June 5, 2011

Before I get start to talk about one of the poems, I am going to reestablish the background that we learned.

Nicholas III document:

The question arises of whether or not strict poverty is required or is only for those who want to be the most faithful. He says that it is required. They give up the right to own property or personal things. They are under usus pauper, which is the restricted use of goods or things. They take a vow to live like a poor person, and he also introduces a concept of necessity.

Jacopone da Todi:

He studied in Bologna, which was where you went to study law. He worked for a while as a nataio (lawyer/accountant). He married nd it was a very short marriage because she died. He spent the next ten years as a bizzoconoe. Then he joined the franciscans as a tertiary in 1278. He asked Celestan for support and created Celestans who lived as hermits and were a separate order (1294). Celestan died in 1297 and Bonifice said it was a fake order, and stopped it and reversed the Celestan’s view on poverty. Bonifice had a run in with cardinals and got in a family dispute with Colonna’s and they ended up signing a document called the longhezza manifesto in 1297 and it said Bonifice wasn't actually the pope. Jacopone was in prison in 1298, and he wrote some of his really cranky poems while in prison and was released in 1303 when Bonifice died.

Poem 30:

This poem is a praise poem. He initially seems to be talking in a general way about religious people as corrupt, but then it ends by talking about the people in his own order (Franciscans). He identifies with St. Francis, Jesus, and John the Baptist. One stanza that stood out to me was the last one.

“We were a mighty host, encamped on the heights,

But the waters of the flood have risen and covered us,

And taken from us the power to pray;

Which alone could keep us afloat and heal our wounds”

Jacopone seems to be focused on the people of his own order at the end. He talks about “we” as a mighty host. He also gives the reader imagery from the Bible, or scripture. When he says “heal our wounds,” I think of Jesus as he went around and helped and healed people.