theology and structure in "the dream of the rood"

The University of Notre Dame

Theology and Structure in "The Dream of the Rood"Author(s): Anthony R. GrassoSource: Religion & Literature, Vol. 23, No. 2 (Summer, 1991), pp. 23-38Published by: The University of Notre DameStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40059473 .

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THEOLOGY AND STRUCTURE IN "THE DREAM OF THE ROOD"

Rev. Anthony R. Grasso, CSC

"The Dream of the Rood" has for a long time captivated readers with its controlled, dramatic style and understated expression. The poem's subtle catharsis invites continued re-reading, and it remains a consistent favorite of students and scholars alike. Perhaps because the portrait of Christ the Victor- Vanquished is so well balanced and vividly conveyed, the poem has been read as an attempt to preclude the kinds of Christological heresies which had been addressed at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 C.E. (Woolf 142). l Other critics concen- trate on the soteriological aspect of the poem, suggesting that apocalyptic overtones place "The Dream" in the mainstream of Christian literature about the final judgment.2

The poem is fascinating for the way in which it portrays Christ's dual nature in concrete images, using minimal theological language. Yet the poem's theology is of a piece with its literary expression and structure; the two are clearly intertwined. The poem's impact and message are not of the didactic type, aimed at correcting heretical thought. Rather, the poem presupposes belief in the tenets of faith, Christ's salvific death and resurrection. Its aim appears to be to rein- force faith and to evoke an interior conversion, an individual response to the theological concepts which define Christian faith. The graphic description of the rood's first-hand participation in the crucifixion, noble yet moving, prompts the reader to reflect on how he or she has responded to this gift of faith.

One plausible source for both the theology and structure in "The Dream of the Rood" is the Nicene Creed. Like the Creed, the poem moves from the concept of God as Light through the death, resurrec-

flGT'L 23.2 (Summer 1991)

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24 Religion & Literature

tion and Second Coming of Christ, even echoing phrases from that prayer which would be familiar to any Christian. Just as the pattern of the Creed proceeds from a summary of the tenets of faith to focus on the believers gathered at worship, the poem treats the salvific event and then emphasizes the individual response of the rood and the onlookers to that event. Prayer and poem share a common pattern and purpose: to rekindle an active response to a faith that is professed.

Although the recitation of the Creed had only been done as a part of the baptismal liturgy, it first came to be practiced in Spain in 589 when "... it was ordered said by all the people at every Mass right before the Tater Noster' so that, before the Body and Blood of the Lord were received, the hearts of all might be purified by faith" (Jungmann 297). Jungmann indicates that two centuries later the Creed came into regular use at Aachen where it "was sung after the Gospel." The custom appears to have spread from the Spaniards by means of Irish monks, who had traveled extensively in the Eastern and Western Empires. They first carried it to the Anglo-Saxon church and, through Alcuin, the custom made its way into Charlemagne's daily Mass whence it continued to spread throughout France (298). 3 Thus the Creed was recited with regularity at least until the eleventh century when an in- struction was issued from Rome "restricting the 'Credo' to Sundays and to those feasts of which mention is made in the symbol [the Creed]" (Jungmann 298).

Although the Gregorian Sacramentary was in use at Rome, the Gallican rite for the Mass differed from it. As opposed to a unified liturgy for the whole church, local customs prevailed allowing for differences in prayers. In this context Dom Gregory Dix cites Bede's remark, re- corded in his Ecclesiastical History (1.27), that "Pope Gregory in 595 ad- vised Augustine of Canterbury to take what seemed best out of both Gallican and Roman rites to form a new mixed rite for the Anglo- Saxon church" {Shape 570). In his study of the development of the Mass, The Liturgy of the Roman Church, Archdale King finds evidence for the introduction of the Creed "in its actual position after the Gospel" by Celtic monks into the Anglo-Saxon liturgy during the seventh and eighth centuries. Their custom involved reciting the Creed at daily Mass and singing it on Sundays. He too records that Alcuin transmitted this practice to Charlemagne's court as early as 798 C.E. (King 264).

In addition to the frequently cited declaration from the Synod of Haethfeld in 680, testifying to the Anglo-Saxon church's conformity of belief in the Nicene Creed,4 other evidence exists that points to the significance of the Creed in the Anglo-Saxon church. In 734 Bede wrote



ANTHONY R. GRASSO, C.S.C. 25

to Egbert of York about the duties of the bishop toward his people "whose faith he has to nurture":

The laity, or those among them who do not understand Latin, are to learn the Creed and the Lord's Prayer; they are to be taught to say them daily and even to sing them, "so that there may spring up in them a love of the truths they contain." They are to be told to bless themselves frequently, and it is to be pointed out to them "how salutary it is for every kind of Christian to receive each day the Body and Blood of the Lord." (Leclercq 53)5

This set of spiritual exercises, an ideal laid down for pastoral leader- ship, establishes a connection among the Creed, the sign of the cross and the daily celebration of Mass. And from the seventh century, when monastic life prospered and its numbers grew, eucharistic celebration occurred with greater frequency in the monasteries. Service at the altar increased, since many of the monks were clerics who did less manual labor (Leclercq 54).

