Theology, Liminality, and the Exiled in Anglo-Saxon Literature Nathan John Haydon University of Arkansas, Fayetteville
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University of Arkansas, Fayetteville ScholarWorks@UARK Theses and Dissertations 5-2019 "We Are Strangers in this Life": Theology, Liminality, and the Exiled in Anglo-Saxon Literature Nathan John Haydon University of Arkansas, Fayetteville Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd Part of the History of Christianity Commons, Literature in English, British Isles Commons, Medieval History Commons, Medieval Studies Commons, and the Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion Commons Recommended Citation Haydon, Nathan John, ""We Are Strangers in this Life": Theology, Liminality, and the Exiled in Anglo-Saxon Literature" (2019). Theses and Dissertations. 3230. https://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/3230 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UARK. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UARK. For more information, please contact [email protected]. “We Are Strangers in this Life”: Theology, Liminality, and the Exiled in Anglo-Saxon Literature A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English by Nathan Haydon Austin College Bachelor of Arts in English and Classical Studies, 2011 Nashotah House Theological Seminary Master of Arts in Ministry, 2013 May 2019 University of Arkansas This dissertation is approved for recommendation to the Graduate Council. __________________________________ Joshua Smith, Ph.D. Dissertation Director __________________________________ __________________________________ William Quinn, Ph.D. Mary Beth Long, Ph.D. Committee Member Committee Member __________________________________ Lora Walsh, Ph.D. Committee Member Abstract In “‘We Are Strangers in this Life’: Theology, Liminality, and the Exiled in Anglo-Saxon Literature,” I analyze the theme of exile in the theological literature of the Anglo-Saxon era as a way of conveying the spiritual condition of eschatological separation. The anthropological theory of liminality will be applied in this dissertation as a way of contextualizing the existence of the exiled, and the multiple ways in which exile is enacted. The intervention of the theory of liminality in this dissertation offers a methodology and vocabulary for assessing what exile means in terms of a spiritual identity, how it operates in ideas of spiritual conflict, and how that conflict is interpreted in theological constructs. The theory of liminality provides a way to interpret the symbols that are constructed within social acts that arise from rituals of transition, of crossing the limen, or thresholds of social and spiritual boundaries, as in the case of exile and banishment. As a theme, exile emerges as a remarkably consistent presence, looming and lurking in the landscapes and characters of Old English poems, many of which are religious in nature. However, there is a lack of scholarship that attempts to understand how exile became such a prevalent theme in Anglo-Saxon literature, which leads to a lack of considering its rhetorical and spiritual function in light of Anglo-Saxon religious literary culture. It is interesting, and perhaps unfortunate, that more attention to this idea has not been afforded, given the clear theological impetus of eschatology and judgment that undergirds much of Anglo-Saxon religious literature. This dissertation will examine patristic literature, biblical commentaries, hagiography, homilies, and monastic regula in Anglo-Saxon England as a way to contextualize the theological concept of being in exile, and its meaning for Anglo-Saxon Christians and the spiritual identity they constructed as liminal people. Acknowledgments I would like to offer my thanks and appreciation to friends and family who, through their ceaseless encouragement, walked with me in this time. I also thank my colleagues with whom the shared experiences of trading advice, anxieties, complaints, and hopes provided a network of support for what is undeniably a challenging path. My dissertation committee deserves praise for their patience, advice, support, challenges, and mentorship. Specifically, I extend gratitude to my dissertation advisor, Dr. Joshua Byron Smith, for helping me discern this project; for pushing and challenging me when I needed to be pushed and challenged; for giving me space and advice to practice and grow as an academic and an Anglo-Saxonist; and for being a gebēor during our semester of reading the Old English homilies of Ælfric, in which the idea for this dissertation was conceived. Finally, I reserve highest laud to my wife, Kathryn. Her unrelenting strength, love, and support held me up when I felt like I could not do this. Table of Contents I. Introduction: