The Waldensian Dissent: Persecution and Survival, c. 1170-c. 1570.

Gabriel Audisio, The Waldensian Dissent: Persecution and Survival, c. 1170-c. 1570

Translation of Les 'Vaudois': naissance, vie et mort d'une dissidence (xii'-xvi' siecle), 1989, by Claire Davison. (Cambridge Medieval Textbooks.) Cambridge, UK and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. xiv + 234 pp. $59.95 (cl), $21.95 (pbk). ISBN: 0-521-55029-7 (cl), 0-521-55984-7 (pbk).

Written for the "enlightened amateur" (xi), and based on the latest serious research -- made difficult both by the paucity of surviving self-generated records and by confessional and academic debates -- this survey seeks to present an account, "solid in matter and accessible in form" (xiii) of the origins, evolution, secret and contradictory ways, and extinction of a medieval "sect," or movement of dissent, that absolutized certain scriptural injunctions and always remained a tiny minority, even if more numerous in particular regions.

The Poor of Christ or Poor of Lyon, as they called themselves (their Protestant descendants call themselves Waldensians), were founded by a Lyonese merchant identified as "Vaudes" (the first name "Peter" is a later addition) who felt that the injunction of Matt. 19.21 to practice poverty and of Matt. 28.19-20 to preach to all nations applied to him personally. Because the Poor, both male and female, became itinerant preachers of penance in opposition to a prohibition of the archbishop of Lyon, Pope Lucius III in 1184 condemned them as schismatics. Expelled from Lyon, the Poor spread to other areas of southern France, to Italy, Germany, Austria, Bohemia, Moravia, and Poland. Vaudes died c. 1205/07, orthodox in belief and hoping for the condemnation to be lifted. When the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 also condemned them, the Poor met at the Synod of Bergamo in 1218 to legislate their beliefs and practices.

Primarily in response to persecution, the Poor were forced to adjust and organize. From urban areas they relocated to farming and pastoral regions. Preaching was no longer in public but clandestine. Instead of recruiting new members, emphasis was placed on retaining current membership by marrying fellow Poor and practicing their faith in a secret family context. From their contact with other dissident groups, the Poor came to adopt Donatist beliefs. The obligation to preach and practice poverty was restricted to a carefully selected and trained group of men who, like mendicant friars, were also chaste, recited prayers at fixed times during the day, and lived under obedience (the younger to the older master when traveling in pairs on the preaching circuits; all to the four governors elected in their annual synod/chapter). Called brothers or barbes, an affectionate term for elderly relatives such as uncles, they recited from memory texts of scripture (mostly vernacular translations of the gospels of Matthew and John or of the pastoral epistles), preached on morality rather than doctrine, heard confessions, and celebrated the Lord's Supper. The barbes kept the community together and embodied its ideals.

Audisio has identified the common beliefs over time of the Poor. The Bible is the ultimate authority and is to be interpreted literally. While lying and taking oaths are forbidden (Matt. 5.33-37), the Poor did in practice hide their beliefs, and swear to marriage and other legal contracts. They also rejected the death penalty in keeping with Matt. 5.21-22 and 26-52. Although denying purgatory, they frequently left money for Masses for the dead. The Poor typically conformed to Lateran IV's requirements of annual confession to the parish priest and communion at Eastertime, but they also confessed to barbes, who granted absolution and imposed penances, and they celebrated their own Lord's Supper on Holy Thursday. Because they considered the sacraments of unworthy priests to be invalid, they transferred many priestly functions to their barbes. They also rejected the cult of the saints, avoiding feast days, relics, and pilgrimages. In many ways, they were indistinguishable from their Catholic neighbors.

Why did the barbes vote to give up their peculiar beliefs to adopt those of the Protestants at the Synod of Chanforan/Le Serre (1532) after three centuries of persecution? Having heard of the Protestant message that was similar to theirs in certain areas, the Poor sent emissaries to Farel, Bucer, and Oecolampadius, who provided them with books and answers to their questions. They were initially perplexed by the Protestants' denials of free will, clerical celibacy, and scriptural literalism. Audisio speculates that Farel was able to convince the majority of bathes at the 1532 synod of the truthfulness of the Protestants' positions by the force of his personality, as well as by showing them the Pauline doctrinal epistles' teaching on justification by faith -- which they usually ignored -- and Titus 1.6 on married clergy. Some of the barbes were probably already doubting literalism and the value of poverty when wealth was now seen as a sign of divine favor. Once the barbes accepted Protestantism, the sect ended: itinerant preaching ceased, and resident pastors trained as Protestants replaced the barbes and established churches of their own with a creed and worship service determined by Calvin in the 1540s. They now intermarried with Protestants. Renewed persecution eliminated many groups, but those in the Savoyard valleys survived to become the chiesa valdese that today numbers 45,000. While retaining their culture (language, family names, and traditions), its members gave up the beliefs and practices of their ancestors to become part of Protestantism.

Audisio has admirably succeeded in his effort to provide a clearly-written, balanced, and up-to-date account of a medieval sect that became a modern Protestant church.