Apocryphal Visions before Dante: Apocalypse of Paul and Tundale’s Vision

Introduction
Overview

Worms that infest men’s genitals and hot chains that encircle women’s necks comprise just two

of the images in the apocryphal visons of the Apocalypse of Paul and Tundale’s Vision. Often,

contemporary readers focus on the graphic-novel aspect of this literary genre. The shock of eternal

torture explains why Dante’s Inferno is read more than either Purgatorio or Paradiso. A naïve view of

Christian after-life visions assumes that they vary little and use standard literary tropes like harrowing

journeys, fiery punishments and superbeings casting mayhem on helpless sinners. Yet, I maintain that

reading past the infernal trauma can reveal important aspects of the culture’s and the Church’s values

for each vision’s historical milieu. I also maintain that those values affect the vision’s narrative strategy.

My proposition is that even though the Apocalypse of Paul and Tundale’s Vision share common after-life

literary images and symbology, their ideas of judgment and mercy reveal significant differences. Each

vision’s historical and cultural context can help to explain the differences in how they express judgment

and mercy and how they develop their narrative strategies. So, how did their historical contexts affect

their ideas of judgment and mercy? In order to discuss these issues, one must understand the textual

history of each vision.

Textual History

An unknown author composed the Apocalypse of Paul in the mid-third century when a

community of loosely affiliated entities constituted the Church. The original text is thought to be

Egyptian in origin, written in Greek, with a preface added in the year 388.1 Succeeding authors revised

1
Theodore Silverstein, Visio Sancti Pauli: The History of the Apocalypse in Latin, Together with Nine Texts (London:
Christophers, 1935).

1
and redacted the text as it transitioned over time. Readers delighted so much in the narrative, that the

Middle Ages produced many redactions in a number of different languages. To understand the historical

context for the Apocalypse of Paul, one must imagine the structure of the early Church. During the first

few centuries, different geographical Christian communities engaged in conflicting ideas about doctrinal

issues. The early Church, as reflected in the Apocalypse of Paul, needed to define what were orthodox

ideas and what were heretical ideas. By contrast, during the time of Tundale’s Vision the Church needed

to address different issues.

An Irish monk named Marcus wrote Tundale’s Vision around 1149. Tundale’s Vision became one

of the most popular after-life visions with 154 manuscripts found of the Latin text dating from the

twelfth to the nineteenth century.2 Prior to the eleventh and twelfth century, the religious hierarchy in

Ireland were often more interested in the welfare of secular rulers than the welfare of the Church.

During the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the Church attempted to address this issue through reform.

Among other reforms that dealt with church governance, the Church advocated for a clergy that was

free from secular rule. The implicit message that Tundale’s Vision proclaims is how a secular ruler

undergoes a spiritual transformation and gives up his immoral life. Where the issue of freedom from

secular rule drives the form and the content of Tundale’s Vision, heresy drives the form and content of

The Apocalypse of Paul. Underlying each vision are the foundational issues of judgment and mercy. In

order to understand, these concepts more clearly, I will provide an overview of the analysis of form.

Form Introduction

Overview

For the analysis of form, I use a narratological literary approach that examines the protagonist

and what I call a guiding character. By narratology, I mean the literary approach to stories that deals

2
Silverstein.

2
with the structure and narration of a story. One aspect of a text’s structure, is the way that the

characters enact a story’s plot. For the purposes of this paper, I will limit the scope of the narratological

analysis to the protagonist and the guiding character. While a contemporary reader most likely

understands the function of a protagonist, the idea of a guiding character may be foreign. In both the

Apocalypse of Paul and in Tundale’s Vision, a guiding character advises and accompanies the protagonist

in the after-life, similar to how Virgil advises and accompanies Dante in The Divine Comedy. In both

Apocalypse of Paul and Tundale’s Vision, angels act as guiding characters. The guiding characters help

the protagonist navigate through the shock of the after-life. Each guiding character interacts with the

protagonist in a different manner. Who the protagonist is and why the protagonist was chosen for the

respective vision dictates the nature of the relationship between the protagonist and the guiding

character.

Protagonist

In an apocryphal vision, the function of each protagonist is to receive God’s message of justice

and mercy as it is understood within the vision’s historical construct. The Apocalypse of Paul enlists the

Apostle Paul as a character who possesses the moral authority to witness judgment against those who

hold beliefs contra to orthodoxy. Paul serves as an exemplum of orthodox Christianity. From the after-

life, Paul receives what is considered a vision of correct judgement and relays it back to the earthly

realm. On the other hand, the protagonist Tundale is a fictional nobleman who during his early life

acted as a cruel and vengeful sinner. As a result of his voyage in the after-life, Tundale rehabilitates his

character; expresses remorse for his behavior and accepts the punishment necessary wherein God can

expiate his sins. Tundale represents the secular ruler who understands his sins, has sorrow for them and

as a result experiences God’s mercy. Both Paul and Tundale fulfill the role of a protagonist—that is to

receive the message of God’s justice and mercy in accordance with their historical construct.

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Guiding Angel

As a character, a guiding angel embodies the historical Church’s doctrine. It conveys the

Church’s conception of God’s justice and mercy to its historical period. Paul and Tundale differ in how

they relate to their guiding character. In the Apocalypse of Paul, Paul sometimes weeps when he sees

the damned punished. However, Paul’s guiding angel often rebukes Paul’s empathetic reactions. His

guiding angel asks him why he mourns. Does he believe that he is more merciful than the Lord? In

contrast, the guiding angel in Tundale’s vision treats Tundale more tenderly. As Tundale traverses the

after-life, he must undergo punishments and purifications. In almost every instance, his guiding angel

reassures him that he will make it to the other side safely. What accounts for the differences in how the

guiding angel treats the protagonists? One way to explain it is by examining how the vision’s author

structures the hierarchy of hell. A relationship between a vision’s hierarchy of sin and the vision’s

historical context can explain why the relationships between the protagonists and guiding angels are

different. One way to understand the visions’ content is via a vision’s hierarchy of sin. I will analyze the

content of the visions by focusing on how the author structures the vision’s levels of hell.

Content Introduction

A vision’s hierarchy of sins provides a synecdochical construct of that vision’s moral universe. As

the protagonists travel through hell, they visit punishment spaces segregated into levels from least to

most severe sin. For my analysis, I want to focus on the most severe sin for each vision and the sin most

prevalent in both. I will narrow the examination, therefore, to three types of sins: heretical sins, self-

serving sins committed by the clergy and sexual sins. I focus on sexual sins for two reasons. From a sheer

number count, sexual sins represent the most sins in each of the sinful hierarchies. In the Apocalypse of

Paul, sexual sins comprise nine of the twenty-six hell tranches (see Appendix 1 - Hierarchy of Sins) while

4
in Tundale’s Vision they represent three out of eleven. Another reason to focus on sexual sins is because

the Christian church defined its views on sexuality differently from Jewish and Greco-Roman cultures.

Just as Christianity defined its sexual norms against an opposing belief system, the Church’s

defined its normative theology in response to heresy. By identifying what was heretical, the Church

constructed an orthodox set of beliefs. In the Apocalypse of Paul, heretical ideas represent of the two

most severe sin categories. In the early centuries, the Church utilized orthodoxy to include or exclude

member. It reinstated members who recanted their heretical ideas and excluded those who did not. The

Apocalypse of Paul treats heretical sins more severely because a fluid theological landscape threatened

early Christianity. By defining a normative theology, Christianity solidified its community in a period of

persecution. Although the Apocalypse of Paul deems heresy as the most severe sin, Tundale’s Vision

constructs a different moral universe.

Tundale’s Vision makes sins committed by church officials who act out of their own self-interest

the most severe sin. Prior to the eleventh and twelfth century church reforms, secular rulers who were

more interested in their own welfare could easily infiltrate the Church and hold positions of power. The

church reforms in the eleventh and twelfth centuries focused on freeing the Church from secular rule.

The Church sought to sanction secular and church officials who acted to benefit themselves and secular

interests. As a result, Tundale’s Vision lists sins of church officials as the most severe sin.

The sinful hierarchy, therefore, provides a useful way to examine the values of the Church for a

given historical period. Examining the most egregious sins and the most wide-spread sin constitutes an

efficient way to understand the cultural concerns of each vision. Given an overview of what this paper

will examine, I will describe how I will proceed in the analysis of form and content.

5
 Method of Proceeding

For the analysis of form, I will discuss and extend the work done by Evelyn Birge Vitz in Medieval

Narrative and Modern Narratology: Subjects and Objects of Desire. Vitz characterizes the medieval

narrative as being constituted by subjects whose desire causes them to pursue objects to fulfill their

desire. I contend that while desire contributes a small part to what drives the medieval vision narrative,

a larger force is at work. The engine that impels after-life visions is the need for a Church community to

explain what it values. An apocryphal vision explains the church’s values by purporting to speak for

God’s judgement and mercy. The behavior that God judges is what the church condemns and the

behavior unto which God provides mercy is what the church values. An apocalyptic vision communicates

God’s judgment and mercy through a guiding character and a protagonist. I will present a protagonist

and a guiding mentor for each of the narratives and explain their differences while describing how they

fit into the historical context for their respective narratives.

