Joachim in the Great Stemma

Notes

In 1986, Yolanta Zaluska shifted the focus of study of the Great Stemma to its most salient theological feature: its exegetical focus on Joachim, the "father" of Mary who is nowhere mentioned in the Gospels. But she barely explored the potential of this doctrine as a means to date the Great Stemma.

Modern studies about this non-canonical belief during the early church period remain relatively sparse. Indeed, the documentary evidence which might be called on, in manuscripts and art of the patristic period, is not particularly ample.

There do not seem to be any artistic depictions of Mary's supposed father and mother, Joachim and his wife Anne, from the first four Christian centuries. Virginia Nixon's book on Anne states that no study of the Anne cult in its early Christian settings has yet been done: paintings depicting Anne's life are only recorded from the 6th century onwards. The same observation is likely to apply to any veneration of Joachim, whose cult is not documented in the eastern church before the 10th and in the western church before the 16th century.[*]Nixon, Virginia, Mary's Mother. (University Park, Penn State Press, 2004) 12. See also a fresco depicting Anne in Santa Maria Antiqua, Rome, dated to 757-767 and reproduced in Wellen, G.A., Theotokos: Eine ikonographische Abhandlung über das Gottesmutterbild in frühchristlichen Zeit. (Utrecht: Het Spektrum, 1961) 221. Wellen also mentions a stone carving at Arles depicting Anne, but gives no date for it. For the historical development of a feast of Joachim, see Amann, 162.

The broadest examination of the cult of Joachim was conducted more than 100 years ago by Emile Amann as part of his 1910 study of the Joachimite camp's principal, and perhaps only, source, the Protevangelium of James. This is a Greek text probably composed in about 200 CE.[*]I follow this form of title used by the main recent student of the work, Rita Beyers of Antwerp. Other scholarly works speak of the Protoevangelium (with an added O), or of the Infancy Gospel of James. I take no stance on the issues that guide these naming choices.

Partly drawing on observations by Constantin Tischendorf in his 1851 work, De evangeliorum apocryphorum origine et usu, and ranging through the patristic literature, Amann assembled an array of evidence about the Early Christian and medieval reception of the Joachim and Anne legend. Unfortunately he overlooked the Great Stemma, the Liber Genealogus and the Origo Humani Generis as perhaps the most significant Late Antique documents to be constructed around the Joachimite solution to the contradiction between Matthew's and Luke's gospels.[*]Amann: Le Protévangile de Jacques et ses remaniements latins. Paris: Letouzey, 1910. Tischendorf in: Verhandelingen / uitg. door het Haagsche Genootschap tot Verdediging van de christelijke Godsdienst, 12, Den Haag, 1851.

In the discussion that follows, we shall assume that those patristic writers who allude to or quote from the Protevangelium and its spinoff versions must necessarily have known of the personage mentioned in its very first line: Joachim.

Only one patristic writer of the earliest period seems to support something resembling the Joachimite explanation of the contradiction of Christ's ancestry, and this only indirectly. Justin Martyr, in chapter 100 of the Dialogue with Trypho, written after 155 CE, writes of Christ:

We know him to be ... the son of the patriarchs, since he assumed flesh by the Virgin of their family ... He said then that he was the son of man, either because of his birth by the Virgin, who was, as I said, of the family of David and Jacob, and Isaac, and Abraham ... (Dods and Reith translation)

In her wide-ranging summary of patristic interpretation of the Gospel genealogies, Genealogia Christi: die Stammbäume Jesu in der Auslegung der christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten fünf Jahrhunderte, Gabriele Broszio argues that this contains two implicit statements. Firstly, Justin is saying that one of the two genealogies is that of Mary, not of Joseph. Secondly, he must be linking this ancestry to the Gospel of Luke, because he quotes the names of his exemplary patriarchs in the order youngest to oldest. Luke's genealogy also follows the order "A, son of B, son of C...", whereas the Matthew text runs in reverse order: "... C begat B, who begat A."

