The Reform of the Roman Liturgy, Its Problems and Background by Klaus
Gamber (tr. K. D. Grimm). Una Voce Press, San Juan Capistrano, CA. 198
pages, $19.95.
Pro captu lectoris, habent sua fata libelli. Ever since Terentianus Maurus
recorded this sententia in late antiquity, it has applied as well to
authors, whose fate, like that of their writings, depends upon the
capacity of their readers. Klaus Gamber's book bears this out, for it has
been received in widely differing ways. Some found the work not only
stimulating and worthy of reflection, but moving and prayerful, indeed an
"amazing book" of "enormous significance," perhaps "the most important book
written in the last 15 years regarding the call for the reform of the Novus
Ordo liturgy and the reinstatement of the Tridentine Mass."
Others, though, are less enthusiastic, and in fact have serious
reservations, judging that the inconsistencies and criticisms contained in
"what comes off like an incessant barrage of rantings, often confused and
confusing" are, at least in the long run, neither healthy nor helpful,
since Part I of the book (at least) is "an unrelenting attack on the
liturgical reforms not only following Vatican II but also leading up to
it, starting with those of Pope St. Pius X."
Klaus Gamber (from 1962) was head of the liturgical institute, originally
founded at Regensburg under Archbishop-Bishop Michael Buchberger in 1957
to conduct and promote research in the areas of liturgical studies and the
history of Benedictine monasticism in the diocese of Regensburg, in order
to make the results of this scientific work fruitful for practical pastoral
work.
Gamber edited (often in collaboration with other scholars) the series of
monographs entitled Studia Patristica et Liturgica (18 volumes), fifteen
volumes of Textus Patristici et Liturgici, and 26 other volumes
supplementary to both series. His specialty was palaeography, the study of
ancient manuscripts, which he learned under the guidance of Benedictine
Father Alban Dold, the pioneer of fluorescent palimpsest photography. (A
palimpsest is a leather or parchment manuscript which has been re-used
after the original writing has been scraped away or erased. Since the
original writing was seldom completely eradicated, it can often be read,
at least in part. Some palimpsests can therefore have great value for the
specialist palaeographer.) Gamber did his first scientific work in
"collecting fragments" at the palimpsest institute which Dold had headed
since 1917 at the Archabbey of Beuron/Hohenzollern. Like his master,
Gamber was a self-taught man. (After eighteen years of private work on a
thesis about the authorship of the ancient treatise De Sacramentis
commonly attributed to Saint Ambrose, Gamber received his S.T.D., not from
a West German university, but from a communist-bloc country, the
theological faculty of the University of Budapest [Fr. Polykarp Rado,
O.S.B.], which caused a minor sensation in 1967.)
Specialists in manuscript studies must often deal with fragments, and the
title of the Festschrift presented to Alban Dold on his seventieth
birthday in 1952 was in fact Colligere Fragmenta. It is not surprising
that Gamber's work was often criticized for drawing broad hypothetical
conclusions from very scanty (often literally "fragmentary") evidence. All
of these factors should be borne in mind when approaching this author and
his work, which represents a notable achievement by any standards.
The English volume contains a preliminary section with a preface by Father
Gerard Calvet, O.S.B., of Le Barroux, and two other brief pieces. To mark
Gamber's seventieth birthday in 1989, a group of friends and colleagues
had prepared a Festschrift containing, in addition to fourteen scholarly
articles, brief congratulatory messages from several cardinals and bishops.
Since the honoree had gone to his reward before the Festschrift was
published, it became, perforce, a memorial volume: W. Nyssen, ed.,
Simandron-Schriftenreihe Koinonia-Oriens 30 (Koln 1989). The memorial
tribute of Bishop Braun of Eichstatt (pp. 20-21 in Simandron) becomes in
English, a "preface" at pp. xv-xvi, but omits the second sentence of the
German original, without indicating that this has been done, thus creating
the impression that the episcopal "preface" (untitled in the original) was
written specifically for this English volume or its (Italian ?) source.
The sentence omitted reads: "The memorial volume for him offers me a
welcome opportunity for a word of greeting and of thanks."
Editor W. Nyssen's memorial article at pp. 23-27 of Simandron is headed
"testimonial" in English (pp. xi-xiii); in it (p. xiii) the citation of
Cardinal Ratzinger is imprecise and hence misleading... wirklich aus der
gottesdienstlichen Mitte der Kirche denkt means "truly thinks out of the
worshipping heart or center of the Church," which is something other than
"truly represents the liturgical thinking of the center of the Church."
Gamber, and not the "liturgical thinking of the center," is the subject of
the sentence... And one wonders why the last sentence of Nyssen's memorial
appreciation is reproduced only partially? Did an anonymous editor do the
trimming? The complete sentence reads: "In the midst of the diligent
search for sensations in the Church of our days, his lonely path of
sacrifice has now come to a sudden end."
A propos translation: while the thoughtful theologian noted only three
typos, he encountered more than a dozen "opaque" passages and inaccuracies,
some of them perhaps caused by unfamiliarity with the technical terminology
occasionally used by the author.
The introductory pages vii-xvi are followed by the two main parts of the
book, each of them representing a separate treatise by Monsignor Gamber.
