Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.32004/k.55.3-4.3
IVAN MULIH'S PRODEŠTVA - SERMONS OF MODEST ORNATUS
Franjo Pajur
; Eisenstadt, Austrija
Abstract
SUMMARY
The prodeštva (sermons) by father Ivan Mulih were published at the end of the 18th century in two volumes. He was a Croat from Črnomelj, a Jesuit monk who continued to act as such even after the order was abolished in the Zagreb Diocese. Ivan Mulih for the most part avoids the most typical baroque forms, the various accumulation of non-contrast forms as well as contrast (antithetical) ones, the allegories. On basis of this fact it may be concluded how the baroque stylistic approaches were only „aestheticism oasis” in his work, i.e., only „marginal phenomenon“. Similarly, Mulih's descriptions are not typical examples because they do not conform with Quintiliani's stipulation: „res gestae aut ut gestae utilis ad persuadendum id quod intenderis commemoratio“, i.e., they contain the external content source (the Bible), the utilitarian function (teaching, concisely expressed in a biblical sentence), but not the literary form (commemoratio, minimal narrative form or Jolle's „simple form“), hence there is a stark contrast in respect to the typical baroque exempla. Namely, the literal quality of the baroque sermon, i.e. its baroque style was mostly the result of abundance and colourful profusion of its exempli. However, in father Mulih's prodeštva this abundance and colourful profusion is (more often) reduced to more retelling of examples from the Scriptures, and (less often) to a collection of examples that conform with the applicatio (parable) from the rhetorical point of view, but are not interesting if focusing on their literary and artistic aspect. The golden era of the Kajkavian baroque sermon literature was initiated in the second half of the 17th century with the works of the Jesuit Juraj Habdelić („Zerczalo Maianzko“, 1962, and „Pervi otcza nassega Adama greh“, 1674), reaching its culmination in the first half of the 18th century with „Hrana duhovna“, a comprehensive five-volume work by the Capuchin, Štefan Zagrebec (civil name Matija Marković). Ivan Mulih appears only as a faint echo of those „golden baroque times“, mostly due to the absence of the rich baroque ornatus in his sermons. There are two objective circumstances that exculpate him in a way: the abolishment of the Jesuit order (1773) as the main carrier of ecclesiastical Baroque, and the uncertain personal status of this former Jesuit.
Keywords
: Ivan Mulih; Baroque sermon literature
Hrčak ID:
295763
URI
Publication date:
30.11.2022.
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