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Mass Communication 27
intended for popular audiences. The first of those was liturgical in
nature, designed for the use of cathedral clergy during the oces,
while the last was monastic in nature, intended for private or group
study and meditation.’
The homiliary of Smaragdus of St Mihiel (d. after 825) does contain
a homily on our marriage feast pericope; according to Amos
it was written for ‘private meditation’. He adds that it ‘came from
and was intended for a monastic milieu’ (ibid. 199). This opinion
carries much weight.
A set of ‘Cat‹ech›eses celtiques’ discovered by Andr‹e Wilmart in
MS Vatican Library Reg. Lat. 49 does contain a homiletic commentary
on the marriage feast of Cana. At first sight this looks
promising. On closer examination the quantity of marriage symbolism
turns out to be fairly exiguous.
I have also drawn a blank with the following sets of homilies
or sermons, in that they they seem not to deal with the marriage
feast of Cana, the natural locus for marriage symbolism in a sermon
collection:
Amos, ‘The Origin and Nature of the Carolingian Sermon’, 12 n. 6.
Migne, PL 102. 84–90.
Amos, ‘The Origin and Nature of the Carolingian Sermon’, 198–9.
Analecta reginensia: extraits des manuscrits latins de la Reine Christine conserv‹es
au Vatican, ed. A. Wilmart (Studi e testi, 59; Vatican City, 1933), ‘III Cat‹ech›eses
celtiques’, 29–112. Wilmart’s extract vii from this manuscript is a commentary on
2 John: 1–11, the marriage feast of Cana narrative.
The passages are so short that they may be quoted (I run Wilmart’s paragraphs
together): ‘DIE TERTIO: dies tertius legem tertiam sig(nificat), in qua
Christus et aeclesia copulati sunt, quando ad illam uenit post tribulationem fidei
trinitatis. NUPTIAE FACTAE SUNT: idest copulatio Christi est et aecclesiae, de
qua sal(uator) dixit: OSCULETUR ME AB OSCULO ORIS SUI. IN CA(NAM)
GAL(ILAEAE), id est in aeclesia in mundo constituta. Chanan enim domus epularum
interpretatur, quod significat aeclesiam, in qua aepulae Christi per orationem
Sanctorum praeparantur, ut ipse dicit: DOMUS MEA DOMUS ORATIONIS
VOCABITUR . . .’ (74). There follows the interpretation of the Hebrew names
‘Chanan’ and ‘Galilea’. Here the connection with marriage symbolism is rather exiguous
and insubstantial. Then: ‘ET ERAT IBI MATER IHESU. Rogatus autem
et Ihesus uenire ad nuptias cum discipulis suis ad nuptias uenit, idest ad copula(tionem)
sibi aeclesiae catholicae quae erat sponsa eius, quia demancipatum diaboli
eruens dedit ei dotem. Nam tribuit ei pignus, idest spiritum sanctum, nec
gratis eam eruit, sed pretio sancti sanguinis sui redimit’ (75). There is a little
more further on: ‘Sponsus autem in postremo a·erens uinum optimum significat
Christum praedicantem euangelium post legem et profe(tas), qui est sponsus
aecclesiae catholicae, cuius filii sunt omnes fideles. Item architriclinus figura est
eorum omnium qui prius nesciunt uerbi dei uinum et postea bibunt, ut Paulus fuit’
(78). That is about all the marriage symbolism there is in the passage printed by
Wilmart.