Die rudimentäre Aufzählung der Vorfahren orientiert sich offenbar am Stammbaum nach Lukas, erkennbar an der aufsteigenden Abfolge der Namen. Es ist dies der Stammbaum Marias... Im Rahmen seines Nachweises der Überlegenheit des Neuen Bundes über den Alten führt Justin in Dialog 120 einen kurzen Ausschnitt des Stammbaumes nach Matthäus an, erkennbar an der absteigenden Abfolge der Namen.[*]Broszio, 49.

However it is plain that Justin does not discuss the missing link between Mary and her supposed grandfather Joseph. He certainly does not mention the name Joachim. Émile de Strycker, in his 1961 edition of a very early papyrus manuscript of the Protevangelium in the Bodmer Library, fiercely rejects suggestions that the work could even have existed in the time of Justin, arguing that any commonalities are purely coincidental:[*]Strycker, Émile de. La forme la plus ancienne du protévangile de Jacques: recherches sur le papyrus Bodmer 5 avec une éd. critique du texte grec et une trad. ann. Brussels: Societé des Bollandistes, 1961, 414-417.

On ne saurait donc considérer ni comme prouvé ni comme sérieusement probable que Justin ait connu le Protévangile de Jacques.

Other authors of the 2nd and 3rd century allude to the contradiction between the genealogies of Luke and Matthew without resolving it. Differing from Justin, a couple of Latin authors suggest instead that the other genealogy, in the Gospel of Matthew, should be regarded as the parentage of Mary.[*] Irenaeus of Lyons, writing between 180 and 192, in Adversus haereses, III, 16,2; Victorinus of Pettau, writing between 270 and 304.

The earliest Christian writers who seem to be aware of the Protevangelium, and thus would have had knowledge of the personage of Joachim, are Clement of Alexandria (died about 215), Origen (died about 253/4) and, doubtfully, Gregory Thaumaturgus (flourished about 250). Writing in Greek, all allude to other aspects of this non-canonical work, in particular its explanation of how it was possible for Jesus to have "brothers" despite his mother being a lifelong virgin (the Protevangelium's answer: because Joseph had been previously married and these were Jesus's half-brothers).[*]Amann 38-9, 81-2, 109-10 cites Clement, Stromata 7 (PG 9, col 529); Origen, Comment in Matth., X, 17 (PG 13, col. 876-7). Strycker admits Clement and Origen as valid witnesses, La forme, 412-413.

More solidly, we find full recountings of some of the Protevangelium's scenes in a work that Amann attributes to Peter of Alexandria (died 311) and in the Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis.[*]Amann 38-9, 81-2, 109-10 cites Peter of Alexandria (PG 18, col 504) and Epiphanius in Haeres. 78 (PG 42, col 700-5).

In the western, Latin-speaking church, clear allusions to the Protevangelium appear in late 4th-century works by Zeno of Verona and Prudentius.[*]Amann 138-40 cites Zeno (PL 11, col 415); Prudentius, Cathemerinon 11 and 12 (PL 59, col 896-899).

It is quoted at length in a 4th-century Latin song, or hymn, which is reproduced below. This text was discovered in the 1950s in a papyrus codex that had probably been excavated by robbers in Upper Egypt. The text summarizes the various episodes of the Protevangelium legend. Joachim is not mentioned, but Anna is named:[*]Roca-Puig, Ramon, Himme a la Verge Maria. 'Psalmus Responsorius' Papir del segle IV, 2. ed., Barcelona, 1965. Also mentioned in: Gijsel, Jan. "Het Protevangelium Iacobi in het Latijn." Antiquité Classique 50 (1981). 351-352. See Speyer, Wolfgang, "Der bisher älteste lateinische Psalmus abecedarius. Zur editio princeps von R. Roca-Puig," in Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum, 10 (1967), 211-216. Gijsel also cites: Peretto, L. M., "'Psalmus responsorius', un immo alla vergine Maria di un papiro del IV seclo," in Marianum, 29 (1967). 255-265 (not consulted by me). The Barcelona codex as a whole is discussed in Markschies, Christoph. Kaiserzeitliche christliche Theologie und ihre Institutionen: Prolegomena zu einer Geschichte der antiken christlichen Theologie. Mohr Siebeck, 2009, 152-154.

