Last week in writing about the Song of Songs, I pointed out that part of the attractiveness of a Mariological reading for poets was that it enabled Mary to speak and her voice to be heard. Another genre of Marian poetry that gave voice to Our Lady was the Marienklage, in which Mary laments. For Holy Week, I would like to share part of a late medieval German lament of Mary at the foot of the Cross.
Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, Douce 264 7r
The figure of Mary at the foot of the Cross is well known from the Stabat Mater, musical settings of which many will have heard around this time of year.
At the Cross her station keeping
Stood the mournful mother weeping
Close to Jesus to the last
The Stabat Mater is a thirteenth-century Latin hymn, but many vernacular poems meditate on Mary's suffering at the Passion, often written in her voice. The following anonymous poem comes from Heidelberg cpg 680, a manuscript containing pre-Reformation Meistersang from Augsburg. You can see the manuscript digitised here. It isn't the easiest to read! Luckily, there is also an edition by Elisabeth Wunderle: Die Sammlung von Meisterliedern in der Heidelberger Handschrift cpg 680, in which the poem is printed in full on pages 17-20.
Here the second strophe, beginning 'Sie machte[n] im vom scharpfen dorn ainenn kranz' on folio 5v
The poem is five strophes, each of fifteen lines, so I won't give the whole poem here, but rather concentrate on the three middle strophes in which Mary and Christ speak to one another. This is a fairly rough and free translation. We begin in the middle of the second strophe, when the soldiers, mocking Christ, give Him vinegar to drink.
II
They poured it into his mouth
From then the noble count began to feel the prick of death
A new torture was made known to him
His gentle light began to dim
From here on it burned as red as a rose.
Gentle Mary stood there in great suffering
'O my dear child, death torments you!
O Lord God, must I be separated from you?
That I cannot help you! Where shall I turn from here?'
Mary then shouted aloud:
'Heart, break in two!
Death, take my life from me and let me end with Him'.
III
You will gladly hear, how God spoke on the cross
When He saw her with His sad eyes:
'Lady, mother mine, never again should you cry.'
'But where are your followers, your friends?
[The scribe appears to have missed a line out here]
'Gentle mother, do you stand alone?
I want to care for you.
Oh, dear mother, you should have happiness!
When I am released from this awful place,
I want to bring you great joy.
A host of even more than a thousand angels
Will have to accompany you altogether
I myself will go,
There in the kingdom a throne stands ready for you.
You will sit there for eternity, when I send for you.
There in the highest
A crown is poised
It should be carried on your head until the end of time.
IV
Mary said: 'Since I cannot help You,
I must endure many a sorrowful day,
When I consider Your great sufferings,
And also Your deep, red wounds
And also Your blameless death,
The sorrow will never leave my heart
That it does not break
As I witness your death'.
She beat her chest heartily.
'O Lord God, what should I do now?'
[The fourth strophe ends with Longinus deciding to end Mary's agony by piercing the side of Christ]
The paradox of the Passion, that Christ's death was both pitiful and triumphant, can be seen here in the contrast between Mary's agony at seeing her son suffer with the exultant picture Jesus paints of accompanying her to sit in glory with Him in heaven when He is risen again. Her sorrow and pain (in the German we hear the of her 'bitter jamer', and her 'grosse[m] laide') is juxtaposed with the great joy (grosse[n] freude[n]) Christ offers her. As great as her 'laide' (suffering) is, so great will her 'freude' (joy) be.
Mater Dolorosa from the workshop of Dieric Bous, 1480/1500, via the Art Institute of Chicago
The poem seeks to arouse our own emotions and piety in its depiction of Christ's suffering through the eyes and voice of Mary. This corresponds to the 'affective piety' often seen as characterising late medieval devotion, with its focus on the humanity of Christ which encouraged Christians to respond and engage emotionally with their faith. Mary's suffering here, that of a mother, gives us a human, emotional means of accessing the Paschal Mystery. The double apostrophe at the end of the third strophe in which she first addresses her heart, commanding it to break, and then death, asking to die that she might be with Her son, is particularly heartrending.
Through this poem, we not only to meditate on the crucifixion through Mary's eyes, but also to marvel at Jesus' great love for her. In this moment of great suffering, His priority is still for her: one of the seven sayings of Christ on the Cross is Him telling John to 'Behold thy Mother' (John 19:27) so we know from the gospels that some of His few words on the cross were concerned with Mary's welfare. This vernacular dialogue can help us to contemplate the privileged relationship between Mary and her Son through giving voice to Mary's sufferings and imagining a conversation between those who are both mother and son, and God and God-bearer.
Visualising the Passion with Mary, through artwork and poetry such as this and engaging our emotions, may help us to enter into the mysteries we celebrate this week. The affective piety that aided those in the Middle Ages can also be adopted by us today.
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