For the analysis of content, I will examine the work done by Kathy Gaca in The Making of

Fornication: Eros, Ethics, and Political Reform in Greek Philosophy and Early Christianity. I will discuss the

content of the narratives by looking at three categories of sin: sexual sin, sins related to heresy and sins

committed by the clergy and church hierarchy. For the category of sexual sin, I wish to argue against

Gaca’s contention that early Christianity’s ideas about sexual behavior represented an aberrant

historical change when contrasted to Greco-Roman sexual norms. While Christian sexual behavior

differed from Greco-Roman culture, I maintain that Christian sexual behavior can better be understood

as an extension of Judaic culture’s sexual behavior. Although Christianity, more than Judaism, placed a

greater emphasis upon abstinence as an alternative sexual behavior choice, sexual attitudes between

Christianity and Judaism did not differ greatly. For the analysis of sins related to heresy and those

committed by the clergy, I will show how these sins reflect the realities of the Church’s history during

each of the narrative’s historical periods. But first, I will examine the form of the visions and explain my

6
theory, contra Vitz’s, about what aspect of form drives the narrative of after-life visions. My examination

will focus on the protagonists and the guiding characters of the visions.

Analysis of Form
Overview

In an after-life vision, a protagonist’s role is to subject themselves to a supernatural force who

places them in experiences that will make them understand the structure of God’s mercy and justice. A

protagonist in an after-life visions does not function as an autonomous individual. The modern idea of a

self-determining protagonist who initiates its own activities runs counter to after-life visions.

Protagonists do not choose to participate in an after-life journey. They must go on the journey, observe

what is presented to them and conform their own life to what is revealed. The driving force of an after-

life narrative compels the protagonist to comprehend God’s justice and mercy and report it back after

the vision. This idea differs from Vitz’s formulation. For Vitz, desire drives characters within a medieval

story. She maintains that while desire is a preoccupation with all literature, in medieval works “it is

virtually the sole characterological principle.”3 Vitz’s uses A.J. Greimas’s actantel model as the

foundation for her theory. Greimas, who was a 20th century French-Lithuanian literary theorist,

developed the actantel model. In the model, six actants (sometimes understood as characters) are

driven along three axes.4 For medieval literature, Vitz foregrounds the axis of desire, whereby a subject

desires an object. As an example, a prince (subject) desires a grail (object). In her study of medieval

narratives, Vitz emphasizes desire because she believes that the characters in medieval narratives do

not have the capacity for self-reflection. Unlike a modern narrative where a character’s self-

consciousness often drives the narrative, a medieval character lacks self-consciousness. Therefore, she

3
Evelyn Birge Vitz, Medieval Narrative and Modern Narratology: Subjects and Objects of Desire (New York: New
York University Press, 1989), 3.
4
Louis Hébert, “Algirdas Julien Greimas : The Actantial Model / Signo - Applied Semiotics Theories,” accessed July
7, 2018, http://www.signosemio.com/greimas/actantial-model.asp.

7
believes that a medieval narrative tells the reader what a character wants (desires) but not what a

character thinks. I agree with Vitz that medieval protagonists do not self-reflect. However, I do not agree

with her supposition that lack of self-reflection makes desire the driving force in the narrative. Yet, Vitz

adds an interesting sidelight about how medieval characters can be measured on horizontal and vertical

scales.

Vitz contends that a vertical scale measures how characters differentiate themselves in terms of

holiness. A horizontal scale measures how characters differentiate themselves in terms of human

qualities. The vertical axis explains the character’s relation to God, while the horizontal scale

demonstrates how a character’s personality contrasts with other characters. A medieval narrative

emphasizes the vertical scale, while a modern narrative emphasizes the horizontal. I agree with Vitz

that a medieval protagonist does need to prove themselves on the vertical dimension. I also agree with

Vitz that medieval characters lack the modern sensibility to differentiate themselves from their fellow

characters along the horizontal. Yet because no real multi-dimensional characters inhabit after-life

visions, I believe that the horizontal scale counts for very little among medieval protagonists.

In pre-Dante apocryphal visions, I contend that one-dimensional characters exist in two sets of

oppositions: human vs. supernatural and sinful vs. holy. A human protagonist can begin its journey as

holy or sinful, but they will complete it as holy. I suggest that a vision is more interesting with a

protagonist who transitions from human and sinful to quasi-supernatural and holy. Likewise, a guiding

character who displays more human qualities makes the vision more interesting. However, most after-

life visions do not have rounded characters as we have become accustomed to in modern narratives. In

pre-Dante visions, the characters are fairly one dimensional. For instance, in after-life visions, the role of

protagonists is to work as reporters without choice in their assignment. As embedded journalists, they

observe and describe the mayhem surrounding judgment and punishment in the after-life. At times, as

in Tundale’s case, they must undergo judgment and punishment. The protagonists also learn who and

8
why someone receives mercy. Protagonists must assent to what is presented and report back from the

front so that others may learn about God’s judgment and mercy. The guiding angel explains to the

protagonist the values with which they must conform. In both visions, the guiding angel illustrates

God’s justice and mercy. To the protagonist in the Apocalypse of Paul, however, the quality of mercy is

often strained and that is apparent from its opening.

Apocalypse of Paul – Protagonist and Guiding Angel

The opening of the vision illustrates how Paul receives the tenor of God’s judgment. It begins

with an unnamed nobleman from Tarsus who lives in the same house where the apostle Paul had lived.

An angel wakes the man and tells him that he should break up his house’s foundation and publish what

he finds there. Because he believes that a lying spirit delivered the message, the man ignores the vision

twice. On the third time, however, the angel scourges him for ignoring the call and forces him to dig up

the foundation. When the man finds a box encased with lead, he fears he does not have the authority to

open it, so he takes it to a judge. The judge, fearing that his authority is insufficient to open it, sends the

manuscript to the emperor Theodosius. Within the lead case, Theodosius finds a manuscript of Saint

Paul’s revelation. Theodosius makes a copy of the manuscript and sends it to Jerusalem. The opening

provides an overture to the narrative’s theme of who has the authority to judge.

The narrative’s opening illustrates a judgmental hierarchy. The unnamed man sits at the lowest

point in the hierarchy. The angel scourges him because he does not possess sufficient judgment to

comply with the angel’s first two prompts to find the manuscript. The manuscript signals authority

because it resides in a box incased with lead. As a man of humility, the unnamed man finally judges

correctly that he does not have the authority to open the box and he presents it to a judge. The judge

realizes that the manuscript exceeds his authority to open it and sends the manuscript to the emperor.

As the ultimate secular ruler, the emperor judges correctly that he has the authority to open the

9
manuscript but also realizes that the manuscript must be shared with a religious leader. He sends the

manuscript to Jerusalem, which represents one of the centers of the Church as established by the First

Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325. Within the vertical hierarchy of judgment that exists between church and

state, the manuscript reaches its apex. At this point, the author has defined the appropriate hierarchy.

Now the narrator changes from a third person omniscient narrator to the Apostle Paul who narrates in

the first person.

Sometimes, the narrator shift from third person omniscient to first person could portend a shift

of power. In a narrative, the one who narrates can dictate who has the power of judgement. In the

Apocalypse of Paul, the narrator shift happens in an abrupt way and is worth reviewing. After the

narrative’s introduction ends, the omniscient narrator stops suddenly and Paul begins. The omniscient

narrator tells us that the once hidden document was sent to the emperor Theodosius. The narrator

relates that Theodosius opens it, presumably reads it and sends a copy to Jerusalem. Paul’s voice enters

as narrator immediately after Theodosius completes his role.

. . . when the emperor had received it he opened it, and found the revelation of Saint Paul, a
copy which he sent to Jerusalem, and he retained the original himself.

While I was in my body in which I was snatched up to the third heaven, the word of the Lord
came to me . . . 5
The narrator shift begins with how “I [Paul] was snatched up to the third heaven.” The line refers to

Paul’s experience in 2 Corinthians 12: 2-4.

I know a person in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether
in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows. And I know that such a person—
whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows—was caught up into Paradise
and heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat.

