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Are you studying medieval religious drama? Are you having trouble understanding the difference between the Assumption and the Ascension? Between adoration and veneration? The Immaculate Conception and the Virgin Birth? This glossary (compiled by Dennis G. Jerz) will help.
Ascension
Christ's departure from the Earth
forty days after his rising from the dead (Mark 16:19, Luke 24:51, Acts
1:9, 11). He rose to Heaven under his own power, as the fully divine God
in a fully human (but resurrected)
body. Compare: Assumption.
Ash Wednesday
The first day of Lent. A solemn and prayerful day
when the penitent faithful seek pardon for their sins and receive ashes
on their forehead, reminding them that "you are dust, and to dust you shall
return" (Genesis 3:19). Because people often refrain from eating rich foods
during Lent, the last day to indulge is informally called "Fat Tuesday,"
or, in French, "Mardi Gras."
Assumption
The Virgin Mary was assumed (taken up)
into heaven, body and soul, not under her own power but by the power of
God. The medieval faithful differed as to whether she was taken before
or after her natural death, but all who venerated
her were united in their belief that through God's grace, Mary, from whose
womb came the body of Jesus Christ, was as
perfect as mere human flesh can be. Mary's fullness of grace (or most highly
favored condition) (Lk. 1:28) preserved her from the effects of original
sin -- namely, the separation of body from soul and the physical corruption
of the body. Compare: Ascension. See also: Incarnation,
Saints,
cult of.
Corpus Christi Cycle
A collection of many small Biblical plays, produced on the Feast
of Corpus Christi. Four complete English cycles survive, although different
kinds of religious plays appeared throughout England.
Corpus Christi
Latin for "The body of Christ."
Corpus Christi, Feast of
A movable feast dating from the 13th century, upon which the church
celebrates the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
It took place each year on a Thursday in late spring or early summer, about
two months after Easter. It was an important day in medieval England, not
only because of its religious significance, but also because by that time
of year the weather would finally be warm enough for outdoor celebrations.
Crucifixion
In general, a painful, slow form of public execution used by the Romans
on criminals who were not Roman citizens. The feet were nailed to an upright
wooden post and the hands to a crossbar. For the Christian, the crucifixion
of Christ and the cross upon which it took
place become a symbol not of a gruesome physical death, but rather a glorious
victory over spiritual death. Medieval religious art depicts Jesus as engaged
in all aspects of his function in the divine cosmic plan, but depictions
of the moment of his death on the cross are by far the most significant.
In order to foster an increased appreciation of Christ's sacrifice and
an increased desire to respond to Christ's sincere call, the medieval church
encouraged its faithful to gaze upon pictures or statues, to witness a
re-creation of the events in a passion play, to worship in public liturgy,
or to reflect privately.
Eucharist
Meaning "thanksgiving," a celebration of the real
presence of the body and blood of Christ
under the appearances of consecrated bread and wine. The thanksgiving action,
celebrated at the Mass, was the central point of medieval
spiritual life.
Gaps (processional
cycle)
Gaps occur during the performance of the York Corpus Christi Play when a longer
play falls behind a faster preceding play. The faster play runs on ahead, performing
and vacating a station before the following play has reached it. The result
is that the stations between the fast play and the slow play are vacant, and
the whole cycle takes longer to complete. See also: backups
Goldberg, Rube
A U.S. cartoonist (1883-1970) known for his drawings of intricate cause-and-effect
inventions. The board game "Mousetrap" suggests the complexity and humor
of his work. Alan Nelson compared the traditional description of the York
Corpus Christi performance to a Rube Goldberg device.
Incarnation
The Christian mystery of the infinite and eternal God entering the
world as a finite human being (or becoming "incarnate") within the womb
of the Virgin Mary. The human Jesus
of Nazareth was vulnerable to all the foibles that afflict humanity
as the result of the fall, including hunger, fear, pain, loneliness, and
despair; he also experienced hope, love, and the simple pleasure of making
breakfast for his friends. The divine Son of God had access to supernatural
powers such as the forgiveness of sins, the healing of sickness, and mastery
over the forces of nature. The Son existed before the world, and it was
through the Son that the Father created the world. In what the early Church
called the hypostatic union, the two separate but full natures, human and
divine, co-exist, each without diminishing the other, within the one person
who is Jesus Christ. See also: Trinity
On earth, Christ preached a doctrine of mercy in the form of forgiveness, and justice in the form of upright moral conduct and charity towards those in need. He was crucified for these teachings. The death of the Son of God was the sacrifice necessary to redeem, or purchase back, humanity from the bonds of sin. Christ rose from the dead in order to commission his apostles and all his followers to share their knowledge with all nations. He ascended, body and soul, to heaven; he will preside on Judgment Day.
