Ileana Andrei, Romania:
The Romanian Religious Poetry
Just like in world literature, religious poetry in Romanian literature represents a concrete form of Man's attempt to communicate with God/Divinity.
Religious poetry underlies the whole development of our language and literature, and clearly demonstrates that the Genesis of the Romanian people took place within a Christian space. It also constitutes one of the first expressions of the Romanian literature which was thus enriched with themes and lyrical motifs of great artistic sensitivity: life, death, love, pain, grief, joy, faith, all of these being expressions that have become part of our history once the Romanian language was born.
Stemming from the archaeologically attested, uninterrupted existence of the Dacian-Roman population in Dacia and Scythia Minor for a long centuries, the activity of the ancient Romanian writers, people of the Church, once again stands proof to our continuity in this ancient Romanian space as a place wholly integrated into the general preoccupation for producing books. That is why religious lyricism is the best represented genre in our literary beginnings. Niceta de Remesiana, Ioan Cassian from Scythia Minor, Dionisie Exiguul, a great Dacian-Roman scholar, are just a few founders of Romanian Poetry, who created here a connecting realm, a spiritual bridge between the East and the West. Following this tradition we come across hymnal verses in Varlaam’s Cazania ( Homiliary ) (1643) and in Dosoftei’s Psaltirea pre versuri tocmită (Psalter drawn up in verses) (1673). The latter is still considered to be the first great achievement in Romanian lyrical genre. Hymnal verses are also found in Mihai Eminescu’s religious style poetry or in the poems of George Cosbuc, Octavian Goga, Lucian Blaga and Vasile Voiculescu. But it is Macedonski and his psalms cycle 'Psalmi moderni' ( Modern Psalms), Tuder Arghezi (with the 17 psalms series) and Ştefan Augustin Doinaş (with no less than 100 psalms, gathered together in a booklet which was published by Albatros Publishing House, in 1997) who give special attention to the psalms, because they express the modern Man's drama in search of his ego in relation to God.
For almost half a century, after the communist regime settled in Romania, this theme of poetic inspiration was regarded as a taboo, and literary critics could not list the Christian dimension of the Romanian literature among its distinctive characteristics. It was only after 1990 that the Romanian Poetry could be examined from a dual perspective: theological and literary.
Consequently, today, when we are trying to reconstruct the history of the Romanian Religious Poetry, we can start from Niceta de Remesiana's masterpiece, Te Deum laudamus ( Thee, Lord, we praise), which represents for the Dacian-Roman period what Eminescu's poem Lucaefarul (The Morning Star) represents for Romanian Classical Poetry. Pursuing one way of lyric expression – the religious hymn – we will group together the poets of subsequent ages, from Nicolae Olahus, Petru Cercel, Mitropolitul Dosoftei, Varlaam, Miron Costin, Timotei Cipariu, with those of the 1848 generation, such as Vasile Alecsandri, Grigore Alexandrescu or valuable creators of Mihai Eminescu’s importance, George Coșbuc, Octavian Goga, and our contemporary poets writers, Ştefan Augustin Doinaş, Ioan Alexandru, or Daniel Turcea.
It is quite remarkable that Mihai Eminescu, before Ioan Alexandru, sensed intuitively the extraordinary Christian and poetical value of the biblical text which inspired him. So, Luceafărul could be considered a Christian poem of the Romanian literature. George Coşbuc and Octavian Goga are viewed as poets of liturgical life in Transilvanian villages. Nichifor Crainic, our pre-eminently Christian poet, like Paul Claudel who is the outstading French Christian poet or Rainer Maria Rilke, the German Christian poet, expressed in his turn the concrete spirituality of the Romanian people. But the most of the explicit Christian poetry was composed by Nichifor Crainic during his over 15 years spent in communist prisons. These poems are the work of a martyr poet. Another martyr poet, Vasile Voiculescu, with his Ultimele sonete închipuite ale lui Shakespeare (The last immaginary sonets of Shakespeare), reveals a themed unitary poetical vision. His 90 poems together compose a genuine Romanian Canticum Canticorum, (Song of Solomon, in English or Shir ha Shirim, in Hebrew), competing with the great poetry of the Old Testament.
