As unknowable and unreachable as he was, God had sacrificed himself on the cross, and had sent prophets and saints to perform miracles and look after the common people, the poor, the sick, and so on. Christianity would perpetuate the memory of these wonders throughout all the Middle Ages thanks to the Vitae of saints, and with good reason: such stories would edify the faithful by showing them that the only apparent problem with Christian monotheism – the distance separating man from God – was way more irrelevant than it might have seemed. This and other parallel miracles in the Navigatio Sancti Brendani were clearly meant to recall biblical miracle tales, such as that of the manna from heaven, or of the quails that God sent to Moses. The bird dropped the branch on Brendan's lap, and the heavenly food filled the brothers for 12 days (another symbolic number). For instance, by sending them a big bird that flew over their boat carrying in its beak a branch of an unknown tree from which was hanging a bunch of exceptionally red and ripe grapes. Albeus.īrendan's journey to the Promised Land continued to be watched over by God, who would assist the Irish monks in many ways. He also told them that the inhabitants of that island did not get old, nor did they feel cold or heat: the anxieties of the human world did not belong to the island of St. The abbot of the monastery told the strangers that everyday he found such miraculous loaves in the pantry, and that God gave them all the food they needed. Suddenly, the table was set by itself, and the monks had a white loaf and a fish each to eat: a generous and miraculous lunch which was in total harmony with the typical monastic diet (in which meat was often replaced with fish for penance-related reasons). It led them to a large dwelling where table, chairs, and water had been elegantly set inside a wide atrium, almost as if the abode itself had been waiting for the Irish monks to arrive. The company was welcomed by a cheerful dog, and Brendan immediately recognized the pet as a messenger of God. It took them three days to eventually dock when, at the ninth hour, they saw a small bay suitable for anchoring: needless to say, these numbers were no coincidence, and were all connected with biblical symbolic ones (3, multiples of 3, etc.). The moment the monks ran out of food, they immediately caught sight of an island and headed for it. Actually, their estimate proved pretty accurate, and it was no matter of luck: God, from His invisible outpost, was guiding them. After the fast, the monks built a wooden boat, covered it with bovine leather, and finally set sail with provisions for 40 days: clearly, they planned to reach the Promised land within.“biblical times”.
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