Judgment Day
At the end of the world, when all humans are resurrected, God will
manifest his justice by rewarding the good and punishing the wicked. His
judgment will be on the grounds of each individual's moral conduct and
attitude towards's God's will, as well as the effect on society and upon
others of the accumulated blessings or evils that resulted from each individual's
actions. As the agent of God's mercy and justice, Jesus
Christ will preside.
Another word for Judgment Day is Doomsday. The word "doom" originally meant judgement, either good or bad; this sense survives in our word "deem". However, medieval piety often depicted an angry Christ, vexed by mankind's sinfulness, and ready to destroy the world. The message in such an image was not all negative, for Mary his mother was always there beside him, pleading and begging for his mercy on the behalf of the imperfect, fallen world.
Latin
The international language of the Middle Ages, in which all important
cultural activities were performed, and therefore the language of the Church.
Most people, however, couldn't read or write the vernacular
language of their own country, much less Latin.
Lent
A period of forty days of fasting, reflection, and preparation for
Easter.
It recalls the time Christ spent, shortly before
beginning his public ministry, overcoming temptation in the wilderness
(Matthew 4:2, Mark 1:13, Luke 4:2).
Liturgy
From the Greek for "public work," it refers to the official communal
act of adoring God. For the Church, the central liturgical act is the Mass,
a celebration of the Eucharist, instated by Jesus
Christ at the Last Supper. The term in general
means anything pertaining directly to the ceremony -- a liturgical play,
for instance, would have taken place as part of a formal worship service.
Participants generally recite or sing formulaic prayers to show the unity
of their belief, hear passages from the Bible, and listen to a homily (sermon)
as a group.
While she was a young girl, engaged to Joseph, an angel appeared to her, telling her that she would conceive a child who was to be the Messiah. Her humble consent to God's will (Luke 1:34) is a model for all Christians, as is her service to those in need (Luke 1:36, 56); her confidence in the power of Christ (John 2:1-11); her loyalty to her son during the Crucifixion (John 19:25-27) and her living in prayerful communion with the apostles and other followers before Pentecost. See Assumption, Ascension; Immaculate Conception, Virgin Birth.
Mass
From the Latin for "sending," a word for the central
liturgical worship service in the church. Based upon the Last
Supper, and linked inseparably to the sacrifice offered by Christ on
the cross. The solemn prayer and familiar rituals were doubtless beneficial
to the spiritual lives of even the most uneducated medieval churchgoers.
The paintings, statues, stained glass windows and music would have offered
much in the way of material for reflection even for those who could not
understand the Latin. Liturgical drama, with its
costumes and props (swaddling clothes, an empty tomb, etc.) informed the
senses as well as the mind. The repetitive parts of the service would have
been in Latin, and the faithful could usually expect a sermon in the vernacular,
since even many priests found Latin a difficult language to use informally.
Movable Feast
Religious feast days are called movable if their calendar dates are
linked to Easter, which takes place on the first
Sunday following the first full moon in spring. All the religious calendar
events that commemorate events dependent upon Easter, such as Ash
Wednesday, Lent, Ascension
Thursday , Pentecost, and Trinity
Sunday, shift backwards and forwards depending upon when Easter took
place. The Feast of Corpus Christi
took place on the Thursday following Trinity Sunday.
Passover
A Jewish feast commemorating the protection God gave to Jewish families
when he killed all the first-born men and animals in the land of Egypt.
After this divine punishment, Pharaoh consented to allow Moses to lead
the Israelites out of slavery (Exodus 12).
Pentecost
Celebrated by the church for the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the
apostles of Christ, in the lodgings they were
sharing with Christ's mother Mary and other
followers, about fifty days after Easter (Acts 2:1-4). In the Jewish tradition,
Pentecost was another name for the Feast of Weeks or the Feast of Harvest,
which took place 50 days after Passover. By that
time the crops planted in the spring would have begun to produce their
"first fruits," upon which the people feasted.
