Earthly Treasures: Material Culture and Metaphysics in the Heptameron and Evangelical Narrative

Chapter Four: Of Tableware, Chalices, and Axeheads: The Evangelical Narrative and Transitory Treasures

111 Chapter Four Of Tableware, Chalices, and Axeheads The Evangelical Narrative and Transitory Treasures Vous n’estez le premier de ma congnoissance qui, trop toust voulent estre riche, devenir et parvenir, est à l’envers tombé en pauvreté: voire quelquefoys s’est cassé le coul. (“You’re not the first man I’ve met who’s wanted to get rich too quickly and make his way in the world, but who has fallen down into poverty, and sometimes even broken his neck.”) François Rabelais Quart livre1 The evangelical writer explicates characters and relationships in reference to things of the world; however, narrative problems arise from their presence, because the evangelical author remains ambivalent about objects, and cultivates an attitude of distrust about them. Charles Taylor explains the evangelical attitude toward objects in this way: God placed mankind over creation and made the things of the world for human use. But humans are there in turn to serve and glorify God, and so their use of things should serve this final goal. The consequence of sin is that humans come to be concerned with these things not for God’s sake but for themselves. They come to desire them as ends and no longer simply as instruments for God’s purposes. And this upsets the whole order of things. Humans were meant to bring the rest of creation to God.2 Evangelical writers find license to use earthly objects in narrative when they attempt to realign them with this higher purpose.3 112 Chapter Four Luther, Marguerite, and Rabelais draw on shared prototypes in crafting their evangelical genre. Luther and Rabelais both mention Aesop’s Fables,4 while Luther, Marguerite, and Rabelais all incorporate proverbs, parables, and aphorisms in their narratives. The most frequent recourse to a narrative model among the three is, however, the gospels, especially Jesus’ use of the parable, coupled with the writings of St. Paul. Luther set the tone for Marguerite and Rabelais. Translated into French around 1524 to 1534, at least three of his Treatises circulated in diverse social groups throughout France. Among the most popular of his writings were the Petit catéchisme de Luther (1520) and the Petit livre de prières (Betbüchlein), translated in 1522, as well as several of his introductions to St. Paul’s letters, and the Treatise on Christian Liberty. At this time, few French evangelicals dared to profess their faith openly.5 Nonetheless, the French translations of Luther’s texts possessed a pronounced French tenor, attesting to interest in evangelical piety and a desire to incorporate Lutheran thought in France.6 Such conformity in idiom, as well as ideology, especially manifested itself around the time that Marguerite began to write the Heptaméron. Louis de Berquin had translated the majority of Luther’s works into French. These translations were condemned by the Sorbonne from 1523 through 1525. In 1529 Louis de Berquin was burned at the stake for having propagated evangelical doctrine. The translations nevertheless went into print and circulation because François Ier himself granted publication, a concession obtained through Marguerite ’s intercession. Other evidence explicitly associates Luther and Marguerite. The evangelical printer of Luther’s works in France, Simon Du Bois, participated with Marguerite in evangelical circles.7 Prior to 1530, Du Bois had published a translation in Alençon of Luther’s Petit catéchisme.8 Du Bois dedicated several volumes that he published to Marguerite’s interlocutor, Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples,9 and Du Bois also printed several of Marguerite’s works.10 Luther and Evangelical Storytelling Riches are the most insignificant things on earth, the smallest gift that God can give a man. What are 113 Of Tableware, Chalices, and Axeheads they in comparison even with physical endowments and beauty? What are they in comparison with gifts of the mind? And yet we act as if this were not so! The matter, form, effect and goal of riches are worthless. Martin Luther Table Talk11 Table Talk was written over several years in the 1530s, prior to, but contemporary with, the writing of the Heptaméron. However , it was not published until 1566. Although Table Talk came out in print too late to have influenced Marguerite’s composition in any explicit way, its technique for textual exposition derived from Luther’s commentaries and tracts that were already known to Marguerite. Table Talk thus provided a parallel to Marguerite’s...