In addition to the practice of regular eucharistic celebration, Leclercq explains the corollary kinds of devotion found in monasteries during the seventh through ninth centuries:

. . . prayers, hymns [and] litanies were in use either in public worship or to sus- tain the personal devotion of the clergy, monks or pentitents, found in the Book qfCerne and the Carolingian Libelli precum [which] were compiled chiefly in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon circles ... As these prayers, inspired by the liturgy though used apart from it, answered the needs of many they soon spread throughout England and the Continent. (64)

The most common forms of devotion associated with these prayers, according to Leclercq, were the "Cross of our Lord, the relics and tombs of the saints, and . . . the Mother of God."

Because it maintains structural and theological affinity with that prayer, "The Dream of the Rood" may well have been composed as a personal meditation on the Creed by a monastic author. Whatever the poem's origin, textual evidence suggests that the Vercelli Manu- script, in which the poem appears, is comprised of devotional texts, which were intended for personal use (O Carragain 490). 6 In the way that "Caedmon's Hymn" presents a syncopated version of the Creation Narrative in Genesis in the form of a meditative prayer, "The Dream of the Rood" makes more accessible the abstract theological formulae concerning Christ's identity and mission which are found in the Creed (Holloway 28). 7 The poem offers a series of panels that together convey the tale of the Crucifixion in the heroic fashion of the day. These pictures clarify the intellectual statements of belief, uttered at public celebrations of worship, thereby offering an opportunity to enhance one's spiritual condition and commitment. Given the spiritual requisites




delineated by Bede and others, the connection of the cross with the Creed would not be at all unusual during the period.

In one very helpful treatment of the poem's structure, Peter Orton compares the effect of "The Dream of the Rood" with that in the riddles of the Exeter Book. 8 He concludes that the poet sought to achieve a "continuous denouement" which deepens with repeated readings, rather than a once-and-for-all conclusion. Just as one is drawn into the wordplay of the riddles to discover their possible meanings, one quickly becomes absorbed in the poignant experience of the personified cross. "The poem's identification of the cross with Christ has been ex- plained by the liturgical practice of using the cross as a substitute for the body of Christ, as in the 'Adoratio Crucis' of the Book o/Cerne and the 'Regularis Concordia,' a practice that was to continue in monasteries and convents" (Holloway 30-31). The cross, central symbol of Christianity, is also the concrete sign and gesture performed frequently in prayer. The sign of the cross is made at the opening and closing of the Mass and at other devotions. Thus, associations among the cross, the person and mission of Christ and the Creed, which con- tains references to all three, could have arisen naturally from various monastic liturgical practices, including celebrations of the Mass.

During the fifth century, much energy was devoted to the specific definition of Christ's dual nature which is contained in the Creed. In his history of the church, Jaroslav Pelikan offers an insightful ex- planation of the council fathers' intent at Chalcedon, which may well serve to illuminate the work of the Anglo-Saxon poet. The fathers at Chalcedon sought to link

a static doctrine of two natures with a dynamic soteriology. [Their] underlying soteriology required that Christ as Savior be both divine and human, so that he could effect the exchange between himself and the sinner by which he assumed the sins of the world and the sinner became holy. The kenosis of Christ estab- lished a new covenant between god and man. By his humiliation he taught men humility, so that they could be exalted with him (Ambrose). "We were raised because he was lowered; shame to him was glory to us. He, being God, made flesh his residence, and we in return are lifted anew from the flesh to God" (Hilary). The cross of Christ was the mystery of salvation by which the power of God achieved its redemptive purpose, as well as an example by which men were aroused to humility. "By a wonderful exchange he entered into a bargain of salvation, taking upon himself what was ours and granting us what was his" (Leo). (257-58)

What stands out in Pelikan's precis is the fathers' desire to communicate in living, comprehensible terms the experience of who Jesus is as the Christ and what the implications of his mission are for "sinful" humanity which must daily struggle with its life of faith. All of these com-




ments reveal an emotional dimension that theological doctrines cannot convey, but which must exist if there is to be any personal response to the intellectual aspect of faith in theology. In "The Dream of the Rood" the poet invites just such an active response and succeeds in filling the gaps left by the theological language that evolved in formu- lating the Creed.