Anna, quae sterilis dicebatur ... [*]Roca-Puig, 105. = Anna who was called a barren woman.

It is not until Augustine of Hippo (354-430) that we find explicit mention by a Latin patristic writer of the person of Joachim. In Contra Faustum Manichaeum 23:9, Augustine, writing in about 400, declares he is "not bound to admit the uncanonical account of Mary's birth" whereby her father was a priest of the tribe of Levi of the name of Joachim:

Ac per hoc illud, quod de generatione Mariae ..., quod patrem habuerit ex tribu Levi sacerdotum quendam nomine Ioachim, canonicum non est, non me constringit.

This introduces a new element that significantly differs from that in the Protevangelium, where Joachim is described as a rich sheep farmer descended from David (Protevangelium 1, 4, 10).

Augustine devotes a full paragraph to the Joachim topic, raising the difficulty that it would be strange for any priest of the tribe of Levi to claim his descent from David, who had belonged to the tribe of Judah. The priesthood was only open to Levites. Augustine then suggests that this unlikely situation might perhaps arise if Joachim's mother had belonged to the tribe of Judah, but he leaves the matter unconcluded and turns to another topic.

Whether this variation in the Joachim legend can be taken to indicate an historical root for the name Joachim that is independent of the Protevangelium is a moot point. From the context, it seems more likely that the Manichean Faustus or one of his syncretist predecessors has somehow merged two legends into one. With delicate reserve, Amann leaves it to his Protestant predecessor Tischendorf to speculate— without actual evidence— that there just might have been a living tradition among 2nd century Christians that Jesus's maternal grandfather had been named Joachim:

Je n'hésite pas, dit-il, à regarder ces noms comme authentiques. On pouvait les connaître en effet au milieu du IIe siècle; quelle nécessité y avait-il d'en forger de nouveaux? La tradition sur ce point semble bien avoir été ferme de très bonne heure, puisque Fauste le manichéen, tout en faisant du père de la Vierge un prêtre de la tribu de Lévi, conservait néanmoins le nom traditionnel... Quant au métier de pasteur que le Protévangile donne à Joachim, il est plus douteux. La tradition sur ce point n'était pas ferme, puisque Fauste le manichéen pouvait faire de Joachim un prêtre. Il ne faut pas perdre de vue que la vie de pasteur se prêtait mieux que d'autres aux narrations imaginées par l'auteur.[*]Amann, Protévangile, 50-1.

Almost contemporary with this dialogue by Augustine is the appearance of Joachim in the Liber Genealogus and its digest recension, the Origo Humani Generis, in section 38 of my own edition and at line 609 of Mommsen's combined edition:

Ioachim genuit Mariam (Liber Genealogus, in the Donatist recension of 427, Donatist recension of 438, Catholic recension of 455-463).

Neither the Liber nor the Great Stemma, which I would argue slightly precedes it, offers any information on Joachim's profession: whether priest or sheep farmer is left to our imagination.

Also in the 5th century, we find dialogue quoted from the Protevangelium almost word for word in a mildly Arian work, the Opus imperfectum in Matthaeum. This is the surest indication of all that a Latin translation of the full Protevangelium must have been in circulation by this time.[*]Amann 144-146. Rita Beyers ("Latin translation of the Protevangelium of James in Ms. Paris, Sainte-Geneviève, 2787," McNamara, M. [ed], Apocrypha hiberniae; 1: Evangelia infantiae. Turnhout: Brepols, 2001, 887-889) sums up the current position of scholarship on the extant Latin manuscripts, and commends two recent studies which argue that the Protevangelium was translated twice into Latin: Gijsel, Jan. "Het Protevangelium Iacobi in het Latijn." Antiquité classique 50 (1981), 351-366; Kaestli, Jean-Daniel. "Le Protévangile de Jacques en latin. Etat de la question et perspectives nouvelles." Revue d'histoire des textes 26 (1996), 41-102.

