The Missal of Robert of Jumièges ed. by H. A. Wilson (review)

BOOK REVIEWS359 persons are not constituted by relationships, but by something absolute, she claims (p. 10) that "Personality is the result of relationship. I am who I am by virtue of my relationships to others throughout my life." Even taken contextually, this statement is problematic. Subsequent pages (pp. 11 12), in fact, seem to correct if not contradict the previous claim. Apparently, Ingham (p. 36) follows the usual, but largely unsubstantiated , claim that Scotus's Metaphysics was an early work. However, there is much evidence to support a scenario that the entirety of his Metaphysics was not done early in his career, nor during a relatively short period of time, as the introduction to the critical edition amply demonstrates. In addition to the music model (pp. 65ff.) as an analogy for ethical harmony, the medievals were also fond of invoking health, the balance of the four humors, as a paradigm for moral integrity. The statements "In the strictest sense, virtue is not an essential part of the moral realm, since it operates naturally" (p. 93) and "Virtue is not the subject of deliberation or choice" (p. 94) call for a ' Scotistic' distinction between virtue-as-habit and virtue-asact . Both classically and medievally, habits make for prompt and easy actions, but virtuous habits are initiated and reinforced by virtuous acts! The Harmony of Goodness combines aesthetics, philosophy and theology to explain ethical integrity and provides a wholesome introduction for the uninitiated and the proficient alike. The Franciscan InstituteGIRARD J. ETZKORN Professor Emeritus H. A. Wilson, ed. The Missal of Robert of Jumieges. The Henry Bradshaw Society. Rochester, NY: Boydell, 1994 (1896). lxxiv + 378 pp. 14 plates. $89.00 This reprint of a volume in the ongoing publications of original liturgical texts by The Henry Bradshaw Society is very welcome not only because of the text's importance but also because of the distinguished scholar who edited it. Two years previously Wilson had 360BOOK REVIEWS already published a critical text of the Gelasian Sacramentary (1894) and some years later, among other work, established a text for the Gregorian Sacramentary (1915), an important point of reference, as we shall see, for the Jumièges missal. The manuscript of the missal, consisting of 228 leaves, remained at the abbey of Jumièges until the French Revolution at which time it was deposed at the Rouen municipal library, its current site. It is important to note the term "missal" in the title since it differs technically from a related term "sacramentary." The sacramentary, the historical antecedent of the missal, is the presider's book for celebrating the eucharist and other sacraments as well as for presiding at the office of the Hours and other liturgical events such as the dedication of a church. Thus it contained, to some degree, what would later be found in three books—the pontifical, the missal, and the ritual. In contrast to other liturgical books, then, the sacramentary does not contain the chants, readings, or even the extended rubrics of the ordines. Therefore, when Emmanuel Bourque (Etudes sur les sacramentaires romains, 1958) calls the Jumièges missal "un pur sacramentaire," he means to infer that it is the final step toward the "missal" as we understand the term today. The title also indicates the provenance of this text. Robert, the former abbot ofJumièges in Normandy, had become Archbishop of Canterbury in 1051 under Edward the Confessor. This missal was a gift to his former abbatial church in Normandy and was probably copied at the New Minster, one of the two great abbeys at Winchester (there are a number of entries of English saints, especially those honored at the New Minster). The date of the manuscript can be fixed with some certainty between 1013 and 1017. There are four sections in the missal: the calendar and paschal tables, the canon and the temporal cycle, the sanctoral cycle, and a final section with votive masses, benedictions, offices for visitation, the anointing of the sick, and the burial of the dead. To appreciate Wilson's work, the reader should remember that the number and quality of critical editions of sacramentarles and ordines have considerably increased since Wilson's time. As we...