Reading the theology apart from the context of the poem, however, does not adequately account for the quality of its art or the particular structure of the theological statements which form the core of "The Dream of the Rood." But repeated readings of the poem do suggest the connection in form and formula with the universal Christian prayer. "The Creed of Nicaea had followed its statement of the 'divinity' (God in himself) with the one about 'economy' (God in his plan of salvation) in the confession that Tor the sake of us men and for the purpose of our salvation' Christ had come down, had become incarnate, had suffered and risen again on the third day, had ascended to the heavens, and would come again to judge the living and the dead" (Pelikan 228-29). These key points are exactly the poet's focus in "The Dream of the Rood." Although the Anglo-Saxon poet occasionally replicates credal phraseology, his development of images correspond- ing to each phase of the Creed appeals to the reader's capacity to be moved emotionally, rather than to be persuaded intellectually. A compassionate reaction to the heroic suffering of the "young savior" en- genders greater natural response to faith than the inducement of fear of the afterlife.

That the poem seeks to catalyze reflection on one's spiritual condition first becomes apparent in line 13: "Seldlic waes se sige-beam, and ic synnum fag,/forwundod mid wammum [The tree of victory was wonderful, and I stained by sin,/ wounded sorely by iniquities]."9 The vision of the glorified cross, "beama beorhtost" (6a), forms a vivid contrast to the things of earth, enabling the dreamer/narrator and reader of the poem to become aware of their spiritual condition. The poet identifies the glorified cross guarded by hosts of angels, the "halge gastas" of line 1 1 , not only with Christ but also with God enthroned above creation. His angels also watch "menn ofer moldan, and eall £eos mabre gesceaft" (12) [men upon earth, and all this glorious creation], echoing the credal acknowledgment of God as "maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible,"10 in which role Christ too participates.

In addition to its effectiveness as personification, the poet's association of the cross with God also acts as a metaphor for the most essential theological point contained in the Creed. The glorified cross simul-




taneously represents the "Lord of Creation" and Jesus Christ, who shares complete unity with the godhead:

Et in unum Dominum Jesum Christum, Filium Dei unigenitum. Et ex Patre natum ante omnia saecula. Deum de Deo, Lumen de Lumine, Deum vero de Deo vero. Genitum, non factum, consubstantialem Patri: per quern omnia facta sunt.

[And in one Lord, Jesus Christ, The only begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages; God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God; begotten, not made, of one essence with the Father, Through whom all things were made.]

Several of these points are concretely interpreted in the opening fif- teen lines of the poem. After he identifies the cross with God/Christ, the poet expands upon the image of transcendent light contained in the Creed. The cross becomes a vision of light whose brilliance is por- trayed in variously significant ways. It is first spoken of as "leohte bewunden, beama beorhtost" [the brightest of crosses/trees, encircled with light] (5b-6a); it is twice referred to as a "beacen" (6b, 21b) which, translated as "vision," "portent" or "sign," emphasizes the heavenly origin of this light and the theological import of the cross as well.

The author also adorns the cross with gold and gems (11.7,16), saying that it "wynnum scinan" [shines beautifully] (15b). Howard Patch explains the liturgical association and symbolism of the gems:

We should expect the wounds to receive special attention since they are given so much emphasis in the hymns and the liturgy [he cites the Missale Sarum as one example] . The five crosses cut in the altar stones and the five signs of the cross are taken as similarly symbolical. With these may be associated the five grains of incense in the liturgy ... It seems fairly safe therefore to believe that in "The Dream of the Rood" the poet mentions the five jewels not only because they were prominent in the actual cross that he knew, but because they represented the sacred wounds, an interpretation of some power. (243-45)

Patch's connection of the gems/wounds with the "grains of incense" refers to the practice of marking the Paschal candle during the Easter Vigil Liturgy. Representing the wounds of Christ, the five grains are placed into the candle in the form of a cross just prior to the proces- sion in which the candle, the Light of Christ, remains the only illumi- nation in the church. The poet's use of the gems expands on the credal description of Christ as "light from light, true God from true God." He employs what were well-known symbols from worship to elaborate the formula in the Creed that cites Christ's divinity, and also implies his humanity in the now-glorified wounds that the gems recall. The




rood, meant to represent Christ, is imbued with the same dual nature. As does Christ, the cross bathed in light can simultaneously transcend the realm of human experience while still remaining an ordinary, physical substance. Its origin as a tree is never forgotten in the text.

