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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 February 2016
Since King Alfred, and before, Gregory’s Pastoral Rule has been understood to apply to rulers as well as to bishops. A rich repertory of moral and spiritual qualities, as well as of duties and responsibilities, was thus made available for sketching an ideal that kings no less than bishops could be measured against. The question of whether this ambiguity in its reference had been intended by its author, or foisted upon it by subsequent generations who were less able to distinguish between the various offices, whose occupants might be referred to as rectores, has never been satisfactorily resolved. There is an important piece of evidence which might be expected to help to clarify this puzzle, Gregory’s Commentary on I Kings. It has not, however, been widely utilized, as the authenticity of the work has, until recent years, been in doubt.
1 See, for instance, Campbell, J., John, E., and Wormald, P., The Anglo-Saxons (Oxford, 1982), p. 156Google Scholar. That it is intended to apply bodi to kings and to prelates is assumed by, e.g., Reydel-let, M., La royauté dans la littérature latine de Sidoine Apollinaire à Isidore de Séville, BEFAR, 243 (1981), p.463.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2 On this theme, see my discussion ‘Gregory die Great’s rector and his genesis’, in Fontaine, J., Gillet, R., and Pellistrandi, S., eds, Grégoire le Grand = Colloques internationaux du CNRS (Paris, 1986), pp. 137–46Google Scholar. On the vocabulary, see also Folliet, G., ‘Les trois catégories de chrétiens’, Année théologique augustinienne, 14 (1954), pp. 81–96Google Scholar: ‘Note: Emploi du mot “praepositus”’, pp. 94-6.
3 By Verbraken, Dom P., in CChr, 144 (1963)Google Scholar. This is the edition used and referred to through out here. See also his ‘Le texte du Commentaire sur les Rois attribué à saint Grégoire’, RBeh, 66 (1956), pp. 39-62 and his ‘Le Commentaire de saint Grégoire sur le Premier Livre des Rois’, ibid., pp. 150-217. The recent edition with French translation, introduction, and notes by Vogüé, Dom Adalbert de, SC, 351 (Paris, 1989)Google Scholar was not available to me in preparing this study.
4 The two independent studies, which appeared at almost die same rime, reached substantially the same conclusions: see Vogüé, A de, ‘Les Vues de Grégoire le Grand sur la vie religieuse dans son Commentaire des Rois’, StMon, 20 (1978), pp. 17–63Google Scholar (= The views of St Gregory the Great on the religious life in Commentary on die Book of Kings’, Cistercian Studies (1982), pp. 40-64 and 212-32); and, especially, the characteristically thorough investigation by Meyvaert, P., ‘The date of Gregory die Great’s Commentaries on die Candele of Canticles and on I Kings’, Sacris erudiri, 23 (1978-9), pp. 191—216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5 These are the conclusions of Meyvaert’s study. They are well supported by the evidence adduced. De Vogüé comes to the same views. On the audience, see the penetrating remarks by Meyvaert, The date’, pp. 203-5, and de Vogüé, The views of St Gregory’, pp. 42-3.
6 Gregory’s correspondence provides examples of a wide range of such officials. The phrase cited in the text is quoted from Meyvaert, The date’, pp. 204-5.
7 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.211; 6.3; cf. 4.155. This is a common theme in the Moralia; cf., for example, ‘Bene autem saneó uiri scriprurae sacrae testimonio reges uoeantur…’: Mor. 26.28.53.
8 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.15, referring to chapters 1-14.
9 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.3. Note that Gregory’s exposition ad litteram has a clear moral dimension.
10 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.4.
11 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.5.
12 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.9.
13 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.6-7. He will adopt a different point of view in his exegesis in a later section, 4.38-78: see below, p. 12, n. 19.
14 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.8. Preoccupation with bad pastors is, of course, a recurrent theme in the Commentary. That it is, in fact, one of the central problems of the work is strongly suggested by the deliberation with which it is brought into the Prologue, §5.
15 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.9 (11.179-81).
16 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.10.
17 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.12.
18 Ibid.
19 Especially In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.63-9.
20 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.68.
21 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.14. Cf. 6.47: ‘sed quid antiquos adtendimus, cum nunc tantam lapsorum regum multitudinem videamus? Caceruadm namque nunc in flagida corruunt non solum subiecti debiles sed edam praelari et sacerdotes neglegentes.’ Their sin appears to be the desire to be ordained, notwithstanding their unworthiness.
22 This is not an infrequent practice in his writings. Sometimes, e.g. In 1 Lib. Reg. 1.84, he explicitly brackets historiam siue moralem intellegentiam together as against typicam expianationem.
23 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.15:
24 Ibid. This idea is also a commonplace, frequent in the Moralia; e.g. 20.24.52; 25.16.34.
25 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.16-38.
26 In 1 Lib. Reg. 5.29.
27 In 1 Lib. Reg. 5.30.
28 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.10 (cf. above, n. 16); cf. 4.115.
29 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.115.
30 In 1 Lib. Reg. 4.116.1 am inclined to doubt that primalus here refers to the papal office, and that it means anything more than praelatio and its synonyms.
31 I have discussed these passages in my ‘The sacred and the secular: from Augustine to Gregory the Great’, JThS, ns 36 (1985), pp. 84-96, at pp. 86-7. The Moralia passage is compared with Augustine’s De ciuitate Dei 19.15 by Reydellet, La royauté, pp. 464-5.
32 Reydellet, La royauté, p. 465.
33 Also revised for publication later.
34 On this and what follows, see my ‘Gregory the Great’s Europe’, TRHS ser. 5, 31 (1981), pp. 21-36 repr. in Markus, R. A., From Augustine to Gregory the Great (Collected Studies) (London, 1983), no. XV.Google Scholar
35 The sacred and the secular’, where the argument is more fully deployed.
36 Straw, Carole, Gregory the Great: Perfection in Imperfection (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London, 1988), p. 9.Google Scholar
37 Quotation from In 1 Lib. Reg. 3.137. Cf. ibid., 2.59. For references to the theme in Gregory’s other works, and for the rich imagery of the end of the world in which it is embedded, see my study, The sacred and the secular’.
38 In 1 Lib. Reg. 2.59.
39 On the three ordina see Additional Note, below, pp. 20-1.
40 Jews and pagans were the two significant groups which formed an exception to this rule, as what might be described as ‘internal anomalies’ within a Christian society. A study of Gregory’s treatment of them would show interesting divergences, which cannot be pursued here.
41 On the substance of this paragraph see my fuller treatment in Burns, J. H., ed., The Cambridge History of Medieval Political Thought, c.350-c.1450 (Cambridge, 1988), at pp. 118–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
42 The tres fidelium ordines: e.g. Hom, in Exech. 2.4 (praedicantium, continentium, coniugum). On the ordina see Folliet, ‘Les trois catégories’. On the originality of Gregory’s vocabulary, Ladner, R., ‘L’ordo praedicarorum avant l’ordre des prêcheurs’ in Mandonnet, P., Saint Dominique. L’idée, l’homme et l’oeuvre (Paris, 1937), pp. 51–5Google Scholar. I owe this reference to Dagens, C., Saint Grégoire le Grand. Culture et expérience chrétienna (Paris, 1977), p. 312, n. 2.Google Scholar
43 See above, nn. 5 and 6.
44 In 1 Lib. Reg. 2.130.
45 Ibid.
46 In 1 Lib. Reg. 3.171; cf. 4.1.