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What
is the structure of the Anthonian sermon?
Saint
Anthony followed this order:
1.
He presented the sacred text with its literal meaning
and then discussed the various spiritual applications:
allegorical, moral and mystical;
2.
He articulated the real sermon, which was composed
of a prologue, the development of a theme and
an epilogue. The whole sermon was meant to be an instrument
for explaining the doctrine and exhorting the listeners
to apply it to their lives;
3.
He closely followed the use that the liturgy makes of the
holy Scripture. It offers one the opportunity to discuss
four arguments taken from the Bible in each sermon. A
tale from the Old Testament proposed by the divine
office, the introit, the epistle and the Gospel taken
from the Sunday mass. In this way, over the course of a
year all of the holy Scripture is covered;
4.
He discusses the Scripture with its concordances, which
reunite the four themes of the sermons again, and explain
each single theme, introducing other citations of the holy
Scripture. The concordance consists of an explanation
of the holy Scripture by means of the Scripture itself. A
sentence of the Gospel is explained with a sentence from the
Old or New Testament. The same process is repeated for
all the other arguments.
In
this way, says the Saint, we have built a quadriga which,
like that of Elijah, will raise the soul from earthly things
and lift it up to those more heavenly (see Prologue, n.
5).
 Therefore,
Saint Anthony's writings, both for their pre-established
goal and for the method used, can be defined as a study
of sacred doctrine taken from the Scripture, and not a simple
series of Sermons intended as preaching. They have
only the external structure of a sermon. This is only
a literary genre, or a teaching method. It is the
holy Scripture that gives them their internal and essential
structure.
Saint
Anthony never called his writings "Sermones," but
simply opus, work. In addition, it can be deduced that
it is a study of all of the Scripture by the fact that
he did not begin the first Sunday of Advent, as liturgical
year does, but rather on the Sunday of Septuagesima (three
Sundays before Lent) on which in the Divine Office the reading
of the holy Scripture was begun, starting from the book
of Genesis. "In the beginning God created the heavens
and the earth" (Gen 1,1). The Saint himself confirmed
this in the prologue placed before the first Sunday after
Pentacost.
The
language used in the Sermones is Medieval Latin.
It has a certain elegance. It is not a rough Latin.
The
Saint begins his Sermones with a liturgical formula,
"At that time: Jesus said ...;" or "At that
time: While a great crowd ... ".
The
prologues of the Sermones have various beginnings, "In
the first book of the Kings, one reads …;" "In
the third book of the Kings, we can find ... ;" "Solomon,
in Ecclesiastes, speaks to the preachers saying ... ;"
"In the Apocalypse, John says ...;" "The Lord
spoke through Isaiah ... ".
The division of the theme is enunciated with the words,
"Observe that in this Gospel, two arguments are discussed
..."
He
then begins his discussion of the topic with the words, "Dicamus
ergo ...." After having made a few related citations,
he returns to the main theme, that is to the words of the
Gospel, of which he makes a short summary. Here is an example,
"That is the justice that renders just the penitents,
about whom the Lord says, 'If your justice is no greater than
that of the Pharisees, etc.' And observe that justice is that
for which, with proper wisdom, to each is given his own."
(Sermon of the 6th Sunday after Pentecost.)
The
exposition of the theme, both the principal and the secondary
one, begins with the words, "Observe that," and
other similar phrases. Differently, the single parts of the
theme begin with the "item" word: likewise, as well,
etc.
The
explanation of the name held first place in the illustration
of the theme. But, the thing indicated by the name also required
further explanation. Saint Anthony, too, used this method,
and in the general prologue he notes that he has explained
etymologies and the nature of some elements as ornamentation
for his Sermones, to better explain the subject, "...
at the beginning of each Gospel, we have stated a suitable
prologue, and we have introduced here and there the description
of natural elements and animals and etymologies of names,
interpreted in a moral sense." (Prologue, number 5).
Anthony
took his interpretation of names from the Gloss and other
sources: the etymologies of Isidor; the descriptions
of the nature of things again from Isidor and other authors.
The descriptions of the nature of animals, of their qualities,
introduced with the words "Natural History says,"
are taken from the work The Animals by Aristotle or
from the work Polyhistory by Solinus.
The
examples, in the medieval Sermones, served to confirm
the explanation of the theme and were told principally at
the end of the sermon. In a strict sense, the examples
consisted of facts from the holy Scripture and the lives of
the Saints, but in a wider sense, examples were also made
from the habits and customs of the people, events that happened
every day, pagan sayings, fables, descriptions of things and
animals. The pagan saying are presented with the words, "the
Philosopher says," the stories and fables with the words
"it is said," "they say," "it is
told," etc.
The
epilogue, which is the conclusion of the sermon, consists
of a prayer to ask God for the blessings discussed in the
sermon.
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