The Cathars:  Cathar Beliefs:  Ceremonies:  The Pater

The Pater (or Lord's Prayer) was the favourite Cathar prayer - arguably their only prayer. It is, after all the only one sanctioned by the New Testament.

The Cathar Pater (from the «Cathar Ritual»)

Pater noster qui es in celis, sanctificetur nomen tuum; adveniat regnum tuum. Fiat voluntas tua sicut in celo et in terra. Panem nostrum supersubstancialem da nobis hodie. Et dimitte nobis debita nostra sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris. Et ne nos inducas in temptationem sed libera nos a malo. Quoniam tuum est regnum et virtus et gloria in secula. Amen.

Our father, which art in Heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our supplementary bread, And remit our debts as we forgive our debtors. And keep us from temptation and free us from evil. Thine is the kingdom, the power and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Ordinary believers would not invoke God in this way. The prayer was therefore reserved for Parfaits and Parfaites - who recited it on ceremonial occasions, including before a meal.

The Doxology

Notice the final lines - a doxology - which will be familiar to Protestants but not to Catholics. These words were a sure sign of heresy to Catholic theologians and inquisitors for many centuries. Here is a monk writing in about 1147 on the subject: A most corrupt and secret aspect of their cult is that they do not say the [Roman Catholic] doxology but instead of "Glory be to the Father" say "For thine is the kingdom, and thou shalt rule over all creation, forever and ever. Amen" Cathar texts give a slightly different version: For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, forever. Amen Cathars claimed that the words they used were in the original versions of the text of Matthew 6:13. Here is an extract from a Cathar ritual explaining the Lord's Prayer, line by line: 'For thine is the kingdom'. This phrase is said to be in the Greek and Hebrew texts... The Catholic Church denied that these words should be included as they were not to be found in the Vulgate - a fifth century translation into Latin by St Jerome, which the Roman Catholic Church regarded as infallible. In fact the phrase is to be found in early Greek texts and in Slavonic texts - confirming that the Cathars really did have links to the early Church and suggesting that those links were Bogomil. The oldest witness is the Didache, otherwise known as the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. This ancient catechism dates to the early second century, perhaps shortly after 100 AD (ie much earlier than the texts used to justify omitting the text in question). Do not let your fasts be with the hypocrites. They fast on Monday and Thursday; but you shall fast on Wednesday and Friday. Do not pray as the hypocrites do, but as the Lord commanded in His gospel, you shall pray thus: 'Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the power and the glory forever.' Pray thus three times a day.

The quotation here is from the Writings of a Cistercian monk from Périgueux named Herbert. The translation is from Walter Wakefield & Austin Evans, Heresies of The High Middle Ages (Columbia, 1991) p 139 from Herbiberti monachi epistola de haereticis Petragoricis reproced in Migne, Patrologia latina, CLXXXI, 1721-22. For the Cathar doxology in Greek and Slavic versions of the bible see Runciman, The Medieval Manichee: A study of the Christian Dualist Heresy, Cambridge, 1955, p 166 The question of the Cathar doxology was discussed by Medieval theologians (eg Antoine Dondaine, Un Traité neo-manichéen du XIIIe siècle: Le Liber de duobus principiis, suivi d'un fragment de rituel Cathare. Rome, 1939, p48 and Arno Borst, Die Katharer (Schriften der Monumenta Germaniae historica, XII), Stutgart, 1953, p191. The translation of the Didache is from W. A. Jurgens, The Faith of the Early Fathers (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1970), 3.). There are numberous early witnesses : It is found in the Old Latin, the Old Syrian, and some Coptic versions (such as Coptic Bohairic). Old Latin texts, such as Codices Monacensis (q-seventh century) and Brixianus (f-sixth century), read, "et ne nos inducas in temptationem. sed libera nos a malo. quoniam tuum est regnum. et uirtus. et gloria in saecula. amen." The Syriac Peshitto (second to third century) reads, "And bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever: Amen." (James Murdock, The Syriac New Testament from the Peshitto Version [Boston: H.L. Hastings, 1896], 9.) Among the Greek uncials it is found in K (ninth century), L (eighth century), W (fifth century), D (ninth century), Q (ninth century), and P (ninth century). It is found in the following Greek minuscules: 28, 33, 565, 700, 892, 1009, 1010, 1071, 1079, 1195, 1216, 1230, 1241, 1242, 1365, 1546, 1646, 2174 (dating from the ninth to the twelfth century). The Church Father John Chrysostom was also familiar with it. He cites the verse in the fourth century in his Homilies: ". . . by bringing to our remembrance the King under whom we are arrayed, and signifying him to be more powerful than all. 'For thine,' saith he, 'is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory.'" (St. Chrysostom, "Homily XIX," in The Preaching of Chrysostom, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan [Philadelphia: Fortress Press], 145.)

