Mary and the Body of God: Servasanctus of Faenza and the Psalter of Creation

Chapter 5 Mary and the Body of God: Servasanctus of Faenza and the Psalter of Creation

Rachel Fulton Brown

Riddle me this, as the preacher might say: What do the following things have in common?1

Snow, a harbor, the river Doryx, a well, precious minerals including silver, a fir tree, the fragrant resin of the storax, a bee, a window, a dining room, a ship, a fish net, a candelabrum, an atrium, a tambourinist.

Any guesses? What if I told you that, according to the Franciscan Servasanctus of Faenza (d. ca. 1300), they were all names found in Scripture for Mary, the Mother of God?2 What if I added a few more?

1 This paper was originally presented as a lecture at the University of California, Berkeley, in February 2015. I also presented it at the University of California, Los Angeles (April 2015), and at the University of Mississippi (October 2015). I am grateful to all three audiences for their attention and questions. Much as the Franciscans hoped to bring their studies in theology to wider audiences by adopting more popular forms of address in their preaching, I offer it here in an edited, but still conversational form, as a model for alternative ways in which we as scholars might speak. Like a Franciscan sermon, it is meant to be somewhat interactive, drawing in the audience with questions and vivid images on which to hang their memory of its theological points. 2 On Servasanctus as a preacher, see David d’Avray, ‘Philosophy in Preaching: The Case of a Franciscan Based in Thirteenth-century Florence (Servasanto da Faenza),’ in Literature and Religion in the Later Middle Ages: Philological Studies in Honor of Siegfried Wenzel, ed. Richard G. Newhauser and John A. Alford, Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies 118 (Binghamton, 1995), 263–273; and L. Oliger, ‘Servasanto da Faenza O.F.M. e il suo “Liber de Virtutibus et Vitiis”,’ in Miscellanea Francesco Ehrle. Scritti di storia e paleografia I: Per la storia della teologia e della filosofia, Studi e testi 37 (Rome, 1924), 148–189. For additional bibliography on Serva- sanctus’s life and works, see Maarten van der Heijden and Bert Roest, Franciscan Authors, 13th–18th Century: A Catalogue in Progress, . According to van der Heijden and Roest, Servasanctus was born between 1220 and 1230 in Castello Oriolo near Faenza. He entered the Franciscan order at Bologna and was ordained sometime between 1244 and 1260. He was active in the convent at Santa Croce in Florence from the 1260s as a preacher and confessor. His most widely disseminated work was the Liber de exemplis naturalibus, a collection of exempla, legends, visions, and miracle stories ar- ranged thematically for preaching on the articles of the faith, the sacraments, and the virtues

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Light, the firmament, the sun, the moon, the morning star, the dawn, the rainbow, the dew, the flood, the sea, the river, the aqueduct, the fountain, the earth, the mountain, gold, the cedar, the cypress, the rose, the olive, the vine, cinnamon, balsam, myrrh, the lily, the turtle-dove, the sheep, the city, the castle, the wall, the tower, the bedchamber, the throne, the litter, the oven, the ladder, the ark of Noah, the tabernacle, the temple, the holy of holies, the ark of the Lord, virago, mother, chosen one, queen, daugh- ter, sister, beloved, bride, handmaiden.

Do you see a pattern yet? Do you want more?

Day, cloud, mist, the Ganges, the Nile, the Tigris, the Euphrates, the Jor- dan, paradise, a field, solitude, a rock, the palm tree, the plane tree, the terebinth, the pomegranate, onyx, frankincense, nard, the hind, a fleece, a golden vessel, the gate, the house, the couch, the cellar, the golden altar, the veil, perfect, nurse.

Wait, I left some out.

Heaven, star, noon, air, valley, gemstone, tree, root, rod, fig tree, wood of Sethim, almond, bramble-bush, mulberry, grove, spice-bed, galbanum, drop, flower, dove, neck, heart, exemplar, book, mirror, new vessel, court, granary, treasury, mercy seat, column, one.

Plus a few more while, not strictly speaking mentioned in Scripture, ought to have been.

Crystalline heaven, star of the sea, constellation, chaste tree, opobalsam, cloister, lady, advocata, virgin of virgins, queen of confessors, martyrs, apostles, patriarchs and prophets, queen of angels, archangels, virtues, powers, principalities, dominations, thrones, cherubim, and seraphim.

Let’s see, how many names is that? Fifteen plus fifty plus thirty plus thirty-two plus twenty-two, which comes to 149. Oh, and Magnificata. Now do you see?

and vices. For the prologue and a table of contents of this collection, see M. Grabmann, ‘Der Liber de Exemplis Naturalibus des Fraziskanertheologen Servasanctus,’ in Franziskanische Studien 7 (1920), 85–117. On Servasanctus’s Mariale from which his list of names for Mary is taken, see below, n. 10.