5
Jean-Michel Picard, trans., The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1989), 620:2-
3.

10
The Apocalypse of Paul, therefore, purports to be the never told vision that Paul claims he received in 2

Corinthians 12. Given that the vision is referenced from the gospel, it would seem that the hierarchy of

judgment is elevated even further from the earthly to the heavenly because the manuscript is based on

Paul, an apostle who transcends secular and ecclesiastical rule. The irony is that while Paul has name

status, he does not have the power to judge within the vision narrative. This means he does not have

the power to define orthodoxy. The Apocalypse of Paul demonstrates how even an apostle must

conform to what is revealed.

An examination of the structural difference between narration and focalization explains why

Paul is a narrator without power of judgment. In narratology, focalization refers to how a story

represents a particular perception of reality, as if the story was put through a filter. While Paul delivers

the narrator function (i.e. he is the one who tells the story), the focalization function comes in a

different manner. Gérard Genette originated the term focalization to separate narration from point of

view.6 Genette wanted to make a more accurate distinction between who reports the story (the

narrator) and who presents the point of view (the focalizer). Focalization can come from the narrator,

another character or a set of characters. While Paul is the narrator who tells the story, the guiding angel

is the focalizer who presents the Church’s orthodox doctrine. Focalization takes place in the background

through the passing of judgmental information from God to angel to Paul. Paul simply narrates what he

receives and the judgement that he receives aligns with Church orthodoxy.

Paul demonstrates his lack of judgment in an episode from the vision. After Paul is swept up to

heaven, he witnesses a guiding angel judging a sinner. The sinner claimed that while he was in the world

he knew nothing other than to “enjoy what is in the world; for who is there who has descended into hell

6
Gerard Genette, The Narrative Discourse: An Essay in Method, trans. Jane E. Lewin (Ithaca: Cornell University
Press, 1983).

11
and, ascending has declared to us that there is judgment there!”7 The sinner’s response is heretical

because he questions the existence of Christ and his redemptive mission. The sinner’s guardian angel,

who speaks for the Church’s orthodoxy, tells the sinner that it had tried to minister to him while he was

alive but the sinner would not listen and now the sinner must “go on then to the just judge.”8 God has

no mercy for the sinner and he tells the angel Tartaruchus to cast the sinner into darkness. After this

judgment, Paul relates that he heard the “the voice of angels and archangels saying. ‘You are just, Lord,

and your judgement is just.’”9 The angels who proclaim the Lord’s justice represent the Church

proclaiming its power of judgment. Paul possesses no authority to judge. Indeed, not only is he

powerless to judge, he must accept rebuke. As an example, when Paul hears a sinner recount the horror

of his punishment, Paul empathizes: “When I heard this, I wept and groaned over the human race.”10

Paul’s guiding angel, however, reprimands Paul asking him “’Why do you weep? Are you more merciful

than God?’”11 His guiding angel continually reminds Paul that he possesses no power. God and the

earthly Church judge.

Paul’s lack of judgment demonstrates itself in another part of the vision. After Paul is released

back to his earthly life, his guiding angel relates that he is favored because no one else received this type

of revelation. The guiding angel tells Paul that he “’is given this mystery and revelation; as you please

make it known to the sons of men.’” Mysteriously when he returns to his earthly life, he does not reveal

the vision. Instead, he writes it down and buries it under the ground of his house. When Paul dies he

meets the Lord who questions Paul’s judgment in the vision saying, “’Paul, have we shown all these

things to you that you should deposit it under the foundation of a house? Then send and disclose this

7
J. K. Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament: A Collection of Apocryphal Christian Literature in an English
Translation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 625.
8
Elliott, 625.
9
Elliott, 626.
10
Picard, The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin, 634:3.
11
Picard, 634:3.

12
revelation that men may read it and turn to the way of truth, they also may not come to these bitter

torments.”12 The Lord provided with Paul this vision and he did nothing with it. What was Paul thinking?

Where was his judgment? And what are we to make of the contradiction between the vision and the

gospel. In the vision the Lord asks Paul why he hasn’t revealed the vision to others. But 2 Corinthians 12

warns Paul not to share the vision. One can draw only two conclusions. The first is that the writer of the

vision was unware of 2 Corinthians 12. However, given that the vision references Paul being swept up

into the third heaven, which is an intentional reference to 2 Corinthians 12, it is more probable that the

vision’s author simply ignored the fact that Paul was told not to share his vision in the biblical text. The

vision is used, therefore, to assert the Church’s power of judgment and demonstrate the character

Paul’s humility to adhere to that judgment. Another way that the vision portrays Paul’s humility is by

depicting the character Paul as less knowledgeable than the historical Paul.

The vision places Paul in the position of being an unknowledgeable and humble initiate. Unlike

the historical person, who commands respect for his spiritual acumen, the character Paul asks his

guiding angel question after question: “Sir who are these who are not admitted to enter into the City of

Christ?”13 and “Sir, how did David alone above the other saints make a beginning of psalm-singing?”14

and “’Sir, what is Alleluia?”’15 The exasperated angel, looks at Paul and tells him “‘You ask questions

about everything.’’”16 The character Paul knows less than the historical Paul. What purpose does it serve

to have Paul reduced to a neophyte concerning God’s justice and mercy? One can examine it by utilizing

two concepts from narratology.

12
Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament, 643–44.
13
Elliott, 630:24.
14
Elliott, 632:29.
15
Elliott, 632:30.
16
Elliott, 632:30.

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 The first concept describes Paul’s character type. In the narrative, Paul is a homodiegetic

narrator, i.e. a narrator who also is a character in the story. Unlike an omniscient narrator who does not

appear as a character, Paul is both narrator and character. The second concept involves an

epistemological state that can be associated with a homodiegetic narrator. This concept, paradoxical

paralipsis, refers to a situation where a homodiegetic narrator knows either more or less than their

corresponding character. Because a reader cannot explain the knowledge gap between the narrator and

character, the term paradoxical is applied. James Phelan, who originated the concept, uses a modern

example from the novel The Great Gatsby.17 Nick Carroway, is a homodiegetic narrator because he is

both a narrator and character. The paradoxical paralipsis happens because Nick, the narrator, describes

a scene of which Nick, the character, could not possibly have knowledge. The reader is not told why an

inconsistency in knowledge exists between the narrator and the character.

For the concept of paradoxical paralipsis, I want to make an extension that concerns the

knowledge gap between the historical Paul and the character Paul. The questions that the character

Paul asks his guiding angel are questions that the historical Paul would not ask because he would already

know the answers. Phelan explains Nick Carroway’s inconsistency of knowledge in The Great Gatsby by

saying that Fitzgerald was not concerned with “how Nick knows what he narrates but [is only

concerned] that this scene be narrated and that the information it contains come to us as

authoritative.”18 I account for the inconsistency in knowledge between Paul the apostle and Paul the

character in a manner somewhat similar to the way Phelan accounts for Carroway’s inconsistency. I

contend that Paul the character is used in the vision in two manners. The vision requires the historical

Paul as a character to lend stature to the story. At the same time, the vision needs a narrator that can

17
James Phelan, Narrative as Rhetoric: Technique, Audiences, Ethics, Ideology (Columbus: Ohio State University
Press, 1996).
18
Phelan, 108.

14
receive and accept the Church’s orthodoxy. Paul the character possesses a knowledge gap so that the

narrative can show that even someone who is as renown as Paul can have the humility to accept what is

revealed. The character Paul, unlike some other men of knowledge during the early centuries of the

Church, lacks the hubris of postulating his own theological conceptions. Where many knowledgeable

men developed ideas that were ultimately deemed heretical by the church, the character Paul accepts

what is revealed to him by his guiding angel.

In the Apocalypse of Paul, the guiding angel has three functions. Two functions occur while a

person is still living and one at the time of judgement. During a person’s life, the guiding angel resides

with their assigned human and they watch over them to see if they are behaving ethically. Because the

angels are cognizant of that fact that people have free will, they cannot dictate a human’s behavior.

While a person lives, the angels have a laissez faire mentoring role. However, every angel must report

their human’s behavior twice a day to the Lord. A human stores the data about their ethical behavior in

their soul. At death and the time of judgment, the guiding angel performs a soul ex-ray. Based on their

person’s earthly behavior, angels become attorneys for or against the human during a judgment session.

Paul’s guiding angel has an additional function. He explains to Paul how judgment and mercy works in

the after-life so that he can reveal it back on earth.

In the vision, Paul’s guiding angel brings Paul to a reporting and judgment session so that he can

witness first-hand how the Lord administers justice. At the reporting session, the first angels to present

are the angels of holy people who are still in the world. The Lord replies to the reporting angels that his

Son will be present with them and guide them. Afterwards, the angels for humans who are living a sinful

life report. The Lord tells the angels that they must “minister to them until they be converted and

repent, but if they do not return to me I will judge them.”19 When a person dies and it comes time for a

19
Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament, 623:10.