The poet stresses the tree's living nature in his account of the making of the cross (11.25-38), since its suffering builds the pathos that leads up to Christ's death. It is "aheawen" [hewn down] (29a) and its trunk "astyred" [severed] (30a). This passage also connects the description of Christ's person and identity with the definition of his earthly mission. In spite of any human impulse to the contrary, the point stands that Christ came to die. Thus the poet smoothly develops the soteriological portions of the creed: "Qui propter nos homines, et propter nostram salutem, descendit de caelis . . . Crucifixus etiam pro nobis, sub Pontio Pilato, passus, et sepultus est. [He for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven . . . He was also crucified for our sake, under Pontius Pilate, suffered, died, and was buried]."

In the next section of the vision, lines 39-41 become pivotal; they function almost proleptically, recapitulating the poem's beginning and anticipating its outcome:

Ongierede hine £a geong Haelef)- pact waes God aelmihtig, - strang and stip- mod; gestag he on gealgan heanne, modig on manigra gesihpe, pa. he wolde mann-cynn liesan [Then the young Savior unclothed himself- he was God almighty - strong and brave; he mounted high onto the cross, courageous in the sight of many, since he wished to ransom mankind].

The poet reiterates, in a compact blend of credal phrases and heroic elements, the identity of the "savior" while indicating both his method and mission - the precise theological meaning of the cross. His particular phrase, "he wolde mann-cynn liesan," is a synthesis of the statement in the Creed that "he came down from heaven" and "was crucified for us men and for our salvation." The positive, almost upbeat tone of the passage lends a dynamic force, which allows it to serve as a reassuring preface to the more graphic treatment of the Crucifixion. The reader is thus given the context of Christian hope as the founda- tion from which to enter into reflection on what human sinfulness has brought about. This pattern also imitates the Creed, which begins with the knowledge of salvation at hand, but reminds those who pray of the cost at which that redemption was gained. The desire to renew one's faith, implying the need for reviewing one's sinfulness, is understood within the text, which cites belief in "one baptism for the remission of sins" as an essential action for following Christ.

Only after he has provided this positive framework does the poet offer a detailed, emotional meditation on the laconic doctrinal state-




ment that "he suffered, died, and was buried." The account, all the more poignant because it is related from the cross's immediate point of view, comes directly from the Crucifixion narrative common to all four gospels, with one important change. The poet incorporates all the elements of Christ's passion: his being nailed to the cross; his mocked, pierced, and bleeding body; the yielding up of his spirit; his removal from the cross; and his burial in a stone sepulchre.11 In the last aspect of the narrative, however, he departs from the gospel text. Where the evangelists agree that the tomb was provided by Joseph of Arimathea, the poet says that "Ongunnon him pa mold-aern wyrcan beornas on banan gesihpe, curfon hie £aet of beorhtan stane" [In the sight of the slayer, the men began to make a sepulchre for him carved from the brightest stone] (65-66).

Viewed together with the sharp contrast in language between the two sections, this textual change sheds light on the real focus of the poetic meditation. The poet's intentional alteration of the burial sequence becomes a paradigm of the humble faith-response to the ordeal of Christ on behalf of humanity. Like that of the cross itself, the onlookers' reaction symbolizes the free will gesture that faith really is; it is also spontaneously engendered by Christ's unflinching "embrace" of death. The Anglo-Saxon poet has been careful to emphasize this exact point in his choice of language. The lord "efstan elne micle" [hastened with great zeal] (34) in order to ascend the cross, and later "gestag* [he mounted] (40) and "ymbclypte" [embraced] (43) the rood without hesitation. Rather than sermonizing about the proper response to Christ's free will offering, the poet dramatizes it. He reveals even the inanimate cross as a would-be defender of "the young Savior": "Ealle ic meahte feondas gefiellan" [I could have killed all the enemies] (37b-38a). Although it cannot be carried out for the obvious theological reason, this gesture does more than heighten the implications of Christ's undertaking (Patten 390). Both the rood's desire and the action of carving the tomb are immediate and unsolicited responses of the will to Christ's death. This type of active response is essential in order for faith to remain alive, and is what the tone of the poem aims to elicit from its readers.

