a hook, or canst thou tie his tongue with

  a cord? Canst thou put a ring in his nose, or bore through his jaw with a buckle?

  Will he make many supplications to thee, or speak soft words to thee? Will he

  make a covenant to thee, and wilt thou take him to be a servant for ever? Shalt

  thou play with him as with a bird, or tie him up for thy handmaids? Shall friends

  cut him in pieces, shall merchants divide him? Wilt thou fill nets with his skin, and

  the cabins of fishes with his head? Lay thy hand upon him: remember the battle,

  and speak no more. Behold this hope shall fall him, and in the sight of all, he shall

  be cast down. I will not stir him up, like one that is cruel: for who can resist my

  countenance? Who hath given me before that I should repay him? All things that

  are under Heaven are mine.)

  A second theory has considered the interpolation as native narrative material

  derived from the mythological fishing for the Miðgarðsormr (the World

  Serpent of Norse mythology), related most extensively in the poem Hymiskviða

  of the Elder Edda, and subsequently treated by Snorri Sturluson (†1241) in the

  Snorra Edda, in which Þórr, on his fishing expedition, attempts to catch the

  78 Niðrstigningar saga

  Miðgarðsormr but eventually fails.32 James W. Marchand has subsequently

  discarded this theory and has instead drawn attention to a homily by Pope

  Gregory the Great on the Resurrection of Christ, in which Job 41 is quoted and

  commented upon; this homily made its way into the Icelandic Homily Book

  (Stockholm, Kb Holm. Perg. 15 4to), in which the name “Leviathan” is glossed

  above the line with “Miðgarðsormr.”

  oc ſté h aɴ þa yv er eɴ forna fiánda eſ h aɴ lét ofriþar m eɴ b er iaſc i gegn ſér.

  þ at ſýnde d ró tteɴ þa eſ h aɴ m æ lte viþ eɴ ſǽla iób. ᴍoɴ e i g e þu d ra ga leviaþan miþgarþ ar ormr a ǫngle eþa bora kiþr h anſ meþ báuge. Sia gléypande hvalr

  m er k er gróþgan aɴſkota þaɴ eſ ſvelga vill ałt maɴkyn idauþa. Agn eſ lagt a

  ǫngol en hvas broddr léyneſc. þeɴa orm tók almáttegr g oþ a ǫngle. þa eſ h aɴ

  ſende ſon ſiɴ til dáuþa ſýnelegan at líka m en oſýnelegan at g oþdóme. Diaboluſ

  ſa agn lika mſ h anſ þ at eſ h aɴ beit oc viłde fyrfara. En g oþdo mſ b ro ddr ſtangaþe h aɴ ſvaſe m ǫngoł. A ǫngle varþ h aɴ tekeɴ. þ uia t h aɴ beideſc at g ri pa líca mſ

  agn þ at eſ h aɴ ſa. en vas g oþdó mſ b ro dr ſa eſ léyndr vaſ ſǽrþe h aɴ. A ongle

  varþ h aɴ tekeɴ. þ uia t h aɴ fek ſcaþa afþui eſ h aɴ béit. oc glataþe h aɴ þei m eſ

  h aɴ hafþe áþr vełde yv er. þ uia t ⸌h aɴ⸍ tréyſteſc at g ri pa þaɴ eſ h aɴ hafþe etke

  vełde igegn.33

  (And then He [Christ] overcame the Old Enemy, who had let hostile people go

  against Him. This was shown by the Lord when He spoke to the blessed Job: You

  cannot drag out the Leviathan ⸌the Miðgarðsormr⸍ on a fishhook, or pierce its jaw

  with a ring [Job 41:1–3(40:20–1)]. This devouring whale symbolizes the greedy

  enemy that wants to swallow mankind into Death. The bait is lain on the fish-

  hook, and its sharp point remains hidden. That serpent was taken on a fishhook

  by the Almighty Lord when He sent His Son to death with a visible body but an

  invisible divinity. The Devil saw the bait of his body, which he bit and wanted to

  destroy, but the divinity picked him like a fishhook. He was taken on a fishhook

  because he was impelled to seize the bait of the body, which he could see, but the

  sharp point of the divinity, which was hidden, injured him. He was taken on the

  fishhook because he was hurt by what he had bitten and he lost what previously

  was under his power because he trusted himself in seizing the One upon whom

  he had no power.)