15
judgment session, both impious and holy angels peer inside the human’s soul looking for their own

angelic likeness. In the case of the holy man, we are told that the impious angels “saw no likeness in

him.”20 The holy angel looks inside the holy man and tells the Lord that he “’had found a place of

refreshment in it, acting according to your judgement.”21 For an unholy man’s judgment session, a

similar process takes place. The holy and unholy angels gather, but the holy angels do not find a

reflection of themselves in the sinner. The guardian angel for the sinful man tells the man that if it were

up to him, he would not have ministered to the man, even for one day. But because the Lord is just, “he

himself commanded us that we should not cease to minister to the soul till you should repent, but you

have lost the time of repentance . . . Let us go on then to the just judge.”22

While the angels in the Apocalypse of Paul focus heavily on judgment, they focus lightly on

mercy. When the human is alive, an angel “ministers” to the human but with little effect and with little

energy. It delights in its stay in a holy people but complains about its stay in sinful people. As a resident

of the soul, it can exert little power to change a human. However, when it comes to judgment, it acts

vigorously. Twice a day an angel judges a human’s behavior against church doctrine and reports back to

God. When a person dies, the angel performs a spiritual screening and forwards the results to the Lord.

Finally, it directs the person to their appropriate place in the after-life pre-judgment queue so that God

can assign them to their eternal fate. In both the earthly realm and the after-life, an angel doggedly

measures the human against the morality of the Church. We will look again at the guiding angel during

the analysis of Tundale and we will be surprised at the differences in how it acts concerning justice and

mercy.

20
624:14.
21
Elliott, 624-625:14.
22
Elliott, 625:16.

16
 Tundale’s Vision – Protagonist and Guiding Angel

In regard to the concepts of judgment and mercy, the opening in The Vision of Tundale contrasts

with the opening in the Apocalypse of Paul. In the prologue to The Vision of Tundale, the author Marcus

praises an abbess named Lady G who asks Marcus to translate the Vision of Tundale from the vernacular

to Latin. Marcus responds modestly about his ability to complete the task. However, he tells her that his

efforts will be strengthened by a saying among Christians that “Charity provides the strength that is

denied by ignorance.”23 Tundale’s opening focuses more on charity than Paul’s opening. In the

Apocalypse of Paul, an angel scourges a man who lives in Paul’s house in order to get his attention to

reveal the vision. In Tundale, however, Marcus agrees to reveal the vision due to his esteem for the

abbess. Because Lady G shows charity to Marcus, Marcus reciprocates out of love and agrees to

translate the text. Even though Marcus’ kind words may be a literary conceit for the time, it still has an

effect on the reader who notices the charity between Marcus and Lady G.

Another difference between the two visions’ opening, is that in the Apocalypse of Paul,

revelation takes place within a judgmental hierarchy while in Tundale’s Vision it happens in a charitable

peer to peer relationship. In the Apocalypse of Paul, a man discovers the text under the foundation,

passes on the manuscript to a judge, who passes it on to an emperor and then to the Church center in

Jerusalem. In Tundale, the relationship is horizontal between Marcus and Lady G. She does not

command Marcus to translate the text but merely invites him to do so. In the Apocalypse of Paul, the

Apostle Paul provides stature for the vision. His word could be presumed as knowledgeable and

authoritative. On the other hand, in Tundale’s Vision, Marcus does not presume to possess sufficient

23
Picard, The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin, 109.

17
knowledge to disclose the vision. However, he affirms that through charity and humility the strength

required to overcome his ignorance will be divinely supplied.

The protagonists’ interaction with foil characters also reveal differences in judgment and mercy.

Both Paul and Tundale have a foil character whereby the contact between the protagonist and the foil

propels the vision. Paul launches his vision in media res, flying to a third heaven and immediately an

indignant Lord, Paul’s foil, tells Paul to speak to the people and ask them why they continue to heap sin

upon sin. The Lord figuratively knocks Paul on his heels and he is put on judgment by proxy for other

people’s sins. Despite his stature as an apostle, the Lord does not treat him charitably. Unlike Paul,

Tundale is a fictional character and an inveterate sinner. His vision begins when Tundale visits his friend,

Tundale’s foil, who owes Tundale money. When Tundale learns that his friend cannot pay the debt, he

erupts in a rage. Despite Tundale’s uncivil treatment towards his friend, his friend responds to him

charitably and asks him to stay for dinner. While he is eating Tundale suffers a stroke and lapses into a

coma. His friend cares for him while he is unconscious. The difference in the visions is that Paul, a holy

man, is subjected to God’s angry judgment while Tundale, a sinner, is treated with mercy by his friend.

Another way to examine Paul and Tundale is to compare how each character possesses agency.

Paul has two roles in the narrative, i.e. protagonist and first-person narrator. Yet despite the dual roles,

he has less agency than Tundale. Paul plays a passive role in the narrative. He observes what he sees and

then reveals the story to others. He even performs poorly at the revelation part because he initially

buried the vision under his house. The narrative does not enhance Paul’s stature. In comparison,

Tundale is a fictional rather than a historical character. Since an omniscient narrator tells his story, he

does not have first-person narrative agency. Like Paul, Tundale observes God’s mercy and judgment, but

unlike Paul he undergoes personal punishment. Yet as a result of that punishment, he experiences a

personal transformation. As such, Tundale has more agency than Paul because unlike Paul he is

18
personally touched by God’s mercy. The narratological strategy of using Tundale in this manner is tied to

a strategy of showing how repentance can lead to God’s mercy.

Tundale’s journey into the after-life educates Tundale on the efficacy of repentance. At the

beginning of his vision, he realizes the extent of his sins and becomes frightened. Evil spirits recognize

his sinfulness and want to inflict the punishment that he deserves. But the Lord saves him because

according to the narrator “having the power to dispense the cure after death, the almighty Lord, just

and merciful . . . assuaged this misery according to his will.”24 Immediately afterwards an angel appears

to Tundale who tells him that while he was alive he never listened to his angel’s advice but that “’God

always shows forgiveness in his judgment, his undeserved mercy will not fail even you.’”25 From the

start, his guiding angel replies by certifying God’s mercy and forgiveness. The evil spirits who initially

confronted Tundale reply angrily that God granted Tundale unmerited mercy and cry out, “’O what a

cruel and unjust God He is, since he brings death to whomever He wants and restores life to whomever

He wants but does not reward each according to his works and merits as He promised.’”26 What are we

to make of God’s judgment given these utterances from the evil spirits? How can we depend on God’s

judgment if he arbitrarily saves those who should be damned? Perhaps we can begin to explain it by the

words the guiding angel provides Tundale. He tells Tundale that he must suffer “a few of the many

torments you deserve.”27 Because God is merciful, Tundale will suffer torments but he will not suffer

them all nor suffer them eternally. In the first section of hell, murderers are punished and although

Tundale committed murder, he escapes from punishment. His guiding angel merely tells him that in the

future he should avoid committing this sin. In the second section of hell, he sees the proud punished and

although Tundale in his incarnate life is noted for his pride, his guiding angel allows him to avoid

24
Picard, 114.
25
Picard, 115.
26
Picard, 116.
27
Picard, 116.

19
punishment. It isn’t until the third section of hell, which is for the avaricious, that Tundale must

experience punishment. Tundale undergoes his first punishment in a scene that parallels the book of

Job. Tundale’s and Job’s stories present a contrast concerning Gods mercy. Tundale visits a level of hell

where a gigantic beast named Acheron devours the avaricious. The same beast is referenced in Job:

40:15-18. The Lord asks Job if he dares to argue with him. Job replies that he is small and will not argue

(Job 40: 4), “See, I am of small account; what shall I answer you. I lay my hand on my mouth.” Although

Job adopts a submissive attitude to the Lord, he responds to Job angrily.

Gird up your loins like a man;

I will question you, and you declare to me.
Will you even put me in the wrong?
Will you condemn me that you may be justified? (Job 40: 7-8)

How dare Job question the Lord’s judgment? The divine’s response to Job is similar to the guiding

angel’s response to Paul as he mourns seeing the punishments in hell. Does he believe he can question

the Lord’s judgment? In contrast, when Tundale encounters the same beast found in Job 40, a different

experience ensues. The angel leads him to the beast and lets him know that he must undergo

punishment. The beast beats Tundale severely. Yet afterwards, Tundale experiences a significant

transformation. When Tundale emerges from the beast, he states that he must “blame himself for his

past deeds.”28 After going through punishment that includes, “the ferocity of dogs, bears, lions, snakes

and countless other unknown monstrous beasts” Tundale cries, “How can I poor wretch, repay the Lord

for all the favours He has done me.”29 His guiding angel replies, “As you said at first and as you know for

a fact, divine mercy is greater than your iniquity.”30 When Tundale tries to walk he staggers, “But the

angel of God touched him and comforted him.”31 Because of Tundale’s repentance, God, via Tundale’s

28
Picard, 121.
29
Picard, 121–22.
30
Picard, 122.
31
Picard, 123.

20
guiding angel gives Tundale mercy. The idea that penance can be a corrective to one’s sins and that the

Lord’s mercy can overcome sin is a contrast to Job’s and Paul’s experiences.