"The Dream of the Rood" is striking as well for the sophisticated way in which the poet balances the theological themes of suffering and glorification. The poet's language in describing the Crucifixion is suf- ficiently dramatic to move the reader beyond guilt over human sinfulness as the cause of Christ's death and into compassionate reaction, symbolized in the actions of the rood and the onlookers. The poet succeeds both at imaging and explicating the theological hope, rather than




the aspect of judgment, which the cross represents. Yet he never glosses over its brutal agony: the lord is "jxirhdrifon deorcum naeglum" [driven through with dark-colored nails] (46) and he bears "opene inwitt- hlemmas" [open, malicious wounds] (47a); the cross is "mid blode bestiemed, begoten of £aes Guman sidan" [entirely suffused with blood, drenched from the side of this man] (48b-49a). The most com- pelling image is that of "heofenes Dryhten . . . hine f)aer hwile reste, mede aefter J3am miclan gewinne" [the Lord of Heaven . . . resting there for awhile after that great agony] (64-65a). In an example of consum- mate understatement, the cross is depicted as helplessly - and hope- lessly-caught in that seemingly eternal moment, as in the effect of stop-frame cinematography. Dreamer and reader are inexorably drawn into its perspective of overwhelming human sorrow. But the description seeks not so much to engender guilt, which would only immobilize people, as to evoke a sense of compassion at this picture of the ex- cruciating pain which Christ willingly undertook on behalf of the human race. As were the rood and the onlookers, one ought to be moved by the experience to action.

The climactic message of the cross supports the poet's deemphasis of the judgment motif and provides additional impetus for that action: "On me Beam Godes prowode hwile; for-{)on ic |3rymm-faest nu hlifie under heofonum, and ic haelan maeg aeghwelcne anra" [On me the Son of God suffered awhile; therefore I now rise up glorious under heaven, and I am able to save every one of those who is in awe of me] (83b-86a). Sandra McEntire, indicating that the practice of praying to the Rood and making the sign of the cross had been encouraged in Britain, cites a relevant passage from one of AElfric's Homilies:

fordan de we habbactda de he on drowade, ac hire anlicnys bid"halig swa-J)eah, to daere we a bugad"on gebedum symle to dam Mihtigan Drihtne, pe for mannum drowade [For although we have not that on which He suffered, its likeness is, nevertheless, holy, to which we ever bow in our prayers to the Mighty Lord, who suffered for men; and the rood is a memorial of His great passion, holy through him . . . We ever honour it for the honour of Christ.] (346-47; her translation).12

It is more than coincidental that AElfric similarly regards the cross, so closely identified with Christ, as an agent of salvation. When speaking about Christ's passion, AElfric also echoes the phrase from the Creed that he "suffered for men." The sentiments of this homily are consonant with the hopeful perspective of the author of "The Dream of the Rood." As well, the implications are the same: anyone who reveres the cross, makes or wears the cross as a "sign," is saved by it.




During the cross's final speech, one finds almost verbatim the statement from the Creed on Christ's resurrection and glorification:

. . . hwaedre eft Dryhten aras/ mid his miclan meahte mannum to helpe./ He fa on heofonas astag. Hider eft fundaj)/ on pisne middan-geard mann-cynn secan/ on dom-daege Dryhten selfa,/ aelmihtig God and his englas mid [Never- theless, the Lord rose again by his great power in order to help men. Then he ascended into heaven. He will come hither again on this earth to seek mankind on the day of judgment, the Lord himself, almighty God and his angels with him] (101b-106). And on the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures. And He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead; and of His reign there will be no end.

The cross offers, literally and figuratively, to all the "reord-berendum" [speech-bearers] the message of salvation and the concomitant hope of glory. In the context of the poem the personified and now-glorified cross offers itself, the unwilling instrument of Christ's agony and death, as the example that salvation is possible for everyone.

Even the foreboding aspect of final judgment is quite tempered as the poet presents it here. While it is clearly to be a time of challenge -

"frigne£ he for pstre menige hwzer se mann sie, se-j)e for Dryhtnes naman deacfes wolde biteres onbiergan, swa he dbr on £am beame dyde" [he will ask of the multitude who among them would partake of bitter death for the Lord's name, just as he had died before on the tree] (112-14) - the account has been modified to exclude any fearful and cataclysmic elements. Judgment will be made solely on the basis of the individual's willingness to follow the Lord and to be an active witness to faith.

Along with the challenge that faith represents, the poet is quick to add the reassurance which it offers. In his words, "Ne {)earf f)2er fxmne aenig anforht wesan pe him str on breostum berej) beacna selest" [At that time, none will need to be terrified who bore that best of signs (the cross) for him on their breasts (in their hearts)] (116-17). The author never presents a doomsday message to instill fear; this stage of the poem develops the message of the Creed and reinforces the theme of salvation which he has emphasized in each successive image of the dream. Because Christ and the cross, as a personified entity, have suffered and were humiliated for "a short time," they were and are glorified forever. The dreamer receives the same assurance and so does every Christian who has "shown" faith. Significantly, it had been the practice to make the sign of the cross, as a gesture of faith and hope, at this point during the recitation of the Creed: "And I look




forward to the resurrection of the dead, (Here all cross themselves) and the life of the world to come." The monastic poet would have been aware of this rubric and with the intimate connection of cross and Creed expressed in spiritual writings and practice.13 The Anglo- Saxon poet's expansion and presentation of credal doctrine remain positive throughout, never straying from their theological source.