  It should nevertheless be noted that the first line of the interpolation makes

  no explicit reference to the Leviathan itself; instead it describes the terrifying

  transformation of Satan into a great dragon after his expulsion from Hell.

  This description seems to be typologically and formally more suitable to the

  literary context of Revelation, Satan’s rejection from Hell being reminiscent

  The Textual Interpolations of Niðrstigningar saga 79

  of his other epic expulsion, his fall from Paradise. In Revelation 12:9, when he

  is expelled from Heaven and cast down to earth, Satan is powerfully described

  as having the shape of a great dragon (“draco magnus” / “dreki mikill”), threat-

  ening or lying around (“sedurre” / “liggia umb”) the entire world (“orbem uni-

  versum” / “allan heima”): “Et proiectus est draco ille magnus, serpens antiquus,

  qui uocatur diabolus, et Satanas, qui seducit universum orbem et proiectus est

  in terram et angelis eius cum illi missi sunt” (“And that great dragon was

  cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduceth the

  whole world; and he was cast unto the earth, and his angels were thrown down

  with him”).

  As I will show below, the second section concerning the defeat of Satan is

  not derived from the Bible itself, and the homily of Gregory the Great in the

  Icelandic Homily Book, albeit thematically and theologically suitable, cannot

  be considered the ultimate source of this passage, since it lacks the other two

  images: those of a mousetrap and a snare.

  The analogy between the cross and a fishhook, subsequently adopted by

  Gregory the Great at the end of the sixth century, was first employed in the

  fourth century by Gregory of Nyssa (†ca. 395) in one of his sermons to illus-

  trate the meaning and consequence of the death of Christ.34 Gregory of Nyssa

  suggested that the death of Christ was a necessary ransom paid to the Devil by

  God himself, who sacrificed his only Son to deliver humanity from original sin.

  Satan accepted God’s bargain, but he was eventually defeated as he failed to

  recognize the duality of Christ’s nature: both human and divine. Gregory tells

  that when the Devil, hungry for death and blinded by his greed, saw Christ in

  his earthly body on the cross, he rushed to gulp down Christ’s body but was

  instead entrapped on the Cross like a “ravenous fish” on a “fishhook.”35 This

  view of Redemption, which would later be labelled as the “ransom theory of

  atonement,” would become the most widely disseminated theory of Redemption

  throughout Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages.36

  In the fifth century, Augustine drew extensively on this theory and further

  developed it, suggesting that God consciously decided not to defeat the Devil

  by exercising his absolute power over him but instead preferred to conquer

  him through justice in order to provide a good example to humanity.37 Accord-

>   ingly, Gregory’s fishhook metaphor seems to have at least partially inspired

  Augustine to adopt the image of a “muscipula” (“a mousetrap”) for the captur-

  ing of Satan on the cross, a gloomy image that was normally reserved for the

  temptations of Satan.38

  On two occasions, Augustine employs the two images – that is, “hamus”

  (“fishhook”) and “muscipula” (“mousetrap”) – together to symbolize the cross.

  In both contexts, a third hunting trap, a “laqueus” (“snare or trap for lions”), is

  80 Niðrstigningar saga

  also involved to further emphasize the beastly nature of the Devil and the dan-

  ger of leaving him unbound.39 Of particular interest to this discussion is Sermo

  265D, De Quadragesima Ascensione Domini, a sermon delivered against the

  Manicheans and their heresies, which contemplated Christ as a pure emanation

  of the deity and neglected his human substance.40 A section of the text com-

  menting upon 1 Corinthians 15:54,41 entitled Crux Christi muscipula fuit diab-

  olo, displays important verbal and thematic affinities to the interpolated text of

  Niðrstigningar saga:42

  quid ergo miraris? certe uita est christus: quare mortua est uita? nec anima

  mortua est, nec uerbum mortuum est: caro mortua est, ut in ea mors moreretur.

