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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 February 2016
Within the last decade noteworthy efforts have been made to provide for a better understanding of Joachim of Fiore through new editions of his work and the establishment of a more exact chronology for the events in his life. Under the direction of Kurt-Victor Selge a Herausgeberkommission der kritischen Gesamtausgabe der Werke Joachims von Fiore has been established, a symposium on the manuscript traditions of Joachim’s work has been held under its auspices, and new critical editions are expected to be forthcoming soon. Professor Selge has contributed significantly to these efforts with his study of the chronology of Joachim’s writings and his edition of the Praephatio sive Prologus super Apocalypsim. I am building on this work and, of course, the outstanding work of such scholars as Marjorie Reeves, and hope now to identify a distinctive stage in Joachim of Fiore’s career.
1 Selge, Kurt-Victor, ‘L’origine delle opere di Gioacchino da Fiore’, L’attesa delta fine dei tempi nel Medioevo (Bologna, 1990), pp. 87—131Google Scholar; and ‘Eine Einführung Joachims von Fiore in die Johannesapokalypse’, Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 46(1990), pp. 85–131. edition on pp. 102–31.
2 Joachim of Fiore, Expositio in Apocalypsim (Venice, 1527; repr. Frankfurt a. M., 1964), fol. 39V: ‘… subito mihi meditanri aliquid quadam mentis oculis intelligentie claritate percepta de plenitudine libri huius et tota veteris ac novi testamenti Concordia. Revelatio facta est. …’
3 Ibid., fo. 39r-v, ‘Aliquid in libro isto meditanti occurrere pro quo confisus de dono Dei audacior factus sum ad scribendum. Quinimmo in silendo et non scribendo timidior, ne quando tacenti mihi diceretur a iudice. Serve male et piger sciebas quia meto ubi non seminavi, et congrego ubi non sparsi. Oportuit ergo te committere pecuniam meam num mularis et veniens recepissem utique quod meum est, cum usura.’
4 Joachim of Fiore, Psalterium decern chordarum (Venice, 1527; repr. Frankfurt a. M., 1965), fo. 227r-v.
5 For arguments for specific and differing chronologies see Lerner, Robert, ‘Joachim of Fiore’s breakthrough to chiliasm’, Cristianesimo nella storia, 6 (1985), pp. 489–512, in particular pp. 495–6Google Scholar; McGinn, Bernard, The Calabrian Abbot (New York, 1985), p. 22Google Scholar; and Kurt-Victor Selge,’L’origine’, pp. 108–13.
6 Lerner, , ‘Joachim of Fiore’s breakthrough to chiliasm’, p. 502Google Scholar.
7 Ibid., pp. 496–8; Joachim of Fiore, Expositio in Apocalypsim, fo. 39r-v. Apparently Joachim worked on his texts over a long period; see Kurt-Victor Selge, ‘L’origine’, pp. 87–131 for a description of this. At the end of his life Joachim was concerned that the exemplars be safe guarded: ‘Rogo ex parte dei omnipotentis coabbates meos et priores et ceteros fratres metuentes dominum et ea qua posse uideor auctoritate precipio, quatinus presens scriptum aut exemplar habentes secum ac si pro testamento opuscula que hactenus confecisse uideor et si quid me de nouo usque ad diem obitus mei contigerit scriptitare quamcitius poterint collecta omnia, relictis in salua custodia exemplaribus, apostolico examini representent recipientes ab eadem sede uice mea correctionem …’ in Abbot Joachim of Fiore: Liber de Con cordia Noui ac Veteris Testamenti, ed. Daniel, E. R., Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 73, 8 (Philadelphia, 1983), p. 5Google Scholar. The process of manuscript transmission and, in particular, the correction of the Fiore manuscripts have been studied by Fabio Troncarelli and a detailed article with emphasis on Padua, Biblioteca Antoniana, MS 322, is soon to be published by him. Also, seldom mentioned in regard to the Fiore manuscripts is possible damage from the fire of 1215 that burned the original monastery founded by Joachim and that preceded the move of the Florensians to the present-day site of San Giovanni in Fiore. Unless it was symbolic, as a needed purification after the 1215 condemnation, did the fire result in any damage to their manuscripts and thus produce a possible immediate need for new and quickly produced copies such as Padua, Biblioteca Antoniana, MS 322?