In order to understand how penance affects Tundale’s Vision, we must understand the past

tradition of penance in Ireland. Where before the fifth century sin was equivalent to a crime, by the fifth

century sin was seen as a sickness and an impediment to holiness. Thomas O’Louglin, in Celtic Theology,

asserts that the sacrament of Penance changed from patristic times to its state in the fifth century.

Penance became medicine and a way to restore spiritual health.32 This was particularly true in Ireland

because monastic culture there heavily influenced the Church. The nature of penance changed earliest

in the monastery. Rob Meens, in The Historiography of Early Medieval Penance, argues that the

penitential textbooks used by the church were originally developed by the churches in Ireland. Rather

than public Penance, a different form of Penance took place in private “where monks confessed their

inner secrets to a senior in order to get to know their shortcomings and achievements on their way to

perfection, a penitential practice was developed for the laity as well.”33 Additionally, where prior to the

fifth century, Penance was a one-time event that was extraordinary in nature, by the fifth century

Penance was seen as an ordinary event and part of Christian life.34 St. Patrick also influenced the

concept of sin and repentance. He saw his initial enslavement in Ireland as part of God’s plan to rescue

him. Patrick advises his fellow Christians that after God rescues us “we return thanks to God, that after

being corrected and having come to an awareness of God, that we glorify and bear witness to his

wonderful works in the presence of every nation under heaven.”35 By Tundale’s time, penance allowed a

32
Thomas O’Loughlin, Celtic Theology: Humanity, World, and God in Early Irish Writings (London: Continuum,
2000).
33
Rob Meens, “The Historiography of Early Medieval Penance,” in A New History of Penance, ed. Abigail Firey
(Leiden: Brill, 2008), 85–86.
34
O’Loughlin, Celtic Theology, 2000, 65.
35
Thomas O’Loughlin, Celtic Theology: Humanity, World, and God in Early Irish Writings (London: Continuum,
2000), 35.

21
sinner to start anew and receive God’s mercy. We see this enacted in Tundale as he goes through the

vision.

Tundale undergoes a series of penances that help to purify him of his sins. The angel informs

Tundale that he must see these visions of torment and actually experience the punishments because

they will act as medicine for his sins. Tundale’s guiding angel tells him that in the after-life the

punishments inflicted are just because the punishments awaken the sinful to “the glory of the saints.”36

Tundale replies, ‘If we are to come back later to the glory, I beg you to lead me quickly as possible to the

next punishment.’”37 The words that Tundale speaks are astonishing because he appears to welcome

the next punishment. He begins to associate penance with sanctification and he believes that further

penance will allow him to participate with the saints in their glory. Behind the term, “glory of the saints”

is a theological idea that through penance the sinner can be excluded from the Church or brought back

from exile and join the glory of the saints. Dominique Iogna-Prat states that “the penitential weapon

granted to clerics in the power of the keys—the science to discern offences coupled with the power to

exclude from the communion of the saints—was a fearsome and efficient means of social regulation.”38

Iogna Prat’s words provide insight into how Tundale lived his earthly life. Tundale implicitly recognizes

that because of his own sinful life, he excluded himself from God’s mercy and the Church community.

But through the vision he becomes aware of how repentance brings him back into community and the

glory of the saints. The importance of confession and how it was conducted was a subject that Gratian

presented in the Decretum (c. 1140) and pertinent to our discussion.

Gratian’s Decretum might possibly have influenced how Tundale must repent for his sins. In

Decretum, Gratian presents two sides of the penance question: can sin be forgiven by a private

36
Picard, The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin, 128.
37
Picard, 129.
38
Dominique Iogna-Prat, “Topographies of Penance in the Latin West,” in A New History of Penance, ed. Abigail
Firey (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 166.

22
contrition of the heart or must the sinner confess to a priest? As a jurist, Gratian presents the arguments

but does not come down on one side or the other. Allen Franzen writes that:

By the time Gratian published his concordance to the cannons (1140) a serious disagreement
about confession had arisen: the followers of Peter Abelard argued that sin could be forgiven so
long as the sinner was genuinely sorry for it, but the followers of Bernard of Clairvaux insisted
on oral confession, to be followed by penance and absolution.”39
In the vision of Tundale, one sees a heavier influence on Bernard’s idea that the combination of oral

confession to a church representative, penance and absolution are necessary for remission of sin.

Because Tundale is an acknowledged sinner, he cannot ignore the necessity of God’s justice. He must

confess and undergo penance. Tundale’s punishments, however, fall into the realm of medicine. The

punishments are the necessary means by which Tundale comes out from the other side of sinfulness

and experiences a spiritual transformation.

The conception of penance attributed to St. Bernard can be understood through Bernard’s

influence on Irish monasticism and especially by his connection with Malachy of Armagh (A.D. 1094-

1148). Bernard knew Malachy from in-person meetings (A.D. 1139-1140 and 1148.)40 Marcus surely

knew about Malachy’s reputation for holiness and his influence upon monasticism because he refers to

Malachy in Tundale’s prologue. Marcus states that Tundale’s Vision became known in (A.D. 1149) which

was “the same year Malachy . . . legate to the Irish, through whose life and doctrine the whole western

Church shines, died in Clairvaux.”41 Marcus claims a special relationship between the vision and

Malachy. In the last chapter of the vision, Malachy appears as one of the last personages seen by

Tundale. Marcus describes Malachy’s holiness: how he built fifty-four religious congregations and kept

nothing for himself and how he distributed everything to the church and to the poor. At the end of the

39
Allen J. Frantzen, The Literature of Penance in Anglo-Saxon England (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press,
1983), 202–3.
40
Marie Therese Flanagan, The Transformation of the Irish Church in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries, 29
(Woodbridge: Boydell, 2010), 101.
41
Picard, The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin, 110.

23
vision, Tundale wants to stay with Malachy and he weeps and begs his guiding angel to allow him to

remain. But the angel denies his entreaty and states that Tundale must relay “’everything you saw, for

the benefit of your neighbor.’”42 God’s mercy has touched Tundale and like Malachy he must give

everything he has to others.

By the end of the vision, Tundale has become a different person. He has experienced God’s

judgment, he has confessed his sins, repented, and received God’s mercy. Before Tundale returns to his

body, his angel counsels him to maintain abstinence from his former sinful behavior and assures him

that his “aid will not be lacking and [I] will remain with you faithfully.”43 As long as Tundale lives his life

well, God’s mercy will not desert him When Tundale returns to his body, he gives everything that he has

to the poor and he preaches God’s word with “great devotion, humility and knowledge.”44 Tundale has

run the gamut of God’s judgment and mercy which I contend is the driving force of after-life visions.

To understand the idea of judgment and mercy as the driving force of medieval after-life visions,

rather than Vitz’s contention that it is desire, it is necessary to think through the two alternatives as it

applies to Tundale. If we were to posit that desire motivated Tundale, I contend that it would

characterize only a small portion of the vision. Vitz, to her credit, states that desire in the medieval

narrative is often represented as not competent. She amplifies this opinion by saying that causality is

“largely incomprehensible in these texts.”45 By that she means that the object that a character desires

does not always satisfy the desire. Vitz goes on to explain that the objects that humans want often result

in “’satisfaction’ that is with the fulfillment of what characters deserve as distinct from what they

want.”46 Vitz means that the outcome that characters receive is different from what they originally

42
Picard, 155.
43
Picard, 156.
44
Picard, 156.
45
Vitz, Medieval Narrative and Modern Narratology, 207.
46
Vitz, 207.

24
wanted. What started with human desire and a quest to create an outcome, often ended in a lesson that

“it was only in the divine nature to be fully efficacious.”47 For Vitz, characters receive what divine

providence believes is most efficacious for them. While I agree to a point with Vitz’s statement, I do not

believe that the model of desire seeking an outcome is the correct manner to analyze an after-life vision.

As an example, we could claim that Tundale’s desire to get repaid by his friend constitutes the engine

that is directed to an outcome. In this case, desire is “incompetent” because Tundale does not get

repaid. Instead, he goes into a coma (not of his desire) and experiences many travails. At the end,

however, God’s wish prevails, as Vitz’s theory asserts, and Tundale dedicates his life to holiness and

living a monastic way of living. The problem with this analysis is that the desire which motivates Tundale

ends after only a few pages of the story. For most of the story, Tundale experiences God’s justice and

mercy. Rather than trace desire in after-life visions, it would be more profitable to see how after-life

visions provide a focalization that speaks for the church’s teaching. The purpose of the teaching is to

show how a man must live in order to experience God’s mercy and to avoid God’s judgement.