Person
The modern definition of the word "person" may mislead us into thinking
that the trinity is a collection of three separate gods. But the Latin
"persona" means "the mask that an actor uses." So, in a sense, the Father,
the Son, and the Holy Spirit of the Trinity
are three "masks" that the one transcendent God uses.
Processional Cycle
See also: backups, full
performance, gaps, single
performance, pageant, wagon
Scripture records that Christ's resurrected body was able to penetrate a sealed tomb, locked doors, and to appear and disappear suddenly; clearly the Body of Christ was not bound to the same earthly physical laws that binds humanity. The real presence also meant that Christ was truly and actually present in the Eucharist, regardless of the opinion of an observer or beholder. To show disrespect towards any drop of wine or any crumb of bread that has been properly consecrated was to show an almost unimaginable affront to the Creator.
Although official church opinion never wavered, occasional pockets of resistance over the centuries led the church to develop the theory more fully in order to handle objections. The doctrine of the real presence was, aside from papal authority, one of the major points of contention during the Protestant Reformation, when several groups of dissenters formed their own churches based on their own systems of belief.
Resurrection of Christ
Christ's return from death on the third day after his crucifixion and
burial. One of the central tenets of the Christian faith, expressed in
the Bible and in early church practices, is that Christ showed his victory
over sin and death by sacrificing himself for the sake of redeeming the
sins of humanity.
His resurrected body retained the wounds inflicted during his crucifixion as a sign of glory (John 20:27). He ate food with his followers, but his transfigured body was not bound by ordinary restraints of time and space. People often had difficulty recognizing him at first, suggesting some change in appearance. (See resurrection of the body). For about 40 days, until the Ascension, Christ remained on Earth, teaching and preaching.
Resurrection of the Body
The Christian belief that the souls of all human beings, good and evil,
will rejoin their bodies on Judgment Day.
For Christians, the great sacrifice is that of Jesus Christ, whose crucifixion paid back to God the great debt that humanity had incurred through Adam's fall. When Jesus instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper, he gave a new significance to the sacrifice of bread and wine, one which continues to communicate the graces he merited by virtue of his own death.
Saints, Cult of the
The word "cult" (from the Latin "colere",
to cultivate) today has negative, coercive connotations; but when applied
to the veneration of the saints, it means a distinctive, often a little
unusual, form of religious observance. See: veneration
Single Performance (processional
cycle)
The performance, at a single location, of all plays in a cycle. Each
play is performed only once. See also: full
performance
Trinity
According to the central doctrines of the Christian religion, there
is one God, who manifests himself as God the Father, God the Son, and God
the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19). The three divine persons
in the trinity are co-equal and deserve co-equal adoration
from the faithful.
From the Church's point of view, one justly venerates, or "reveres" human beings who, through the grace of God, have achieved a state of grace. Such reverent honor does not detract from the adoration due to God, since the venerator is always conscious that the goodness of the saint derived from responding appropriately to God's gifts. Several Protestant groups harshly condemn this traditional practice.
The medieval Church was aware that in some areas, excessive devotion to the cult of the saints was disruptive. In their zeal to possess and venerate physical items precious to the saints, the faithful occasionally unearthed, dismembered, and distributed the bodies of the dead. Because a town with a popular relic could expect good favor from heaven and good money from pilgrims, famous corpses sometimes appeared to replicate themselves in competing locations.
During the middle ages, the saints were heroes of stories and songs, and as such were the major cultural touchstones. They had a popular following much like various elements of our own society have for Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, The Beatles or even Martin Luther King, Jr. In medieval times, the faithful gave alms for miraculously preserved drops of milk from the breasts that nourished the infant Christ; at an auction in April 2001, one of pop singer Madonna's cone-shaped bra sold for $20,000.
Vernacular
The local language commonly spoken by the people; as opposed to Latin.
Virgin Birth
The Christian belief that Mary conceived
the child Jesus while still a virgin, and that
she remained so all her life. Defended by various early Church writers,
the belief was formularized by St. Augustine (354-430): "A virgin conceived,
a virgin gave birth, a virgin remained." Biblical references to Jesus's
"brothers" use a word that also carried the meaning of a figurative brother,
or any male relative. See also: Incarnation;
Immaculate
Conception
Virgin Mary
See: Mary, Blessed Virgin.
by Dennis
G. Jerz
June, 1997 -- first published in (Re)Soundings
16 Jul 1999 -- posted here
26 Apr 2001
-- last modified
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