Niorstigningar Saga

by Dario Bullitta

  biðja þess almáttigan Guð, þann hinn sama, er þá krapta gefr inum sæla Þorláki

  byskupi at gefa sjón blindum mönnum, en heyrn daufum, göngu höltum, en hre-

  insa líkþrá, ok reka djöfla frá óðum mönnum, lífga þá er áðr eru dauðir, stöðva

  vötn ok vinda.21

  (Now we can appreciate what has been presented on this anniversary [ Þorlák-

  smessa] with the bearing of virtue and praying to God the Almighty, the same

  who has given the powers to the blessed Bishop Þorlákr to give sight to blind men,

  and hearing to the deaf, walk to the lame, and [the powers] to clean leprosy and to

  drive out the devils from mad people, to resuscitate those who had previously been

  dead, and to halt waters and winds.)

  Once again, drawing a parallel between the sanctity of Christ and that of

  Þorlákr, Páll adopts the similes of “trap” (“gilldra”), “bait” (“ögn”), and “wild

  The Theological Context of Niðrstigningar saga 91

  animals” (“dýr”), employing them eleven times throughout the text. These

  amount to another echo of Niðrstigningar saga. Accordingly, we are told by

  the author that in our earthly life we encounter two kind of traps: those set by

  God to bless us and those set by the Devil to lead us into temptation. Páll ex-

  plains that God has set before us “manifold traps of mercy” (“margafalliga

  miskunnar gildrur”) in granting us the teachings and miracles of Bishop

  Þorlákr, into which we are drawn, attracted by the “accessible baits” (“aðgen-

  giligum ögnum”) of divine “love and affection” (“ást ok elsku”):

  Hefir allmáttigr Guð í lífi ok kenningum, dýrlingum dæmum ok ítarligu andláti en

  ótalligum jareinum ins sæla Þorláks byskups sett fyrir oss margafaldliga miskun-

  nar gildrur með atgengiligum ögnum ok teygiligum tillögum, at heimta oss með

  ást ok elsku í sinn einangr, þann hvervetna er hirt ok haldit er í þann kemr.22

  (With the life and teachings, the saintly proofs, the glorious death, and the innu-

  merable miracles of the blessed Bishop Þorlákr, God the Almighty has set before

  us manifold traps of mercy, accessible baits and seductive counsels, to draw us

  with love and affection into His narrow passage, which is hidden everywhere and

  holds in it whoever comes in.)

  In the same manner, the Devil sets a trap of misfortune (“ófarnaðar gildru”),

  laying in it as bait “all the corrupted desires” (“allar rangar fýsnir”). Once a

  man is caught, it is impossible for him to escape, just as if it were done to an

  “evil and noxious animal” (“skaðasöm dýr ok meinsöm”) that dies miserably

  inside the trap. It is easily inferred that Páll is here referring to a typical medi-

  eval Icelandic trap for foxes made of stone (“gildran er gjör af grjóti”).23

  En at teygja til þessarar gildru er þessi ögn: röng ást óskaplig ok ágirni, metnaðr

  ok mannráð, reiði ok ranglæti ok allar rangar fýsnir. En þeir menn sem í þessa

  ófarnaðar gildru ganga eptir teygingu þessara ódáða ok ógna ok megu eigi til

  snúask ór henni at ganga, þá eru svá hörmuliga staddir. Ok þá hleypr fyrir hana

  hurð, þat er dauðinn, endir þessa heims lífs, ok þá eru gefnir í vald þess er egndi

  gildruna, fjándans sjálfs, segi ek, er þá dregr til eilífs dauða ok óendanligra kvala

  at þeim hætti sem gjört er hér við skaðasöm dýr ok meinsöm at þá eru deydd er

  þau koma ór gildrunni.24

  (And to allure these traps, there is this bait: corrupted unnatural love and greed,

  haughtiness and conspiracy, wrath and injustice, and all the corrupted desires.