As a protagonist, Tundale can be best understood if we look at the relationship between

Tundale and his guiding angel. The response that Paul receives from his guiding angel contrasts with

how Tundale interacts with his guiding angel. Tundale’s penitential behavior can account for part of the

difference. But we must also look at how Irish monasticism formed Marcus. Irish monasticism treated

penance as a means of self-transformation from sinful weakness to virtuous strength. Additionally,

around the time of Tundale, Gratian, Abelard and St. Bernard were writing on the theology of sinfulness

and penance. The debate must have influenced Marcus, especially since Marcus may have visited

Bernard in Clairvaux when he wrote the Life of Malachy.48 Marcus would know about Bernard’s notion

of seeking forgiveness through oral confession and penance.

47
Vitz, 207.
48
Picard, The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin, 27.

25
 Tundale’s guiding angel serves as a proxy or focalizer for the Church. The angel promotes the

Church’s point of view regarding justice and mercy. Given the angel’s behavior during Tundale’s journey

in the after-life, what message is the angel promoting and who is the audience for the message? Since

the protagonist is Tundale and he is receiving the message from his guiding angel, I propose that the

message is directed to men like Tundale. As a nobleman who long ignored the Church’s teachings, the

message is directed to those who payed little regard to the Church and who engaged in unethical

behavior. The Church wants to inform these men that their behavior must change if they want to

conform to God’s ethical economy and to avoid God’s judgment. For those who have abused power,

they need to reform their lives. If they reform, then the Church will extend them mercy and help them

through their transformation. Just as Tundale’s guiding angel walked with Tundale while he purified his

sins, so will the Church walk with other sinners like Tundale. Through the Church, the sacrament of

Penance is available and is a potent force that can heal the sickness of sin. For those who place

themselves at the mercy of God, the Church will assist them as long as they loosen their hold on power

and think less about their own self interest and more about the interests of others, especially the

interests of the Church.

Thus far, we have examined the form of the two visions focusing on the two protagonists and

the two guiding angels. The procedure was to take a narratological view of how the protagonists and the

guiding angels function within the story. Along the way, the narratological was married to the historical

so that some sense could be made of the different narrative strategies. Now I will change to an analysis

of the visions’ content and look at the types of sins that were considered the most egregious in each of

the visions as well as the sin that is most discussed.

26
 Analysis of Content
The Worst Sins

For the analysis of content, I will focus on three types of sins: sins of heresy, sins committed by

the church hierarchy and sexual sins. In the Apocalypse of Paul, the most severe sins relate to heresy.

Paul asks his guiding angel:

‘Who are these, sir, who are put into this well?' And he said to me, 'They are those who do not
confess that Christ has come in the flesh and that the Virgin Mary brought him forth and those
who say that the bread and cup of the Eucharist of blessing are not the body and blood of
Christ.' 49

The worst sinners are heretics who refuse to believe that Christ was human and born from Mary; that

the Eucharist contains the body and blood of Christ and that a human’s body rises from the dead to join

the soul after the last judgment are the worst sinners. A little further on, Paul asks his angel to identify

the sinners that he sees being punished. The angel answers, "'These are they who say that Christ did not

rise from the dead and that this flesh will not rise again.'"50 Why did heresy became the most important

sin in the Apocalypse of Paul? The reason was that the early Church began to experience that its faith

belief was being torn asunder because of various theological disputes. The question of what was

authoritative and who had the power to judge became an issue. Charles Freeman in A New History of

Early Christianity states, “There was no clear distinction between orthodoxy and heresy in the early

church.”51 The Church fathers believed that unity among Christian communities required unity in

doctrine. Paul’s efforts to unite doctrine among first century Christian communities parallel the Church’s

efforts to unite doctrine in the years when the Apocalypse of Paul originated. No other apostle wrote as

prolifically as Paul and Paul’s letters helped to construct Christian orthodoxy. During the first five

centuries, the Church used Paul’s corpus as foundational texts to debate various theological concepts.

49
Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament, 637:41.
50
Elliott, 637:42.
51
Charles Freeman, A New History of Early Christianity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009), 156.

27
One of the first theological debates centered around the nature of Christ and his embodiment. The

heretical sins enumerated in the vision relate directly to the heresy of Docetism.

Docetism claimed that Christ’s body was a phantom. In the early Church, two of the church

fathers who preached against the Docetists were Ignatius of Antioch (c. 35 – 108) and Tertullian (c. 155 –

240). Ignatius’s Letter to the Trallians addresses the issues brought up in the Apocalypse of Paul. Ignatius

advises the Trallians:

Be deaf therefore when anyone speaks to you apart from Jesus Christ, who was of the family of
David, and of Mary, who was truly born, both ate and drank, was truly persecuted under Pontius
Pilate, was truly crucified and died in the sight of those in heaven and on earth and under the
earth; who also was truly raised from the dead when his father shall raise up in Christ Jesus us
who believe in him, without whom we have no true life.52

Ignatius’s letter specifically treats Christ and his embodiment. It claims that Christ truly had a body; that

he descended from Mary and that he was raised from the dead. Likewise, he asserts that Christ’s

followers will be raised bodily from the dead. He also claims that dishonest teachers who associate

themselves with Christ are similar to “mixing as it were a deadly poison with honeyed wine.”53 Ignatius

councils the Trallians to stay close to the orthodox church because one who does “anything apart from

the bishop and the presbytery and the deacons is not pure in his conscience.”54 Ignatius believes the

Trallians should allow the Church to determine what is true and false. The church hierarchy urged this

approach, as part of an on-going effort, to centralize power and combat heresy. Tertullian also inveighs

against heretical Docetists in his texts. He contravenes against Marcion (second century theologian) who

held Docetist tendencies.

Marcion, in order that he might deny the flesh of Christ, denied also His nativity, or else he
denied His flesh in order that he might deny His nativity; because, of course, he was afraid that

52
Ignatius of Antioch, The Apostolic Fathers, ed. T.E. Page, trans. Kirsopp Lake, vol. I (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1912), (IX, 1-2) 221.
53
Ignatius of Antioch, I:218 (VI, 2).
54
Ignatius of Antioch, I:218 (VII, 2).

28
 His nativity and His flesh bore mutual testimony to each other's reality, since there is no nativity
without flesh, and no flesh without nativity.55

Tertullian accuses Marcion of denying Christ’s embodiment, which the Apocalypse of Paul considers

heretical. Tertullian condemns heretics comparing them to fevers that destroy life. For Tertullian, the

apostles embody the true faith. They handed down the orthodox principles to the churches. For

Tertullian, any doctrine that deviates from the apostolic churches was ipso facto a heresy. Where in the

Apocalypse of Paul, heresy is the sin that most threatened Church, in Tundale’s Vision a different sin is

more threatening.

In Tundale’s Vision, the people in the furthest depths of hell are those who abused their power.

Instead of helping others, they used power for their own selfish interests. This includes secular rulers as

well as prelates. Tundale’s guiding angel describes these people in the following:

Here also will suffer forever the prelates and the mighty of the world who wished to be at the
head not to serve but to rule: they did not regard the power given to them to rule and correct
their subjects as granted by God, and they did not exercise power as they should have over the
people entrusted to them.56

Powerful prelates and secular rulers who abuse power reside in the furthest recess of hell. In this area of

hell, Lucifer resides as well. Although Lucifer is a powerful demon, he is not free. Lucifer suffers by being

tied down with chains and oppressed with unending anger. He picks up souls in his hands, presses them

like grapes and exhales them into the fire. When he inhales, he sucks the expelled souls back into his

sulphurous mouth and devours them. Upon seeing this scene, Tundale asks his guiding angel “I beg you

to remove me from here quickly . . . For I see many relatives and friends and acquaintances whose

55
“Church Fathers: On the Flesh of Christ (Tertullian),” accessed June 26, 2018,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0315.htm Chapter 1. The General Purport of This Work. The Heretics,
Marcion, Apelles, and Valentinus, Wishing to Impugn the Doctrine of the Resurrection, Deprive Christ of All
Capacity for Such a Change by Denying His Flesh.
56
Picard, The Vision of Tnugdal: Translated from Latin, 139–40.

29
company I enjoyed in the world but whose association here I deeply abhor.”57 Since Tundale wielded

considerable power in his earthly life, it is logical that he sees people who he knew in this realm of hell.

The author includes both secular and church rulers who abuse power together in this section of hell for

a historical reason.

During the tenth century, the lines between who was secular and who was religious blurred,

often to the detriment of the Church. In the tenth century, the church began to align itself with secular

rulers for protection against foreign invaders.58 In some cases, a single person was both a secular and

religious leader. As an example, King Cormac of Cashel, who came from the same town as Tundale, was

the first king-bishop in Ireland. Before the Church reformation in the eleventh and twelfth centuries,

Irish secular rulers eyed Church property as lucrative bounty for their own use. If churches wanted to

survive against foreign invaders or competing secular rulers, they needed to align themselves with a

strong secular leader who could provide protection. The mixture of the secular and religious fostered a

non-adherence to church rules. The Church frequently did not enforce celibacy and even anchorites had

sons.

