Images of Sin and Temptation in Afanasii Kalnofoiskyi’s, Ioanykii Haliatovskyi’s and Dymytrii Tuptalo’s Marian Narratives

The article elucidates the main peculiarities of depicting sin and temptation in four seventeenth-century collections of the Marian narratives about miracles: Afanasii Kalnofoiskyi’s “Τερατο？ργημα” (“Teraturgema”), Ioanykii Haliatovskyi’s “Nebo Novoie” (“The New Heaven”) and “Skarbnytsia Potrebnaia” (“The Needful Treasury”), and Dymytrii Tuptalo’s “Runo Oroshennoie” (“The Bedewed Fleece”). The religious and philosophic interpretation of evil represented in these baroque narratives is examined in the context of canonical Christian church tradition. In particular, the author takes into account the Christian understanding of evil as alienation from good, the medieval distinction of “mirabilis”, “miraculosus” and “magicus”, and the division of miracles into holy (or creative) and unholy (or destructive). As well, the article places the Ukrainian Marian narratives into the context of apocryphal tradition and demonological stories, which were very popular at the time. No less interesting is the analyzed antithesis of false beauty (which is shown, for example, in demonic love of decorations) and the art of representing the truth related to the didactic intentions of homiletic literature. It is stressed that Ukrainian baroque authors configure demons not just as horrible beings, but as wicked creators of havoc that scare and make readers laugh at the same time. It is also clarified that sin is primarily interpreted as illness (especially madness), immobility, oppression, fall, and breakage. The main focus here is on the problem of double blindness and stagnation, the motif of the hero’s descent and ascent, the motif of cleansing of the soul, and the tragedy of losing personal spiritual integrity represented by a chain of unexpected images.