I believe this ties to the legend that Gregory the Great posthumously
baptized Trajan.
Tom Izbicki
On Tue, 5 Sep 2000 [log in to unmask] wrote:
> Date: Tue, 05 Sep 2000 20:04:18 -0400
> From: [log in to unmask]
> Reply-To: [log in to unmask]
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Re Harrowing of Hell - was - Dante's Inferno
>
>
> Is there one fairly standard version of who was saved in the Harrowing of
> Hell and who wasn't? I'm thinking of the 14c. English "De Erkenwaldo" in
> which the dead virtuous pagan specifically laments that Christ left him
> behind on that occasion. ("Quen žou herghedes helle-hole and hentes hom
> žeroute, Ži loffynge oute of limbo, žou laftes me žer.") He is virtuous
> enough to deserve heaven, but now requires a posthumous baptism (and I
> recall that there was a similar baptism-of-dead-virtuous-pagan story told
> about another saint too) ... does this fit in with the usual understanding,
> or would you call it creative license in order to give Erkenwald a miracle
> and a plot?
>
> I'm familiar with the Erkenwald poem by chance, more or less; I'm
> reasonably ignorant of other texts of the period ...
>
> Jonathan Gilbert
>
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