8 Grundmann, Herbert, ‘Zur Biographie Joachims von Fiore und Rainers von Ponza’, Aus-gewählte Aufsälze, II, Joachim von Fiore (Stuttgart, 1977), pp. 281–94, esp. pp. 281–2. 293–4, and 297Google Scholar.
9 The anonymous Vita, in Grundmann, , ‘Zur Biographie Joachims von Fiore und Rainers von Ponza’, pp. 345–6Google Scholar, ‘Cepit itaque vir fidclis et prudens prudenter et fideliter temporalem sub-stantiam dispensare, sed omnis prudentia eius in spiritalis profectus cxercirio vcrsabatur, nullatenus negligere volcns gratiam quam accepit; sed meditabatur, eloquebatur et com-mentabatur in data sibi desuper intelligentia scripturarum….’
10 Grundmann argued that the anonymous Vita has survived only in part; the first and last parts are missing. See Grundmann, , ‘Zur Biographie Joachims von Fiore und Raincrs von Ponza’, pp. 292–4Google Scholar.
11 The anonymous Vita in ibid., p. 342, ‘Moises noster gemine revelatione legis accepta de monce descendit…’.
12 To see Joachim’s intellectual development in terms of these three visions, each connected to one of the three persons of the Trinity, is to understand Joachim according to the programme he and his biographer put forth. These visions can be seen also to have occurred in Trinitarian sequence if one accepts Robert Lerner’s dating of the visions in ‘Joachim of Fiore’s break through to chiliasm’, pp. 492–6 and 508.
13 Abbot Joachim of Fiore: Liber de Concordia Noui ac Veteris Testamenti, pp. 145–6, ‘Has, inquam, duas arbores sublimes et condenpsas ponamus ante oculos mentis, et sic in eis Patrem et Filium, quorum alius ex alio est principaliter intelligamus; ut tamen cum eis genus hominum secundarie accipiamus, quia, etsi disiuncti sumus a bono deo condicrione nature, gratie tamen ipsius participatione coniuncci. Nunquam enim diceret euangelista scribens dominicam genealogiam: “Qui fuit Ade, qui fuit dei”, nisi eundem primum homiuem filiuni esse dei per adoptionem sentiret. In prima icaque cedro—de cuius medulla et ramorum uerrice nara est arbor secunda, aut dubium quod similis eius—populus ille antiquus intel-ligendum est qui, sicut iam supcrius, diximus creatus est specialius ad ymaginem Patris, sicut ct sequcns populus ad ymaginem Filii. Si autem secundum illud quod ait dominus Moysi: “Vide ut omnia facias secundum exemplar quod ostensum est tibi in monte”, non quasi ex similitudine fingenda est ueritas, sed magis, ueritate perspecta, propter eos qui tardioris sunt ingcnii, similitudo significans adhibenda, talem nos cedri huius ymaginem assignare oportet, qualem earn pro dono grade in montis uerrice contemplati sumus, non quales in siluis montium consueuerunt inueniri.’ Also Liber concordie Noui ac Veteris Testamenti (Venice, 1319; rcpr. Frankfurt a. M., 1964), fo. 19r. As can be seen, Joachim’s comment about his Mosaic vision comes in his discussion of the relationship of the two trees/two testaments, the topic of the chapter. Because this part of Book Two of the Concordia was written after his later visions, there is one mention at the very beginning of this chapter of a third tree that grows from these two. The chapter, however, treats only of the two trees and Joachim’s mention of his Mosaic vision is immediately related to the two trees/two testaments discussion. See also Marjorie, Reeves and Beatrice Hirsch-Reich, The Figurae of Joachim of Fiore (Oxford, 1972), pp. 32–3Google Scholar.
