FFMR The Newsletter December 2006

In past newsletter articles this year, the 500th anniversary of the death of Christopher Columbus, there has been mention of a book which he composed, Libro de las profecias, the Book of Prophecies. Columbus produced this book in a very hectic period of his life between September 1501 and March 1502 while he was making preparations in Spain for his fourth and last voyage to the New World. He was ably assisted in this project by scholarly Carthusian monk in Seville, Fr. Gaspar Gorricio, with whom he regularly corresponded and often visited.

As early as 1481, 20 years before the writing of the Libro, Columbus wrote copious notes in the margins and blank pages of a book in his private library entitled: Historia Rerum Ubigue Gestarum (A History of Things Everywhere Accomplished) by Aeneus Sylvius Piccolomini (the future Pope Pius II, 1458-64). These early notes provide clear evidence that the main outline of the later Libro was already firmly in his thinking then, when he was 30 years of age.

The original manuscript of the Libro has remained over the centuries in the priceless Columbian Library of the Cathedral of Seville. Ferdinand Columbus, the younger son of Columbus, had collected one of the largest libraries in Europe, including all the books of this father's library and all the writings of his father. When Ferdinand died in 1539 all these materials became the property of the Cathedral Chapter of Seville.

Although the printing press invented by Johann Gutenburg appeared around the time of Columbus' birth in 1451, the handwritten Libro was never printed until the Italian government printed all the known writings of Columbus on the 400th anniversary of his discoveries in 1892. No translation of the original Latin Libro was made until a Spanish translation appeared almost 100 years later in 1984.

In 1991 the University of Florida Press finally published an English translation of the Libro, with the original Latin on the opposite page. In addition to the Libro itself, this work contains a 93 page commentary covering Columbus' cultural background, his piety and faith, and the importance of the Libro in understanding Columbus. The co-authors of the major work were the Reverends August Kling and Delno C. West, both of whom were outstanding Protestant research fellows at the Center for Theological Inquiry at Princeton University in New Jersey.

Rev. Kling, broadly educated at Wheaton College, Princeton Theological Seminary, McGill University in Canada, and the Universities of Mexico, Edinburg, Paris and Vienna, took up pastoral ministry with a special avocation of examining the faith lives of prominent Christians In 1984 at the age of 57, he left the pastoral ministry to devote his energies to translating the Libro until his unexpected death in 1986. The Rev. West, already a published authority on Columbus and on the reform work of the Order of Friars Minor, completed the work in 1991.

These Protestant authors, unlike most prominent Columbus authors in the past, understood the vital role that the Word of God is always meant to play in the mission of the church and gave Columbus proper credit for being a perceptive amateur Biblical scholar.

They accurately describe the Libro de las profecias, this book which Columbus compiled to substantiate his claims to have been called to be a "Christ-bearing" missionary to distant lands and to have received guidance from the Scriptures and the Holy Spirit for the expansion of Christendom, as "surely the world's most unique notebook of an individual's personal Bible studies" (Libro, p. 3).

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They frankly report the unfair treatment that the Libro had previously received over the centuries from most historians and biographers:

"Most have viewed the Libro de las profecias as genuine but as a kind of relatively unimportant excursion into fanaticism that occurred late in the explorer's life" (Libro, p. 85).

The Reverends Kling and West do not neglect to note the importance to Columbus, a member of the Franciscan Third Order, of the influence of his patron, the great 13th century evangelist, St. Francis of Assisi:

"As a lay Christian Columbus showed a special devotion to the Order of St. Francis and the Seraphic founder's teachings, including a deep attraction to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception" (Libro, p. 48).

In this regard our Protestant authors portray the importance that St. Francis and his Third Order enjoyed in 15th century Europe:

"Men and women of all social classes and occupations sought lives of holiness through the lofty ideal of St. Francis" (Libro, p. 58).

They quote a modern Franciscan historian, Lazaro Iriarte, in his book Franciscan History:

There came in time a moment when St. Francis reigned as the supreme luminary over the whole of Spanish society: kings, bishops, generals, scholars, and artists thought it an honor to call him `our seraphic Father' . . . and to be buried in his robes (Libro, p. 58).

In Chapter Four of their book, Reverends Kling and West sum up their assessment of Columbus' Libro de las profecias:

This book has finally presented Columbus properly as a true Christian visionary moved by the Grace of God to bear Christ to those who had not yet heard of the message of the Gospel. We are indebted to the Reverends Kling and West and to the University of Florida Press for bringing to the Englishspeaking world Columbus' own work and a learned commentary adding light to this unique Biblical study.