The 5th century marks a time when the Joachimite doctrine seemed to enter an eclipse in the western, Latin-speaking church.

An alternative explanation for the contradiction between the Gospel genealogies had been available for well over a century, and had been discussed by Eusebius of Caesarea at the start of the 4th century. This alternative hypothesis, which begins to gain traction in the 5th century, contends that the Matthew genealogy sets out Joseph's biological ancestry whereas the Luke genealogy sets out Joseph's legal ancestry.

As expounded by the 3rd-century, Greek-speaking scholar Julius Africanus in his Letter to Aristides, this hypothesis is a complex explanation in which widows are married off to the brothers of their late husbands in accordance with the Jewish custom of levirate marriage, resulting in Joseph having a biological ancestry that is different from his legal line of descent.

While the dispassionate observer might find such a convoluted genealogy highly unlikely, it could be argued that it offers an outcome that harmonizes better with the Gospel texts than the Joachim legend, since the levirate-marriage hypothesis dispenses with the counter-intuitive assumption by the Joachimite camp that the "Joseph" who is being referred to by Luke is Mary's grandfather, not her husband.

This new approach, which eliminates the need for Joachim as a stopgap, won praise from Augustine and the two other principal 5th-century intellectual leaders of western Christianity, Jerome and Ambrose. It was to become dominant in the Latin church for several centuries, with later approval from Bede and from Rabanus Maurus.[*]Supporters include the mature Augustine, Retractationum, libri II, I,26, II,7,2, II,12, II,16; Jerome, Commentariorum in Matheum, libri IV, I,1-17, Iacob autem genuit Ioseph and Ambrose, Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam III,15. Broszio, 95-97 quotes a series of other references to the levirate explanation in both Greek and Latin writers. These include: Eusebius (uncommitted) in Historia ecclesiastica, I,7 and Quaestiones et responsiones ad Stephanum, IV; Eucherius (uncommitted), Instructionum ad Salonium libri II, I,3; Pseudo-Eustathius, Commentarius in Hexaemeron; Gregory of Nazianzus, Carmina dogmatica; Hilarius, In Matthaeum I,1; Pseudo-Ambrose, De concordia Matthaei et Lucae in genealogia Christi. Zaluska, Stemmata, n 31-2 quotes later approval of the doctrine by Bede, In Lucae evangelium expositio (PL 92, 361), and Rabanus Maurus, Commentarius in Matthaeum, (PL 107, 755-756). Amann states that Jerome's exegesis is also accepted as authoritative by Sedulius Scotus, Walafrid and Strabon.

The levirate-marriage hypothesis is the salient feature of the Lesser Stemma, which Zaluska has described and which we propose to examine more closely in a future article:

Dans notre groupe de Ripoll-Parc-Floreffe-Foigny-Burgos, Joachim et Anne sont bannis, la généalogie selon Luc est rétablie d'après la Vulgate et la Lettre à Aristide, précisément, est largement utilisée en conclusion.[*]Zaluska, Stemmata.

At the same time as the levirate-marriage explanation is gaining ground, we find the western church beginning to push back against the novella-like text that sets out the Joachimite hypothesis, the Protevangelium. Amann suggests that it may have been circulating in the Latin west in the 4th century in a fairly informal fashion, largely ignored by serious theologians and ecclesiastical authorities, or regarded by them as no more than an innocent diversion for those of the pious who were curious to understand the virgin conception and nativity in simple terms.

A l'époque de saint Augustin et de saint Jérôme, les narrations du Protévangile circulaient depuis un certain temps dans les milieux chrétiens. Considérées d'abord comme fort innocentes, elles n'avaient attiré l'attention ni des docteurs, ni de l'autorité ecclésiastique.[*]Amann, Protévangile, 104.

