Magyar Egyház, 1993 (72. évfolyam, 1-5. szám)
1993-10-01 / 4. szám
MAGYAR EGYHÁZ 13. oldal disrupt it, must not be defended. Here was the reason of the fight between Stephen and his great enemy, Koppány. Koppány felt that he was the defender of the ancient law and that Stephen was usurper, the breaker of true faith. Koppány stood on the ground of the law of seniorate, the pagan law, even demanding Geza’s widow for his wife (according to some records, Sarolta was of 34 years of age and a beautiful woman). The fight was between the law of the seniorate and of the primogeniture, Koppány and István, the Christian King and the Pagan Pretender; it can easily be said that in this fight good and evil were fighting. Koppány did have followers. In the fight Stephen was the victor. What would have happened if Koppány had won? The raids of the West would have resumed, probable new defeats would have crumbled up the people, resulting in the dissolution in the Slavic majority, maybe a second Christianization, if any, but not Hungarian. This may be a vague inference but clearly points to the fact what a tremendous responsibility every generation has being the alchemist to rightfully mix good and bad. However, Stephen won. Koppány was punished and had to disappear from the scene of history. The quartering of his body may have been retrojecting the XIV.. century Zach Felician episode. Stephen, from many records, is shown as being merciful to his defeated, vanquished enemies. Against this clement attitude, the case of Vazul (Vászoly) is used as an argument, whom Stephen blinded in vengeance. The following story can be put together from the various records. Stephen, old and frail, was sleeping when at night a would be assassin was about to stab him to death, when the dagger fell to the ground and Stephen woke. The man was caught, confessed that the abettor was Vazul, the cousin of Stephen; the punishment was pushing out his eyes and cutting off his hands. We say cruel, however, assassination of the ruler was punishable with death. Vazul was not only not executed, made incapable to endanger Stephen, but true to his clement behavior, Stephen spared life and limb of Vazul’s three young sons, András, Bela and Levente. Banished to Poland, the three boys grew up and in their later years the first two became kings of Christian Hungary. A striking explanation of the Vazul-assassination plan can be found in the Smaller St. Stephen legend. Vazul was about to act according to the ancient pagan law of regicide, killing the helpless, old king. (Almos was killed like that, Arpad’s father.) The death of Stephen would have been, for Vazul, the way to the restitution of the ancient regime. This also explains why Stephen, true to his Christian belief in clemency, spared the life of the young Vazul-sons. As a matter of fact, a successor of Stephen, Kalman (Könyves Kalman, often called Kalman, the Booklover, in English), Vazul’s great-grandson blinded not only his rebel brother Almos but also the child son of Almos, Bela; who, notwithstanding his blindness, did become king under the name Bela II, named Bela, the Blind (Vak Bela). Stephen was building a new nation for a spiritually changed people. Yet, he was not wiping out old ways and customs. He was somehow building old blocks into the new building. He did not eradicate the memory of old legends which lived on in the songs of old minstrels. Stephen’s Admonition to his son contained a passage that the land of one tongue and one culture (egynyelvű es egyerkolcsu) is weak. It sounds as if Stephen had no ethnic consciousness, or that the many foreign newcomers as well as the many Slavs, living among the Hungarians, should be acceptable. It should be rather explained as the universalism of the Christian world empire idea, the conception of Emperor Otto III, that only a world empire uniting all Christian people and lands in one brotherly union non-conscious of ethnicnational differences is the ideal one. In the Admonitions Stephen advised his son Imre (tragically died young) that peaceloving monarchs rule, the rest only tyrannize. Stephen was only merciful to defeated enemies, he also provided a haven for countless refugees from other lands. To name only the two exiled princes, Edward and Edmund Ironside. Edward returned to England; his wife was Agatha, Stephen’s daughter; her daughter St. Margaret of Scotland was thus Stephen’s grand-daughter. From the description of the various legends and contemporary - and even modern profiles and pictures - Stephen lives in our minds as a pious, devout old man. This profile must be changed. Combined the acts and facts of his 42 years of rule, Stephen was pious yet realistic, just yet fair, strong handed yet peace loving. Using the characteristics of St. Augustine: rex a recto regendo, justus, pius et pacificus idoneus ad regendum, rex Christianus. Stephen was canonized in 1083 but was a saint well before that in the eyes and hearts of his people. He was recognized by his people as the great founder of the kingdom. The official canonization was obtained by St. Ladislaus (Szent László). It is said that “História est magistra vitae” (History is the teacher of life). It is a true word so rarely followed. Here it should be learned that history is not there to repeat its examples from the distance of a thousand year nor to bury them but eagerly studying their influence, to become sensitive, susceptible and responsive. Let us this way commemorate St. Stephen. Andrew Harsanyi