Lucian Blaga, a philosopher and representative poet of the inter-war literature, also wrote poetry of religious inspiration, but he particularly projects himself against the background of pagan myths, before or parallel to Christianity, from Zamolxis to the myths and legends stored in the creation of Romanian villages.
Unlike Blaga, Tudor Arghezi, another great Romanian poet, in the same way as Iov or David, places himself in a direct relationship, commencing a dialogue with Divinity, sometimes rising in revolt against It. His Poetry ceaselessly reveals, from its beginning to the end, a Homo Religious who is unequaled in the whole Romanian literature.
In 'The Former Church' volume, mainly in the 'Magi’s Road' cycle, Ion Pilat unveils divinity in the Romanian space and in domestic instances. The cultivated remaking of the folklore motifs and the refined simulation of the peasant naivety deliver admirable, sweet, realistic and candid visions similar to the paintings of Cimabue and Giotto.
A special place is occupied by the poetry belonging to the 'Romanian Christians', Traian Dorz and Costache Ioanid, "confessors upon Christ”, alongside with the poets from the communist prisons: Valeriu Gafencu, Radu Gyr, Sandu Tudor, Valeriu Anania.
In contemporary poetry we discover Ştefan Augustin Doinas in the position of a modern psalmist or, Lidia Stăniloae, Daniel Turcea and Ioan Alexandru, who are undoubtedly accepted by the connoisseurs of their poetry as genuine religious poets. Ioan Alexandru, a "poet of the Logos”, is the most important hymngraph of Romanian poetry, who is even compared with some hymngraphs of Bizantyne literature, such as Roman Melodul or Efrem Sirul.
We cannot ignore the Christmas Carol, one piece of our folk artisitic creation. Throughout centuries the carol song has proved to be a genuine Romanian Canticum Canticorum, as poet Vasile Voiculescu called it. In the verses of Romanian Carols we find God Himself, as an Eucharist Romanian miracle together with the whole creation, with all the elements that form our kin, and transcend Heaven and Earth
The Romanian Religious Poetry
Just like in world literature, religious poetry in Romanian literature represents a concrete form of Man's attempt to communicate with God/Divinity.
Religious poetry underlies the whole development of our language and literature, and clearly demonstrates that the Genesis of the Romanian people took place within a Christian space. It also constitutes one of the first expressions of the Romanian literature which was thus enriched with themes and lyrical motifs of great artistic sensitivity: life, death, love, pain, grief, joy, faith, all of these being expressions that have become part of our history once the Romanian language was born.
Stemming from the archaeologically attested, uninterrupted existence of the Dacian-Roman population in Dacia and Scythia Minor for a long centuries, the activity of the ancient Romanian writers, people of the Church, once again stands proof to our continuity in this ancient Romanian space as a place wholly integrated into the general preoccupation for producing books. That is why religious lyricism is the best represented genre in our literary beginnings. Niceta de Remesiana, Ioan Cassian from Scythia Minor, Dionisie Exiguul, a great Dacian-Roman scholar, are just a few founders of Romanian Poetry, who created here a connecting realm, a spiritual bridge between the East and the West. Following this tradition we come across hymnal verses in Varlaam’s Cazania ( Homiliary ) (1643) and in Dosoftei’s Psaltirea pre versuri tocmită (Psalter drawn up in verses) (1673). The latter is still considered to be the first great achievement in Romanian lyrical genre. Hymnal verses are also found in Mihai Eminescu’s religious style poetry or in the poems of George Cosbuc, Octavian Goga, Lucian Blaga and Vasile Voiculescu. But it is Macedonski and his psalms cycle 'Psalmi moderni' ( Modern Psalms), Tuder Arghezi (with the 17 psalms series) and Ştefan Augustin Doinaş (with no less than 100 psalms, gathered together in a booklet which was published by Albatros Publishing House, in 1997) who give special attention to the psalms, because they express the modern Man's drama in search of his ego in relation to God.
