Savonarola: Epistula Ad Papam Alexandrum VI, 20May1497

A week after word about the excommunication of Savonarola the Dominican friar had arrived, and just under a month before it was publicly read out in Florence, the friar quickly penned a letter to the pope who had sent the breve. He had previously sent out a detailed work answering statements of purpose for the reorganization of the Lombard Congregations, set as an apology for the Congregation of Brothers of San Marco in Florence. He would also pen a letter 'Against the Sentence of Excommunication'  to numerous unnamed individuals which encouraged the continued work of reform and which countered the papal accusations. This was based on ideas inherit in and while extensively quoting the noted fifteenth century reformer Jean Gerson. This would be sent in the month of June. Savonarola was also putting the final touches on his book The Triumph of the Cross which he said would explain 'without any doubt' what they were doing at San Marco and why.

The quick letter to Pope Alexander VI, dated May 20, 1497 immediately starts with a number of defensive questions. Why are you angry? What have I done? This then leads to accusing Savonarola's antagonists, those who gave false information to the pope. Quoting Psalms 21:17, he claims, "Many dogs have surrounded me, a company of malicious men besets me."

The accusations against him he says have been refuted by his own very words which have also been printed accurately and widely disseminated 'by booksellers and printers'. If not by his word, then certainly, these written pieces should be enough to exonerate him.

"Let them be obtained, let them be read, let them be examined whether there is anything whatsoever that offends my lord's Holiness, as they have so often claimed, falsely. Can it be that I said one thing publicly and wrote another? I want to disprove the charges with the most public response possible. What is the sense in it? What is the purpose? What kind of unhinged mind would come up with such an allegation?" [iv, 1]

 Next, Savonarola states his own belief that there is one Florentine friar in particular who may have turned the pope against him. Fra Mariano da Genazzano (1412-98) was an Augustinian preacher that often spoke out vehemently against Savonarola during his ascendancy. During an Ascenscion Day sermon in 1491, Genazzano had devolved into an ad hominem attack on Savonarola and was soon forced to leave the city. It was he that went to Rome and in time began speaking to the new Pope about the trouble this Dominican friar from Ferrara was stirring.

Turning again his point of attack, Savonarola asks in the letter,

 "... what kind of conscience does that highflying preacher there with you accuse blameless me of the crime of which he himself is the guiltiest of all?"

There are witnesses, of course, that Savonarola knows who could testify that this informer Genazzano was raging at other times against His Holiness. And Savonarola had refuted 'his insolence' then. For,

"... it is not right to assail the smallest person, how much less a prince and pastor of sheep! Who is so demented as not to know that? God willing, I am not yet so stupid as to forget myself; and for no purpose, in no dealings, on no occasion would I knowingly dare to challenge or scorn the Vicar of Christ on earth, who especially ought to be obeyed." [iv, 2]

In conclusion, he claims he has preached or done nothing against the faith or the Catholic Church - 'heaven forbid!'. So he pleads, 'don't wish for the wicked and envious'. First he should 'adhere to the faith'. But further, he warns, if 'human assistance fails', he (Savonarola) will then tell the world of their 'impious iniquity', until God willing they repent. This friar does not seem to ask for forgiveness but then, in the very next sentence, he claims, 'I commend myself most humbly to Your Beatitude.' And, 'humilis filiolus et servus frater', humble son and little friar.

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Savornarola, Girolamo: Apologetic Writings; ed. and trans. in english , by M Michele Mulchahey, for The I Tatti Renaissance Library (ITRI); by The President and Fellows of Harvard College, USA 2015