Knygotyra ISSN 0204–2061 eISSN 2345-0053
2023, vol. 80, pp. 103–115 DOI: https://doi.org/10.15388/Knygotyra.2023.80.125

Brest Catechism (1553). The Confesional and Cultural Background of the First Publication of the Printing House in Brest

Dariusz Chemperek
Institute of Linguistics and Literature, Maria Curie-Skłodowska University
pl. M. Curie-Skłodowskiej 4A, 20-031 Lublin, Poland
E-mail: dariusz.chemperek@mail.umcs.pl

Summary. The aim of the article is to answer the question about the sources of inventio of the so-called Katechizm brzeski [Brest Catechism] showing the confessional and cultural basis of this print published in Brest-Litovsk in the first year of this publishing house’s operation. Printed in 1553, and created by an unknown writer, Katechizm brzeski is a product of various confessional tendencies and aspirations – religious, cultural and political – of the Lithuanian political class in the second half of the 16^th century. The conclusions of the article are as following: 1. Katechizm brzeski was published in the second half of 1553. 2. This theologically eclectic catechism is an attempt to find iunctim between Martin Luther’s and John Calvin’s influences. The Lutheran influences prevail. 3. Katechizm brzeski’s author used not only the catechism of Jan Seklucjan (1544), but also two works by Urban Rhegius (catechism from 1543, Medicina animae in the Polish translation, 1551) and Catechismus minor (1527–1528) by Johannes Brenz. 4. The compiler was well versed in the Osiandrian controversy taking place in the 1550s in the nearby Ducal Prussia. As a supporter of Andreas Osiander, the compiler applied to the Katechizm brzeski his optimistic anthropology to the newest – formally Calvinist – catechism.

Keywords: Katechizm brzeski, Brest printing house, Mikołaj Radziwiłł the Black, Bernard Wojewódka

Bresto katekizmas (1553 m.). Pirmojo Bresto spaustuvės leidinio konfesinis ir kultūrinis kontekstas

Santrauka. Šio straipsnio tikslas yra atsakyti į klausimą, kokie yra galimi vadinamojo Katechizm brzeski [Bresto katekizmo] kilmės šaltiniai. Atskleidžiamas šio spausdinto leidinio, publikuoto Lietuvos Brastoje pirmaisiais šio miesto spaustuvės veikimo metais, konfesinis ir kultūrinis pagrindas. Katechizm brzeski buvo išspausdintas 1553 metais, o jo autorius nežinomas. Tai yra įvairių XVI a. antrosios pusės lietuvių politinės klasės konfesinių tendencijų bei ambicijų – religinių, kultūrinių ir politinių – rezultatas. Straipsnyje prieinama prie šių išvadų: 1. Katechizm brzeski publikuotas antrojoje 1553 m. pusėje. 2. Šis teologiškai margas katekizmas yra bandymas atrasti jungtį tarp Martino Lutherio ir Jeano Cauvino ideologijų. Jame dominuoja liuteroniškoji ideologija. 3. Katechizm brzeski autorius naudojosi ne tik Jano Seklucjano katekizmu (išleistu 1544 m.), bet taip pat ir dviem Urbano Rhegiuso kūriniais (1543 m. katekizmu; Medicina animae 1551 metų vertimu į lenkų kalbą) bei Johanneso Brenzo Catechismus minor (1527–1528 m.). 4. Šis sudarytojas buvo gerai susipažinęs su Osiandro kontroversija, kuri XVI a. 6-ajame dešimtmetyje buvo plačiai svarstoma kaimyninėje Prūsijos Kunigaikštystėje. Kadangi sudarytojas buvo Andreaso Osianderio gerbėjas, jis Katechizm brzeski pateikė optimistinę Osiandro antropologiją, taip sudarydamas naujausią formaliai kalvinistinių pažiūrų katekizmą.

Reikšminiai žodžiai: Katechizm brzeski, Bresto spaustuvė, Mikalojus Radvila Juodasis, Bernardas Wojewódka.