  And those men who walk into this unfortunate trap, after the temptation of these

  misdeeds and baits, may not turn and escape from it, and in this way they are sadly

  stopped. And before it there slides a door, that is Death, which ends this earthly

  92 Niðrstigningar saga

  life. And they are trapped in that power which baited the trap, the Devil himself, I

  say, which drags them to eternal death and endless torments, in the same way it is

  done to an evil and noxious animal, so that those who come into the trap are dead.)

  The Skálholt Scriptorium ca. 1200–1210

  During the first decade of the thirteenth century, the scriptorium of Skálholt

  flourished in the production of hagiographical and historical literature. With

  the great public acclaim generated by the numerous testimonies of Þorlákr’s

  miracles, witnessed both before and after his death, and especially after the

  translation of his relics to the Skálholt Cathedral in 1198, the Icelandic eccle-

  siastical authorities were urged to provide texts commemorating his vita and

  wondrous portents for the benefit of the Christian community. In order to be

  accessible to all Icelanders, literate and illiterate alike, the life and deeds of the

  first local saint had to be adapted into the vernacular. Moreover, to further le-

  gitimize and validate his memorable deeds and their venerable legacy, his bi-

  ography had to be placed within the greater picture of the history of the

  Icelandic Church. In this manner, Þorlákr’s saintly figure could be connected to

  Christianity’s early history and its rise on the island, as the adoption of the new

  faith has been commonly contemplated as a sacred event.25

  In the span of a decade or so, some of the greatest hagiographical and his-

  torical texts of the Icelandic Middle Ages were produced at the diocese of

  Skálholt. The Jarteinabók Þorláks byskups in forna was written around 1200,

  and around the same time, two biographies inspired by Þorlákr’s saintly life

  were completed: the oldest redaction of Þorláks saga byskups in the vernacular

  and his vita in Latin, whose oldest witness dates to ca. 1200.26 The first collec-

  tion of his miracles was subsequently substantiated with more prodigious

  events and anecdotes ascribed to Þorlákr. Before the death of Bishop Páll

  Jónsson in 1211, the second redaction, the Jarteinabók ǫnnur, possibly com-

  piled by Bishop Páll Jónsson himself, was also completed.

  Before the death of Bishop Páll in 1211, and possibly after the death of the

  erudite lawspeaker and priest Gizurr Hallsson in 1206 (the great-grandson of

  Bishop Ísleifr Gizurarson, who is acknowledged in the preface of the Hung-

  rvaka text as the greatest source consulted for its compilation), an epitome on

  the regencies of the first five bishops of that diocese, under the emblematic

  name of Hungrvaka (“hunger-waker or appetizer”),27 was also completed in

  the Skálholt scriptorium. Accordingly, the vernacular chronicle had to “stimu-

  late the appetite” of the lay people and clerics – that is, their curiosity to know

  more about the lives of the five Icelandic bishops who preceded Þorlákr

  The Theological Context of Niðrstigningar saga 93

  (†1193), namely, Ísleifr Gizurarson (†1080), Gizurr Ísleifsson (†1118), Þorlákr

  Rúnólfsson (†1133), Magnús Einarsson (†1148), and Klængr Þorsteinsson

  (†1176). Its text, in my view, also created an appetite for the very pièce de ré-

  sistance of the scriptorium, the recently produced biography testifying Þorlákr’s

  unparalleled sanctity, the first redaction of the Þorláks saga byskups, a
s im-

  plied in the concluding lines of the text:

  Nú er komit at frásǫgu þeiri er segja skal frá inum sæla Þorláki byskupi […] er at

  réttu má segjask geisli eða gimsteinn heilagra, bædi á þessu landi ok svá annars

  staða um heiminn. Hann má at sǫnnu kallask postoli Íslands, sva sem inn helgi

  Patrekr byskup kallask postoli Írlands, því at þeir frǫmdu verk postola sjálfra í

  sínum kenningum ok þolinmœði, bæði við óhlýðna menn ok rangláta.28

  (Now, after their [the bishops’] story, the time has come to relate to the blessed

  Bishop Þorlákr, […] who may justly be called the sunbeam and gemstone of [all]

  the saints, both on this land and also in other places in the world. He may truly

  be called the apostle of Iceland, much like the holy Bishop Patrick is called the

  apostle of Ireland, for they furthered the deeds of the apostles themselves in their

  teachings and with their endurance, both towards disobedient and unjust men.)

