[Previous: lines 236-299]
Jesus has just raised Lazarus from the dead. Now read on!
His actis, deus orantis vicina Simonis [300]------------
tecta subit, quem tota olim lacerum ulcere membra
eripuit morbo, atque in pristina reddidit ipse.
Dum vero mensas grati dignatus amici
accubat, in medio procerum urbis; protinus ecce
ingreditur forma insignis cultuque puella, [305]
picta peregrinas tunicasque, sinusque crepanti
argento saturos, atque auro intertexto:
cui caput implicitum gemmis, it flexile collo
aurum ingens, mixtis onerosa monilia baccis;
propexique nitent electro molle capilli, [310]
nexilibus quos in nodos collegerat hamis:
aureaque ex humero demissam fibula vestem,
Eois opibus gravidam et Gangetide gaza,
subnectit. Media micat ardens fronte pyropus
crebraque consertis pendent redimicula gemmis; [315]
qualis laeta sinus cum tellus veris honorem
pandit, opesque suas gremio explicat alma virenti.
Haec olim amissis utrisque parentibus orba
restitit, et proles in opes successit avitas
unica, quas pater immensas praedives habebat: [320]
Dumque aetas rudis, una illi super omnia cordi,
relligio fuit, et servandi cura pudoris.
Mox autem, paulatim annis fervente juventa,
sensibus illapsa est Veneris malesuada cupido.
quae mentem immutans furiis subiecit iniquis. [325]
Ah miseram! abiecto non obstat cura pudori;
non species, non fama movet. Cessit timor omnis,
relligioque oblita: domo iam nubilis exit;
iam convivia, jam spectacula laeta frequentat,
vinclaque contemptis rectoribus omnia rumpit, [330]
ac veluti ratis Aegaeo fine remige in alto,
sublatos simul ac fluctus inflaverit aura,
nunc huc incerto, deinde illuc fluctuat aestu,
quo ventique undaeque, urgent spoliata magistro.
Et iam freta opibus praedulces ambit amores [335]
florentum iuvenum, si quis, spectabilis ore
egregio formaque alios supereminet omnes.
Ergo laeta virum praestanti corpore postquam
accepit venisse, deum quem fama ferebat;
nullam passa moram, studio correpta videndi [340]
venerat. Ast ubi conspicuos deperdita vultus
hausit, et egregiae divinum frontis honorem,
divinosque oculos, ardentis pabula amoris;
diriguit, penitusque animo sententia versa est
atque alias longe concepit pectore flammas. [345]
Ecce autem subito visae spirantis ab ore
septem adeo circum offusa caligine, et atra
nube exire faces; veluti cum torris obusti
ultima sursum flamma fugit, fumumque relinquit.
“Haec,” deus, “haec,” inquit, “capitum foedissima septem, [350]
correptam miserae mentem vexabat, Erinnys.”
Tum Maria (hoc illi nomen) mutata, nec illa
argento qua; illusa sinus modo venerat aureos.
Iam capiti crinale aurum, colloque monile
detrahit, et tunicas squalentes exuit auro. [355]
Iamque sui piget, et curis mordetur honestis.
Inde deum orabat veniam, genibusque volutans,
(ut canis ad mensam procumbere suetus herilem)
lambebatque pedes nudos, lacrymisque rigabat,
veste fovens, alios tulerat quam nuper in usus. [360]
Tum de marmoreis varios deprompsit odores
thesauris, casias, et nardi mollis aristas,
aut thuris lachrymam atque auram fragrantis amomi,
pronaque permulsit nudas liquido unguine plantas:
suavis in aereas diffugit spiritus auras. [365]
Cuncta Deus placida qum mente accepit, et illam
dignatus venia, monitis implevit amicis.
After this, the god went to the house of Simon [300]------------
nearby, a man whose body once ulcerated
with wasting sickness he had previously cured.
He took his place at his friend’s table, together
with leading figures of the town; when suddenly
a girl came in, as striking for beauty as for style, [305]
dressed in multicoloured imported cloth, wreathed
in tinkling silver interworked with gold,
gemstones adorning her head, flexed round her neck
a weighty gold chain intricately woven with pearls;
her long combed hair, fixed by an amber pin, [310]
and braided into soft plaits, hung gleaming:
a gold brooch at her shoulder pinned her robe,
Eastern in style, laden with the treasures of Ganges,
cinched, a ruby at her brow, and gem-studded ribbons; [315]
as dazzling as springtime when the earth opens wide
and displays all the grace of its goodness
spreading all the fertile favours of its green lap.