Part I, whose title was given to the English volume as a whole, was
published as a pamphlet in 1979. Those of us who actively supported the
German Una Voce from its early days in Berlin/Schoneberg, where the late
Albert Tinz published its Rundbrief from the Kufsteiner Strasse as
mimeographed circular letters, recognize the chapters of this section as a
number of earlier articles originally published in other places, chiefly in
the Una Voce Korrespondenz (UVK). Thus, for example, Chapter 2 - UVK 5
(1975) 142-51; Chapter 3 - UVK 6 (1976) 298-301; Chapter 4 WK 7 (1977) 88-
96; Chapter 7 - UVK 4 (1974) 283-7; Chapter 10 - UVK 2 (1972) 1-9 etc.
Part II was published in 1987 as a brochure Zum Hern hin! intended for the
general reader as a kind of commentary on the problems presented by the
modern altar and celebration facing the people. It was occasioned by an
exchange of letters to the editor of a German Catholic weekly, Deutsche
Tagespost, and once again combines earlier articles with new materials.
In short, the book we have before us is not a systematic treatment of its
subject, but rather a compilation of occasional pieces, some of them twenty
years old. Would it be wrong to see the principle of colligere fragmenta at
work here?
In spite of the handicaps implied by these facts, several important themes
recur throughout the book, and thus impart a certain unity. Among these
themes--all worthy of serious reflection and earnest discussion--the
legitimate liturgist notes:
* the <organic> development of symbol and ritual which has taken place in
the Ecclesia orans during the course of a millenium and more;
* the <Christocentric> character of the divine liturgy, in which with all
the warriors of the heavenly army we sing a hymn of glory to the Kyrios
(Sacrosanctum Concilium 8);
* the proper <orientation> for liturgical prayer by priest and people who
are together conversi ad Dominum (Saint Augustine).
There can be no doubt that this last aspect has attracted the lion's share
of attention since the publication of Gamber's book. Building upon the work
of predecessors and contemporaries like Joseph Jungmann, Cyrille Vogel,
Louis Bouyer, Walter Drig and Joseph Ratzinger, Gamber (in spite of the
view expressed in his Liturgie Ubermorgen p. 251 [Freiburg 1966]) has shown
that the oft-repeated claim that the early Christian altar as a rule pre-
supposed "orientation" toward the people, is a myth and nothing more (J. A.
Jungmann). Gamber's insistence on this point has not been entirely
ineffectual, as the editorial published a year ago in the official organ of
the Vatican's Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the
Sacraments clearly indicates (Notitiae 29, May 1993, pp. 245-249). In what
was surely intended as a response to this book, the sacred dicastery
asserts that the eastward position of celebrant and faithful, while "a
great tradition even if not an unanimous one," did not constitute an
indispensable element of the liturgy and so "cannot be considered a
tradition, fundamental principle in Christian liturgy." While striving to
justify the westward position currently so widespread, the congregation
also admits that it is "not an absolute value above and beyond all
others... The principle of the unicity of the altar is theologically more
important than the practice of celebrating versus populum." Non jam frustra
doces, Klaus Gamber! (See Sacred Music, Vol. 121, No. 1 [Spring 1994], p.
19-26; Vol. 120, No. 4 [Winter 1993], p. 14-17.)
Those who knew Klaus Gamber personally, who benefited from his kind and
courteous hospitality to other scholars and researchers, can testify to his
fundamental attitude as a man of the Church. Quiet and reserved by nature,
he possessed a great diligence and a strong sense of responsibility which
prompted his efforts toward gaining a better insight into those "general
laws governing the structure and meaning of the liturgy," which the last
council calls for as a basic pre-supposition for any responsible discussion
and practical activity in liturgical reform and renewal (Sacrosanctum
Concilium 23).
Klaus Gamber was neither a traditionalist at any price, nor one who could
come to terms with the perhaps too hastily introduced reforms of the
liturgy after the last council. He was a "centrist" who by his researches
in the history of liturgy could prove that the liturgy was constantly
undergoing changes, that it did not congeal in cast-iron forms, but always
took full account of the men who prayed it. After all, the fathers of
Vatican II never dreamed that their reference to making the liturgical
signs more transparent, would open the doors to a new wave of rationalism.
And it was precisely such a rationalist attitude which Klaus Gamber opposed
as vigorously as he could. For that, we are all in his debt. But for our
part, we must exert ourselves to reach an appreciation of his motives and
his points of view. The legitimate liturgist is vexed at the witless ease
with which the ill-informed so readily over-simplify a complex situation,
and he cannot help but recall the words which a genial jurist wrote more
than half a century ago, for they apply as well to Klaus Gamber's book:
Have a care, my friend! This book is esoteric through and through, and its
immanent esotericism increases to the precise degree to which you penetrate
its pages. Therefore, better to leave hands off! Put it back again in its
place on the shelf! Touch it no more with your fingers, be they washed and
manicured, or stained with blood as is typical of the times. Wait and see
whether you will meet this book again, and whether you are one of those to
whom its secrets are revealed! The fata libellorum and the fata of their
readers are somehow mysteriously intertwined. I tell you that in all
friendship. Do not try to force your way into the arcarza, but wait until
you have been properly introduced and admitted. Otherwise, you might suffer
an attack of rage which would be harmful to your health, and you might
attempt to destroy something which is beyond all destructibility. That
would not be good for you. Therefore, hands off! and put the book back in
its place! Sincerely, your good friend, Benito Cereno.