For Joachim’s tree imagery also see Abbot Joachim of Fiore: Liber de Concordia Noui ac Veteris Testamenti, pp. xxviii—xxxv and 107–12, 145–84.
14 Ibid., pp. 145–6, ‘Si autem secundum illud quod ait dominus Moysi: “Vide ut omnia facias secundum exemplar quod ostensum est ribi in monte”, non quasi ex similitudine fingenda est ueritas, sed magis, ueritate perspecta, propter eos qui tardioris sunt ingcnii, similitudo significans adhibenda, talem nos cedri huius ymaginem assignare oportet, qualem earn pro dono gratie in montis uertice contemplati sumus, non quales in siluis montium consueuerunt inueniri.’
15 Joachim of Fiore, Enchiridion super Apocalypsim, ed. E. Burger (Toronto, 1986), pp. 47–8, ‘Sed quia tempus adhuc parumper distat, ut ille intellectus qui perfecte erir in Spiritu assignari qucat, magisque nobis incumbit assignare ea quae in statu secundo completa sunt, respondentia operibus tesrimonii prions, sicut in opere Concordiae, quantum Dcus donavit, ostendimus, operae pretium credidi ea ipsa quae consonare veteribus simplici assertione monstravimus, pro eo scilicet quod historiae quas ecclesiasticas dicimus, minus authenticae judicantur, ex libro Apocalypsis qui tantae est auctoritatis ostendere, ut tanto securius illi open fidem accomodare possimus, quanto concordiam rerum et temporum quae in eo praestante Domino ciaruisse cognoscitur, nequaquam sensus hominis adinvenit et protulit sed is qui in utroque testimonio loquitur Spiritus edidit prophetiae.
Denique et ego cum librum hunc lectitare coepissem, et adhuc concordiarum sacramenta nescirem, quo illuc impetu a primo ductus sim nescio. Deus scit. Unde scio quod nequaquam historiarum periria ad concordiae notiriam perductus sum, sed sola praeteritorum operum, hoc est, tesrimonii veteris comparatione pulsatus, credens discordare non posse in corpore quod in capite concors inveni, nee otiosum fore in reliquis Sanctis quod in patriarchis et aposrolis concordarc perpendi, dedi operam in hoc ipso, ut quantum Deus mihi concederer testimoniorum concordiam compilarem, sed an scrupulosis mentibus sarisfecerim nescio.’
16 See McGinn, Bernard, Visions of the End (New York, 1979), p. 315, 11. 33Google Scholar, where he makes this observation in reference to Joachim’s Expositio de prophetia ignota.
17 McGinn, , The Calabrian Abbot, pp. 22–4Google Scholar, and ‘Joachim and the Sibyl’, Citeaux, 24 (1973), pp. 97–138.
18 Grundmann, , ‘Zur Biographie Joachims von Fiore und Rainers von Ponza’, p. 346Google Scholar, ‘… reverens tamen zelum ordinis, in quo stabat, quia non erat ei licitum scribcrc sine licentia Capituli generalis’. See also ibid., pp. 307–8, and Canivez, J.-M., Statuta capituloritm oencralium Ordinis Cisterciencis, 1 (Louvain, 1933), p. 26Google Scholar, ‘“Si liccat alicui novos libros dictarc.” Nulli liceat abbati, nee monacho, nee novitio, libros facere, nisi forte cuiquam in generali capitulo concessum fuerit.’ As I discussed in chapter two of my book, Joachim of Fiore and Monastic Reform (New York, 1990), the anonymous biographer was concerned to show that Joachim followed ecclesiastical regulations consistently, and in this case St Paul’s admonition (I Cor. 14. 39–40), ‘And so, my dear brothers, by all means be ambitious to prophesy …, but let everything be done with propriety and in order’, carried the watchword.