Received: 2023 01 02. Accepted: 2023 04 02
Copyright © 2023 Dariusz Chemperek. Published by Vilnius University Press. This is an Open Access journal distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

The beginnings of the chronologically second printing house in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, after the printing house of Francysk Skaryna in Vilnius 1522 – ca. 1525, the bind with Brest Litovsk and Prince Mikołaj Radziwiłł the Black and the printer and translator Bernard Wojewódka. From the 1540s (Wojewódka) and the 1550s (Radziwiłł) of the 16^th century, both were connected by their Reformation sympathies and contacts with Protestants from the Ducal Prussia ruled by Prince Albrecht Hohenzollern. As we know, Radziwiłł was friends with the Prince, and, in the 1540s, he supported the Polish and Lithuanian pioneers of Protestantism, including his brother Jan Radziwiłł. Informal accession of Radziwiłł the Black to Reformation dates back to around 1551. He openly embraced Protestantism in 1553, while establishing a church with the protestant service in Brest-Litovsk in the same year.1 Wojewódka, who came from a Cracow bourger family, already around 1545 prepared a translation of the Lutheran postyl of Antonio Corvinus, and he was the author of two translations of psalms in the first Polish cantionale Pieśni duchowne a nabożne [Spiritual and pious songs] published in 1547 by Jan Seklucjan in Königsberg (nota bene, the addressee of the dedication of this cantionale was Stanisław Kieżgajło who was related to the Radziwiłł family). Wojewódka began his activity as a printer around 1551 in the printing house of Marek Szarffenberg’s heirs in Cracow. In the summer of 1553, Wojewódka, together with the Neo-Latin poet Andrzej Trzecieski the younger, came to Brest at the invitation of Radziwiłł the Black to open a printing house there.2 It was the first in Great Duchy of Lithuania in over a quarter of a century after Skaryna’s printing house. Like the former one, it was oriented to the religious needs of its readers, or, to be precise, it was supposed to create these needs.

The aim of the article is to answer the question about the sources of inventio of the so-called Katechizm brzeski [Brest Catechism], showing the confessional and cultural basis of this print published in Brest-Litovsk in the first year of this publishing house’s operation. Katechizm brzeski is a product of various confessional tendencies and aspirations – religious, cultural and political – of the Lithuanian political class in the second half of the 16^th century. The analysis should be preceded by a reminder of the factual findings.3

The Discovery and Description of Katechizm brzeski

The name of Katechizm brzeski comes from its discoverer in 1907, Franciszek Pułaski, the librarian of Krasiński Library in Warsaw4. In fact, Pułaski called two works with the name Katechizm brzeski: Katechismus mniejszy [Lesser Catechism] – Kátechiʃmus mnyeyʃzy, to yeʃt Náuka s krotkim wykłádem o przednyeyʃʃych cząʃtkach zakonu krzesćiáńʃkyego dla ludu prostego and written as a dialog between Father and Son Katechismus więtszy [Greater Catechism] – Kátechiʃmus Więtʃʃy, to yeʃt Náuka Krzeʃciyáńʃka o Bodze y o Wyerze ʃwyętey w ktorej Oćyec z Synem rozmawyáją. Both of them are continuously numbered (from A to J8), have 136 uncounted pages and constitute a coherent whole – e.g. considerations on the sacrament of Baptism and the Altar are shortened in the Katechizm wiekszy, the author silently refers the reader to the longer lectures contained earlier in the Katechizm mniejszy. Both catechisms – the lesser and the greater – thus constitute two parts of one whole, distinguished by titles. The explanation of the “two-in-one” mechanism stems from the practice of the book trade. Since both works were not provided with dates, the bookseller or bookbinder could sell them either as one book (with a new title page) or as two publications. There are four reasons in favor of the use of the name Katechizm brzeski by historians of the book and of the Reformation: the continuous numbering of the pages, the non-discriminatory nature of the titles of both parts (the terms ‘greater’ and ‘lesser’ were used throughout Europe for catechisms of various denominations), the semantic connectivity of the content of the works and the research tradition of over a hundred years. The first crucial argument is of a technical nature.

