What is it about?
The article examines how St. Jerome’s The Life of St. Paul the First Hermit was adapted into Old Church Slavonic texts and medieval Serbian visual culture. It explores how the textual tradition from both Latin West and Greek East was creatively interpretated in South Slavonic sources. The article concludes by showing how the saint’s image connected the emerging monastic centers of medieval Serbia with the origins of hermitic tradition, highlighting how this image became a metaphor for the ideals of hesychasm, subtly addressing the political context of post Nemanjic Serbia.
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Why is it important?
The article is important because it provides an English translation of the Church Slavonic Life of St. Paul as preserved in a 14th century manuscript from the National Library of Serbia. It traces the centuries long development and reinterpretation of saint’s Vita in both textual and visual sources, spanning from a 10th century Old Church Slavonic translation in Bulgaria to its use in later periods. The article also shows how the saint’s life was employed to convey specific theological ideas and address medieval Serbian political issues. Additionally, it analyses the symbolic complexity of Byzantine iconography, exploring how the saint’s story was removed from its historical context and transformed into a powerful metaphor.
Perspectives
Researching the complex journey of St. Paul of Thebes Vita was a truly enjoyable experience, made even more rewarding by the opportunity to collaborate with world-renowned scholars. Each Zoom meeting became a moment of reflection and learning. It is fascinating to observe how hagiographic texts, once written, take lives of their own, continually evolving and being reinterpreted over time.
Nebojsa Tumara
St Athanasius College, University of Divinity, Melbourne, Australia
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The Old Church Slavonic Tradition, December 2024, Brill,
DOI: 10.1163/9789004702226_012.
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