  The bulk of information collected for the composition of the hagiographical

  texts concerning Þorlákr and his predecessors were naturally drawn from oral

  accounts – for instance, that of Gizurr Hallsson in the case of Hungrvaka – and

  from various written sources available at the scriptorium, most notably, annals

  and church registers. However, the basic literary framework for the constitu-

  tion of the texts was borrowed from European hagiography. It has, for in-

  stance, been suggested how the vitae of the prominent continental bishops,

  especially Ambrose of Milan (†397), Martin of Tours (†397), and Nicolas of

  Myra (†343), must have represented primary literary models on which the

  Icelandic gesta abbatum were skillfully moulded, primarily on account of

  these bishops’ political commitment and confrontation of powerful and poten-

  tially dangerous men.29

  If the ethics, morality, and integrity attributed to the Skálholt bishops were

  partially modelled on those of their European predecessors, the greatest source

  for their sanctity and some of their most topical miracles and supernatural abil-

  ities were those of Christ himself. This connection is especially evident in the

  treatment of the miracles performed by the two most eminent bishops, Ísleifr

  and Þorlákr. Ásdís Egilsdóttir has for instance noted that some miracles attrib-

  uted to the first bishop of Skálholt, Ísleifr, in Hungrvaka, recall those per-

  formed by Christ in his early career of thaumaturge. She draws attention to

  94 Niðrstigningar saga

  Ísleifr’s alleged restoration of deteriorated ale, which closely recalls Christ’s

  transformation of water into wine at the wedding at Cana, mentioned as Christ’s

  first miracle in the Gospel of John.30 On the contrary, the list of healing proper-

  ties attributed to Þorlákr in the Jarteinabók Þorláks byskups ǫnnur, namely, the

  healing of the blind, the deaf, the lame, the possessed, and the lepers, which are

  found in Niðrstigningar saga, in Latin T, and in the Gospel of Matthew, are

  significantly related to the miracles of a mature Christ. As a matter of fact, the

  texts of Evangelium Nicodemi and Niðrstigningar saga are filled with the su-

  pernatural and divine wonders performed by Christ, both during his lifetime

  and in the afterworld, when he confronted Satan alone.

  There is reasonable evidence to support that the text of Niðrstigningar saga

  was already available in Skálholt by the time of composition of the Jarteinabók

  ǫnnur between 1200 and 1210, as Bishop Páll Jónsson seems to allude to it in

  his treatment of the sanctity of Þorlákr. Moreover, the fact that the oldest wit-

  ness of Niðrstigningar saga, AM 645 4to, copied in Skálholt during the follow-

  ing decades (approximately in the years 1225–50), already transmits numerous

  textual corruptions and can actually be counted as evidence of the abundant

  scribal and editorial activity within the scriptorium during those years; one

  must postulate a considerable production of copies before the transcription of

  AM 645 4to.

  With the advent of the first local saint and the great interest among Icelandic

  clerics and laypeople in the blessed life and miracles of Þorlákr, the scriptorium

  of Skálholt was urged to produce the first indigenous hagiographical material

  concerning Þorlákr and his predecessors. This cultural impetus was masterfully

  directed by Þorlákr’s nephew and successor, Bishop Páll Jónsson, who com-

  missioned, supervised, and even himself wrote new hagiographical texts, which

  would validate Þorlákr’s sanctity and concurrently give prestige to the diocese.

  Moreover, Páll Jónsson seems to have encouraged readings in the vernacular

  among the young clerics, a cultural policy which necessarily involved the very

  composition of these texts, either ex novo or as translations of foreign Latin

  literature, as some of the introductory lines to Hungrvaka seem to indicate:

  “Þat berr ok annat til þessa rits at teygja til þess unga menn at kynnisk várt mál

  at ráða, þat er á norrœnu er ritat, lǫg, eða sǫgur eða mannfrœði”31 (“And sec-

  ondly, this writing is intended to allure young men to whom our tongue is

  known to read that which is written in Norse: laws or stories or genealogies”).