She had, some time before, lost both her parents
and, their only heir, inherited all the wealth
which her father had earned in abundance [320]
As a young girl she had followed her heart:
had been religious, preserved her chastity.
But as years passed and the heat of youth grew
the misleading passion of Venus awoke in her.
turning her mind, subjecting her to shameful lusts. [325]
Poor thing! She no longer cared for chastity,
nor honour nor reputation. Fearing nothing,
she forgot faith. Though a young girl she left her house
and frequented parties and wild spectacles,
despising her guardians’ advice, all restraint gone, [330]
like an oarless ship at the mercy of the Aegean,
as the sea-surge is stirred up by the rising wind
and the craft veers this way and that on the shifting tide
steerless before the vagaries of breeze and wave.
That's how she used her riches: to indulge her love [335]
for handsome young men, for those most beautiful
in face, those whose bodies surpassed all others.
So when she heard that a fine-looking man
had come to town, rumoured to be the son of a god,
she wasted no time. Eager to set eyes on him [340]
she came. But when she fixed her lustful gaze
on him, and saw his noble high forehead,
and divinity in his eyes, love's prompt,
she was changed, deep within her heart
a very different kind of flame burst out. [345]
At that moment, as she breathed hard from her mouth
seven jets of fog poured and flowed out, soot black
as from torches, when a firebrand is finished
the last flame is snuffed and only smoke remains.
“See,” the god cried, “see,” he said, “this foul seven-headed [350]
Fury had seized the mind of this woman to vex her!”
Now Mary (this was her name) changed, no longer
happy to wear silver or wrought gold as before.
She removed her gold headband, and the necklace
from her throat, her clothes hardened with gold. [355]
Now she was ashamed, troubled by pious cares.
She asked forgiveness of God, and chose to kneel,
(like a dog who sits beside its master’s table)
and kiss his naked feet, wetting them with her tears,
wiping them with the robe she'd worn for other reasons. [360]
From a marble box she brought out certain perfumes
some bark of cassia, and pure soft spikenard;
scenting the afternoon air with perfumed cardamom.
Bowing, she anointed his feet with shining unguent
and a sweet smell of rose petal diffused the air. [365]
All of this the god placidly accepted
pardoning her and bestowing on her kind words.
This episode is derived, of course, from Luke 7:36-50.
36 And one of the Pharisees desired him that he would eat with him. And he went into the Pharisee's house, and sat down to meat.Vida adds a couple of biographical details: the woman’s orphanhood and wealth, her malesuadus cupidus (line 324) or ‘misguiding passion’, but most of all her possession by a seven-headed demon of lust. This turns the episode into one of casting out devils, rather than (as I take Luke to be) a story about sincere in-the-heart repentance. Identifying this woman of Bethany with Mary Magdalene is a tradition of longstanding, but the diabolical possession seems to be Vida’s invention.
37 And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster box of ointment,
38 And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment.
39 Now when the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him: for she is a sinner.
40 And Jesus answering said unto him, Simon, I have somewhat to say unto thee. And he saith, Master, say on.
41 There was a certain creditor which had two debtors: the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty.
42 And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell me therefore, which of them will love him most?
43 Simon answered and said, I suppose that he, to whom he forgave most. And he said unto him, Thou hast rightly judged.
44 And he turned to the woman, and said unto Simon, Seest thou this woman? I entered into thine house, thou gavest me no water for my feet: but she hath washed my feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head.
45 Thou gavest me no kiss: but this woman since the time I came in hath not ceased to kiss my feet.
46 My head with oil thou didst not anoint: but this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment.
47 Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.
48 And he said unto her, Thy sins are forgiven.
49 And they that sat at meat with him began to say within themselves, Who is this that forgiveth sins also?
50 And he said to the woman, Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace.
I’ve never understood, I think, the NT balance between devilish possession and freely willed sinfulness. Doesn’t the former involve a kind of abdication of moral agency on the part of the possessed? Was Vida’s Mary, in all her finery, really at fault? And if not, then what personal weight does her repentance, even carried to this level of abasement, entail?