  mortem passus, mortem occidit: ad leonem escam in laqueo posuit. piscis si

  nihil uellet deuorare, in hamo non caperetur. mortis auidus diabolus fuit, mortis

  auarus diabolus fuit. crux christi muscipula fuit: mors christi, immo caro mor-

  talis christi tamquam esca in muscipula fuit. uenit, hausit et captus est. ecce

  resurrexit christus: mors ubi est? iam in illius carne dicitur, quod in nostra in fine

  dicetur: absorta est mors in uictoriam. caro erat, sed corruptio non erat. manente

  natura qualitas immutatur: ipsa substantia, sed nullus ibi iam defectus, nulla tar-

  ditas, nulla corruptio, nulla indigentia, nihil mortale, nihil quale solemus nosse

  terrenum. tangebatur, tractabatur, palpabatur, sed non occidebatur.43

  (The Cross of Christ was a mousetrap for the Devil. So why be surprised? Surely,

  Christ is life: so why did life die? The soul did not die, the Word did not die, but the

  flesh died, so that Death would die in it. Having suffered Death, He slew Death; He

  put the bait for the lion in the snare. If the fish did not want to devour anything, he

  would not be caught on the fishhook. The Devil was greedy for Death, the Devil

  coveted Death. The Cross of Christ was a mousetrap: the death of Christ, or rather

  the mortal flesh of Christ, was like a bait in the mousetrap. He came, he swal-

  lowed it, and was caught. And Behold, Christ rose up again. Where is Death now?

  Already for His flesh can be said what will be said for ours in the end: Death is

  swallowed up in victory [1 Corinthians 15:54]. It was flesh, but it was not corrupt-

  ible. Its nature remains the same, its quality changes. The substance is the same,

  but there is no deficiency there, no tardiness, no corruption, no neediness, nothing

  mortal, nothing which we know to be earthly. He was touched, He was patted, but

  He was not slain.)

  In the Icelandic text, these narrative elements are presented in a different

  order due to the necessary reformulation and adaptation of the sermon to the

  plot of the pseudo gospel. Nevertheless, the Icelandic compiler seems to be at-

  tentive by partly translating and partly accommodating all the above-mentioned

  The Textual Interpolations of Niðrstigningar saga 81

  similes. Accordingly, the interpolated passage states that upon the death of

  Christ in Jerusalem (i.e., before his cross at Golgotha, right above the entrance

  to Hell), Satan wanted to tear away the soul of Christ (“slita ondina”), which,

  as Augustine asserts, would never die (“nec anima mortua est”).44 The Old

  Enemy craved to swallow it (“gløpa” / “devorare”), but being unable to recog-

  nize the true nature of Christ – that is, his hidden divinity (“verbum” / “godo-

  mens”) – he was instead captured (“veiddr” / “captus”) on the Cross (“Crux

  Christi” / “crossmarkit”) like a fish (“piscis” / “fiscr”) on a fishhook (“hamo” /

  “øngullinn”), like a mouse in a mousetrap (“musicpula” / “treketti”), or even

  caught in a snare (“laqueo” / “gilldro”) like an artic fox (“melracki”) – a neces-

  sary adaptation of an African lion (“leo”) into a suitable Nordic equivalent – the

  prey most commonly caught in traps in medieval Iceland.45

  The sentence describing Satan being physically bound by Christ – “Þa for til

  Dominus Noster oc batt hann enn qvade til engla sina at varþveita hann”46

  (“Then Our Lord went to him and bound him and ordered his angels to guard

  him”) – is a repetition and an anticipation of his final binding before the deliv-

  erance of Adam to Paradise47 and should therefore not be considered part of the

  interpolation.

