2 - Crafting Prayer

Summary

Abstract

While much of the literature on the craft manual has attempted to disentangle magic from practical recipes for making art, there is a growing appreciation for texts, such as Theophilus Presbyter's de diversis artibus, that provides an explanation of the mystical role of craft for the artisan. The use of mixed craft metaphors by Peter of Celle (1115-1183) and Peter the Painter (fl. 1100) exemplifies how sacramental change was informed by understandings of artisanal and alchemical transformation in the Middle Ages. The prologues to Theophilus’ books guide the reader to awareness of craft as a conduit for receiving the gifts of the Holy Spirit, an infusion with divinity, hinting at the artisanal foundations of Suger's material way.

Keywords: art, craft manuals, sacramental change, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, alchemy, prayer

Aurum nec sumptus, operis mirare laborem.

Marvel not at the gold and the expense but at the craftsmanship of the work.

Materiam superabat opus.

The workmanship surpassed the material.

Although he has often been criticized for his materialism, Suger explicitly identifies the ultimate end of the material condition of Saint-Denis as a conduit to properly engaging with the artisanship that produced it. For the abbot, the crafting of the church creates a divine residence in the believer and in the terrestrial realm. His reference to the relationship between work and material is often noted as a citation to Ovid's Metamorphosis. However, the wonder expressed toward artisanship also fits well with Ephesians 2:10. Just a few lines prior to the metaphor associating the building of the church with the reforming of the ecclesia, which Suger chooses to interpret literally, the author of Ephesians structures a relationship between the making of things and the divine path that good works provide.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus in good works, which God has prepared that we should walk in them.

In describing history as the foundation upon which his canons will build their education, Hugh of Saint-Victor establishes a similar, metaphorical relationship between what is made and what the made provides. In the Didascalicon, Hugh elucidates the process of education as the building of a wall, which is incomplete but which, through its construction, signals the path one is to take in continuing to learn.