In this hypothesis, it would not have been until the realization that such non-canonical scriptures and legends were bolstering the appeal of Priscillianists or other "heretics" that church authorities became more engaged in trying to suppress such alternatives to scripture, Amann suggests.

A letter from Pope Innocent I in 405 urges Exupery, bishop of Toulouse in France, to publicly condemn non-canonical works falsely attributed to Matthew, James and others.[*]Amann, Protévangile, 104.

Pourtant on commençait à se rendre compte que l'ensemble des légendes apocryphes, aussi bien celles qui avaient rapport à l'histoire de l'enfance du Sauveur, que celles relatives aux apôtres, avait cours particulièrement chez les sectes hérétiques, manichéennes ou priscillianistes...

C'est ce qui résulte nettement de la lettre du pape Innocent Ier à l'évêque de Toulouse Exupère en l'an 405. Répondant aux questions que lui avait posées ce prélat, le pape lui rappelle la liste des livres canoniques, puis il ajoute «Quant aux autres livres qui portent le nom de Matthias ou de Jacques le Mineur ... et tous autres livres de ce genre, sache bien qu'il faut non seulement les répudier, mais les condamner.» [*]Amann, Protévangile, 104.

Jerome too is an eloquent foe of such non-canonical works:

[il] a repoussé avec mépris ce qu'il appelle les deliramenta apocryphorum.[*]Amann, Protévangile, 45, quoting Jerome, Adv. Helvidium 8 (PL 23, col 192).

Nevertheless the Protevangelium must have remained in wide circulation among Latin-speaking Christians well into the 5th century. A catholic revision of the Donatist Liber Genealogus, the recension of 455-463, continued to campaign for belief in Joachim.

In Amann's view, such holdovers reflected a general willingness in the 5th and 6th centuries to tolerate statements of purported fact in dissident works provided that the underlying heretical doctrines in the documents were excised. He quotes Turibius, bishop of Astorga in Spain in about 450, writing to Hydatius of Chaves in this vein.

Amann suggests that the practice established by early in the 6th century was to create catholic editions of non-canonical works, carefully censored to eliminate "false" doctrines. Amann does not mention the Liber Genealogus, but doubtless it is as good an example as any:

Malgré ces condamnations plus ou moins solennelles, les livres proscrits continuaient à faire leur chemin, et finissaient par se répandre de plus en plus dans les milieux catholiques. On adoptait d'ailleurs à leur endroit une attitude assez différente.

Jadis ils étaient considérés comme des écrits d'origine hérétique, on en arrivait à les considérer maintenant comme des livres composés primitivement par des catholiques, mais falsifiés dans la suite par les manichéens. C'est ce que montre déjà la lettre de Turibius, évêque d'Astorga (vers 450), à ses collègues Idacius et Creponius. Turibius qui rejette en effet toute cette littérature apocryphe, croit que de tels livres ont été composés ou falsifiés par les manichéens ...[*]Amann, Protévangile, 105 cites C. Schmidt, "Die alten Petrusakten", in Texte und Untersuchungen, 24 (NF 9) fasc. 1, p 57-58: Quae haeresis [that of the Manicheans] quae eisdem libris utitur et eadem dogmata et his deteriora sectatur, ita exsecrabilis universis per omnes terras ad primam professionis suae confessionem nec discussa damnetur oportet, per cujus auctores vel per maximum principem Manem ac discipulos ejus libros omnes apocryphos vel compositos, vel infectos esse manifestum est, specialiter autem actus illos qui vocantur Andreae ... et his similia ex quibus Manichaei et Priscillianistae vel quaecumque illis est secta germana, omnem haeresim suam confirmare nituntur.

Pour Turibius, les récits que donnent ces apocryphes peuvent être exacts; ce sont leurs doctrines qui sont dangereuses. Cette opinion, d'abord timidement énoncée, va prendre consistance; elle doit être devenue courante dès le début du VIe siècle. Il était tout naturel, par conséquent, de donner de ces textes apocryphes exploités par les manichéens des éditions catholiques, où l'on respecterait les faits historiques, d'où l'on éliminerait tout ce qui sentait l'hérésie. [*]Amman, Protévangile, 103-106.