For almost half a century, after the communist regime settled in Romania, this theme of poetic inspiration was regarded as a taboo, and literary critics could not list the Christian dimension of the Romanian literature among its distinctive characteristics. It was only after 1990 that the Romanian Poetry could be examined from a dual perspective: theological and literary.
Consequently, today, when we are trying to reconstruct the history of the Romanian Religious Poetry, we can start from Niceta de Remesiana's masterpiece, Te Deum laudamus ( Thee, Lord, we praise), which represents for the Dacian-Roman period what Eminescu's poem Lucaefarul (The Morning Star) represents for Romanian Classical Poetry. Pursuing one way of lyric expression – the religious hymn – we will group together the poets of subsequent ages, from Nicolae Olahus, Petru Cercel, Mitropolitul Dosoftei, Varlaam, Miron Costin, Timotei Cipariu, with those of the 1848 generation, such as Vasile Alecsandri, Grigore Alexandrescu or valuable creators of Mihai Eminescu’s importance, George Coșbuc, Octavian Goga, and our contemporary poets writers, Ştefan Augustin Doinaş, Ioan Alexandru, or Daniel Turcea.
It is quite remarkable that Mihai Eminescu, before Ioan Alexandru, sensed intuitively the extraordinary Christian and poetical value of the biblical text which inspired him. So, Luceafărul could be considered a Christian poem of the Romanian literature. George Coşbuc and Octavian Goga are viewed as poets of liturgical life in Transilvanian villages. Nichifor Crainic, our pre-eminently Christian poet, like Paul Claudel who is the outstading French Christian poet or Rainer Maria Rilke, the German Christian poet, expressed in his turn the concrete spirituality of the Romanian people. But the most of the explicit Christian poetry was composed by Nichifor Crainic during his over 15 years spent in communist prisons. These poems are the work of a martyr poet. Another martyr poet, Vasile Voiculescu, with his Ultimele sonete închipuite ale lui Shakespeare (The last immaginary sonets of Shakespeare), reveals a themed unitary poetical vision. His 90 poems together compose a genuine Romanian Canticum Canticorum, (Song of Solomon, in English or Shir ha Shirim, in Hebrew), competing with the great poetry of the Old Testament.
Lucian Blaga, a philosopher and representative poet of the inter-war literature, also wrote poetry of religious inspiration, but he particularly projects himself against the background of pagan myths, before or parallel to Christianity, from Zamolxis to the myths and legends stored in the creation of Romanian villages.
Unlike Blaga, Tudor Arghezi, another great Romanian poet, in the same way as Iov or David, places himself in a direct relationship, commencing a dialogue with Divinity, sometimes rising in revolt against It. His Poetry ceaselessly reveals, from its beginning to the end, a Homo Religious who is unequaled in the whole Romanian literature.
In 'The Former Church' volume, mainly in the 'Magi’s Road' cycle, Ion Pilat unveils divinity in the Romanian space and in domestic instances. The cultivated remaking of the folklore motifs and the refined simulation of the peasant naivety deliver admirable, sweet, realistic and candid visions similar to the paintings of Cimabue and Giotto.
A special place is occupied by the poetry belonging to the 'Romanian Christians', Traian Dorz and Costache Ioanid, "confessors upon Christ”, alongside with the poets from the communist prisons: Valeriu Gafencu, Radu Gyr, Sandu Tudor, Valeriu Anania.
In contemporary poetry we discover Ştefan Augustin Doinas in the position of a modern psalmist or, Lidia Stăniloae, Daniel Turcea and Ioan Alexandru, who are undoubtedly accepted by the connoisseurs of their poetry as genuine religious poets. Ioan Alexandru, a "poet of the Logos”, is the most important hymngraph of Romanian poetry, who is even compared with some hymngraphs of Bizantyne literature, such as Roman Melodul or Efrem Sirul.
We cannot ignore the Christmas Carol, one piece of our folk artisitic creation. Throughout centuries the carol song has proved to be a genuine Romanian Canticum Canticorum, as poet Vasile Voiculescu called it. In the verses of Romanian Carols we find God Himself, as an Eucharist Romanian miracle together with the whole creation, with all the elements that form our kin, and transcend Heaven and Earth
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