THE PRESBYTER COSMAS'S SERMON REGARDING THE NEWLY-APPEARED BOGOMIL

HERESY

A page from Cosmas the Priest's Sermon Against the Heretics

The Bulgarian Presbyter1 Cosmas's "Sermon" on Bogomilism (ca. 970 A.D.) is a priceless document for

the history of medieval dualism, not only with respect to Bulgaria and the Byzantine Empire, but for

Western Europe as well. What makes it especially valuable is that it was written by a contemporary, who

encountered the heretics and heard their preaching first-hand. Cosmas's "Sermon" also offers a sweeping

description of tenth-century Bulgarian life, by one who loves his country and is agitated by the social

disintegration which has been accelerated by war2 and religious controversy. Cosmas is grieved not only

by the Bogomils, whom he sees as tearing the very fabric of society apart, but also by the Bulgarian ruling

classes and the clergy. A true Jeremiah, he castigates men who leave their wives and children and flee to

the safety of monasteries. He also criticizes monks who travel abroad — to Rome and Jerusalem —

returning home to boast of their travels. As for the rich, he asks them to make their libraries available to

the less fortunate, so that knowledge may be disseminated, and the perils of heresy and ignorance

diminished.

In a brief Prologue, Cosmas sets forth his motive for writing about the new heresy of a man named

"Bogumil" (literally "dear to God"). Cosmas says he is rather "Bogu-ne-mil," i.e. "not dear to God." He

states that of all sins heresy is the unforgivable one, since it is a sin against the Holy Spirit. He admits that

he is concerned that in discussing the heresy he will further it, but write he must, in order to save other

Christloving people "from falling into their net."

Cosmas accuses the Bogomils of the sin of pride — of pretending to be meek and humble, while attacking

the human frailties of other Christians, including the clergy. He castigates them for opposing the

veneration of the cross and of icons, as well as of the relics of the saints. The Bogomils scoff at miracles,

he says, claiming they are the works of Satan. According to Cosmas, they believe that Christ and Satan

are brothers, and that Satan created the material world, including the earth and mankind. In this way they

explain the presence of evil in the world.

Cosmas finds their teachings on Mary so despicable that he can't bring himself to recite them. (We know

from other sources that the heretics denied that Mary was the Mother of God, some even claiming that

Christ's birth was only an illusion.) The Presbyter tells us that the Bogomils also oppose the sacraments,

except for baptism, which must be spiritual — i.e. by the laying on of hands — and not by immersion in

water. Baptism with water, a material substance, is of the Devil, and thus John the Baptist was Satan's

emissary. And while the Bogomils accept the necessity for Confession, it is of the non-auricular kind, i.e.

they believe it enough to confess one's sins to another "Christian" (their name for each other). Cosmas is

particularly outraged that women are included among those to whom one may confess. The Bogomils also

oppose the priesthood and the hierarchy, as well as the liturgy and Holy Communion, claiming that the

latter are the innovations of John Chrysostom.

This sect relied almost exclusively on the New Testament and the Epistles and Acts of the Apostles as

their authorities, while rejecting most of the Old Testament and particularly the Prophets. In effect, they

sought the return to a more primitive form of Christianity — to a renewal of Christ's message as they

interpreted it — minus the accretions of the Church. They recognized only two groups of worshipers: the

"perfect," who have received spiritual baptism (the consolamentum) at a mature age, and the "believers,"

who have yet to receive baptism. Kiselkov (1921) believes that in Cosmas's time their teachings were

transmitted exclusively orally, since the Presbyter makes no mention of any writings, continually stating

"they say."

All the Bogomil "errors" were looked upon very seriously by the medieval Church, as leading to the

perdition of the individual soul, as well as threatening the foundations of the Church. In addition, their

opposition to the tsar and his government, and to the boyars and local chiefs, posed a serious threat

Cosmas Presbyter is well-versed in the scriptures: scholars have counted more than two hundred citations

from the Bible in the "Sermon." He is also familiar with the works of the Church Fathers, including John

Chrysostom and Basil the Great. But unlike some religious writers, the author of the Beseda comes before

us as a human being with a full range of emotions. His greatest skill is in evoking images from daily life,

and it is precisely this quality which makes his words alive today, more than one thousand years after they

were written. His main weakness is his lack of organization, but this is not a great problem in a work as

brief as this.

Our text is taken from M. Popruzenko's publication (1936) of the Volokolamsk MS.; it shows some

Russian Slavonic features, but otherwise should be close to the Old Bulgarian original. What is

noteworthy about Cosmas's language, particularly his syntax, is the palpable presence of a non-Slavic

substratum, namely, Greek.

