Historical Setting: Jarrow, 793 C.E.
Bede lived his life in the monastery confined by walls with books as his window on the world. His doorways were the travelers to and from Rome as he always kept current with papal decree and edict. He valued the pope’s intention to bring unity to the whole wide Church. Bede put the highest priority on papal rule, which I suppose is how a child nurtured in monastic Rule, once designed to fill the void of parental guidance, would grow. “Truth” [Footnote1] as Bede called the pope’s proclamation of a proper date for Easter, was not simply a choice to make among human traditions; but this date for Easter was a defining foundation stone of “righteousness.”
The first chapters weren’t tainted by his personal judgement, since they had the objective distance of time. He named ancient traditions and Roman rulers over these islands, including Ireland. Ireland was never Roman but it was Christian. Even the grasses of Ireland sprout Trinitarian. So, in times when the sorting of peoples as Christian or heretic based on acceptance of the Trinity, the Irish were clearly not the heretics. But in matters of monastic rule, where the Irish and the English differed, as in the tonsures of monks and the calendar date for celebrating Easter, Bede’s words are flavored with his own Roman warp.
Aiden, the founding first bishop of Lindisfarne, came to Northumbria with the Celtic Rule. But his supposed erroneous observance of the Easter date was “patiently tolerated” while he was alive, “because” as Bede said, “they had clearly understood that although he could not keep Easter otherwise because of the manner of those who had sent him, he nevertheless laboured diligently to practice the words of faith, piety, and love, which is the mark of all the saints. He was therefore deservedly loved by all, including those who had other views about Easter.” [Footnote 2]
So, Bede’s grace toward Aiden didn’t extend to his successors, also from Iona with the Irish tradition. This apparently had gone too far when the King had Easter one day, and the Celtic Queen on another.
He spent a whole chapter of his Ecclesiastical History on these lurid details of Lindisfarne’s sin. [Footnote 3]
My own opinion, this was not without his personal bias.
[Footnote1] Bede Ecclesiastical History of the English Oxford University Press. Book III, 25 pp.153
[Footnote 2] Ibid.
[Footnote 3] Ibid.
(Continues tomorrow)
Lazarus Ink 