JOHN OF PARMA, BL.

Franciscan minister general, 1247 to 1257; b. 1208?, Parma; d. 1289. John was born in the anti-imperial city of Parma. After entering the Franciscan Order in the 1230s, he lived most of his life beyond the confines of his native city. Sent to study at the Franciscan studium generale in Paris, he was appointed as a lector of theology in various studia of the Order, in Bologna (c. 1241) then in Naples (c. 1243–45). In 1245, upon the deaths of alexander of hales and john of la rochelle, John found himself called back to Paris, this time as lector in theology for the friars. When in July 1245 the minister general of the Franciscan Order, Crescentius of Jesi, decided not to attend the First Council of Lyons (whose primary aim was to excommunicate Emperor Frederick II), innocent iv asked John to represent the friars. At the General Chapter of 1247, the friars chose him as minister general, replacing the irascible Crescentius. John immediately set out on a visitation of the provinces of England, France and Spain.

During his time in Naples, John had absorbed the eschatological ideas of joachim of fiore, and became one of the leading proponents of them. The Franciscan chronicler, salimbene, refers to John as a maximus joachita. This current of eschatological thinking was highly critical of the actions of Frederick II toward the Church and the moral corruption of the ecclesiastical hierarchy; it also envisioned a leading role to be played by both the Friars Minor and Preacher—the prophesied viri spirituales of Joachim of Fiore—in the eschatological events of an end-time fast approaching. John was instrumental in bringing these ideas—and the associated pseudo-Joachim texts— northward. Indeed the well-known fascination with Joachite ideas of hugh of digne and his circle of adherents at Hyères can be traced directly to John.

One of the key elements in the eschatological scenario propounded by Joachim and the Franciscan Joachites was the reunion of the Latin and Greek Churches. Thus, it was not simply John's knowledge of Greek, but more especially, his belief in the critical importance of this latter event that prompted Innocent IV to call him back from his visitation in early 1249 to lead a delegation of friars to Nicaea in order to explore the possibility of a reunion between Rome and the Greek Church in exile led by its emperor, John Vatatzès. John and his companions (among whom was another maximus joachita, Gerard of Borgo San Donnino) were responsible for drafting the interpolations to the Vaticinium Sibillae Erithreae, an apocalyptic text that predicted the return of the Greek Empire and Church from exile in Nicaea to Constantinople and the demise of the Hohenstaufen line as the necessary preludes to the last days. In addition, the Vaticinium anticipates the friars serving not simply as missionaries to but bishops of a renewed Church in the East, activities already strongly promoted within the Order itself by the minister general.

When the mission foundered in mid-1250 with no concrete results, John returned to the West. He addressed himself to the critical issue facing the Franciscan community in this period: how to balance the needs of food, clothing and housing of an ever-growing Order with its vocation of total poverty. Determined that the deeds of the friars match their ideals, at successive general chapters in 1251 and 1254, John led the opposition of many within the community to Ordinem vestrum —the bull of Innocent IV granted to the Order in 1245 that had opened the door to the possibility of greater laxities among the friars in their observance of poverty.

John struck a humble posture on behalf of the Minors at the University of Paris during the controversies with the secular masters, calming the situation by publicly promising to abide by the strictures imposed by the masters limiting the mendicants to one chair of theology. But in 1255 when it was learned that an inflammatory book fiercely critical of the papacy and hierarchy, predicting their demise in a new Age of the Spirit—the famous Liber introductorius to the works of Joachim of Fiore— had actually been written by a Franciscan, Gerard of Borgo San Donnino, John rallied to the defense of his embattled confrère. In doing so, he became inextricably associated with the radical ideas of the book.

alexander iv demanded that John resign as minister general at a special chapter in Rome on Feb. 2, 1257; he was replaced by the young theologian, bonaventure of Bagnoregio. The latter put Gerard and his companions on trial the following year for heresy, resulting in their perpetual imprisonment, but John suffered only the humiliation of his deposition. A few years later, however, probably in 1261 or 1262, John himself was put on trial by Bonaventure for, according to Angelo Clareno, having written a "little book," whose identity has never been determined. Only the timely intervention of Cardinal Ottobono in his behalf spared the former general from a fate similar to the other Franciscan Joachites. He was allowed to retire, under house arrest, to the quiet of the hermitage of Greccio. There he remained for nearly the rest of his days until, in 1289, having received permission to leave the hermitage, he set out again for his beloved East. But John died en route shortly afterwards in the town of Camerino in the Marches of Ancona.

Bibliography: salimbene, Cronica, I, ed. g. scalia (Turnhout 1998), 453–477. a. clareno, Liber chronicarum sive tribulationum ordinis minorum, ed. g. boccali (S. Maria degli Angeli 1999), 354–388. r. brooke, Early Franciscan Government (Cambridge 1959). p. alexander, "The Diffusion of Byzantine Apocalypses in the Medieval West and the Beginnings of Joachimism," in Prophecy and Millenarianism. Essays in Honour of Marjorie Reeves, ed. a. williams (Essex 1980), 53–106. a. franchi, La svolta politico-ecclesiastica tra Roma e Bisanzio (1249–1254). La legazione di Giovanni da Parma. Il ruolo di Federico II (Rome 1981).

[m. f. cusato]