We are fortunate to have two excellent and complementary works relating to Cosmas's "Sermon": J.

Begunov's Kozma Presviter v slavjanskih literaturah (1973) and M. Loos's "Dualist Heresy in the Middle

Ages" (1974). A third, supplementary work is N. Garsoian's "The Paulician Heresy" (1967), which treats

the Armenian origins of Paulicianism, the heresy that probably spawned Bogomilism. Other works of

interest are H. Puech and A. Vaillant's Le traite contre les Bogomiles de Cosmas Ie Pretre (1945) and D.

Obolensky's "The Bogomils: A Study in Balkan Neomanicheism" (1948). Also useful is J. Ivanov's

Bogomilski knigi i legendi and V. Topentcharov's Bougres et cathares: deux brasiers une memo flame. ].

Gagov has written a Latin dissertation: Theologia antibogomilistica Cosmae Presbyteri, Bulgari saec. X.

(1942). M. Popruzenko's Kozma Presviter: Bolgarskij pisater X veka (1936), is a thoroughly grounded

work, even though he makes occasional deductions which are not supported by his examples. This is

typical, to some extent, of all the above works, which are necessarily speculative at times. Of them all,

Loos is the most careful and exhaustive in his research. V. S. Kiselkov offers a modern Bulgarian

translation of the Beseda (1921).

PRESBYTER COSMAS'S SERMON

...Now it so happened in the Bulgarian land that in the time of the Orthodox Tsar Peter there was a priest

by the name of "Bogomil" /beloved of God/. But to tell the truth he was "not beloved of God." He was the

first to teach heresy in the Bulgarian land, which error I shall describe further on.... Externally these

heretics are like sheep: meek, humble and quiet; they appear pale from their hypocritical fasting. They

don't utter excessive words, they don't laugh loudly and are not inquisitive; they avoid the glance /of

others/, and on the outside they do everything so as not to be distinguished from orthodox Christians. But

internally they are wolves and predators, as the Lord said. When people see such humility, thinking that

they are Orthodox and capable of showing the way to salvation, they approach them and question them

regarding salvation of the soul. And they, like the wolf that wants to seize the sheep, pretend to sigh at

first and answer humbly, and when they preach they act as if they were in heaven. And when they see a

person who is simple and ignorant, it's there they sow the weeds of their teaching, reviling the rules

passed down to the holy churches, about which I shall talk further on....

/After comparing the Bogomils to the antichrist, Cosmas warns against associating with them, quoting

Christ: "By their fruits ye shall know them/" and threatening: "Every tree that doesn't bear fruit is cut

down and cast into the fire."/

But they are worse than devils. Devils fear Christ's cross, but the heretics cut them up and make tools

from them. Devils fear the image of Christ painted on a wooden panel, but the heretics do not bow to

icons, calling them idols. Devils fear the relics of God's righteous /saints/, not daring to approach the

caskets in which lie the priceless treasure, given to Christians for their deliverance from all sorts of

misfortune. But the heretics jeer at them, and they make fun of us when they see us bowing to them and

asking for their help, because they have forgotten the Lord's words: "Believe in me, and the deeds I do

you will do, and even greater." And not wishing to give praise to the saints, they revile the divine miracles

which the relics of the saints accomplish through the power of the Holy Spirit, and they say: "Miracles are

not accomplished through the Divine Will, but rather the Devil does them to deceive people." And they

babble lots more about them, shaking their heads like the Jews, who crucified Christ....

In error they say about the cross: "Why should we bow to it? Because the Jews crucified God's Son on it,

the cross is more hateful to God." Thus they teach their people to hate it and not bow to it, saying: "If

someone killed the tsar's son with the tree, can it be dear to the tsar? It's the same with the cross and God."

...What do they say about Holy Communion? That Communion was not created by God's command, nor

is it — as you say — Christ's body, but it is like any simple flour. Nor (they say) did Christ create the

liturgy: "Therefore we do not honor it." 0 what blindness and thickheadedness! Tell me, godless heretic,

why did the Lord say to the apostles, when he was giving them bread: "Take ye and eat, for this is my

body, which will be broken for you, for the forgiveness of sins;" and in like manner, when he was holding

the chalice in his most pure hand, and giving it to his disciples he was saying: "Drink from this all of you,

for this is my blood, which will be shed for many."