19 See Benedicti regula, ed. Hanslik, R., Corpus seriptortim ecclesiasticorum latinorum, 75 (Vienna, 1977). p. 23Google Scholar. ‘…ut capacibus discipulis mandata domini uerbis proponere …’.
20 Joachim’s sermons and short instructional pieces were not only not itemized in his corpus to be submitted to the Pope, but even today remain incompletely catalogued.
21 See Stegmüller, F., Repertorium biblicum medii aevi, 3 (Madrid, 1951), p. 226Google Scholar. There is a real need to publish a ‘definitive’ list of the manuscripts of Joachim of Fiore (and Pseudo-Joachim); one manuscript text, not recorded before, that I wish to note here isjoachim’s Deseptent sigillis in Bruges, Stedelijke Openbare Bibl., MS 86, fos 100r-101r. See the edition of this work in Marjorie Reeves and Beatrice Hirsch-Rcich, ‘The seven seals in the writings of Joachim of Fiore’, Recherches de theohgie ancienne et medievale, 21 (1954), pp. 239–47.
22 There is a short description of MS 326 in Stephan Rossler, ‘Verzeichniss der Handschriften der Bibliothek des Stiftes Zwettl’ in Xenia Bernardina, pt 2, vol. 1, Die Handschriften- Verzeiclmisse der Cistercienser-Stifte (Vienna, 1891), p. 413, but no mention of Joachim of Fiore as the author of the Praefatio, which Rössler calls the Explanatio libri Apocalipsis, and no notice of this additional new text or the fragment on Rev. 6. 6. He dates Zwettl, MS 326 as ‘XII u. XIII Jahr’.
23 Abbot Joachim of Fiore: Liber dc Concordia Noui ac Veteris Testamenti, p. 295 and Joachim of Fiore. Expositio in Apocalypsim, fo. 115-v. I am examining this fragment in the light of Joachim’s condemned Trinitarian ideas.
24 A comparison between Selge’s edirion and the Zwettl text shows that they arc extremely close; where there are variants, in as much as 1 have been able to pursue this aspect of research now, the wording in Zwettl seems to make more sense, i.e., following standards of the infernal logic of the text, scriptural reference or Joachim’s choice of language in his other writings.
25 See tavola II in Tondelli, Leone, Reeves, Marjoric, and Hirsch-Rcich, Beatrice, II Libro delle figure dell’abate Gioachino da Fiore, 2 (Turin, 1953) and Reeves and Hirsch-Rcich, The Figurae of Joachim oj Fiore, pp. 153–9Google Scholar.
26 Reeves, Marjorie, The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford, 1969), p. 518Google Scholar; Paris, Bibl. Nat., MS Lat. 11864, fos 151V-152V; Paris, Bibl. Nat., MS Lat. 3595, fos 28r-29r; and Rome, MS Vat. Lat. 3822. fos 3v-4r.
27 The text, in its later version, has been edited by Jeanne Bignarni-Odicr, ‘Notes sur deux manuscrits de la bibliothcque du Vatican contcnant des traitcs incdits dc Joachim de Flore’, Melanges d’archeologie et d’histoire, 54 (1937), pp. 224–6. Sec Tondelli, Leone, II Libra dclle figure dell’abate Gioachino da Fiore, 1 (Turin, 1953), pp. 41–3Google Scholar; Tondelli’s footnotes show variants found in the Paris manuscript versions that reflect an earlier version than the Vatican text.
28 Reeves, and Hirsch-Rcich, , The Figurae of Joachim of Fiore: genuine and spurious collections’, Mediaeval and Renaissance Studies, 3 (1954), p. 198Google Scholar; Bloomficld, Morron and Reeves, Marjorie, ‘The penetration of Joachism into Northern Europe’, Joachim of Fiore in Christian Thought, ed. West, D., I (New York, 1975), p. 116 n. 40Google Scholara.
