Ascetics, Authority, and the Church in the Age of Jerome and Cassian: Second Edition

APPENDIX IV: CASSIAN'S DEPENDENCE ON ORAL TRADITION: SOME EXAMPLES

APPENDIX IV CASSIAN'S DEPENDENCE ON ORAL TRADITION: SOME EXAMPLES With regard to Inst. iv. 24, 1 Weber suggests that the examples of obedi­ ence given in the passage, referring as they do to men who were living eremitic lives, had been recast by Cassian, to make them more relevant to coenobites. 2 Comparing it with G John Colobos 1, he says, 'Wonder­ working is the characteristic of the hermit: blind obedience is indispen­ sable for community life'. This is to assume that Cassian knew the story as we now have it in G, or in Sulpicius, Dial. i. 19, with the subsequent flowering of the dry stick that John had been ordered to water; and that Cassian deliberately omitted this element. It is possible, however, that he reproduced an earlier, less miraculous version of the story 3 in which case, his emphasis on obedience may just as much reflect the values of the desert hermits. Cassian was certainly not dependent on the later version of Pelagius and John, Vitae Patrum, V, xiv. 3: they follow the Greek, independently of Cassian. Inst. iv. 27, similar to G Sisoes 10, may also depend on Cassian's memory of an oral tradition. 4 I am not happy with Weber's suggestion that the dictum at the end of Can. vii. 23-'sedete in cellulis vestris et quantum libitum fuerit manducate et bibite atque dormite, dummodo in eis iugiter perduretis' -depends on a version of the Latin apophthegma, Vitae Patrum, V, vii. 27. 5 Cassian's words, 'sedete in cellulis vestris', are much closer to Greek equivalents, such as Nau 195; 6 but, since many of these, in their present form, are no more likely to be contemporary with (or earlier than) Cassian himself, his own statement may, again, repro'duce an oral tradition. Even more uncertain is the link forged by Weber between Can. viii. 15 f. and Vitae Patrum, V, v. 39. 7 He asserts that it is hard to decide which text depends on which, and therefore suggests an Urform for the pair. Nau 191, the Greek equivalent, (which Weber does not mention,) is no more likely as an Urform; and it is quite possible that here Cassian 1 See above, p. 195. 2 Weber, Stellung, 40, III ff. 3 Chadwick, Cassian, 21. 4 Weber, op. cit. 40. 5 Weber, Stellung, 2l. 6 See above, p. 44. 7Weber, op. cit. 92. APPENDIX IV 255 has drawn upon an oral tradition only later transposed into Greek and Latin apophthegmata. The most famous link between Cassian and the Apophthegmata Patrum concerns the dying words of John of Lycopolis, Inst. v. 28. 8 Both Bousset and Weber suggest that G Cassian 5 is dependent on the Institutes, rather than their source. 9 This might help to explain why the Latin equivalent, Vitae Patrum, V, i. 10, is so different from Cassian's text. G reproduces the structure of Inst. v. 28, while Pelagius and John reflect the vocabulary of G. Th:e same is true of Inst. v. 27, to be linked with G Cassian 4 and Vitae Patrum, V, iv. 24. Vitae Patrum, V, iv. 25 is also connected with Cassian: Can. ii. 11. Weber is sure that Cassian's is the primary text: there is, again, a Greek equivalent, possibly inter­ mediate between the two Latin versions, and not in G; but about its significance Weber will only speculate. 10 The conclusion must be, there­ fore, that Cassian, recounting the deathbed scene of John, could easily have been calling upon memory alone, without recourse to written sources. 8 See above, p. 24. 9 BOllsset, Apophthegmata, 72; Weber, Stellung, 101. lOWeber op. cit. 103, n. 172. ...