Georgi Vasilev Dualist ideas in the English Pre-Reformation and Reformation: Bogomil-Cathar influence on Wycliffe, Langland, Tyndale and Milton.
Translated into English by Bistra Roushkova.  Sofia: Bul Koreni, 2005.  Pp. 208.  ISBN 954-798-019-X

In this imaginative and original study, the Bulgarian scholar Georgi Vasilev seeks to trace the roots of various English reformers from the fourteenth to the seventeenth centuries back of the dualist movements of Catharism in southern Europe and Bogomilism in Bulgaria.  As Vasilev correctly observes, Wycliffe and the English Lollards have been studied in a largely insular fashion, without much reference to their possible roots outside England.   The English Reformation from the 1530’s onwards has always been considered within the wider context of the European Reformation and while some attention has been given to its links with medieval Lollardy, little attention has been given to its links with medieval dualist movements on the Continent.

William of Newbury, the medieval chronicler, mentions under the year 1162 the presence in England of Cathars from Germany.  They were tried and convicted for heresy in Oxford, branded and either chased out of the country or starved to death.  Their sad story is well known (and told again by Vasilev) but otherwise England seems almost totally free of heretical movements that came within the framework of Christianity (therefore excluding from consideration the small community of Jews) until the career of John Wycliffe in the late fourteenth century.

Chapter 1 examines Lollardy, the movement that drew its inspiration from John Wycliffe.  Vasilev focuses mainly on the trials of Lollards conducted by the bishop of Norwich in the early fifteenth century – the best documented of all heresy trials in medieval England.  He admits the defendants from East Anglia were not recorded as making any explicit appeals to Cathar teaching, and their beliefs had various features that cannot be reduced to Cathar dualism and its radical rejection of the material world as inherently evil.  The core of the chapter lays side by side the alleged beliefs of the East Anglia Lollards and those of Bulgarian Bogomils and French Cathars, on a range of issues: the fall of Lucifer and his angels; Satan as the creator and owner of the visible world; baptism in the holy Spirit; preference for the ‘Our Father’ prayer; direct confession to God; denial of hell and purgatory; attitudes towards the rich; rejection of oath-taking and capital punishment; anti-clericalism; church buildings; transubstantiation; rejection of the crucifix; refusal to venerate saints.

It is very useful to have the passages set side by side and the similarities, regarding both ideas and language, are often striking.  One wonders, nevertheless, whether Lollards were drawing directly on Bogomil and Cathar teachings, or whether, rather, the parallels result from a wider common pool of ideas and expressions.  Sometimes passages from Scripture provides the key, without much need to seek other dependencies: for example, chapter 12 of the book of Revelation for the fall of Lucifer and his angels: or various passages regarding the rejection of oaths and of violence. Sometimes, too, there are significant differences.  Thus while the East Anglian Lollards appear to have favoured temporal lords by urging them to confiscate the goods of the Church, Bogomils showed outright hostility to them.   The records of the East Anglian trials emanate from the prosecution, so that important aspects of the defendants’ beliefs may be ignored.  Yet if there had been explicit dependence upon Cathar and Bogomil teachings, the prosecution might well have latched onto this in order to label the Lollards more clearly as heretics.  There is, moreover, a considerably body of surviving evidence written by Lollards, notably sermons, and explicit appeals to Bogomil and Cathar teachings are not to be found in them. 

Chapter 2 seeks to trace the word ‘bugger’ back to ‘Bulgarian’ and ‘Bogomil’, and its development as a term of abuse.  Chapter 3 sees the liberation of women as a connecting link between various heretical movements in the Middle Ages, in contrast to the oppression of women by the Catholic Church.  Cathars and Bogomils may have viewed men and women in a similar light inasmuch as the souls of both were regarded as imprisoned in the flesh in this life and ultimately open to the same kind of liberation.  There may have been a certain equality, but as much in gloom as in liberation.  The claim that ‘over one million’ Cathars were killed by the Catholic Church (p. 55) surely goes too far.  There may have been the occasional Lollard woman priest, but certainly they were not common, so that not much can be made of this opportunity for liberation and equality with men. Whether Lollardy gave women more religious scope and a better lot than the Catholic Church is much debated.  The evidence from East Anglia, especially, reveals a number of remarkable Lollard women.  On the other hand, the rather austere teachings of Lollards, for the most part, may have restricted the space for feminine features in Christianity.  The Bibliography lists Shannon McSheffrey’s 1991 article ‘Women and Lollardy’, but this should be supplemented by her 1995 book Gender and Heresy.

Chapter 4 is entitled ‘John Wycliffe and the Dualists’.  Various points already made in the comments on chapter 1 could be mentioned again here.  Wycliffe does not appeal to the doctrines of Cathars or Bogomils.  There are some interesting similarities in their teaching, but do they reflect views held quite widely amongst Christians rather than Wycliffe’s direct dependence upon the two movements?   His translation of the words in the Lord’s prayer ‘our bread over other substance’ (i.e. ‘suprasubustantial’, rather than the more common ‘daily’) suggests knowledge of Biblical studies in Bulgaria, both Bogomil learning and the Cyrillo-Methodian translation of the New Testament, Vasilev argues (p. 66); and ‘the word of God’ was ‘bread’ for both Wycliffe and Bogomils (p. 69).   Wycliffe’s treatment of sinful priests, of the Church as fornicator, and of religious images, hints at dualism yet the more obvious explanation is straightforward criticism of the Church of the time. The alleged dualism certainly seems well short of the radical rejection of the material world that is normally associated with Cathars.  In this chapter too there are some exaggerations and errors: the Council of Constance condemned 260 errors in Wycliffe’s writings, but the number never approached 700 (p. 71); the fourth Lateran council of 1215 did not go so far as saying that confession to a Catholic priest is necessary for salvation; Wycliffe was a secular priest not a member of the Augustinian order (p. 85).

The final three chapters treat of William Tyndale’s translation of the Bible into English, Langland’s Piers Plowman, and Milton’s Paradise Lost.  The dualism inherent in the writings of the three men is highlighted as well as Bogomil-Cathar influence.  Vasilev argues that Tyndale was a ‘covert dualist’ (p. 89) and motivated by ‘Bogomil-Cathar philosophy’ (p. 90), that Piers Plowman abounds in the philosophy and imagery of dualism (p. 89), and Paradise Lost is permeated with Bogomil myths (p. 163).   It is good to have attention drawn to these possible influences, supported by passages from Bogomil and Cathar writings.  Though once again there is an absence of explicit appeals to the earlier Continental writings on the part of the English writers.  Some of the similarities can be explained by the simple fact of a common source, especially the book of Revelation.   Dualism is a wide concept and an attraction to it is almost inherent in human nature – or certainly was until a measure of control was gained over nature after the end of the period covered in this book.  Luther, Calvin and other leaders of the Reformation emphasised the corruption of human nature through original sin and this teaching encouraged a dualist outlook in various ways.  Tyndale and Milton must be seen primarily within the context of the European Reformation. The conundrum remains as to how explicit and immediate was the contribution of Bogomil and Cathar thought to this context.

The translation into English is well done by Bistra Roushkova.

Professor Vasilev must be thanked for his thought-provoking and well documented study of issues of great importance for late medieval and early modern England.  

© N. Tanner

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