The validy of the Cathar version is endorsed by the Anglican Church which also follows the early Greek texts and includes the phrase translated in the Authorized Version as "For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, forever. Amen" - the same as formulation as that used by some Cathar texts. The passage is also found in Spanish, French, Italian, and German versions which pre-date the Authorized (or King James) version. Early English versions such as the New Testament of William Tyndale (1525) also have it: "And leade us not into temptacion: but delyver us from evyll. For thyne is the kingdome and the power, and the glorye for ever. Amen."

 

Daily Bread ?

One of the most compelling pieces of evidence that the Cathars preserved a very ancient tradition - earlier than the that represented by modern mainstream Christian Churches - is the treatment of the word rendered in the Latin text above as "supersubstancialem". The original Greek word is επιουσιον and the interesting thing about it is that no one knows for sure what it means. One thing for sure is that it does not mean "daily", which is how mainstream Churches translate it (..Give us this day our daily bread"). More interesting yet is the fact that the cathars, and the Bogomils before them, appear to have preserved the meaning of the original Greek - and more remarkable still is the fact that the original meaning was known to the early Church reformers in England.

If you find this extraordinary, as I do, you might want to read on. (If not, you may find it hard going). The text below is taken from the Etudes balkaniques, 2001, No1, which deals in detail with the whole question - (With thanks to Georgi Vasilev, Ph.D., D.Sc. see http://www.geocities.com/bogomil1bg):

JOHN WYCLIFFE, THE DUALISTS AND THE CYRILLO-METHODIAN VERSION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT

1. Our bread over another substance [ouer bread over othir substaunce]

... Open any modern official edition of the Bible in English (for example The Holy Bible. New Revised Standard Version. Oxford, 1989) and read the Lord’s Prayer and you shall see that there God is asked to give [us] “this day our daily bread”. In Wycliffe’s English versions of the Scriptures however, begun about the year 1380, one finds a rather different text, i.e. “oure breed ouer othir substaunce” Math. 6:9-13 [give us this day our daily bread over another substance] {9}. Why the difference? Why such an unusual sounding in which, besides the translation, there is obviously a small comment of the translator himself? The answer on principle was provided by Yordan Ivanov, a noted Bulgarian philologist and historian. In his well-known book, Bogomil Books and Legends, he wrote that the Bosnian Bogomils read the Lord’s Prayer in just such a way, pronouncing “give us our daily bread of another substance” {10}. A similar version can be found in the lyonnaise rendition of the Albigensian Scriptures: “E dona a noi lo nostre pa qui es sabre tota cause” [“the bread that is above all else”]. Similarly there is one Old Italian version: “Il pane nostre sopra tucte le substantie da a nnoi oggi” [“our bread over any substance”].

Since the Bogomils gave the Cathars the quoted version of the Cyrillo-Methodian translation of the New Testament (subsequently translated into the Latin by the Cathars), we shall turn to the idea that John Wycliffe did not translate the Scriptures from the Vulgate, as the printed editions of his version later stated, but from a Cyrillo-Methodian version. By the way, even today the Bulgarian version of the Lord’s Prayer reads “our daily [substantial] bread” which is much closer to the Greek original “τον̣ αρτον ημον τον επιουσιον where the word “επιουσιον” means literally “suprasubstantial”. In other words, the Cyrillo-Methodian version is closer to the Greek original than the Vulgate “our daily [quotitianum] bread”. In fact, the term “supersubstantialem” is used in the various Vulgate versions, in Matthew and in Luke (11:2-4), but it is practically excluded from the liturgical and sacramental practice of the Catholic Church. What is more, to pronounce “suprasubstantial” [supersubstantialem] instead of “our daily bread” [panem nostrum quotidianum] in the Lord’s Prayer was considered a sure sign of heresy in the Middle Ages. According to Collectio Occitanica, Inquisition records from Carcassonne, in Lombardy Bernard Oliva, the heretical bishop from Toulouse, pronounced 'panem nostrum supersubstantialem' (dicendo in oratione Pater noster: panem nostrum supersubstantialem) when he said the Lord’s Prayer{11}.

