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RELIGIOUS POEMS
- University of Pennsylvania Press
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RELIGIOUS POEMS The power of the Christian message for the early Anglo-Saxons is told in legendary form by Bede when he recounts the story of the conversion of King Edwin of Northumbria in his History of the English Church and People. When Edwin asks his counselors for their opinion about this new faith, his chief priest Coifi admits that the old religion seems powerless and without value. An unnamed advisor then says: Your Majesty, when we compare the present life of man on earth with that time of which we have no knowledge, it seems to me like the swift flight of a single sparrow through the banqueting-hall where you are sitting at dinner on a winter’s day with your thanes and counselors. In the midst there is a comforting fire to warm the hall; outside, the storms of winter rain or snow are raging. This sparrow flies swiftly in through one door of the hall, and out through another. While he is inside, he is safe from the winter storms; but after a few moments of comfort, he vanishes from sight into the wintry world from which he came. Even so, man appears on earth for a little while; but of what went before this life or of what follows, we know nothing . Therefore, if this new teaching has brought any more certain knowledge, it seems only right that we should follow it. (Bede, 127) The eighth-century Bede surely colored this story of the seventh-century King Edwin with his own religious convictions, but Edwin did convert to Christianity, and in time England became one of the centers of religious CÆDMON’S HYMN | 191 learning and power in early medieval Europe. There is a wide variety of Christian religious poetry in Old English, including narrative treatments of Old Testament stories, depictions of Christ as hero, stories of saints’ lives, homiletic poems, and “The Dream of the Rood.” The Christian literature in Old English is extensive and represents a varied and compelling testament to the strength of the Anglo-Saxons’ faith and the poetic power of their religious vision. CÆDMON’S HYMN “Cædmon’s Hymn” comes down to us from a story in Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People and exists in 21 manuscripts, whereas most Old English poems exist in only a single manuscript. The poem is an important cornerstone in Anglo-Saxon history and legend. It purports to be the first poem in which the new Christian teachings were set down in the alliterative, strong-stress poetic traditions of the Germanic peoples who had migrated to England. Bede’s eighth-century description of the seventh-century Cædmon’s miracle begins with the setting of the monastery at Whitby. The monastery was a double monastery with separate houses for men and women, which was not uncommon at the time. Cædmon worked in a secular capacity at the monastery. After dinner the harp would sometimes be passed around the table for each person to sing something, but on such occasions Cædmon would excuse himself and leave the festivities because he didn’t know how to sing. On one such occasion, he left the harp-passing party, went to the livestock shed where he was assigned night-duty, and lay down to sleep. Then an awe-inspiring figure came to him in a vision or dream and called to him, Cædmon, sing mē hwæthwugu, “Cædmon, sing me something.” Cædmon answered humbly, “I don’t know how to sing—that’s why I always leave the table.” The voice answered, “Yet you will sing for me.” “What shall I sing?” Cædmon asked. The voice answered, Sing mē frumsceaft, “Sing me Creation, the beginning of all things.” And Cædmon, who had never sung anything before, began miraculously to sing the song now known as “Cædmon’s Hymn.” The next morning, Cædmon remembered the song and told his steward and then the abbess who directed the monastery. The abbess, knowing this to be a divine inspiration and miracle, invited Cædmon to join the monastery , study the religious traditions and teachings, and spend the rest of his [18.212.87.137] Project MUSE (2024-03-29 02:05 GMT) 192 | R ELIGIOUS POEMS life writing about Christian subjects in the vernacular Anglo-Saxon poetical mode—which he did. Bede says that Cædmon devoured the teachings and ruminated on them like a cow chewing...