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Zrcalo duhovno od početka i svrhe života čovječanskoga (Spiritual mirror of the beginning and end of human life, 1614), Mavro Orbin's translation of the work Specchio spirituale del principio et fine della vita humana by Angelo Elli, a Franciscan of Milan, is the only book that this famous Dubrovnik Benedictine wrote in Croatian. It owed its publication to the efforts of the commissioner and patron Rade Sladojević, translator Mavro Orbin, and editor Bartol Kašić: Orbin signed his dedication to Sladojević on 20 April 1606 during his abbacy at St. Michael Monastery in Pakljena on the island Šipan; on 20 August 1613, almost three years after Orbin's death, Sladojević prompted the Jesuit Kašić to make arrangements for the publishing of Orbin's translation in Rome, whereupon in November that year Kašić wrote a censure and edited the text of Orbin's manuscript for print according to his own instruction for Croatian writing system "Nauk za dobro pisati Slovinski i lasno pročtiti ovo libarce" ("Instruction for the correct writing of Croatian and easy reading of this booklet"); lastly, the Jesuit of Pag appended to the edition his own poem entitled Čtivnikom (To the readers), which thus became his first poem to be printed, bearing the date 25 March 1614. According to the evidence presented here, Orbin based his translation on the edition of Elli's work from 1601, which is essentially augmented and revised in relation to the 1600 edition. Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno features three genre characteristics: 1. a series of dialogues; 2. a collection of quodlibetal questions; 3. an ascetic handbook on "the last things" (de novissimis). Due to the third genre feature Elli and his Croatian translator often refer to the second and fourth book of Sentences by Peter Lombard. To the philosophical layer in Zrcalo duhovno the reader's attention is first drawn by the index of "valuable authors" at the beginning of the edition. Listed here are two philosophers, Aristotle and Seneca, physician Avicenna, along with the leading figures of the high scholastics, all equally prominent as both theologians and philosophers, and a succession of Franciscan commentators of Peter Lombard's Sentences from Alexander of Hales to John Duns Scotus. Yet the presence of philosophical topics may only be fully revealed by a comparative study of Elli's original text and Orbin's translation. The first dialogue, which discusses the questions on the creation of the world, provides basic philosophical insights on God, world and man. This dialogue is also noted for the fact that it dwells on the question: "What is a woman?" without previously discussing the question: "What is a man?" or "What is a human being?", whereby Orbin adopts the tradition of misogyny in Christianity imbued with Aristotelianism. The second dialogue, focused on the original sin of Adam and Eve, exposes four 'definitions' of death: 1. "one nothing;" 2. "privation of life," whereby he evidently leans on one of the three principles of a physical body in Aristotle's Physics: privatio, in Elli's original privatione; 3. "separation of the soul from the body;" 4. "the last of all the terrible things" in Aristotle's sense according to Chapter 6 about bravery in Book 3 of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. The third dialogue centres on the concept of life (vita brevis). The fourth dialogue discusses immortality of the soul, the major thesis of Christian anthropology, as well as pain and fear incorporated in the topic of human mortality. Thus concluded is the discussion on "the first things." Fifth dialogue provides the topography of "the last things" from the perspective of the Venetian cartographer Giuseppe Rosaccio. Dialogues six and seven discuss two gnoseological topics: the use of senses as the feature of human knowledge and comparison between the knowledge "in this world" and the knowledge "beyond" where condemned souls dwell, whereupon Orbin in his translation omits Elli's valuable explanation of human knowledge per mezzo de fantasmi. Dialogue eight proves the corporality of fire, and at the same time aims to justify the difference between the fire in the world and that in hell, based, therefore, on elementary knowledge in natural philosophy about the process of combustion. In addition to the understanding of the suffering in hell, the dialogue also touches upon the desire for non-existence, for which Orbin coins the term 'nebitje' (non-being). Dialogue nine on the relationship between God and man, i.e. about freedom and grace, mercy and justice, also leans on philosophical insights on God and man, whereby Orbin coins the term 'slobodna vlast' (free power) for Elli's libero arbitrio (free will). Discussion on the end of the world in the tenth dialogue relies on Aristotelian natural philosophy, according to which the 'course of heavens' has its natural cause. Dialogue eleven, which discusses the resurrection of the dead, is dominated by the topics in social and natural philosophy beyond time. Augustine vs. Aristotle - a debate that leads to the conclusion in support of the ontic status of the woman in resurrection: the woman will resurrect as woman. The second focus of this dialogue concerns heavenly occurrences at the end of time, viewed from the standpoint of natural philosophy. Dialogues twelve and thirteen deal with two topics with philosophical background: the concept of the divine justice and Aristotle's world picture after the Last Judgement. Dedicated entirely to paradise, dialogue fourteen questions four topics which presuppose philosophical consideration: senses, beatitude, (un)equality and friendship. Dialogue fifteen offers eschatological anthropology constructed on three notions: dowries of the soul, dowries of the body, and deeds of glory, whereby in accordance with the then philosophical anthropology the features of the soul, body and actions for the inhabitants of paradise are introduced, that is, a comprehensive philosophical anthropology of 'the world beyond' is constructed. Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno is therefore marked by a wide range of most diversified philosophical topics, owed largely to its source text - Specchio spirituale by Angelo Elli, but equally so to Orbin's capacity to translate such a work into Croatian. In his attempt to present complex philosophical issues to Croatian readership, the Benedictine of Dubrovnik often simplified Elli's text, omitted sentences or fragments even, and made rare additions to the Italian original. The philosophical value of his translation Orbin clearly depreciated by omitting the 'geometrical' definition of God from Liber XXIV philosophorum, Avicenna's view on heart, Augustine's definition of a woman: "The woman is nature.", Elli's reference to Aristotle's De anima, and Elli's Aristotelian explanation on the knowledge per mezzo de fantasmi. For the purpose of his translation, Orbin insisted on coining Croatian terms for many philosophical and theological notions. He used fundamental metaphysical terms: 'bitje' for essentia and exsistentia (essence and existence), 'nebitje', 'narav', 'stvoren'je' for non-being, nature, and creature, 'stvorom' for actu. While expounding the doctrine of the Triune God, he introduced the synonyms 'sobstvo' and 'kip' for the notion of person. While expounding the creation of the world he used numerous terms from the field of natural philosophy: 'djelo od razlučenja' for opus distinctionis (work of the distinction), 'prva materija' for materia prima (first matter), 'tvrdina' for firmamentum (firmament), 'četiri elementi' (four elements) for Aristotle's elements, 'razčinjen'je' for corruptio (corruption), 'naredba' for ordo (order). While describing man's free will he introduced the term 'slobodna vlast' (free power) for liberum arbitrium. While discussing hermeneutics he employed the term 'zlamenito' in order to describe an allegoric meaning. For Elli's three Italian terms describing the love between Adam and Eve - amore, concupiscenza and amicitia - he came up with three apt terms in Croatian: 'ljubav', 'požuda' and 'prijazan' ('love', 'concupiscence', and 'amiability'). Aristotle's notion philia he translated by using two terms: 'prijateljstvo' ('friendship') and 'prijazan' ('amiability'). Comparative study of Elli's work and Orbin's translation has resulted in another two important findings. With the exception of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas, among Elli's references thirty-six works and twenty-six authors have been identified, which has been contextualised in the text and documented in the section of bibliography entitled "Elli's (and Orbin's) sources." In addition, the Franciscan of Milan refers to Aristotle's six works: Nicomachean Ethics, De generatione animalium, De anima, De caelo, Politics, and, under Pierozzi's influence, Physics, as well as three works by Thomas Aquinas: Quodlibet tertium, Scriptum super Sententiis Petri Lombardi and Summa theologiae. In order to elucidate the influence of Antonino Pierozzi on Elli and indirectly on Orbin, examined are the sources that Pierozzi used while composing the chapter "De diversis vitiis mulierum" ("On different vices of the women"), notably the definition of a woman in Liber Secundi philosophi and Cicero's Paradoxa. Though a translation, Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno is the first collection of quodlibetal questions printed in Croatian. Further, it is the first ascetic handbook »on the first and last things« in Croatian, because the first edition of Orbin's Zrcalo was printed fourteen years prior to the work Četiri poslidnja človika t. j. od smarti, suda, pakla i kraljestva nebeskoga (Four last things of man i.e. on death, judgement, hell, and kingdom of heaven, 1628) by Franjo Glavinić. Therefore, four editions (1614, 1621, 1628, 1703) printed by Bartolomeo Zanetti, Marco Ginammi and Bartolo Occhi, one Roman and two Venetian printers, have secured two centuries to Orbin's translation and thus helped the more demanding Croatian readership to be introduced to the Christian doctrine on »the first and last things« of man in a very refined form, to become acquainted with the major views of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, as well as with the centuries-long commentary tradition of the Sentences by Peter Lombard, to encounter 'the pictures of the world' by the late-Renaissance cartographer Giuseppe Rosaccio and Ptolemy's follower Aḥmad al-Farghāni from the ninth century, to propose or choose numerous new Croatian terms in philosophy and theology, to recognise in the interpretations of the Biblical message how Catholic theology coupled with Aristotelianism, particularly with Aristotle's world picture and Aristotle's concept of a woman. By reading Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno, Croatian reader was able to advance methodologically, that is, he could learn: how to pose a question; the necessary content of the answer; correlation between question and subquestion; how to determine one's position when the authorities differ in opinion. For Croatian literature the emergence and the two centuries of the presence of Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno is even of greater importance because this work differs significantly from the rest of the religious literary production aimed mainly for broader Croatian readership with the purpose of acquiring brief Christian teaching. Four editions of Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno from 1614 to 1703 prove that the book furnished with a most sophisticated philosophicaltheological apparatus, structured in 150 questions or dilemmas, has clearly earned a very popular status among Croatian readers in the seventeenth century, notably among those in Dubrovnik. Therefore, Orbin's Zrcalo duhovno belongs to Croatian philosophical heritage from different standpoints: 1. It introduces Croatian readership to the key topics in various philosophical disciplines, mostly in natural and social philosophy, but also in metaphysics, philosophical theology, philosophical anthropology, ethics, and gnoseology; 2. In the Croatian linguistic fabric it reveals a lasting influence of Aristotle's views on the interpretation of the Christian doctrine; 3. It enables early reception of the classical authors of Christian philosophy in Croatian, particularly of Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, and Richard de Menneville; 4. It mirrors philosophical topics within the development of the Franciscan School from Alexander of Hales to John Duns Scotus, from François de Meyronnes to Pelbartus de Temesvár; 5. It facilitates early reception of the Renaissance theological summa of Antonino Pierozzi in Croatian; 6. It teaches on the method for conducting philosophical dispute; 7. It exemplifies the translator's systematic effort for the development of Croatian philosophical terminology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
