Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 2.djvu/347

 BARLAAM

297

BARLETTA

(>n his arrival he kissed the robe of Mrs. Lyne, who was already dead, saying- "Ah, sister, thou hast got the start of us. but we will follow thee as quickly as we may"; and told the people: "I am come here to die, being a Catholic, a priest, and a religious man, belonging to the Order of St. Benedict; it was by this same order that England was converted". He was tall and burly of figure, gay and cheerful in dispo- sition. He suffered in the Benedictine habit, under which he wore a hair-shirt. It was noticed that his knees were, like St. James', hardened by constant kneeling, and an apprentice in the crowd picking up one of his legs, after the quartering, called out to the ministers: "Which of you Gospellers can show such a knee?"

Barkworth's devotion to the Benedictine Order led to his suffering much from the hands of the su- periors of the Valladolid College. These sufferings are probably much exaggerated, however, by the anti-Jesuit writers Watson, Barneby, and Bell.

Camm. a Benedwtine Marl7/r in England (London, 1897); Challoner. Memoirs (1750); W.C., A Repli/ lo Father Persona' Libel (1603); Watson, Decacordon of ten Quodlibet Questions (1602); Knox, Douay Diaries (London, 1878).

Bede Camm.

Barlaam, Monk of Ger.4^ce. See Hesychasm.

Barlaam and Josaphat, the principal characters of a legend of Christian antiquity, which was a favourite subject of \vriters in the Middle Ages. The story is substantially as follows: Many inhabi- tants of India had been converted by the Apostle St. Thomas and were leading Christian lives. In the third or fourth century King Abenner (Avenier) persecuted the Church. The astrologers had fore- told that his son Josaphat would one day become a Christian. To prevent this the prince was kept in close confinement. But, in spite of all precautions, Barlaam, a hermit of Senaar, met him and brought him to the true Faith. Abenner tried his best to pervert Josaphat, but, not succeeding, he shared the government with him. Later Abenner himself became a Christian, and, abdicating the throne, became a hermit. Josaphat governed alone for a time, then resigned, went into the desert, found his former teacher Barlaam, and with him spent his re- maining years in holiness. Years after their death, the bodies were brought to India and their grave became renowned by miracles. Barlaam and Josa- phat found their way into the Roman Martyrology (27 November), and into the Greek calendar (26 Au- gust). Vincent of Beauvais, in the thirteenth cen- tury, had given the story in his "Speculum His- toriale". It is also found in an abbreviated form in the "Golden Legend" of Jacobus de Voragine of the same century.

The story is a Christianized version of one of the legends of Buddha, as even the name Josaphat would seem to show. This is said to be a corruption of the original Joasaph, which is again corrupted from the middle Persian Biiddsif (Budsaif = Bod- hisatlva). Still it is of historical value, since it eon- tains the "Apology" presented by the Athenian philosopher Aristides to the Emperor Adrian (or Antoninus Pius). The Greek text of the legend, written probably by a monk of the Sabbas monas- tery near Jerusalem at the beginning of the seventh century, was first published by Boissonade in his "Anecdota Graeca" (Paris, 1832), IV, and is repro- duced in Migne, P. G., XCVI, among the works of St. John Damascene. The legend cannot, however, have been a work of the great Damascene, as was proved by Zotenberg in " Notices sur le livre de Barlaam et Josaphat" (Paris, 1886) and by Hammel in "Verhandl. des 7 intemat. Orientalisten Con- gresses", Semit. Section (Vienna, 1888). Another edition of the Greek was made by Kechajoglos (Athens, 1884). From the original Greek a German

translation was made by F. Liebrecht (Miinster, 1847). Latin translations (Migne, P. L., LXXIII), were made in the twelfth century and used for nearly all the European languages, in prose, verse and in miracle plays. Among them is prominent the German epic by Rudolph of Ems in the thirteenth century (Konigsberg, 1818, and somewhat later at Leipzig). From the German an Icelandic and a Swedish version were made in the fifteenth century. At Manila the legend appeared in the Tagala language of the Philippines. In the East it exists in Syriac, Arabic, Ethiopic, Armenian, and Hebrew.