Within Latin-speaking breakaway churches, a certain willingness to read apocrypha also probably remained in this period. The use and re-use of the Liber Genealogus among Donatist Christians in the middle of the 5th century indicates that in North Africa too, the Joachimite explanation of the Gospel contradiction remained strong.

Amann suggests that it was precisely because of the Protevangelium's association with heretical movements that efforts to suppress it in the western church gathered pace, even as eastern Christians accepted it with few doubts. The 405 letter of Innocent I has been quoted above. The other document Amann quotes, the Gelasian Decree, cannot be relied on. Once dated to the 492-496 papacy of Gelasius I, it is today widely regarded as a forgery and spurious. But the general direction of Amann's argument, even if the evidence is weak, may well be correct.[*]Amann, Protévangile, 104.

From here on, the western church becomes notably silent about Joachim and the Protevangelium. Amman points to a series of 5th and 6th century western authors who seem to steer carefully clear of the Protevangelium in their discussions of the circumstances of the Incarnation. He rejects a supposed reference to the Protevangelium by Hildefonse of Toledo (607-667) as spurious.[*]Amann, Protévangile, 146-7 and 147-8, note 1.

While a cult of Joachim and Anne was probably growing steadily in the 7th century in the East, it is not until the end of the 8th century that we meet with our extant Latin manuscripts of the Protevangelium.[*]Beyers, Saint-Geneviève, 888-889: the two oldest manuscripts, Beyers sigla M2 and JArM, are dated to about 800 and are kept in Montpellier. At the same time we find fresh theological mention of Joachim in Latin: both Amann and Jean Évenou quote Alcuin (died 804) as referring to Joachim during his controversy with Elipand of Toledo.[*]Ioachim, cuius filia gloriosa Dei genetrix virgo Maria esse dignoscitur (PL 96, 871), quoted by Évenou in: Longère, Marie dans les récits apocryphes chrétiens. Amann 148-9 points out a more hostile reference by Alcuin to the Protevangelium in a Homily on the Birth of Mary (PL 101, col 1301).

The Protevangelium is also quoted in the Excerpta Latina Barbari, a Latin text which Garstad has recently argued was created in the first half of the 8th century somewhere in Merovingian Europe.[*]Garstad, Benjamin, "Barbarian interest in the Excerpta Latina Barbari." Early Medieval Europe 19.1 (2011) See also Kaestli, Jean-Daniel. Le Protévangile de Jacques en latin. État de la question et perspectives nouvelles" Revue d'histoire des textes 26 (1996), 101.

Zaluska thus seems to be overstating the case when she claims that belief in Joachim was effectively suppressed until the 10th century when the Great Stemma comes back into circulation:

A l'époque où circulaient nos manuscrits, cette tradition, à la fois très ancienne et marginale, était depuis longtemps tombée en désuétude. [*]Zaluska, Stemmata 148-9.

But it is clear that there must have at least been a lull in the strident claims for the existence of Joachim, perhaps stretching across the 6th, 7th and 8th centuries, and that the resurgence comes in the 9th century, where we find the notions contained in the Protevangelium evolving in the West. Hemo of Halberstadt (died 853), a pupil of Alcuin, elaborates the legend that Anne married three times (the so-called Trinubium Annae) and had three daughters, all named Mary, but by different fathers.

The fresh expansion of the legend and the growth in popularity of the associated cult is entirely consistent with our tentative dating of the Beta recension of the Great Stemma, which adds the name of Anne alongside that of Joachim, perhaps in the 9th century. It is also no surprise to find the Protevangelium copied into the late 10th-century Roda Codex, just five folios after the best exemplar of the Alpha recension of the Great Stemma, at folios 216v-217r. [*]As Kaestli, Le Protévangile, points out, this text has been knifed out, scored through with a cross and marked apocriphum by a later owner of the codex. This legend of the Holy Kinship then goes on to acquire a wider documentary and artistic tradition of its own in the 11th century in the West.[*]Amann, 148-9. On the Trinubium, see both Naydenova-Slade, The Earliest Holy Kinship Image, and Klapisch-Zuber, L'Ombre, 101-3.