  The project of translating the Latin Evangelium Nicodemi may well have

  been initiated in the Skálholt scriptorium, favoured by this innovative and stim-

  ulating cultural context, which characterizes the first decade of the thirteenth

  century. Moreover, the young clerics addressed in Hungrvaka also seem to

  have profited greatly from the new cultural impetus, as many of them were able

  The Theological Context of Niðrstigningar saga 95

  to study on the Continent for a considerable time. As a matter of fact, the num-

  ber of clerics who were travelling abroad for education in those years – that is,

  around 1200 – was so high that Bishop Páll was urged to take a census of the

  priests who needed to perform services in his diocese, so that no parish church

  would remain uncovered.32

  Some of these young clerics may well have decided to study in Paris in imi-

  tation of Þorlákr’s own academic experience. It is consequently likely that

  upon the return of one of these young clerics from northern France, an exem-

  plar of the T redaction of the Latin Evangelium Nicodemi was deposited in the

  Skálholt scriptorium, where its translation may have been initiated at the re-

  quest of Bishop Páll. These years also saw the importation of the first biblical

  glosses and the great systematic exegetical treatises of the Paris school of the-

  ology, which were naturally consulted and interrogated by the compiler of

  Niðrstigningar saga, particularly in those cases in which the Latin Evangelium

  Nicodemi was perceived as scanty or uneventful.

  7 Conclusion

  The text of Niðrstigningar saga reflects a resourceful project of textual and

  biblical exegesis, especially in view of the editorial evaluation that must have

  preceded the translation work, such as choosing the version of the apocryphon

  to translate and determining how to supplement its core narrative with extra

  biblical material.

  The Troyes redaction may
have been chosen as the source because of its

  textual features for providing the scenes copiously attested both in sermons

  and in visual arts and mainly referring to the figure of Christ; most notably his

  arrival in Hell with a host of angels, the shattering of the gates of Hell, and the

  physical binding of Satan. The T text may consequently have been preferred to

  the Majority Text, which enjoyed enormous circulation in Europe and was also

  known in Iceland around the year 1200.

  The textual matrix of the interpolations, on the other hand, reveals the avail-

  ability in Iceland of the contemporary biblical glosses and commentaries of the

  Paris school of theology, especially the Glossa ordinaria, Sententiae in IV li-

  bris distinctae, and Historia scholastica. In all probability, the compiler con-

  sulted these texts for the interpolations into the original pseudo gospel and

  employed them to gloss, exemplify, and augment selected loci of his copy of

  Evangelium Nicodemi. Moreover, some allusions to the text of Niðrstigningar

  saga in contemporary devotional and hagiographical literature seem to suggest

  that its text was composed at Skálholt after Þórlakr’s first collection of miracles

  had been written down and before the completion of the second collection. The

  work of translating and revising the Latin Evangelium Nicodemi might reason-

  ably have been undertaken in Skálholt between the years 1199 and 1211 –

  roughly a century later than the date suggested by Magnús Már Lárusson.1 The

  translation and adaptation of the Latin text may have initiated under the aus-

  pices of Bishop Páll Jónsson, a scholar of broad education, regarded as one of

  the most learned men of his time, under whom the bishopric of Skálholt

  flour-ished in the production of devotional te

  Notes

  Epigraph

  1 (“And when this mortal hath put on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying

  that is written: Death is swallowed up in victory”). Paul proclaims the victory of

  Christ over Death, quoting the eschatological oracle of Isaiah 25:8 and Hosea 13:14.

  Unless otherwise stated, all quotations of the Vulgate are taken from Biblia

  sacra iuxta Vulgatam versionem, ed. Robert Weber et al., revised by Roger Gryson.

  All English translations of the Latin Vulgate are taken from the Douay-Rheims