As a meditation on faith, "The Dream of the Rood" culminates in a highly symbolic vision, beginning at line 122 with the heavenly ban- quet, appropriately transmitted by the dreamer rather than by the cross. Just as the cross has been transformed from the unwitting tool of demons into the means of Christ's glorification, the dreamer also under- goes an interior transformation in the course of the poem. Initially he had been made keenly aware of his condition as "forwundod mid wammum" [stained by sin] (14). When confronted with the Lord's suffering, represented by the cross, the dreamer was "mid sorgum gedrefed" [afflicted with sorrow] (20b). However, as the story of the cross un- folds, he is brought along on his own spiritual journey until he becomes a participant in the vision of eternal peace and bliss. As a symbol of all Christians engaged in the process of salvation, he progresses from being a passive observer to becoming an active witness to faith. In keeping with his method, the poet enlivens the phrase from the Creed, "the life of the world to come," by offering an illustration of what that life will be: communion shared by all who, like the dreamer, have shown faith in the power of the cross.

According to the keen perception of the Anglo-Saxon poet, all faith must be active and participatory; otherwise, Christ's death is in vain. "The Dream of the Rood" is a personal vision that works at faith through human compassion rather than through ornate rhetorical elo- quence or inducing fear of the afterlife. Its impact derives from the poet's success in animating terse and abstract credal statements into dynamic images that emanate from the heroic milieu of Anglo-Saxon society. The poet creates an animated, spiritual meditation that engages his readers on their own terms. He gives flesh to those doctrinal portions of the Creed which otherwise might easily remain abstract or even empty formulas to be recited by rote. The author of "The Dream of the Rood" offers ample evidence that he comprehends the distinction between the intellectual nature of theology and a faith that must be experienced in order to be fully understood and lived. Enfleshed in the powerful imagery of his vision-narrative, the doctrine of the Creed assumes a new vitality.

Although the exact sources for "The Dream of the Rood" are not wholly certain, and there are likely several, the theological content and




phraseology in the poem strikingly resemble the language contained in the Nicene Creed. In addition, the poet's presentation of the vision, from "heavenly light" to "the life of the world to come," follows the same pattern of christological and soteriological concepts in that prayer. The poem provides a pictorial dramatization of each major portion of the Creed, simultaneously enacting its theological significance and eliciting an emotional response from its readers. Scholarship suggests that the poem's origin was monastic and that its use, as O Carragain deduces from his work with the Vercelli Manuscript, was personal and meditative. Given the structural and theological parallels between the poem and the Creed, it appears plausible that the monastic poet used the Creed, the summary prayer of faith and statement about Christ's nature and mission, as the terminus for his compellingly vivid meditation on the centrality of the cross in Christian life, and for his own desire to be continually reminded of its importance. While the poem does contain echoes of the liturgy, the gospel narratives, and the 'Adoratio Crucis' in places, the basic structure of the dream-vision clearly and closely parallels the pattern of statements about Christ contained in the Nicene Creed.

Seeing its basis in the structure and content of the Creed also ac- counts for the poem's theological accuracy. "The Dream of the Rood" evinces a consistent christology, one that balances the humanity and divinity of Christ, and a complete soteriology, which cohere harmoni- ously throughout the text. Insofar as it calls attention to human sinfulness and ultimate judgment, the poem might be described as homiletic. However, its imaginative narrative frame prevents the poem from ever devolving into a hortatory or primarily didactic piece (O Carragain 489). H In content and sequence of doctrinal ideas, "The Dream of the Rood" does parallel the text of the Nicene Creed that emerged from Chalcedon. Yet the individual "call to faith," so effectively rendered in the vision topos of the poem, offers a more engaging and experien- tial approach to faith. The poem brings its audience into personal contact with the Christ who was human and at his most vulnerable, as well as with the Risen Lord in his glory. Thus, "The Dream of the Rood" reinforces extra-liturgically the main purpose of the communal recitation of the Creed. Each time it is heard or read, the poem would enhance, through the special power attributed to the cross, the desire for renewed commitment on the part of the believer to the person and mission of Christ.

King's College




NOTES

1. Rosemary Woolf rightly suggests, since the authorship of and circumstances surrounding the poem are unknown, that no certain conclusions can be made (140-42). She argues that "the burden of proof is undoubtedly on anyone who would maintain that an educated man of this period could remain unaware at the very least that the greatest theological care and precision was required in any statements about Christ's life . . ."(142). This remark, however, neither implies nor establishes that the English church was involved in combatting any particular heresies, or that it was the role of this poem to do so.

