The Prayed Francis: Liturgical Vitae and Franciscan Identity in the Thirteenth Century ed. by Marco Bartoli et al.

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Prayed Francis: Liturgical Vitae and Franciscan Identity in the Thirteenth Century ed. by Marco Bartoli et al. Michael J. P. Robson (bio) The Prayed Francis: Liturgical Vitae and Franciscan Identity in the Thirteenth Century, ed. Marco Bartoli, Jacques Dalarun, Timothy J. Johnson and Filippo Sedda (St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2019), vi + 230 pp. ISBN 978-1-57659-433-9-19. Hagiographical studies have seen significant advances in Franciscan scholarship over the last half a century with new critical editions of central texts being prepared. The fruits of this research have been made available in English translations, from the Omnibus of the Sources for the Life of St Francis to the publication of Francis of Assisi: Early Documents in three volumes with an excellent index at the turn of the new millennium. The examination of the life of Francis of Assisi is now gravitating towards liturgical texts in order to gauge the image of the saint projected during the sacred liturgy in the Mass and the Divine Office. There is a growing realization that these liturgical texts did much to condition the friars' perception of the life and apostolate of their founder. The comparative neglect of the liturgical sources is now being redressed by a team of international scholars. This volume is comprised of four substantial chapters: first, a lengthy introduction, secondly, the foundational texts from the Franciscan Liturgy, thirdly, the Liturgical Legends of the order of Minor Brothers and fourthly the Liturgy of St Francis outside the order of Friars Minor. The first chapter, for instance, consists of three sections dealing with the contributions made to the recent research by Professors Jacques Dalarun, Timothy Johnson and Marco Bartoli. Professor Dalarun's indefatigable search for the earliest witnesses to the life of Francis of Assisi through both hagiographical and liturgical texts requires no introduction. His exciting discovery, Thome Celanensis Vita beati patris nostri Francisci. Présentation et édition critique, was published by Analecta Bollandiana in 2015 and has since been translated into various languages. He summarises the quest for the historical Francis, the Francis of history, and from intuition to publication. This survey marks the contribution of Fr Luke Wadding's edition of the writings of Francis of Assisi in 1623 and the enduring legacy of the scholarship of Paul Sabatier. Plans for the publication of volumes based on this research are explained along with the incorporation of Professor Filippo Sedda, who was already working on early breviaries from inside and outside the order and publishing the fruits of his research. Much of this scholarship is contained in his Franciscus Liturgicus: editio fontium saeculi XIII, a text which was published at Padua in 2015 in conjunction with Professor Dalarun. Professor Johnson's contribution contains three sections: first, the theological reflections (poverty, identity and prayer), secondly, anthropological [End Page 300] reflections (memory, ritual and performance) and thirdly, literary reflections (place, genre and institution) followed by an epilogue. His reflections on the message conveyed during the friars' communal prayers turn a welcome spotlight on the liturgical sources which have hitherto received too little attention in recent Franciscan studies. He observes: 'For more than a century, scholars have overlooked or dismissed this "prayed Francis" of the choir legends like Julian of Speyer's Legend for Use in the choir or Bonaventure's Minor life in the search for the ever-elusive historical Francis' (p. 21). One of the benefits of this short study is the light which is shed on the application of the decree of the 1266 general chapter of Paris; it is clear that the Bonaventurean ban did not stifle the hagiographical instincts regarding Francis. Both old and new materials were copied and circulated in the ensuing decades. Indeed, the transcription of some of the earlier hagiographical and later texts suggests that the decree was honoured in the breach. Professor Johnson's recent research has rightly drawn attention to another text which had hitherto received inadequate attention, Bonaventure's Legenda minor, a text which was not translated in the monumental Francis of Assisi: Early Documents. The Legenda minor is more than a summary of the significantly longer Legenda maior. It is anchored in the liturgical realm...