We owe the establishment of the first date of the printing house’s operation in 1553 in Brest-Litovsk to Franciszek Pułaski. In 1907, a Warsaw librarian purchased an old print, along with two others – Summarius dziesięciora przykazania ... by Christoph Imler and Sposoby ... mówienia by Urban Rhegius – from the Belarusian national activist and collector Ivan Łuckiewicz. These old prints, all in octavo, having a common binding (from the end of the 18^th century), were until then completely unknown, with only the translations of Imler and Rhegius having the dates of publication (1553, 1554 respectively). Significant data on the identification of the prints can be found in the translation of the Rhegius Sposoby ... mówienia, a handbook for Protestant preachers: the printer placed there the coat of arms of Mikołaj Radziwiłł the Black and a dedication dated January 22, 1554 addressed to the wife of the Prince – Elżbieta Radziwiłł of Szydłowiecki. This dedication was signed by the Wojewódka who called himself a printer in the printing house belonging to Radziwiłł, located in Brest-Litovsk.

Additional information on the Katechizm brzeski can be found in the correspondence of Cardinal Stanisław Hozjusz. Well, in a letter of January 25, 1554, the humanist Szymon Marycjusz (Maricius) informed Hozjusz about the issuance of two catechisms in Polish in Brest by Bernard Wojewódka.5 Pułaski, by using the method of bibliological analysis and deduction, correctly recognized all the three prints (Imler, Rhegius and Katechizm) as publications of Wojewódka from the Radziwiłł printing house in Brest Litovsk established in 1553. The researcher mentioned the following reasons:

1) Identical print (fonts, printing ornaments and typographic layout).

2) Identical paper with the same waterprint as in Sposoby of Rhegius.

3) The aforementioned information in Hozjusz’s correspondence proving that Wojewódka, at the end of 1553 or at the beginning of 1554, had printed a catechism in Brest, or, even, as one may assume from this letter, two catechisms.6

Pułaski’s caution regarding the dating of Katechizm brzeski (“at the end of 1553 or the beginning of 1554”) goes too far. It can be assumed with high probability that this print, being a small volume, left the printing presses in 1553, being the second Brest publication (after Summarius by Imler, only 75 pages long), while the third was the most magnificent print of the handbook for preachers by Urban Reghius, with the Radziwiłł coat of arms and a decorative frontispiece, of 150 pages. Wojewódka, as a printer without much experience, had to start by pressing books of a modest size. Undoubtedly, the need to promote the idea of the Reformation among ordinary people in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was best fulfilled by Katechizm brzeski, hence it was among the editorial priorities of Wojewódka and Radziwiłł. The printer and his patron must have known that the catechisms belonged to the basic body of the denominations of each confession, and therefore they wanted to get this printout quickly. In addition, the date of the letter of the Hozjusz’s informant speaks in favour of the publication of Katechizm brzeski in 1553 – as, in January 1554, Szymon Marycjusz was staying in Chełmno, next to Toruń, where, as a chancellor of the Chełmno bishop Jan Lubodzieski, he spied the progress of the Reformation in the Ducal and Royal Prussia.7 If we assume that, at the beginning of 1554, Wojewódka issued Katechizm brzeski, then it is unlikely that a message from Brest Litovsk, located more than 400 kilometres away from Chełmno, reached Marycjusz in the winter time within a dozen or so days. It is known for certain that, in January 1554, Wojewódka was busy printing Sposoby ... mówienia by Urban Rhegius, and let us remember that this print is dated 22 January 1554. To sum up, Katechizm brzeski of 1553 was the second, after Catechizmus prasty šadei by Martynas Mažvydas (Königsberg 1547) of the type of publication intended for the reader from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The author, or, better to say, the compiler of Katechizm brzeski, is unknown, though Natalia Bierezkina supposes that it was created by Wojewódka with the support of Andrzej Trzecieski the younger.8