2. Several articles take this approach. A.D. Horgan and Christopher Chase both situate the poem in the context of Jewish-Christian expression concerning the redemption and final judgment. However, crucial apocalyptic elements, typical of judgment literature, are not present in the text of "The Dream."

3. These dates are also cited in Dix, who records the directive (Council of Toledo, 589) that "the Creed should be recited 'after the fashion of the Eastern fathers' by all in a loud voice" (487).

4. It appears in Bede's History, IV. 17: "This same faith our Lord Jesus Christ delivered in the flesh to His Disciples, who saw Him in person and heard His Teach- ing. This is now set forth in the Creed of the holy fathers, and by all the sacred general councils, and by the united voice of the accredited doctors of the Catholic Church. We follow then in devotion and right faith, professing our belief in their inspired teachings; and we unite with the holy fathers in acknowledging the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Trinity consubstantial in Unity, and Unity in Trinity, that is, One God subsisting in three consubstantial Persons of equal glory and honour."

5. McNeill's research corroborates that worship was in Latin and that the Celtic liturgy is an amalgam of several sources: "Worship in the Celtic churches was, so far as known, never in the vernacular but always in Latin . . . The evidence furnished by the Antiphonary of Bangor and the Bobbio Missal, both of the 7th century, and by the Stowe Missal and the Book of Deer of the early 9th century, indicates an affiliation with the Gallican rite, but with some additional elements from Eastern sources, and from the Mozarabic Liturgy." {The Celtic Churches 131).

6. Eamon 6 Carragain explains that "The Vercelli collection is best understood as a 'florilegium' - a collection of texts made primarily for personal use. The paleo- graphical features of the manuscript indicate that it was written piecemeal, from such sources as came to hand over a considerable period of time; for this reason, the person who wrote the manuscript should be seen not simply as 'the Vercelli scribe,' but as 'the Vercelli collector,' a man not simply doing a job of copying but gradually gathering together the texts which he found most relevant to his spiritual life. The interests of the Vercelli collector were, to judge from the texts which he gathered, primarily ascetic: he seems to have intended the manuscript to aid him in 'conversion of his way of life' (conversio morum - the second monastic vow prescribed by St. Benedict's Rule)" (490).

7 . Julia Holloway offers an interesting observation on the stylistic affinity between the two works: "The runic form of 'The Dream of the Rood' is roughly contemporary with Caedmon, the oral formulaic poet of Abbess Hilda's double monastery at Whitby. He has been suspected of being the poem's author. 'The Dream of the Rood' is clearly a product of a monastic environment and, at the same time, authored by a poet of the highest caliber. Caedmon, contemporary of Hilda and Alcfrith, as a monk and




a poet, belongs to both these categories. The Vercelli form of the poem, written in insular hand, is of Cynewulfs school and time . . . Despite the perhaps three centuries' span between the runic Ruthwell and the insular Vercelli versions, 'The Dream of the Rood' is intrinsically the same, its liturgical matrix unaltered" (28).

8. Orton is careful not to assume a simple equation between the texts because he gives due consideration to the ampler structure and unique literary quality of "The Dream" as a poem.

9. John C. Pope, ed., Seven Old English Poems. All further citations from the poem will be noted by line references within the essay; translations are my own.

10. The text of the Nicene Creed is from the Missale Romanum (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1949). This edition provides an English translation as well as the tradi- tional rubrics for public recitation during the Mass. See "Appendix" for the complete text in Latin and English.

1 1 . The structural outline cited here is taken from the Gospel of John but appears in the other gospels with little variation.

12. McEntire offers further parallels from the writings of Bede and Alcuin, who also comment on the importance of the symbol and of making the sign of the cross frequently (348).

13. On the image of the triumphant Lord, depicted by the poet, Leclercq also offers interesting parallels in the iconography of Carolingian texts: "through every- thing of this kind [i.e., the Libelli precum and similar monastic works] whether poetry, prose, music, as well as iconography, run certain themes, above all that of our Re- deemer's victory . . . and at the beginning of many of the liturgical and biblical manu- scripts [8th - 9th centuries] is a full-page picture of the 'Majestas Domini' in which our Lord is enthroned in glory surrounded by angels and the symbols of the evangelists, having as his sceptre the Cross by which he triumphed" (87-88).

14. 6 Carragain clarifies this point: "The Vercelli texts, as a whole, do not reflect any interest in theological polemic; they are entirely devotional, ascetic and eschato- logical. The Vercelli Book seems to have been intended for personal use; it is not con- sistently arranged according to the liturgical year, nor provided with the systematic rubrics which would have enabled it to be used as an homiliary."