Mi-LLER, Migration of Fables in Contemp. Review (July, 1870); Idem. Selected Essays (London, 1881); Liebrecht in Jahrbuch fur romaniache und englische Litteratur 11; Bhaun- HOLz. Die erste nichtchristliche Parabel des Barlaam u. Josaphat, ihre Herkunft und Verbreitung (Halle, 1884); Kuhn. B. u. J-. eine bibHograpkisch-litteraturgeschichtliche Studie (Miinchen, 1893); Zeitschrift far katholische Theologie, 1892; Bahden- HEWER, Geschichte der altkirchlichen Litteratur (Freiburg, 1902); The Month (1881). XLI, 137; Cosquin in Re^'ue des Quest. Hist. (1880), XXXVIII, 579-608; Kuhn in Abhandl. d. Bayer. Akad. der Wissenschaften (1893); Analecta Bollandiana. XIII. 299; Jacobs, Barlaam and Josaphat, English Lives of Bwldha (London, 1896); Vacant, Diet, de thiol cath., II, 410: Krum- BACHER, Gesch. d. Byzant. Litteratur (2d ed., Munich, 1897). 886; Biblioth. Hag. Latina, 147.

Francis Mershman.

Barletta, Gabriel (sometimes called Barlete, De Barolo, Barolus), preacher, b., according to some, in the Neapolitan territory at Barletta, w-hence he took his name, or, according to others, at Aquino; d. sometime after 1480. Little is known of his life other than that he was a Dominican and probably a pupil of St. Antoninus. All his contemporaries held him in high esteem as an orator. He was generally proposed, even during his lifetime, as the model orator. After his death his fame did not diminish, if the popular saying which Altamura has preserved for us be a criterion. Tliroughout Italy it was the common saying: A^cscit prccdicare qui nescit bar- lettare. His sermons appeared in two voUunes at Bri.xen in 1497, and have been reprinted very fre- quently since. Echard says that no less than thirteen editions appeared in eighty years. The best edition is that of Venice (1.577), in two volumes.

In form his sermons are nothing else than the ordi- nary homily on the virtues and vices of life. He spares none of the foibles and weaknesses of his con- temporaries, and in his denunciations passages of eloquent and biting sarcasm are often met with. At times he descends to an almost burlesque mimicry, as witness his sermon on the manner in which the rich ecclesiastic says the Lord's prayer. Coarse things are also to be found, but not so frequently as in the printed sermons of some of his rivals. He has been blamed for this coarseness by Bayle and The- ophilus RajTiaud, but his name has been completely- vindicated by Dominic Casales, O.P., in the work "Candor lilii seu Ordo Pra>dicatorum a calumniis Petri a Valle Clausa [i. e. Theop. Reynaldi] vindi- catus". Some maintain (Tubing, Quartalschrift, 1872, II, 270) that Barietta is not the author of the sermons which bear his name. They base their con- tention on a sentence of Leander Alberti [Descriz- zione di tutta Italia (Bologna, 1550), 200], who says that an unskilled youth whom he knew gathered together old and unknown sermons and ascribed them to Barletta. Furthermore, they must have appeared in the vernacular, whilst we know them in the Latin alone. Thus they have suffered many changes and alterations. But up to the seventeenth century- there was no question of the authorship. They show sure signs of the times and are not unworthy of his fame. Hence, scholars generally accept them as authentic.

Qnirir and Echard, Scriptures Ord. Prtrd., I, 844. append.. II. 823; TIRABOSCHI, 5(oria della letteratura italiana. VI. 1124; PATTl.tis in Litsrarische Beilage der Kolnischen V olkszeitunff (1904), No. 10.

Thos. M. Schwektner.