Radziwiłł carefully chose the place of the Protestant printing house and the church. In Brest-Litovsk, Radziwiłł the Black was the starosta – the supreme head of the State in the town, so the followers and propagators of the new confession could feel safe there. Moreover, Brest was located in the Catholic diocese of Lutsk, far from the headquarters of the bishop, who, moreover, could not cope with the power of the political or economic influence of the magnate.9 The location of Brest can be considered strategic: it was the ‘gate’ to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, it was located in the middle of the royal route between Cracow and Vilnius, moreover, only Podlasie region separated Brest-Litovsk from the Ducal Prussia. The Reformation in the Calvinist spirit flowed to the town from Lesser Poland, whereas from Prussia came the Lutheran spirit.

Theological backgrounds: Luther, Calvin and... Osiander

This alliance of influences is revealed in Katechizm brzeski, eclectic in terms of the confession, which was characteristic of the first Protestant catechisms in the Polish-Lithuanian State. The nobility sympathetic to the Reformation fought with arguments against the Roman Catholic Church, while their orientation in the doctrines of the Protestant Churches was still vague in the 1550s.

Katechizm brzeski is listed as a Calvinist catechism because the Decalogue is presented in a form typical of Reformed Evangelicalism: the first commandment was included there as two, the second (for Catholics and Lutherans) is the third, etc., while the tenth is a combination of the ninth and the last for non-Calvinists.10 This arrangement exposes the iconoclasm that is important to the Reformed: “lest we give praise and prayer [...] to any images, bow to them, worship them, or kneel before them”.11 Only once does the Calvinist idea of engrafting the faithful into Christ appear (p. 52). The author considers only Baptism and the Lord’s Supper to be sacraments.

There are many more gaps and understatements in the theology of John Calvin. Pułaski already pointed out the lack of predestination.12 However, one cannot blame the author of Katechizm brzeski about it. The topic of predestination, as Alister McGrath noted, occupies only 1% of the volume of Calvin’s vast theological output.13 Not because the reformer from Geneva considered it marginal – quite the contrary. Calvin thought he had discovered an immensely important secret in the Bible (decretum horrible), too terrible to entrust it to theologically unprepared believers. Probably this was also the intention of the author of Katechizm brzeski – not to serve old wine to young heads. Only a distant echo of predestination is found in the assertion that good deeds confirm that man is chosen for salvation (p. 65). This assertion corresponds with the doctrin syllogismus practicus which is characteristic for Reformed.14 Yet the Brest-based author’s liability is to avoid understanding the sacrament of the Altar, which is key to Christian theology. Katechizm brzeski does not answer whether to accept it in one or two forms, it omits the question of transubstantiation (Catholics), consubstantiation (Lutherans) or symbolic reception of bread and wine (Reformed). The sacrament of Baptism is understood as washing sins with water (p. 18, 19) which is in oposition to the Reformed meaning (man is washed only with Christ’s blood).15 Moreover, the author of the catechism is far from the pessimistic Calvinist anthropology, which will be discussed in more detail below. Historian of Reformation Ignacy Warmiński, who analyzed the Calvinist catechisms of 1537-1554, did not find – in terms of the content or arrangement – any catechism that could be the source of inventio for the print from Brest.16

In order to correctly identify other confessional inspirations in Katechizm brzeski, one shall specify the adiaphoric elements. Contrary to the opinion of Aleksander Woyde, the denominational (not unequivocally Catholic) element is the discussion of the Apostolic Creed in twelve articles.17 This tradition is associated with Catholicism, but it also occurs in Lutheran catechisms, for example in Johannes Brenz’s Catechismus minor of 1527-1528. Believing in the power of angels (p. 16, 36) is not contrary to Protestantism, and their presence in devotion was allowed in all Protestant Europe.18 Permanently rooted in the Middle Ages was the conviction about the war that man wages against Satan, the world and the body (p. 16); this conviction was present in both Catholic and Protestant artes bene moriendi.19