APPENDIX: The Nicene Creed

Credo in unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem, factorum caeli et terrae, visibilium omnium, et invisibilium. Et in unum Dominum Jesum Christum, Filium Dei unigenitum. Et ex Patre natum ante omnia saecula. Deum de Deo, lumen de lumine, Deum vero de Deo vero. Genitum, non factum, consubstantialem Patri: per quern omnia facta sunt. Qui propter nos homines, et propter nostram salutem, descendit de caelis (Here all genuflect). Et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine: et homo factus est. Crucifixus etiam pro nobis sub Pontio Pilato, passus, et sepultus est. Et resurrexit tertia die, secundum Scripturas. Et ascendit in caelum: sedet ad dexteram Patris. Et iterum venturus est cum gloria, judicare vivos et mortuos: cujus




regni non erat finis. Et in Spiritum Sanctum, Dominum, et vivifi- cantem: qui ex Patre Filioque procedit. Qui cum Patre et Filio simul adoratur et conglorificatur: qui locutus est per Prophetas. Et credo in unam sanctam catholicam et apostolicam Ecclesiam. Confiteor unum baptisma in remissionem peccatorum. Et exspecto resurrectionem mor- tuorum. (Here all cross themselves). Et vitam venturi saeculi. Amen.

I believe in one God, the almighty Father, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages; God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God; begotten, not made, of one essence with the Father; through whom all things were made. He for us men, and for our salvation came down from heaven (Here all genuflect), and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost from the Virgin Mary; and was made man. He was also crucified for our sake under Pontius Pilate, suffered, died, and was buried. And on the third day He rose again, according to the scriptures. And He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead; and of His reign there will be no end. I believe in the Holy Ghost, Lord and lifegiver, who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who together with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified; who spoke through the prophets. And I believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins. And I look forward to the resurrection of the dead (Here all cross themselves), and the life of the world to come. Amen.

WORKS CITED

Bede. A History of the English Church and People. Trans. Leo Sherley-Price. Baltimore: Peneuin, 1968.

Canuteson, John. "The Crucifixion and The Second Coming in 'The Dream of the Rood.' " Modern Philology 66 (1969): 293-297.

Chase, Christopher L. " 'Christ III,' 'The Dream of the Rood' and Early Christian Passion Piety." Viator 11 (1980): 11-33.

Dix, Dom Gregory. The Shape of the Liturgy. 1945. London: Adam and Charles Black, 1964.

Holloway, Julia Bolton. " 'The Dream of the Rood' and Liturgical Drama." Comparative Drama 18 (1984): 19-37.

Horgan, A.D. " 'The Dream of the Rood' and Christian Tradition." Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 79(1978): 11-20.

Jungmann, Joseph. The Mass of the Roman Rite: Its Origins and Development. New York: Benziger, 1959.

King, Archdale A. Liturgy of the Roman Church. Milwaukee: Bruce, 1957.




Leclercq, Dom Jean, Dom Francis Vandenbroucke and Louis Bouyer. The Spirituality of the Middle Ages. Volume 2. History of Christian Spirituality Series. NY: Sea- bury, 1961.

Macrae-Gibson, O. D. "Christ the Victor- Vanquished in 'The Dream of the Rood'." Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 70 (1969): 667-672.

McEntire, Sandra. "The Devotional Context of the Cross Before A.D. 1000." Sources in Anglo-Saxon Culture. Ed. P. E. Szarmach. Studies in Medieval Culture XX. Kalamazoo: Western Michigan UP, 1986. 345-356.

McNeill, John T. The Celtic Churches. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1974. Missale Romanum. NY: Sheed and Ward, 1949. New American Bible. NY: P.J. Kenedy, 1970. O Carragain, Eamon. "Crucifixion as Annunciation: The Relation of 'The Dream

of the Rood' to the Liturgy Reconsidered." English Studies 63 (1982): 487-505. Orton, Peter. "The Technique of Object-Personification in 'The Dream of the Rood'

and a Comparison with the Old English Riddles. " Leeds Studies in English 1 1 (1980): 1-18.

Patch, Howard R. "Liturgical Influence in 'The Dream of the Rood'." PMLA 34 (1919): 233-257.

Patten, Faith H. "Structure and Meaning in 'The Dream of the Rood.' " English Studies

49 (1968): 385-401. Pelikan, Jaroslav. The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition. Volume 1. Christian Tradi-

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Bobbs-Merrill, 1966. Woolf, Rosemary. "Doctrinal Influences on 'The Dream of the Rood.' " Medium AEvum

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theology and structure in "the dream of the rood"

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