Baptism as Eucharist: Orthodoxy, Wycliffism, and the Sacramental Utterance in Saint Erkenwald

by David Coley, University of Maryland

It is with good reason that critics have focused so persistently on the sacrament of baptism in their readings of Saint Erkenwald: even in the frequently outlandish universe of medieval alliterative verse, the poem's climactic spectacle of a miraculously preserved and reanimated corpse crumbling to dust at the moment of its christening is a remarkable one. Generally recognized to be an English recasting of the legend of Saint Gregory and the Emperor Trajan, Saint Erkenwald focuses on the discovery, during the construction of Saint Paul's Cathedral, of a magnificent sarcophagus containing the inexplicably preserved corpse. Unable to read the engravings on the sarcophagus or to determine the identity or even the vintage of the body, London's increasingly agitated citizens summon their bishop, Erkenwald, from clerical duties in Essex so that he might solve the mystery and quell the growing civic unrest it has created. Erkenwald addresses the corpse, commanding it in the name of God to reveal its secrets, and like some Celtic Frankenstein's monster, it blinks its eyes and begins to tell its story. the corpse, it turns out, was a judge who lived 500 years before Christ. Strict, honest, and unswervingly fair, the judge was buried as a king for his flawless adherence to law; but as a heathen, his soul was "dampnyd dulfully into pe depe lake" (l. 302), unable to join in the great feast of Heaven. Deeply moved by the mournful tale, Erkenwald cannot help but weep, and he wishes aloud that God could grant the virtuous pagan life once more, just long enough to be baptized. If only such a thing were possible, the bishop exclaims, he would speak these words: "I folwe pe in pe Fader nome and His fre Childes, / And of pe gracious Holy Goste" (ll. 318–19). Despite the oddly conditional mode of his baptismal prayer (an issue to which this essay will return), the words have their effect; as Erkenwald utters them, one of his tears falls on the judge's face to complete the sacrament. the new Christian soul flies to heaven; the body falls to ash. bells ring in London. Order is restored.