These are large question, I know, and have been expansively discussed over the centuries. I suppose the particular issue here has to do with the idiom of epic poetry, which from the beginning has been inhospitable to interiority as such: an externalising, action-driven mode of art in which a passion must be personified. The locus classicus for this notion is the opening of the Iliad when Achilles, furious with Agamemnon, rushes sword-in-hand to kill him and then changes his mind, which inward state is described by the poet in these terms:
Athene came from heaven. She stood behind him, and seized the son of Peleus by his fair hair, appearing to him alone. No one of the others saw her. Achilles was seized with wonder, and turned around, and immediately recognized Pallas Athene. Terribly her eyes shone. [Iliad, 1:194-200]The risk Vida is running, I suppose, is that pitching his Christiad as an epic conflict between God and the devils runs the risk of turning us, ordinary mortals, into mere pawns, passive vessels filled without our sayso either with diabolical possessors or divine grace. That won’t do, not least because the Christiad, before it is anything else, is fundmentally the story of how God became an ordinary mere mortal.
It unpacks in some very elaborate ways, I think, some of which I touch on in this old post about another Renaissance text about, in a way, possession by devils (as opposed to disarrangements of brain chemistry): Hamlet. Another text on the cusp of medieval and modern understandings of subjectivity. It may be we literally believe in diabolic possession, in which case we may be persuaded by the argument that a sexually licentious woman is a helpless passenger, bound and gagged in the trunk of her own body's automobile, whilst a lustful devil presses the accelerator its hand on the wheel. Or it may be that we are content to take these devils as metaphors for mental disturbance, or wilfulness, or the human capacity to do wrong. As if to say: Caudius didn't literally pour poison into Old Hamlet's ear—what an inefficient means of poisoning somebody that would be!—rather this is the play's metaphor for the bad advisor, the political collateral of being guided by the wrong people and so on. But as the discussion over at that old blog suggests, folk are often resistant when it comes to giving up their favourite metaphors. A New England Journal of Medicine article, linked there [‘Bartolommeo Eustachio's De Auditus Organis and the Unique Murder Plot in Shakespeare's Hamlet’ by Avrim R. Eden, M.D., and Jeff Opland, Ph.D.] goes to some lengths to insist that it is indeed possible to poision somebody by pouring poison in at the ear; and I had to stifle my immediate reaction, to disagree on those terms (‘surely it would make more sense to pour poison in at the mouth?’). To do so would be to become part of the problem, which is falling-in with those who are minded to take this at face-value rather than as a metaphor.
The point being: people are simply disinclined to give up their concretizations (they like their concretizations) so as to make the move to ‘this is metaphor’ ... almost as if people are resistant to or even hostile to metaphor as such. ‘Reading’ epilepsy and mental illness as ‘possession by devils’ as opposed to taking those devils as metaphors for brain chemistry malfunctions etc is still, today, something millions continue to prefer. Or as per that New England Journal of Medicine article: great energy gets invested in demonstrating that ‘Claudius pouring poison in the ear of Old Hamlet’ literally means his pouring actual poison in the old king's actual ear.
Incidentally, when I say ‘they like their concretizations ...’ I don't mean to sound superior. If you believe that cholera is ‘Apollo firing arrows of sickness at you’ it gives you a face, somebody to placate, to interact with in ways that you understand. If you believe cholera is a bacillus it gives you nothing. The larger point, I think, is this: there's a broad hostility to metaphors as such, grounded in the sense we have that metaphors are ‘less real’ or maybe ‘not real at all’ compared to concretizations (but they're not ... not unreal, I mean! As Derrida say in his ‘White Mythology’ essay pretty convincingly argues).
Anyway: to return to the passage. Its sexual politics are, we might say, problematic, but I like the way Vida has structured this one: balancing the opening description of Mary, with its particular focus on her head: the ruby at her brow, the richness of her head-gear, her lasciviously uncovered hair, before flipping the orientation about and ending on the feet of Christ, lovingly cleaned by the repetentant woman.
The image at the head of this post is ‘Christ in the House of Simon’, by Dieric Bouts, from the 1440s.
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