...You say that it wasn't the apostles who gave us the liturgy and communion, but John Chrysostom. But

from Christ's incarnation to John more than 300 years passed. Can God's churches have been without the

liturgy and communion for so many years? Didn't the Apostle Peter create a liturgy which the Romans

preserved until now, as did James, the Lord's brother? What apostle or righteous one taught you heretics

to reject the law given to Moses by God? What untruth did you find in the prophets, so that you defame

them and don't accept the books written by them? How can you pretend to love Christ, and yet reject the

prophecies about Him by his holy prophets? For the prophets said nothing on their own, but as the Holy

Spirit commanded them, so did they prophesy for us. If you don't believe these words — that God once

spoke through the mouths of prophets — listen to what the holy apostles say about the prophets. And if

you don't believe the apostles, you are the most unbelieving of pagans.... They don't accept Abraham,

God's friend, and Daniel and the sons of Hagar, and the other prophets, whom even the ferocious wild

animals fear, and the fire turns dark. They dishonor John the Forerunner, Dawn of the Great Sun, calling

him Forerunner of Antichrist — him whom the Lord called greater than all the saints.... And besides all

that evil, the cursed ones don't honor the most glorious and pure Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, but they

say much drivel about her. It's impossible to write their words and abominations in this book....

And the heretics, hearing what the Apostle Paul had to say about idols — that it is not proper to subject

oneself to gold or silver /idols/ created by human skill -- the cursed ones think this refers to icons. So

from that saying they found reason — when alone — not to bow to icons, but out of fear of other men

they go to church and kiss the cross and icons. But we have been told by others who have turned from

them to our true faith, that they say: "We do all this for the sake of other men, but not with our hearts,

while secretly we conceal our faith."

...Many do not know what their heresy is and think of them as people suffering for the truth, who will

receive some reward from God for their chains and prison. But they should hear what Paul has to say, that

those who suffer but do not suffer lawfully will not be crowned. For even if they have suffered greatly,

how can anyone cherish people who call the Devil the creator of man and all divine creation, while in

their great ignorance some make him a fallen angel, and others the dishonest steward.5 And these words

are cause for laughter in those who have intelligence....

And what word of the scriptures have they not perverted? What have they not defamed in this God-

created world? They direct their blasphemies not only toward the earth, but toward the heavens, saying

that everything is according to the will of the Devil: the sky, the sun, stars, air, earth, man, churches,

crosses, and every divine thing they attribute to the Devil, and simply everything that moves on the earth -

- with and without a soul — they call the Devil's. Having heard the parable in the gospels about the two

sons, they consider Christ the older son, and the younger one who deceived his father they consider the

Devil, and they call him "Mamon," and they call him the creator and builder of the things of the earth.

And he commanded men to marry, to eat meat, and to drink wine. And while simply defaming everything

of ours, they consider themselves heavenly dwellers, and people who marry and live in this world they

call the "servants of Mamon."

See, brothers, how much the Devil has defeated them! They reject holy baptism, being disgusted by

baptized children. If they happen to see young children, they are repulsed as if by some foul stink. They

turn away and spit. But they themselves are a stink to angels and to men. And if they should lie, calling

themselves "Christians" — as is their wont — don't believe them, for they are liars like their father the

Devil! And how can they call themselves "Christians," when they don't have priests to baptize them, when

they don't make the sign of the cross, when they don't sing priestly hymns and don't respect priests? But if

there is somewhere a priest who has fallen into their faith, then he has totally rejected ours. If some one of

them keeps it, it is from fear of our earthly rulers, /for/ his mind and love are far from the law passed

down to the holy churches.

They teach their people not to submit to their rulers; they malign the rich; they hate the tsar; they mock

their local chiefs;

they blame the nobility; they consider those who work for the tsar hateful to God; and they command

every servant not to serve his master. But on this account, in order to shame these shameless heretics, let

us recall for Christlovers the words and teachings of the apostles and prophets that the tsars and boyars

are appointed by God.

Notes

1. There is no accepted definition of "presbyter;" he was not a simple priest, and more likely was

the equivalent of a bishop.

2. The "war" Cosmas refers to is probably that with Svjatoslav of Rus' (968-969 A.D.), who

defeated the Bulgarians and took their capital of Preslav.

3. Byzantine authorities charged at various times that the Bogomils were supported by the

governments of Tsar Samuil and Ivan Asen II.

4. The Kormchaja kniga or "Pilot Book" included canon law as well as civil law. It is discussed in

the introduction to "The Law Code of the Common People."

5. A Bogomil interpretation of the parable of the dishonest steward appears in the "Secret Book of

the Bogomils," excerpted later in this book.

Council against Bogomilism, organized by Stefan Nemanja. Fresco from 1290