Exile, Liminality, and the Anglo-Saxon Context 1 Chapter 1: Patristics, Early Monastic Literature, and Patria in Anglo-Saxon England 38 Chapter 2: Anglo-Saxon Hagiography — Guthlac and St Mary of Egypt 77 Chapter 3: Liminality, Homiletics, and the Anglo-Saxon Benedictine Liturgical Context 126 Chapter 4: Anglo-Saxons, the Old Testament, and the Patriarch Abraham 164 II. Conclusion 212 III. Bibliography 218 !1 I. Introduction: Exile, Liminality, and the Anglo-Saxon Context In “‘We Are Strangers in this Life’: Theology, Liminality, and the Exiled in Anglo-Saxon Literature,” I analyze the theme of exile in the theological literature of the Anglo-Saxon era as a way of conveying the spiritual condition of eschatological separation. The anthropological theory of liminality will be applied in this dissertation as a way of contextualizing the existence of the exiled, and the multiple ways in which exile is enacted. The intervention of the theory of liminality in this dissertation offers a methodology and vocabulary for assessing what exile means in terms of a spiritual identity, how it operates in ideas of spiritual conflict, and how that conflict is interpreted in theological constructs. The theory of liminality provides a way to interpret the symbols that are constructed within social acts that arise from rituals of transition, of crossing the limen, or thresholds of social and spiritual boundaries, and in the case of exile and banishment, what Victor Turner calls “social drama.”1 Given the pervasive nature of exile as a theme in Old English poetry, historians and literary scholars of Anglo-Saxon literature have studied the concept of exile in depth as a literary motif and a legal punishment in social contexts. Exile emerges as a remarkably consistent presence, looming and lurking in the landscapes and characters of Old English poems, many of which are religious in nature. It has been said that exile is “one of the most durable Anglo-Saxon traditions.”2 Because of that, there have been significant scholarly contributions to understanding exile as a literary and social construct. Some sources consider the historical and social practices of exile, and some take into account the theological implications and meaning that exile has when it is featured in 1 More on this and the theory of liminality will be discussed below in this introduction. 2 Allen Frantzen, Anglo-Saxon Keywords (Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 92. !2 clear representations of Christian theological poetry, or poetic adaptations of scripture.3 However, calling exile one of the most durable traditions of the Anglo-Saxons potentially does a disservice to the way we approach it, thinking of it as a de facto concept that has always existed in the Anglo-Saxon mindset, without consideration of influence. There is a lack of scholarship that attempts to understand how exile became such a prevalent theme in Anglo-Saxon literature, which leads to a lack of considering its rhetorical and spiritual function in light of Anglo-Saxon religious literary culture. It is interesting, and perhaps unfortunate, that more attention to this idea has not been afforded, given the clear theological impetus of eschatology and judgment that undergirds much of Anglo-Saxon religious literature. Barbara Newman, in writing about the intersection between sacred and secular readings of medieval literature, theorizes about what she calls “crossover” of secular and spiritual frameworks in the same text, and brings to mind the overarching theological culture in which many of these works were written.4 Newman notes that in determining the relationship of piety and the secular in works that demonstrate both, that it is not necessary that “every allusion to the sacred needs to be assessed at its full theological weight.”5 In saying this, she goes on to advocate a way of reading that is “both/and: when sacred and secular meanings both present themselves in a text, yet cannot be harmoniously reconciled, it is not always necessary to choose between them.”6 I do not disagree with this statement, and fully agree that in many cases, that 3 A survey of scholarship regarding exile will follow below in this introduction. 4 Barbara Newman, Medieval Crossover: Reading the Sacred Against the Secular (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2013), 7. 5 Newman, Medieval Crossover, 7. 6 Newman, Medieval Crossover, 7-8. !3 sense of sophistication is necessary in interpreting medieval literature. However, this dissertation will not follow the advice of a both/and reading of Anglo-Saxon works. The goal of this dissertation will be to show that for Anglo-Saxons, exile is a theological condition before it is a secular one, and that the theological reading must be privileged to understand what the secular means in this