From all these bare mentions of Joachim or allusions in the West to the Protevangelium we now need to see if we can discern the point in Early Christian development where the Great Stemma might most naturally belong. We can establish an approximate terminus post quem for it in the 4th century, which seems to have been the time with the Joachim legend was spreading among Latin-speaking Christians.

This is consistent with the hypothesis I have developed elsewhere that the Great Stemma slightly precedes the Liber Genealogus. This date not only fits well with the linguistic data (the Vetus Latina names) and the 427 sighting (by the author of the Liber Genealogus) but also harmonizes with the fact that some Latin-speaking Christians were actively promoting the legend of Joachim at this time.

The later evolution of the legend, on the other hand, is too indistinct to offer us much in the way of a terminus ante quem for the Great Stemma, particularly in light of the fact that we do not even know for sure if the diagram's author was strictly Catholic or belonged to a Donatist or other dissident milieu.

If the Great Stemma is Catholic, it could hardly have been created in a spirit of open resistance to the influence, linguistic and theological, of Augustine and Jerome, so it must surely have been completed no later than the 5th century. The last and Catholic recension of the Joachimite Liber Genealogus was created in 455-463, at a time when Jerome's influence was by no means felt throughout the West yet. By the time of Cassiodorus, a hundred years later, it would be unlikely in the extreme that any Catholic author would stubbornly write from the Vetus Latina without so much as a gloss referring to Jerome or Augustine.[*]Were we to suppose that the Great Stemma came from some kind of schismatic group, Donatist or Arian for example, one might perhaps be able to argue for a 6th century terminus ante quem, but one would face the sure objection that heretical works of such late date would never have been easily taken over by orthodox libraries. This proposition seems to me to have just as little force as the possibility, dismissed elsewhere, that the Great Stemma might in fact post-date Isidore of Seville. In any case, the triumph of church authority over the breakaway movements marks an absolute endpoint for such a terminus ante quem in this line of hypothetical reasoning.

Psalmus Responsorius

The Psalmus Responsorius based on the Protevangelium has, as far as I know, never been published online with an introduction in English. It is an abecedarius, a mnemonic form where the first stanza starts with an A, the second a B, and so on. Augustine of Hippo wrote such a similar hymn, concluding at the letter V, using this poetical form.[*]Retractiones, 1.20.

Since the 4th-century existence of the anonymous Psalmus Responsorius is germane to the argument above, I reproduce stanzas A-H here, based on Wolfgang Speyer's version issued 45 years ago in the Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum (JbAC). A 1989 reprint of Speyer's article is online. The punctuation is Speyer's, except that I have converted guillemets around quotations to English inverted commas. I have partly translated the notes. PBarc. indicates the actual papyrus manuscript.

Pater, qui omnia regis,
peto Christi[*]peco christe PBarc. corrected by Roca-Puig. nos scias heredes;
Christus <adsit>[*]<adsit> dubit. Harald Fuchs: collato syllabarum numero., verbo natus,
per quem populus est liberatus.

Audiamus, fratres, magnalia dei:
primum dominus Davit elegit,
qui duodecim reges[*]reges PBarc. Roca-Puig proposed the correction "tribus" (cf. 160). Possibly the author had in mind the twelve archontes of the tribes of Israel (Num. 7:1 ff) and terms them "reges." On these elders, see Noth, M. Geschichte Israels (1963) 104. There is however no record of submission by the 12 kings.; servire fecit.
inde est progenies d(omi)ni mei
Iesum χρ(istu)m quem dicimus Naζarenum,
omnes profetae quem profetarunt,
dei filium venturum clamarunt.