Teaching on justification by faith through grace gives Katechizm brzeski an evidently Protestant profile. The author develops, often in a beautiful, pictorial language, the ideas of sola fide, sola gratia, solus Christus, while the idea of sola Scriptura is less emphasised (which is understandable in view of the lack of a Protestant translation of the whole Bible at the time). An interesting feature is the avoidance of the name of Mary in the catechism – Jesus was twice called the metonymy “maiden seed” (p. 33, 36, and not earthly son of Mary), and this name appears only once in the consideration of the fragment from the Creed (p. 7). The doctrine of justification, being crucial in the Protestant dogma, was competently formulated on the basis of Luther’s theology of the Cross. Already in the tenth article of the Creed, it is stated that “through the faith I have, by the merit and payment of the most precious blood of Christ, certain washing and forgiveness of sins” (p. 11). This thread is raised many times, and, with it, the idea of the certainty of salvation: “I firmly believe that Jesus is my sure savior” (p. 6).

If an Evangelical believes in the certainty of salvation, why should he do good deeds? In the dialogue between the Son and the Father, in the dialogical form of Katechismus więtszy, the second part of the Katechizm brzeski, the Father extensively explains their meaning in the Christian’s life. They are not means to be justified (man has that “for free,” p. 34), but the fruit of justification. Man is to do them “having become righteous by faith, that is, freed by Christ from sins” (p. 63). Before giving as many as nine arguments for doing good deeds, the author illustrated them with a beautiful metaphor: good deeds are the fruit of a good tree (p. 64) – this good tree is Christ’s faith and grace.

In the analysis of the theological profile of Katechizm brzeski, researchers emphasise the presence of passages on penance. According to Dariusz Kuźmina, it is a testimony to the author’s “knowledge of Catholic dogmatics,”20 and Franciszek Pułaski would find these fragments “a stone of offense and scandal for the Lutherans of that time.”21 Both researchers made the mistake of ahistoricism, accusing the author of being under Catholic influence.22 Martin Luther, although he did not consider penance as a sacrament (already in the treatise On Babylonian Captivity of 1520), still believed that confession of sins can take place both before God and a neighbor. It is commanded by God. The Reformer allowed for the practice of aural (private) confession, based on repentance and the faith of the sinner, whereas confession should bring absolution and pastoral catechesis. That is why he recommended it – albeit within the Christian freedom – to young people and people with ungrounded confessional convictions.23 The author of Katechizm brzeski discusses penance in the same way: private confession with a priest is a customary practice (p. 20–21), and it can be used by people who cannot calm their conscience by “considering the merits of Christ’s death and absolution in general confession” (p. 43).

Very interesting reflections of Lutheranism in Katechizm brzeski are the frequent references to the thoughts of Andreas Osiander.24 This controversial Lutheran theologian spent the last four years (1549-1552) of his stormy life in the Ducal Prussia, Königsberg (Królewiec), protected by Prince Albrecht Hohenzollern. Osiander preached the view that Christ’s grace not only forgives the sins of the faithful, but even sanctifies him. He did not understand justification in legal terms the way most Lutheran theologians do, but as the complete, effective indwelling of Christ’s righteousness in man. Thanks to this, there is metanoia, complete renewal, or even sanctification of man in the image of God. Osiander preached an optimistic teaching about the relationship of the believer with God. A person justified by grace through faith undergoes a radical spiritual transformation, thus becoming almost a saint.25 The author of Katechizm brzeski smuggled Osiander’s views (which were heterodox towards the mainstream of Lutheran theology) into the second part of his work (Katechismus więtszy). Of the many references to Osiandrism (p. 29, 42-43, 49-50, 53) let us recall one:

[...] there is no condemnation for those who are engrafted into Christ, so that they have unity with him in spirit and body, in the number of these people I am, grafted into Christ through the holiness of his baptism, his body and blood, and because I am in him engrafted, his goods are mine [...], his righteousness is my own righteousness (p. 52).