29 Reeves, and Hirsch-Reich, , ‘The Figura of Joachim of Fiore’, pp. 178–82Google Scholar, and The Figurae of Joachim of Fiore, pp. 109–10 and 267–8; and Tondelli, II Libro delle figure, p. 41. Grundmann, Herbert, Neue Forscliungen über Joachim von Fiore (Marburg, 1950), pp. 23–4Google Scholar. apparently did not know about the Paris manuscript from the first decade of the 1200s.
30 Reeves, and Hirsch-Reich, , The Figurae of Joachim of Fiore, p. 110Google Scholar.
31 Zwettl, MS 326, fo. 9r, ‘Cum ergo nativitate Christi complete sint hoc temporum xl generationes, id est mclxxvi anni, non restant nisi due generariones complende, id est anni lx, id est duo terdenarii in quibus oportet impleri quicquid de antichristo dicitur et de consummatione seculi.’
32 See Wessley, Stephen, ‘Bonum est Benedicto mutate locum: The role of the “Life of Saint Benedict” in Joachim’of Fiore’s monastic reform’, Revue Bénédictine, 90 (1980), pp. 314-28Google Scholar.
33 There is no mention of a period of earthly bliss and Joachim lists different interpretations of Daniel’s 45 days; this period of bliss is described as short in Joachim’s De ultimis tribulationibus, ed. Daniel, E. R., ‘Abbot Joachim of Fiore: The De ultimis tribulationibus’, in Prophecy and Millenarianism, ed. Williams, A. (Harlow, 1980), p. 183Google Scholar: ‘… ad istam modicam et breuem pacem’.
34 There is an ambiguous 5/7 numerical relationship here in Zwettl, MS 326, fo. 9V. But in this text one finds no indication of Joachim’s subsequent use of this sequence, as fot example, when he later indicated the direction of futute spiritual development in the inheritor of monastic reform.
35 See Kurt-Victor Selge’s description in his ‘Eine Einfühtung Joachims von Fiore in die Johannesapokalypse’, p. 100: ‘Die Theorie der drei trinitarischen “Status” in Ergänzung der alten Lehre von den sechs Weltaltern und der jüngeren Lehre von den sieben Zeiten des sechsten Weltalters liegt fertig vot, ebenso die hermeneutische Theorie von der Concordia des Alten und Neuen Testaments und der sich aus ihr in Anwendung auf die Zeit der Kirche ergebenden spiritualis intelligentia.’ Also compare the wording in ibid., p. 104, for the sixth age: ‘quinta in sacratissimi mundi salvatoris adventu, sexta ab eodem incepta’, to Zwettl, MS 126, fo. 9r, ‘sexta in iudice’.
36 Grundmann, ‘Zur Biographic Joachims von Fiore und Rainers von Ponza’, p. 298: ‘Demnach wäre Joachim 1166/67 nach dem Tod König Wilhelms I. in der Kanzlei zu Palermo tätig gewescn und danach ins Hcilige Land gegangen …’.
37 Only a publication comparing die manuscripts, with some commentary, can make this clear (I will prepare such a study and edition). Joachim’s idiosyncrasy can be seen in part by one calculation of generations: two groups of sixty-three arrived at by counting the latter part of the Old Testament twice. Sec Reeves, and Hirsch-Reich, , The Figurae of Joachim of Fiore, p. 9Google Scholar, and also p. 6: ‘Now he plunges into intricate calculations of generations from which he con structs a framework which is constantly used hereafter: the generations are grouped in series of twenty-one in such a way that the Dispensation of the Old Testament is reckoned as 21 +21 + 21, while that of the New (which, beginning with Ozias, overlaps the Old by twenty-one generations) will likewise endure for sixty-three generations, and beyond, to the consummatio seculi.’ See Zwettl, MS 326, fo. 9t, whete the two groups of generations are arranged to number sixty-three each. This is done as noted by an overlapping, i.e., by com puting the beginning of the New Testament with Isaiah and Ozias. Also, as is typical of Joachim, in this text we see some hesitancy in pronouncing when the end will occur.