Benedictus et potens est ipse pater.
Anna, quae sterilis dicebatur,
munus offerens d(e)o, sic revoca<ba>tur[*]revoca<ba>tur: Harald Fuchs.
lacrumis diurno[*]Cf. ThesLL 5,1, 1641, 65/9 et v.30 d(eu)m rogabat,
sterilitatem filiorum sibi im<precabatur>[*]im: sine lacuna PBarc. suppl. Roca-Puig.
angelus missus[*]Cf. adn. 33 ad illam venit;
orationem faciebat, sic illam invenit.
vocem audibit, verbo concepit,
inde Maria virgo devenit.

Claritas d(e)i demonstrabatur,
trima cum esset in [*]im PBarc. amended by Roca-Puig. templo data
a parentibus voto; quia sic fecerant[*]Dist. Harald Fuchs,
cum sacerdotibus ibi fuit;
plus patrem et matrem iam non requesibit:
quasi columba sic ambulabat
et ab angelis manna <s>umebat.[*]umemac PBarc. amended by Roca-Puig

Duodecim annorum puella tamen
in templo reclusa magnificatur
et ab angelis diurno sic custoditur.
cum sacerdotibus diceretur
de Maria virgine 'sponso detur',
viri prudentes sortes miserunt,
ut, ostensa, Iosepi[*]Ioseti PBarc. amended by Fuchs; cf. Abel, K: Rhein. Mus 110 (1967) 277. daretur.

Ex{c}ierunt ambo de templo pares.
tristis Iosep cogitare coepit
de puella, per sortem quae ad illum venit.
animo suo dicere coepit:
'si deo sic placet quid faciam?
tamen[*]tamen: ex fine v. 39 sing. vers. syllab. num. respic. transpos. Fuchs. puella quam d(omi)n(u)s diligebat
custod<i>enda est mihi data' dicebat.

Facta est ad fontem sola venire.
vocem angelicam tunc ibi audibit
et neminem[*]meninem PBarc. amended by Roca-Puig. v<i>dit.
verbum in utero ferens, sic inde ibit.
spasmum passa mirari coepit.
refug<i>ens, animo suo sic dicebat:
'ego ancilla sum d(e)i' clamabat.

Gaudens Maria per omnes dies[*]Nominatavus pendens, ut vid. (Fuchs); cf. v. 78,
contigit: iter dum pares agunt,
in rure devenerunt ambo. tamen
'urguet me valde, Iosep,' dicit,
'quod in utero fero, foris prodire.'
respicit locum, spelunc{h}am vidit[*]post vidit dist. Roca-Puig.
tenebrosam et obscuram[*]tenebrosae et obscurae PBarc. amended by Fuchs: sic illuc[*]illoc PBarc. ibit.
vox infantis mox audi<e>batur,[*]audi<e>batur Fuchs; cf. Roca-Puig 123
lux magna et praeclara illic videbatur,
signum de caelo demon{s}st<r>abatur,
Xp(istu)s natus esse dicebatur.

Haec sunt gesta per <Iudaeam>[*]<Iudaeam> added by Fuchs omnia. tamen
signa de caelo Graeci[*]i.e. pagani; cf. Roca-Puig 184 viderunt,
cognoverunt esse iam χρ(istu)m natum.
ex{s}ierunt, coeperunt ambulare;
devenerunt tandem ad civitatem.
vociti[*]Cf. A Souter, A Glossary of Later Latin to 600 AD (Oxford, 1949) s.v. voco et v. 96. venerunt ad Herodem:
latenter querebat interrogare[*]interrogare PBarc. interrogans Fuchs:
'<re>x Iudeorum si quando venit,' <dicite>[*]dicite Fuchs,
'ut ego ipse illum possim adorare.'[*]Summarized below.

The ninth and tenth stanzas (J-L), which have been partly sheared away from the papyrus, described the arrival of the Magi at the crib in Bethlehem and Herod's murder of the innocents. The 11th stanza (M) covered the speech of the angel to Joseph. The 12th (N) related Mary's role at the wedding feast and miracle of Cana. How many stanzas followed is unknown.

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