166 Chapter 3 sainthood of the monastery’s founder, and by extension, about the sanctity of his relics that were present at the monastery where the Life was most likely performed. Moreover, by stressing divine communications as motives for Elias’ deeds, the narrative also establishes the sanctity and divine approval of his way of life and of his travels (including the foundation of the monastic community at Salinas). In a way, the emphasised journeys are not motivated by a personal motivation to travel, but instead inspired by a divine plan or by Elias’ prophetic ability. The hagiographer thus crafted his narrative to emphasise that Elias’ motives corresponded to God’s will, and therefore, are beyond criticism. We may speculate, in light of the discussion of this Life in the previous chapter, that the hagiographer took such care in stressing these particular motivations as an attempt to counter potential criticism on Elias’ extensive mobility. The apologetic discourse on monastic mobility in the Life of Elias may relate to the (anticipated) diverse audiences, consisting of members of the monastic community and of people from outside the monastery. Another (speculative) possibility is that the focus on divine incentives as the main justification for mobility presents a norm for the monastic community at Salinas itself, with an implicit warning: only very special persons (are allowed to) travel so frequently and widely as Elias, but ordinary monks who do not receive a divine revelation should better stay near the community. Or would this be reading too much into it with a western conception of stabilitas loci in mind? Whereas we have established that such an ideal should not be imposed on Eastern Roman orthodox monasticism, in the case of southern Italy, it is thinkable that comparable ideas were at least known to the monks at Salinas.564 In southern Italy there were also Latin-speaking communities and Latin-rite churches (particularly in Puglia and Campania), so a cross-over of ideas or controversies between various ideals, including on monastic mobility, are well imaginable.565 Southern Italy, being a frontier region of the Eastern Roman Empire and a region with communities speaking diverse languages and celebrating various religious practices (oriented towards Rome or Constantinople), in any case must have witnessed a diversity of normative discourses and value judgements. We do not (yet) have direct evidence of these discourses themselves, which may never have been written down or have survived, but we could imagine a glimpse of such diversity in the apologetic discourse concerning monastic mobility in the Life of Elias the Younger. 564 The Benedictine foundation of Montecassino – in between Naples and Rome – was also not too far off, although this would obviously involve some travel to get there from Calabria. 565 For a discussion of the various (physically remaining) churches in southern Italy and the multilingual culture (mainly Greek, Latin and Hebrew) with various rites, and particularly for many examples of churches with Latin inscriptions in Puglia, see Safran (2014). See also Mougoyianni (2018). For a discussion of Greek and Latin southern Italian hagiographies, see Da Costa-Louillet (1960).
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