38 Tondelli, Il Libro delle figure, p. 42.
39 Grundmann, Herbert, Studien über joachim von Floris (Leipzig, 1927), p. 52CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
40 Lerner, Robert, ‘Refreshment of the Saints: the rime after Antichrist as a station for earthly progress in medieval thought’, Traditio, 32 (1976), pp. 102–3Google Scholar.
41 Zwettl, MS 326, fo. 9r; the sequence of day, month, year, age in the text does not seem to refer to specific earlier controversies about the length of time, especially if Lerner’s ‘Refresh ment of the Saints’ is reasonably complete, but rather exptesses the idea that it is unclear what Daniel’s forty-five days stand for. Joachim posits in this text that the learned have said that a month can stand for a day, so Daniel’s forty-five days could be forry-fivc months, etc., not that others have proposed this explanation for the meaning of Daniel.
42 Zwettl, MS 326, fo. or, ‘Quod tempus a Daniele diciturxlv videlicet dierum.’
43 Lerner, , ‘Refreshment of the Saints’, pp. 97–11 + and 117Google Scholar. See also Reeves, Marjoric, ‘How original was Joachim of Fiore’s theology of history?’, Storia e messaogio in Giocchino da Flore, Atti del I Congresso internaziotiale di stitdi gioachimiti (Giovanni, S. in Fiore, 1980), pp. 25—41Google Scholar. This period of forty-five days, consonant with the earlier traditions, is a time of penance and conversion to one faith. Careful attention should be given also to the seven ages in this text to appreciate how Joachim changed them in his mature writings. With the sixth age to be that of Christ the Judge, the seventh ‘in quiete animarum’ in Zwettl, MS 326, fo. 9r, takes on a heavenly dimension. The seventh age is not like the description in Joachim of Fiore, Expositio in Apocalypsim, fos 209V—21or. Again, this helps confirm the early period of the text.
44 Paris, Bibl. Nat., MS Lat. 11864, fo. 152V.
45 Leo, Pietro De, ‘Una nuova opera di Gioacchino da Fiore? Il Super Cantica Canticorutn in un codice cosentino del XII secolo’, L’Etáci dello Spirito e la fine del tempi in Gioacchino da Fiore e net Gioachimismo medievale, Alii del II Congresso inurnazionale di studi gioachimiti (Giovanni, S. in Fiore, 1986), pp. 435–88Google Scholar, and Gioacchino da Fiore (Soveria Mannelli, 1988), pp. 58, 129, has proposed that a particular anonymous commentary on the Song of Songs is an early work of Joachim from the last quarter of the twelfth century. Kurt-Victor Selge, ‘L’origine delle opere di Gioacchino da Fiore’, pp. 91–2, n. 16, thinks that the content of De Leo’s text docs not allow ‘alcuna conclusione sulla paternita di Gioacchino …’. Dc Leo, ‘Una nuova opera’, p. 440, considers the Codex Cusentinus not an ‘apografo, bensi di uno scritto originale’. If one accepts Fabio Troncarclli’s conclusions in ‘Un codice con note autografe di Gioacchino da Fiore’, Scriptorium, 43 (1989), pp. 3–34, there is a discrepancy between the script of the two texts. Both cannot be in Joachim’s hand. An examination of the shape of the letter ‘d’ in the manuscripts Troncarelli and De Leo examined shows me they were written by two different hands. The notes that Troncarelli ascribes to Joachim in Rome, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, MS Barb. Lat. 627, may be early, but they have been able to be dated only in a general way.
46 Zwettl, MS 326 has the best readings and seems closest to the original.