Кирило-методиевското наследство през призмата на Словашкото просвещение: Юрай Фандли и неговата Concio Historico-Panegyrica de Sanctis Slavorum Apostolis Cyrilo et Methodio
The Cyrillo-Methodian Legacy in the Light of the Slovak Enlightenment and Juraj Fandly’s Concio Historico-Panegyrica de Sanctis Slavorum Apostolis Cyrillo et Methodio

Summary/Abstract: The article describes the peculiarities of an 18th c. preaching text, written by the Slovak Catholic priest, writer and historiographer Juraj Fándly in the first codified variant of the Slovak literary language (the so-called Bernolacs language). The Concio is an eulogy to the saint brothers from Thessaloniki, proclaimed as spiritual ancestors and apostles of the Slovak people, byzantine missionaries to “Great Slovakia”. The imaginary Slovak state is identified with Great Moravia, and the name Moravia is explained as being brought by king Svetopluk from “Moesia in Bulgaria”, where the river “Moraba” flows. The sermon locates Magna Moravia between Lower Pannonia and Moesia, and the missionary area of St Cyril – “in two states: the Great Slovak and the Great Bohemian”. According to the narrative, it was St Cyril who baptized the Slovaks, and then they sent him to the Czechs. The text is repleted with a lot of non-historical information, but the main pathos is focused on the “God’s chosen Slovak people”, to whom the Lord sent the holy brothers to bring them out of the darkness of paganism. Juraj Fándli’s sermon is one of the examples of how the images of Cyril and Methodius function as a fundamental element in the construction and maintenance of collective identity in epochs of deprived or unfulfilled statehood. The text is full of information from previous sources but interpreted in the spirit of mythological thinking and biblical imagery. Distorted information and anachronisms are layered on the memory of the baptismal missions of the holy brothers, coloured by the messianic idea of the Slovak supremacy among all Slavic peoples to whom they gave their apostles and salvation in the faith of Christ. The whole text carries the strong patriotic charge that laid down the Cyril and Methodius tradition centuries ago as the cornerstone of Slovak national identity. The text of the Concio Historico-Panegirica, translated in Bulgarian, is published as an addendum.

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