Even in the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, many authors paid attention to the fact that the Bogomils lay the stress on “our bread of another substance”.

In this case we shall list just a few of them because, both in Bulgaria and abroad, one encounters a conservative underestimation of this detail and an inability to decipher its theological significance {12}. H. Puech and A. Vaillant underscored the concept described by Euthymius Zygavin that “Bogomils created their haven, the true eucharistic bread that is "αρτος επιουσιος”, by which they acquire the blood and flesh of Christ everyday" {13}. Zygavin mentions the special word "επιουσιος" by which they characterised the bread: "τον̣ αρτον γαρ, φηςι, τον επιουσιον” {14}. N. Osokyn also noted the “Greek practice” of the Bogomils and the Cathars: they sang the Lord’s Prayer after the Greek fashion, substituting “our daily bread” (quotidianum) for the words “our supernatural bread” and adding at the end “ÿêî òâîå åñò öàðñòâî” etc. adopted by the Eastern Church with good reason” {15}. Jean Guiraud, a scholar who studied the Cathars and was their opponent centuries after they existed, claimed that “they dared to adjust even the word of Christ”, taking the liberty to read the said part of the Lord’s Prayer in their own way {16}.

At this point I would like to undertake a rather more comprehensive explanation of the Cathar concept of the Lord’s Prayer that C. Schmidt made in 1849: “... they interpreted ‘daily bread’ in the sense of food for the soul and, instead of the simple formula from the Scripture, ‘Give us today our superstubstantial bread’, ending with the words ‘for Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory in all eternity’. Since these words cannot be found in the Vulgate, the opponents of the Cathars who were not familiar with the original text, accused them of misrepresenting the Bible in this particular place. This accusation the latter did not deserve because on this point their version, made on the basis of a Greek source, was more correct than the version of the Western Church.” {17}

It was exactly Schmidt who gave the explanation, repeated a century later by Yordan Ivanov. He pointed out that, in the Greek original, the expression from Matthew “τον̣ αρτον ημον τον επιουσιον” repeated also in Luke, was translated as panem supersubstantialem (Matthew) and panem quotidianum (Luke) in the Vulgate. He added that the latter expression “was more accepted in the [Catholic – author’s note] Church than the former one” {18}.

FOOTNOTES

9. The Holy Bible, made from the Latin Vulgate by John Wyccliffe and his followers, vol. IV, p. 18.

10. Èâàíîâ, É. Áîãîìèëñêè êíèãè è ëåãåíäè. Ñîôèÿ. 1925, ñ.113. The same fact is quoted in "Slovnίk jazyka staroslověnskeho. Lexicon linguae palaeslovenicae. t .II, p.322: "èíîñîóøòüíû" (Tetra-evangelium Nikojanum, Serbia XV, Cyr. Num.indicis A.-23).

11. Döllinger, Ign. V. Dokumente vornehmlich zur Geschichte der Valdesier und Katharer herausgegeben. Munchen. T. II. München, 1890, S. 38: “...dicendo in oratione Pater Noster: panem nostrum supersubstantialem”. This case was also quoted by Y. Ivanov.

12. One should mention here that there are only a few good interpretations of Bogomil and Cathar theology, including Raicho Karolev’s 19th century work, those of H. Puech and A. Vaillant, as well as Edina Bozoki, among others. In the case of Bulgaria, the cause was the fact that, after 1944, research of the Bogomil movement fell under Marxist interpretation, with their teaching seen above all as a social moevement. In the West, powerful Catholic influence was a barrier before studies of the finer peculiarities of dualistic philosophy. There is not s single study in this sense in Great Britain.

13. Puech, H. A. Vaillant. Le traite contre les Bogomiles de Cosmas le Prêtre. Paris. 1945, p. 245.

14. Patrologia Graeca, 130, col. 1313.

15. Îñîêèíú Í. Èñòîðiÿ Àëüáèãîéöåâ äî êîí÷èíû ïàïû Èííîêåíòiÿ III. T. I. Êàçàíü, 1869, ñ. 214.

16. Giuraud, J. Cartulaire de Notre Dame de Prouilles, précédé d’une étude sur l’Albigeisme languedocien au XIIe et XIIIe siecles. T. 1-2. Paris. 1907, p. CXXII.

17. Schmidt, C. Histoire et doctrine de la secte des cathares ou albigeois. T. II. Paris-Geneve. 1849, p. 117.

18. Ibidem.