  Augustine’s Sermo 265D seems to have enjoyed limited circulation in Europe

  and is today extant in only two twelfth-century codices: Vatican City, BAV,

  4951, copied in Rochester in the first decade of the twelfth century, and

  Worcester, Cathedral Library, F 93.48 Although BAV 4951 was copied in

  England, the collection it contains shows greater similarity with Roman than

  Carolingian homiliaries, it resembles English collections even less, as it gives

  much space to the texts of Augustine, pseudo-Augustine, and Caesarius of

  Arles. Furthermore, the excellent state of the texts might be proof that it is a

  copy of a continental collection of sermons only recently acquired by the

  Rochester Cathedral Library.49 Like the two great twelfth-century Rochester

  Bibles, sharing both textual and paleographic features with the northern French

  Bibles revised at Saint-Germain-des-Prés, the Rochester homiliary may have

  been brought to Rochester from Paris (or a nearby region) via Canterbury, which

  maintained strong ties with northern France throughout the twelfth century.50

  At this point, the question arises as to whether the Icelandic compiler had

  access to Sermo 265D at length or whether he had acquaintance with the fish-

  hook/mousetrap/snare metaphors through intermediate sources such as com-

  mentaries reporting Augustine’s similes, explicit quotations, or scattered or

  continuous glosses.

  It appears that, after a long absence from theological sources, the metaphor

  of the mousetrap for the Cross of Christ surfaces again in the theological and

  exegetical writings of Peter Lombard (†1160), Bishop of Paris and one of the

  82 Niðrstigningar saga

  greatest exponents of the Paris school of theology.51 Perhaps prompted by re-

  newed interest in the theological writings of Augustine, the metaphor is used in

  the Sententiae in IV libris distinctae, a comprehensive collection of theological

  texts extracted from the Bible and from the relevant patristic commentaries

  composed by Lombard at Saint Victor Abbey between 1157 and 1158.52 The

  excerpts were systematically collected in the form of a continuous gloss di-

  vided into four main books, partitioned according to the main theological

  themes summarized in the articles of the Creed: the Trinity, the Creation, the

  Inca
rnation, and the Sacraments.

  The Sententiae enjoyed extensive circulation and, towards the end of the

  twelfth century, the completion of individual scholarly commentaries on it be-

  came a fundamental requirement for the successful completion of a bachelor’s

  degree in theology, the so-called baccalarii Sententiarii, which normally last-

  ed two years and later led to the full degree known as “baccalarius formatus.”53

  In book 3, distinction 19, chapter 1, which draws extensively on Augustine’s

  Sermo 130 (a) – in which Christ is described as the Good Merchant who ran-

  somed humanity from the Devil – Lombard illustrates how the Cross func-

  tioned as a mousetrap, and Christ’s blood as bait for the devil.54

  Per illum ergo redempti sumus, in quo princeps mundi nihil inuenit. Unde au-

  gustinus, causam et modum nostrae redemptionis insinuans, ait: Nihil inuenit di-

  abolus in christo ut moreretur, sed pro uoluntate patris mori christus uoluit; non

  habens mortis causam de peccato, sed de obedientia et iustitia mortem gustauit;

  per quam nos redemit a seruitute diaboli. Incideramus enim in principem huius

  saeculi, qui seduxit adam et seruum fecit, coepit que nos quasi uernaculos pos-

  sidere. Sed uenit redemptor, et uictus est deceptor. Et quid fecit redemptor cap-

  tiuatori nostro? Tetendit ei muscipulam, crucem suam; posuit ibi quasi escam,

  sanguinem suum. Ille autem sanguinem fudit non debitoris, per quod recessit a

  debitoribus. Ille quippe ad hoc sanguinem suum fudit, ut peccata nostra deleret.

  Unde ergo diabolus nos tenebat, deletum est sanguine redemptoris: Non enim

  tenebat nos nisi uinculis peccatorum nostrorum. Istae erant catenae captiuorum.

  Venit ille, alligauit fortem uinculis passionis suae; intrauit in domum eius, id est

  in corda eorum ubi ipse habitabat, et uasa eius, scilicet nos, eripuit; quae ille

  impleuerat amaritudine sua. Deus autem noster, uasa eius eripiens et sua faciens,

  fudit amaritudinem et impleuit dulcedine, per mortem suam a peccatis redimens

  et adoptionem gloriae filiorum largiens.55

  (Then through Him we have been redeemed, as in Him the Prince of the World

  [Satan] has found nothing. Hence, Augustine, alluding to the reason and manner

  of our Redemption, said: The Devil found nothing in Christ for which He should