Barlaam and Josaphat: A Christian Tale of the Buddha Read Free Page A

lingua franca of clerics in western Europe, and
Barlaam and Josaphat
was subsequently translated from Latin into the many vernacular versions that circulated in medieval Europe.
    The Greek translation of the story was long thought to be the original version of the story, and the eighth-century theologian John of Damascus was thought to be its author. This attribution has been discredited by modern scholars, but many medieval translators—including Gui de Cambrai—identified John as the author of
Barlaam and Josaphat
, and the story’s attachment to a well-known theologian could have been another reason for its popularity. Gui de Cambrai even makes John of Damascus a character in the story.
    Gui de Cambrai translates his
Barlaam and Josaphat
from a Latin source, he tells us twice, at the request of his patron, Gilles de Marquais. Gui’s name indicates that he was from Cambrai, in northern France, but we know little about him. He has also been identified as the author of
Le vengement Alixandre
(
The
Revenge of Alexander
), a continuation of the popular
Romance of Alexander
,
which recounts the vengeance taken by the vassals of Alexander the Great on the servants who poisoned their lord. 4 We assume that Gui was a cleric, since he knew Latin. He had literary skills, or at least literary pretensions, because he translated Latin prose into Old French verse, and his
Barlaam and Josaphat
is clearly written for a courtly audience: Gui addresses noblemen directly in many of his narratorial interventions in the text.
    Several times Gui de Cambrai is also named in the third person as the author of the text. Such references may suggest that the text was read out loud to an audience by a minstrel or a professional performer, and in fact the text includes many asides to the audience that could suggest that it was read to, or performed for, an audience. Some scholars have claimed that Gui de Cambrai left his translation unfinished, and that it was completed by an unnamed compiler who may have emphasized Gui’s authorship as he added the extensive social commentary to the text. It is also possible that Gui names himself in the narrative, since it was not unusual for medieval authors to refer to themselves in the third person in order to claim authorship of a text and even to vaunt their rhetorical skills. And indeed other scholars insist that the entire narrative was written by Gui, including the narratorial interjections that explain the story, condemn the vices of the nobility, lament the corruption of the church, and excoriate those who have failed to go on Crusades to win Jerusalem from the Muslims. 5
    Gui’s perspective is resolutely Christian: he speaks of “our Lord” and “our religion,” and he vilifies Jews and Muslims as pagans. As in other medieval texts, Jews come in for special blame for their failure to recognize Christ when their prophets foretold his coming. Muslims are described as idolaters, like the Chaldeans, Greeks, and Egyptians whose religions are also refuted in
Barlaam and Josaphat.
“Idolater” is a fairly common term of abuse for Muslims in medieval narratives, despite the fact that Islam forbids the representation of living beings and especially of God and his prophets. The characterization of Muslims as idolaters reveals the limited knowledge about Islam among medieval Christians, and indeed accusations of idol worship were used to condemn almost anyone who was not a Christian. “Saracen,” the name commonly used for Muslims in medieval French texts, also comes to have the fairly general sense of “pagan,” and in
Barlaam and Josaphat
it appears frequently as an alternative name for Indians.
    Gui de Cambrai’s
Barlaam and Josaphat
includes two unique additions to the story of Prince Josaphat. First, Gui includes a holy war in his story. In most versions, after King Avenir divides his kingdom and gives half to his son, he sees the prosperity of