The Virgin in Song: Mary and the Poetry of Romanos the Melodist Divinations: Rereading Late Ancient Religion by Thomas Arentzen

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Virgin in Song: Mary and the Poetry of Romanos the Melodist Divinations: Rereading Late Ancient Religion by Thomas Arentzen Kevin Kalish The Virgin in Song: Mary and the Poetry of Romanos the Melodist Divinations: Rereading Late Ancient Religion Thomas Arentzen Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2017. Pp. xiii + 265. ISBN 978-0-812-24907-1. Romanos the Melodist, the liturgical poet whose creative genius inaugurated the new form of the kontakia in sixth-century Constantinople, has increasingly received well-deserved scholarly attention. Recent scholarship has moved beyond questions of sources and influences and focused more on the liturgical and cultural context of Romanos' poetry. Thomas Arentzen's The Virgin in Song: Mary and the Poetry of Romanos the Melodist addresses a glaring omission: the role of the Virgin Mary in the kontakia of Romanos. According to Romanos' hagiography, the Virgin Mary appeared to him in a dream and gave him a scroll to eat, and this inspired his poetic prowess. By opening with a retelling of this dramatic moment in Romanos' life, Arentzen highlights two points central to his larger argument. First is the claim that within Byzantine culture Romanos and the Virgin Mary were inseparable precisely because Romanos, having received his poetic voice from the Virgin, in turn gave her a voice through his poetry. In making this claim, Arentzen challenges previous views that Romanos simply follows earlier traditions of either depicting Mary as an ascetic ideal or using her only to emphasize Christology. Instead, Romanos emerges here as the first to promulgate the Virgin as intercessor because of her personal intimacy with Christ. The second [End Page 240] point Arentzen makes with his dramatic opening is one to which he returns in the conclusion, though it is central to his method. While Romanos has been found wanting in theological complexity in comparison to other late antique writers, such a view fails to perceive what Romanos is doing in his poetry. Storytelling is its own form of theologizing. By focusing on the kontakia that deal with the life of the Virgin—from the young Virgin who receives the angelic visitor, to the nursing Virgin Mother, and finally the Virgin who joins her Son at Calvary—Arentzen reveals how crucial Romanos is for giving the Virgin a voice. Chapter 1 deals with Romanos' background, the development of liturgical hymnography, and life in sixth-century Constantinople. The discussion of the liturgical context is particularly rich, with nuanced examinations of such topics as why kontakia are not sermons (even though they share features), how the kontakia are dramatic without being drama, and how they serve as entertainment while at the same time doing something beyond just entertaining. Arentzen presents a compelling argument for why the kontakia are a form of theologizing, but one that relies on elements of storytelling, such as tension and suspense. Romanos' poetry must have been "groundbreaking and breathtaking" (25) as it appealed to a civic audience made up of laity of all types, rather than simply monks and nuns. The book is then organized according to the three stages in the Virgin's life. In chapter two—perhaps Arentzen's most daring—the kontakion on the Annunciation is revealed as a hymn charged with erotic energy, while full of paradox, as we would expect in Romanos. This kontakion stands apart from other accounts of the Annunciation because here Mary is not an ascetic, and Gabriel is not the usual figure of authority. Also, surprisingly and somewhat disconcertingly, the Holy Spirit, the Power from On High, is absent. But is Mary a "desirable body?" (16). To support this reading, Arentzen emphasizes the moments in the kontakion that play with revealing and concealing. A male (even if he is an angel) entering a virginal chamber is no small matter, and Arentzen highlights all of the trembling that takes place in this kontakion. Whether or not one is convinced by the reading of the kontakion as erotic, Arentzen provides a detailed analysis of this lesser-known but startling hymn (and the appendix includes his translation). Chapter 3 ("The Mother and Nurse") draws attention to how Romanos' hymns engage in a "(re)feminization" of Mary. Never one to shy...