2- Familia
2.3 Desde la Psicología
What might be the specific value of this doubling, beyond iconographical complementarity? That is, how might the conceit of the paired figures affect the interpretation of the busts and their role in the Cloister?
While the cloister busts have not received extended scholarly attention, the issue of Carthusian forbears, identity and the order’s self-representation has been explored in relation to the chapels of the monastic church by John Nicholas Napoli. He argues that “the decorative program of the church of San Martino presented a carefully articulated vision of the Carthusian monk in
seventeenth-century Naples that set the eremitic ideal of the monk both in distinction to and in concert with the outreach efforts of the recently founded institutions including the Jesuits, Theatines, and the Oratory of Divine Love.”50 While the Chapel of Saint Bruno celebrates the order’s founder and his leadership, the Chapel of Saints Anthelm and Hugh honours
Carthusians responsible for the diffusion of the order in Europe.51 “Viewed together [with the Chapel of St Martin],” Napoli suggests,
the three chapels present a message about the position of the Carthusian order amidst the monastic tradition, the political and spiritual hierarchy of the Church, and the relationship between the eremitic life of the Carthusian monk and the active service of the bishop.52
50 Ethics of Ornament, 94.
51 Napoli views the altarpiece in the Chapel of Saint Bruno as “a statement of Bruno’s leadership and example that serves as the Carthusian Rule, underscoring the order’s devotion to a set of precepts laid out by the example of their founder.” (ibid., 110.). On the Chapels of St Bruno and Sts Anthelm and Hugh, see ibid., 102-19.
52 Ibid., 119.
139 Napoli frames these issues by drawing attention to the importance of episcopal attributes in depictions of St Bruno.53 A discarded bishop’s mitre frequently appears as a sign of St Bruno’s refusal to accept the bishopric of Reggio Calabria, one of the key episodes in Bruno’s
hagiography discussed above. Napoli suggests the motif embodies “the moral dilemma of the virtue of humility: it can only be exercised through earning and then declining worldly acclaim”.54
I propose a more fluid interpretation. The story of the order’s foundation emerging in Pentimalli’s hagiography and especially the concise summary of Napoli sacra abounds in echoes and repetitions. This is especially evident in the episode of Raymond Diocres, which Dennis Martin argues became particularly central to Carthusian identity from the fifteenth century onwards.55 Paris as centre of study and the reverend Raymond Diocres, much admired for his wisdom and learning, are juxtaposed with Bruno’s own position as scholar and teacher. Diocres’ portentous self-indictment, all the more dramatic because of his reputation, triggers Bruno’s conversion and renunciation of his life as canon at the cathedral of Reims. Yet Bruno and his companions flee Paris to set off for another city (Grenoble) and are received and assisted in their mission by a representative of ecclesiastical authority, Hugh of Grenoble. Although Hugh’s dream presents the desert destined for Bruno as already pre-ordained, Hugh’s power and standing play an important role in enabling the Carthusians’ way of life.56 Hugh of Grenoble’s service to the nascent order provides a contrapposto to the episode of Raymond Diocres. At the very
beginning, the retreat from worldly acclaim is matched by the benefits of authority used wisely.
The theme of authority is picked up again when Bruno is called to the Papal Curia. Bruno is the new pope, Urban II’s former school master and is invited in order to provide wise counsel; yet in leaving the solitude of the desert, Bruno also submits to the demands of ecclesiastical
53 Ibid., 91-93.
54 Ibid., 91.
55 “Nicholas Kempf made the story [of the Paris miracle of Raymond Diocres] central to his interpretation of Carthusian history because it offered a paradigm for the order’s mission: to rescue those swollen with pride of learning, pride of accomplishment, pride of making, pride of technique, from damnation.” Martin, Fifteenth-Century Carthusian Reform: The World of Nicholas Kempf, 259-60.
56 D’Engenio Caracciolo’s brief account places significant emphasis on matters of jurisdiction, land-ownership and boundaries, cf D’Engenio Caracciolo, Napoli sacra, 588.
140 authority.57 Pentimalli presents him as torn between service to the Universal Church and his personal commitment to seclusion.58 It is at the end of his service in Rome that Bruno has to refute earthly authority again, asking the Pope to excuse him from the office bestowed upon him. Retreating to Calabria (the very area, whose bishopric he was offered), Bruno forges new relationships with authority, however, when he encounters Roger, Count of Sicily.59 Bruno’s encounter with Roger reprises the earlier one with Hugh of Grenoble – Bruno and his companions are given land again for a new hermitage.
To link the mitre at Bruno’s feet simply to his refusal of the seat of Reggio Calabria belies the multiple moments of contact with ecclesiastical (and secular) authority that the saint’s
hagiographies develop. The mitre works as temptation and test, rather than attribute.60 It is worth thinking about the episcopal regalia not only in terms of virtue but also in terms of action (calling, one’s specific vocation). The mirrored episodes of Hugh and Roger, Grenoble and Calabria, portray a symbiotic relationship with ecclesiastical and secular authority respectively.
The echoes laced through Bruno’s vita furthermore slow down the process of the order’s foundation; time and delay show it to be a process, rather than a singular moment. St Bruno’s dilemma, aside from celebrating the founder’s virtuous character, is an active question – what must one do? How should one be a Carthusian? Bruno’s vocation is thus not a static position in opposition to something, but a searching-out of a way of living, the pursuit of a spiritual calling.
57 Napoli sees these themes of submission to authority and pastoral service developed in the Chapel of Saints Anthelm and Hugh, Napoli, Ethics of Ornament, 111-13.
58 Pentimalli, Vita, 68-74. Pentimalli plays with the idea of ecclesiastical institutions at the beginning of the chapter on Bruno’s calling to Rome by presenting Bruno’s habitation in the desert as a ‘Sacro Collegio Eremitico’, paralleling the college of cardinals that elects the Pope, or the Sacro Collegio di Propaganda Fide, founded in 1622, around the time of the writing of Pentimalli’s hagiography.
59 While Cesare D’Engenio Caracciolo does not explain Bruno’s move to Calabria, Pentimalli gives the reason as a means of avoiding further incursions from the Papacy – he suggests the original desert is a little too close to major roads that the Pope might travel on, ibid., 88-90.
60 Thus ‘worldly acclaim’ is not simply a matter of recognition. ‘Worldly acclaim’ is tempting because of what could be achieved in a position of authority.
141 The idea of doubling at origin and the active nature of choice affirms the Carthusian calling as not a matter of simple abnegation or opposition.61