Katechizm brzeski is an original work in two ways: it is not a translation of any of the German or French catechisms, and it is at the same time a compilation of the theologies of Calvin and Luther. The elements of this mosaic of influences have already been partially revealed by researchers. The anonymous author borrowed an introduction to his work from the catechism of Urban Rhegius from 1543 (Catechesis illustris Principi Francisco Othoni, Brunsvicenscium Luneburgensiumque Duci, puero generosissimo et toti scholae ducali dicata), published four times between 1543-1545 in Magdeburg, Wittenberg, and Leipzig.26 In his considerations on the Decalogue, the author of Katechizm brzeski used phrases from Katechizm tekstu prostego dla prostego ludu [Catechism of the simple text for the common people] (the so-called Katechizm mniejszy) by Jan Seklucjan (Königsberg 1544).27 Quite a few passages about ars bene moriendi were taken over by the author from the treatise of Rhegius Medicina animae (first edition in 1529, and not, as Pułaski says, 1537)28, and this extremely popular pastoral work had as many as 90 editions in ten languages. The author of Katechizm brzeski took over these fragments from the Polish translation Medicina animae titled Lekarstwo duszne a przyprawienie myśli człowieczej ku śmierci [Soul Medicine and Seasoning Human Thought to Death], probably translated by Jan Seklucjan (Königsberg 1551).29

To add to these well-known philological findings: Margarita Korzo and Dainora Pociūtė found out that the anonymous author in the second part of his Katechizm brzeski used the very popular in the Polish-Lithuanian State (from the mid-16^th century until 1640) Catechismus minor by Johannes Brenz (Brencius) from 1527–1528 (published in Latin in 1532).30 Brenz’s text begins with the question “Who are you?”, to which the answer is that “according to the first birth I am a rational man, created by God, and according to the new birth – a Christian.”31 In the Polish catechism, the Son asks the Father quite unexpectedly the question: “Also, Father, who are you?”. The Father’s answer is identical to that of Brenz, although not so brilliant – the German theologian put it in one sentence, but the Polish author, not counting on the reader’s ésprit, speaks about two births on two pages (p. 71-72, while in octavo it takes three pages). Another proof that the Polish author uses Brenz’s catechism is also convincing: the analysis of the Creed in both texts consists of twelve identical parts.

The author of Katechizm brzeski could have been encouraged to reach for the work of the German theologian by the fame that Brencius enjoyed in Europe and perhaps by the example of Primož Trubar who created a catechism in the Slovene language (1550) by using a model from Brenz.32 It must have also been significant that, in 1552, Brenz was asked by Prince Albreht Hohenzollern to mediate in the Osiandrian controversy, and the theologian issued a verdict in which he did not depreciate (or endorse) Osiander’s theology.33 This decision must have been of use to the Polish author who, as we know, was eager to draw on the Osiandrian concept of effective justification – sanctification.

Conclusions

The above analyses lead to four conclusions:

1. Katechizm brzeski was published in the second half of 1553.

2. This theologically eclectic catechism is an attempt to find iunctim between Martin Luther’s and John Calvin’s influences. The Lutheran influences prevail.

3. Katechizm brzeski’s author used not only the catechism of Jan Seklucjan (1544), but also two works by Urban Rhegius (catechism from 1543, Medicina animae in the Polish translation, 1551) and Catechismus minor (1527-1528) by Johannes Brenz.

4. The compiler was well versed in the Osiandrian controversy taking place in the 1550s in the nearby Ducal Prussia. As a supporter of Andreas Osiander, he applied to Katechizm brzeski his optimistic anthropology to the newest – formally Calvinist – catechism.

Reference list

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