In the twelfth century the Church reacted to these issues when it met in a series of synods to

reform the Church and separate it from secular rule. During this time, the Continental Church

simultaneously held synods and the changes in the larger Church often influenced the Irish synods. As an

example, the Synod of Clermont (A.D. 1049) decreed that a lay ruler could not possess the goods of a

cleric. That rule most probably influenced the first Synod of Cashel (A.D. 1071) which stipulated, as its

first decree, that a lay ruler did not have the power to purchase churches.59 In order to put further

separation between the secular and the religious, the second Synod of Cashel required abbots to be

57
Picard, 140.
58
Kathleen Hughes, The Church in Early Irish Society (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1966), 217.
59
Flanagan, The Transformation of the Irish Church in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries, 47.

30
celibate.60 Another example of a reform that separated church and state was a treatise entitled De statu

ecclesiae. In this document written by a papal legate named Gilbert of Limerick, the Church clearly laid

out the hierarchy of authority with the bishops reporting to an archbishop who received his directive

from the holy see. Gilbert’s treatise specified that the bishops in Ireland could only be appointed by a

religious ruler and could not be nominated by a secular ruler. Gilbert met with other bishops and Irish

secular rulers at the Synod of Ráth Breasail (A.D. 1111) to discuss the issue. An exuberant Geoffrey

Keating (seventeenth century Irish historian) acclaims the Synod of Ráth Breasail because, “It was at this

synod that the churches of Ireland were given up entirely to the bishops, free for ever from the

authority and rent of any princes.”61 In a similar vein, one of the decrees from the second Synod of

Cashel was that church property became free from secular appropriation.62 The Church reforms in the

twelfth century persistently attempted to separate and free the Church from secular rule. The Church

reforms in the twelfth century influenced Tundale’s Vision to place leaders who are only interested in

their own gains and not in the good of the Church in the deepest places in hell.

The Most Sin

While each vision names a different sin that they consider most severe, in both visions, the most

frequently named sin manifests as illicit sex. Neither vision provides precise demarcations of sexual sins.

In both visions sexual sins overlap in different regions of hell. As an example, in the Apocalypse of Paul,

those who are married and consort with whores reside in a different place than those who commit

fornication and adultery. Clerics who engage in glutinous behavior such as eating, drinking and

fornicating exist in their own region of hell. What may perplex a modern reader is that sins like murder

60
Flanagan, 47.
61
Geoffrey Keating, “The History of Ireland,” trans. David Comyn and Patrick S. Dinneen, CELT: Corpus of Electronic
Texts: a project of University College, Cork College Road, Cork, Ireland. — http://www.ucc.ie/celt, XXVIII, 299,
accessed August 2, 2018, https://celt.ucc.ie/published/T100054.html.
62
Martin Holland, Routledge Revivals: Medieval Ireland (2005): An Encyclopedia, ed. Sean Duffy (New York: Taylor
& Francis, 2005), 66.

31
or robbery rank as less serious than sexual sins. While in the Apocalypse of Paul variations of sexual

impropriety are mentioned nine different times (see Table 1, page 35), it does not even mention

homicide. In the Vision of Tundale, a murderer is ranked as less pernicious than a glutton or fornicator.

How can we understand this issue?

One approach is to examine the history of sexuality in the early Christian communities. In The Making of

Fornication, Kathy Gaca argues that the early Christians borrowed ideas about sexual restraint from

Greek philosophers, like Plato and particularly the late Stoics, to develop a radical form of Christian

sexual asceticism. She asserts that since Foucault’s study on sexuality (i.e., The Use of Pleasure and The

Care of the Self), the academy understands early Christian sexuality as merely an extension of Greco-

Roman culture. Gaca, however, critiques Foucault’s thesis by arguing that Christian thinkers like Paul,

Tatian and Clement had ideas that were a radical break from Greco-Roman sexual ideals. She believes

that they favored an Encratite sexual renunciation. She also maintains that the late Stoics espoused

philosophical ideas of sexual self-restraint that were not representative of the broad stream of Greco-

Roman culture and of early Stoic ideals. She alleges that the ideals of the early Stoics, e.g. Zeno (335 –

263 B.C.) and Chrysippus (280 – 207 B.C.) represent the culture more accurately. In her opinion, the

early Stoics did not limit sexual activity for procreation purposes only and they maintained that sexual

passion was not harmful. She contends that the early Stoics believed that the conventional practice of

marriage should be abolished. The early Stoics argued that for men and women among the wise an

allowance should be made to “make love to one another as they see fit.”63 Gaca sees early Christianity

as a branch from a more radical form of Greco Roman culture that considered asceticism as the pathway

to virtue.

63
Kathy L Gaca, The Making of Fornication: Eros, Ethics, and Political Reform in Greek Philosophy and Early
Christianity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), 79.

32
 Yet I believe that Gaca describes an ideal form of Greco-Roman culture that was not frequently

practiced. Bruce S. Thornton, in his Eros: The Myth of Ancient Greek Sexuality provides an example from

Apollonius of Rhodes (early Greek 3rd century B.C. author) who wrote the poem Argonautica, the story

of Jason and Medea. Thornton claims that “Apollonius’s story and erotic imagery are understandable

only in terms of a long Greek tradition of thinking about eros as an inhuman force of nature destructive

and chaotic, overthrowing the mind and orders of civilization.”64 In theory, early Stoic philosophy might

have allowed for communal, egalitarian and nurturing sexuality, but in operation it was not often the

case. During the time of Philo Judaeus (c. 13 B.C. – A.D. 45~50), men who seduced a widow or

unmarried woman “could be punished by death or imprisonment; alternatively, the offended husband

or father could require the malefactor to pay heavy compensation in order to avoid more unpleasant

consequences.”65 In Augustan Rome the law lex de adulteriis coercendis (18 B.C.) stipulated punishments

against those who committed adultery and rape and it defined the rules for legitimate marriages.66 I do

not believe, therefore, that Greco-Roman sexuality prevailed in the manner that Gaca claims. Of course,

classical Roman citizens transgressed against the law as in any other society. But the point is that

societal norms existed to conform society to orderly sexual practices.

Also, I would argue against Gaca’s assertion that Paul’s notion of sexuality was a radical form of

Greco-Roman culture. Although Paul did elevate celibacy as a higher form of spiritual life, he did not

propose an extreme sexuality. In 1: Corinthians 7 Paul makes a number of statements concerning

sexuality that I consider moderate in nature. He wishes more could be celibate like him but he

understands that many cannot (1: Cor 7:7). He therefore asks husbands and wives to be giving in their

“conjugal rights” (1 Cor 7: 3). He believes that those who are unmarried and those who are widows

64
Bruce S. Thornton, Eros: The Myth Of Ancient Greek Sexuality (New York: Routledge, 2018), 12.
65
James A. Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society in Medieval Europe (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
2009), 13.
66
John Younger, ed., Sex in the Ancient World from A to Z (London: Routledge, 2009), 67.

33
would do well to remain unmarried (and celibate) but if they lack self-control then they should marry. (1

Cor: 7 8-9). He councils that if a husband or wife has a spouse that is an unbeliever, then it is better to

remain married. In this situation a believing spouse makes an unbelieving spouse holy (1 Cor: 7 12-14). I

do not believe that Paul’s views of sexuality were a radical form of Greco-Roman culture and I think that

it does not profits us to compare Paul’s views of sexuality to the Greco-Roman culture exclusively.

Rather, we should also compare Paul’s views of sexuality to the then prevailing Jewish ideas

concerning sexuality. Even though Paul knew Greek philosophical ideas, Jewish culture formed him.

According to Naomi Koltun Fromm, two major tenets prevailed within Jewish culture regarding

sexuality.67 The first is that God selected the Jews as the chosen people, therefore, by decree the Jewish

community was holy. Because the Jewish people by decree were holy, the community needed to keep

marriage and procreation within their own culture to sustain that holiness. The second tenet is that one

could elevate their own holiness through their personal behavior. One manner in which to do this was

through sexual restraint. Leviticus 18 prohibits all manner of sexual activities. Like Christian culture,

Jewish culture deemed adultery to be a serious infraction. Alexander Izuchukwu Abasili asserts that in

the Hebrew bible, adultery is a moral infraction having “pride of place.”68 The culture made adultery a

grave matter through a series of parallel beliefs. Just as the relationship of YHWH to Israel required

reciprocal faithfulness, so too did the relationship between husband and wife. Implicit in the idea is that

the family and its stability is central to the stability of society. As a result, an act that would destabilize

the family would also destabilize society. Therefore, an infraction between husband and wife

constitutes an infraction between that person and their culture as well as an infraction between that

67
Naomi Koltun-Fromm, Hermeneutics of Holiness: Ancient Jewish and Christian Notions of Sexuality and Religious
Community (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 31–32.
68
Alexander Izuchukwu Abasili, The Understanding of Adultery in the Hebrew Bible: A Critical Survey (Xlibris
Corporation, 2016), 1.

