Johannes Molanus (theologian)

Portrait of Molanus, destroyed 1915.

Johannes Molanus (also known as Jan Vermeulen , Jan van der Meulen or Jean Molano ) (*  1533 in Lille , †  1585 in Leuven ) was an important Flemish theologian of the Counter-Reformation .

biography

Johannes Molanus was born in 1533 in Lille in the county of Flanders , which belonged to the Habsburg rule from 1477 to 1668 . Calvinism , which emerged from 1542, moved him to become a priest of the Roman Catholic Church .

Afterwards he developed into an important representative of the Counter Reformation , he became professor of theology at the University of Leuven , whose rector he became from 1578. Most recently he was canon of St. Peter's Church in Leuven, where he died in 1585.

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In addition to many other topics, he devoted himself to the content of religious images, and in his work "De Picturis et Imaginibus Sacris, pro vero earum usu contra abusus" , published in 1570, took a very strict view.

Five new and expanded editions of this work appeared between 1570 and 1771, as well as a translation into modern French, last published in 1996. He was also the editor of a book on the work of St. Augustine of Hippo (Antwerp, 1566–1577), and wrote about the history of Leuven.

His understanding of art

Johannes Molanus is mainly known by art historians as one of the first authorities who implemented the still vague resolutions of the Council of Trent on religious images from 1563 into meticulously detailed instructions for artists, which were then widely used in Catholic countries.

His views on the older, originally Byzantine traditional depictions of the birth of Jesus were typical:

The Virgin is shown pale with pains, the midwives prepare a small (narcotic) drought for the childbirth. Why this? Is it because the Virgin Mary would have held back from any pain of childbirth, when in fact she brought forth her divine son without pain? And what pertains to the midwives who are mentioned in the apocryphal Book of the Infancy? Jerome says: There was no midwife! No obtrusiveness of women intervened! She, the Virgin, was both mother and midwife! I saw in not a few places the picture of the blessed Virgin lying on a bed, depicting childbirth, and she was suffering pains from this birth, but that is not true. How stupid! Those artists ought to be laughed at who paint Mary in the very act of childbirth pains, accompanied with pain, midwife, bed, little knives (to cut the umbilical cord), with hot compresses, and many other appurtenances. . . . Rather, those pictures should be promoted which show the birth of Christ in which the Blessed Virgin Mary with arms folded and on bended knee before her little son, as though he was just now brought forth into the light.

For similar reasons, he rejected the traditional depiction of the death of Mary in the circle of the apostles, the depiction of her powerlessness at the crucifixion of Christ, as well as the attitude of supplication to Christ during the “ Last Judgment ”. In his opinion, she would rather sit next to Christ with a stern expression:

Many painters show Mary and John the Baptist kneeling beside Our lord at the Last Judgment ... But we may not think that at that day the Virgin Mary will kneel for us before the Judge, baring her breast to intercede for sinners. Nor may we think that John the Baptist will fall upon his knees to beg mercy for mankind in the way the painters show. Rather, the blessed Virgin and St. John shall sit beside the supreme Judge as assessors. The mercy which is extended now will have no place then. There will only be strict justice at that day.

It was also frowned upon to depict St. Christopher as a giant carrying Christ or as the patron saint of travelers, as well as St. George fighting the dragon, the relatives of Christ, the so-called " Holy Kinship ", the unicorn hunt in the Garden of Paradise and many other depictions that were not can be traced back to reliable sources.

The " Golden Legend ", which had been the inspiration for countless artists for centuries, was not, in his opinion, credible. While he tore down older representations without an explicit written template, he did not hesitate to create new representations himself according to his own interpretation.

Nudity, even when it came to the newborn Jesus, had to be avoided as much as possible. If this was not possible, at least the genitals had to be hidden under strips of fabric.

The St. Joseph should not be presented as the old, half-way comic figure of the Middle Ages, but as a young and vigorous man, which the Holy Family is a defense. Finally, Maria Magdalena should not be shown as a dressed-up prostitute, in general all clothes should be kept simple.

literature

• Anthony Blunt , Artistic Theory in Italy, 1450-1660 , Chapter VIII, pages 107-128, 1940, ISBN 0-19-881050-4
• Émile Mâle , l'Art religieux après le Concile de Trente, étude sur l'iconographie de la fin du XVIe, du XVIIe et du XVIIIe siècles en Italie, en France, en Espagne et en Flandre (1932) (translations available) Molanus and the death of medieval art (excerpt)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Library of the University of Leuven
2. ↑ ^{a b} David Freedburg Johannes Molanus on Provocative paintings (Journal of the Warburg Institute) - biographical note 2, first page ( Memento from June 26, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
3. ↑ Details about the output  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ↑ Jerome H. Neyrey, Mary: Mediterranean Maid and Mother in Art and Literature , University of Notre Dame, Abstract, Biblical Theology Bulletin 20 (1990) 65-75
5. ↑ Online, with examples of the frowned upon representations De Historia SS. Imaginum et Picturarum, 1594, book iv. Chapter 24. Translated in A. Caiger-Smith, English Medieval Wall Paintings , page 35
6. ↑ ^{a b} Émile Mâle, online
7. ↑ Anthony Blunt, p. 127, and Émile Mâle
8. ^ Anthony Blunt, pp. 114 and 118