The World between the Literate and Oral Traditions in Eighteenth-Century France: Ecclesiastical Instructions and Popular Mentalities

T h e W o rld b e tw e e n th e L ite ra te rqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA a n d O ra l T ra d itio n s in E ig h te e n th -C e n tu ry F ra n c e : E c c le sia stic a l In stru c tio n s a n d P o p u la r M e n ta litie s H A R V E Y M I T C H E L L The stud y of what is te rme d “popular religion” during the ancien regime in France, particularly in the eighteenth century, is hardly a new venture. M ore than one generation separates us from the work of Gabriel Le Bras and his followers, whose studies in religious sociology recognized the need to call on the assistance of investigators in many neighboring domains. Almost at the same time, the study of popular culture, under which popular religion can be subsumed, was being altered by the readiness with which historians, following Lucien Febvre, assimilated, though not uncritically, the perceptions and sometimes the models and style of anthropologists, sociologists, ethnologists, and psychologists. In turn, the latter have become more aware of the temporal dimensions of the materials they observe and study. Scholars are consequently more confident in expressing dissatis­ faction with the distinctions that were made and are sometimes still made between “authentic” religious actions and belief and those that are consigned to a world in which large sectors of humanity practiced 33 34 / XWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA H A R V E Y M I T C H E L L and b e lie ve d in something called “magic,” which by its very definition was assumed to be an inferior stage in human intelligence. Similarly, they are trying to avoid the traditional demarcations between rational and irrational modes of thought, and more subtly to differentiate be­ tween the rationality of magic and the rationality of science. They are also having some success in dealing with the coexistence of the liter­ ate, semiliterate, and oral worlds. Their questioning of the dyads of primitive/advanced, traditional/modem, and static/dynamic arises from the uneasiness stemming from models that split the world so artificially and so neatly. M ore consciously and deliberately than before, they are exploring the scope and nature of the links within a single society between dissimilar cultures and mentalities. They are not only insisting on the internal integrity of belief systems, but are challenging the notion that creativity in religious forms is the monopoly of one group within the totality of a complex society. Histo­ rians who are concerned with explanations for continuity and change, as well as resistance to change, are particularly sensitive to the non­ reducible elements of individual and social behavior and are proving to be reliable guides in the study of religion.1 The definition or the problem of the definition of popular religion is far from straightforward or free from ambivalence. This is not the place, however, to undertake either an epistemological or a phenomenological analysis. The goals of the present study can be more effectively served by focusing on a few questions which occur to everyone who seeks to understand the social dynamics of dominant and subordinate groups and the nature of the belief systems and prac­ tices that to some degree help to maintain their separate existences. W hat are the manifestations of popular religion? W hat are its relation­ ships with other domains of belief and practice? W ho notes them and thereby appears to establish their contours, magnifying some of them and distorting others? The sources most accessible to us are the percep­ tions of those who, in describing and analyzing expressions of the popular mind, were impelled to single out those of its features consid­ ered to be resistant and threatening to themselves, the dominant and powerful groups in society. In short, we are in part reliant on the “they” to tell us of the “others.” W hat the “they” can tell us about the E c c le s ia s tic a l In s tr u...