34
person and God. In this regard, Jewish tenets of sexuality do not conform to Gaca’s ideal of early Stoic

sexuality. Wise men and women were not permitted to love anyone as they saw fit.

Gaca, however, is correct in stating that a few early Christians embraced an extreme sexuality.

But those who preached extremity had their own critics within the Christian community. Tatian (c. A.D.

120 – 180), in his On Perfection According to the Savior, claimed that any sexuality is impure. But

Irenaeus criticized that idea in his Against Heresies (c. A.D.115 – 280). Irenaeus condemns both

Saturnius and Marcion as Encrasites because they preached against marriage and thereby thwarted

God’s original plan for creation. Another example of extreme asceticism is the theologian Origen (c. A.D.

184 – 253) who supposedly performed self-castration to remove himself from any possible scandal while

he was teaching women catechumens. Yet the First Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325) denounced the practice

of castration to quell sexual desire.69 Apart from a celibate strain that runs through Christianity, early

Christian sexuality reflected Jewish sexuality. Perhaps rather than comparing Christian sexuality against

Greco-Roman and Jewish sexuality, it might be interesting to compare the sexual sins in the Apocalypse

of Paul with the sexual sins in Tundale’s Vision to see if it results in any insights regarding the sins of

sexuality. If we compare the sexual sins between the Apocalypse of Paul and Tundale’s Vision and rank

them from most serious to less serious we would have the following:

Table 1 – Sexual Sins

Apocalypse of Paul Tundale’s vision
Women who aborted. Deniers of Christ (who among many other
sinners in this realm, i.e. thieves, robbers,
the proud) that commit adultery.
Homosexuality. Monks and other religious fornicators or
people who defile themselves immoderately.
Married who consorted with whores. Gluttons and fornicators.
Girls who defiled virginity unknown to
parents.
Fornicators/adulterers having spouses of their
own.

69
Larissa Tracy, Castration and Culture in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: DS Brewer, 2013), 10.

35
 Deacon who devoured oblations, committed
fornications.
Presbyter who was eating, drinking,
fornicating.

Took Eucharist and fornicated.

Lukewarm, spend some days in prayer and

other in sin and fornication until death.

What can we make of the comparison? First, the Apocalypse of Paul describes sexual sins more

explicitly, especially for women. Women who abort and young girls who sacrifice their virginity without

notifying their parents are called out. By contrast, Tundale’s Vision does not explicitly describe women’s

sexual sins; either because the author only considered men (he was a celibate monk) or because he

chose to be more general in his description. In the Apocalypse of Paul, homosexuality constitutes a

serious sin but Tundale’s Vision does not mention it. Both visions mention adultery. However, in

Tundale, those adulterers (along with other sinners) who deny Christ comprise the worst sexual sinners.

Apparently, they constitute the most egregious sinners because without a belief in Christ, a person

would feel free to commit any kind of immorality. In both visions, the religious who commit sexual

improprieties are mentioned. In the Apocalypse of Paul, deacons and presbyters are named; while in

Tundale, monks and religious fornicators are mentioned. So, while the two visions exhibit some

differences, they do not differ significantly. Perhaps trying to explain the differences between list of

sexual sins does not provide much insight for a good reason. That reason may be that early Christianity,

medieval Christianity and even contemporary Christianity all deem sexual impropriety to be

problematical. Since the family and the health of society in general depends on sexual boundaries, many

histories and cultures toiled over the regulation of sexual immorality. Therefore, I do not find it odd that

sexual sins form the greatest percentage of sins in each vision. The debate about sexuality in medieval

36
society is on-going and much more can be said about it. But for the purpose of this essay, it is apparent

that it was as important to the medieval Christian community as it was to the early Christian community.

Conclusion

Apocryphal visions played an important role in explaining what a historical community valued.

The Church, as ethical standards setter, used it to express what behavior required judgment (or

punishment and reform) and what behavior elicited mercy (or was esteemed). The historical and

cultural context of a community dictated, via an apocryphal vision, what behavior a culture feared and

rewarded. In the early Church, one can see that heresy caused doctrinal and societal unity problems.

The most severe sins in the Apocalypse of Paul were heretical ideas that threatened Church solidarity.

To combat the problem, the narrative strategy set Paul the apostle as a protagonist, who despite his

historical stature, would humbly obey the vision. The guiding angel provided Paul with the Church’s

orthodoxy. The guiding angel adopted a hierarchal relationship with Paul to emphasize that the Church

hierarchy, and no one, else could authorize what is orthodox and what is not. The narrative strategy

clearly demonstrates that the Church hierarchy extends mercy to those who receive and obey what the

vision expresses. In contrast, Tundale’s Vision uses a different approach. Since those who rule solely

based on their own selfish interest constitute the worst sinners, the narrative strategy changes. Tundale

represents the nobleman who can recognize his selfish behavior and reform himself. The Church, as

expressed by the guiding angel, will extend mercy to those who are willing to repent and change their

behavior. In both visions sexual sin appears most often within the hierarchy of sins. Because illicit

sexuality represents behavior that can most easily disrupt society, it is not a surprise that it appears so

frequently in hell’s list of sins. Additionally, defining proper sexual behavior kept the Church community

from becoming fragmented. If procreation remained within a family of believers, the Church body was

strengthened.

37
 In order to go further in study of apocryphal visions, it would be interesting to see how this

model of looking through a narratological-historical lens works for other visions. It might be profitable to

develop an apocryphal vision genre type that uses narratology as one method of analysis. More work

could be done on the idea of space within an apocryphal vision since it plays such a major role there. An

apocryphal vision by its very nature is a hierarchical structure that describes which behavior should be

rewarded and which behavior should be punished. Each space within the hierarchy has certain

characteristics that might be interesting to analyze and compare between visions. Additionally, since

apocryphal narratives are journeys, an intriguing analysis would be to examine the story’s sequence of

events to understand if there is a certain logic to them. How are the sequence of events structured in

relation to time? What is the duration of the journey and how does that relate to the overriding theme

of justice and mercy? What direction do the characters move, i.e. up, down, sideways, and for what

reason? Apocryphal visions constitute a genre that narratology has not much examined. Further studies

in this area would be fruitful for the furthering of the genre.

38
 Appendix 1
Hierarchy of Sins
From Most to Least Severe

Apocalypse of Paul Tundale's Vision

1 Did not believe Christ rose from the dead.
2 Did not believe:
a. Christ was man.
b. Virgin Mary brought him forth.
c. Eucharist contains body and blood of
Christ
d. Man's body rises from dead after the
last judgment and joins the soul.
3 Renounced world but loved no one, did
not offer mercy to their neighbors.
4 Women who aborted.
Devil, prelates who wanted to
rule rather than serve.
Did not hope in God's forgiveness, did not believe
in God, Angels of darkness, promised to do good
in words but refused to do so, deny Christ totally,
performed acts of denial like adulterers, thieves,
robbers, the proud, those who don't repent
properly.
Accumulate sin upon sin.
Monks and other religious fornicators or people
who defile themselves immoderately.

5 Did not attend to the scriptures when they Gluttons and fornicators.
were read to them.
6 Heathen who gave alms but didn't know Thieves and robbers.
the lord.
7 Homosexuality. Avaricious.
8 Married who consorted with whores. Proud.
9 Broke fast before appointed time. Treacherous and perfidious.
10 Harmed orphans, widows and poor. Homicides.
11 Girls who defiled virginity unknown to Lived virtuous life but didn't give to the poor.
parents.
12 Fornicators/adulterers having spouses of
their own.
13 Magicians who prepared people for evil
and magic arts
14 Disparage word of God, making naught of
God and his angels

39
 Appendix 1
Hierarchy of Sins
From Most to Least Severe

15 Usurers, trusted in riches not God

16 Reader who read to people but did not
keep the precepts of God
17 Deacon who devoured oblations,
committed fornications
18 Bishop not true to episcopate, didn't help
orphans and widows
19 Presbyter who was eating, drinking,
fornicating
20 Did not believe Lord would help them
21 Nod to each other in public but slander in
private.
22 Slanderers
23 Took Eucharist and fornicated
24 Engage in idle disputes
25 Lukewarm, spend some days in prayer and
other in sin and fornication until death
26 Proud, glorified themselves and did
nothing for neighbors

40
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