The function of interpretations in the life of John of Sinai (on the material of the old printed edition of The Ladder of 1647)

The article concentrates on the study of the role of interpretations (scholia) belonging to the text of the brief Life of John of Sinai, compiled by the monk Daniel of Raifa. The analysis is carried out on the material of the first Russian edition of the Ladder of 1647. It was prepared by the famous seventeenth-century scribe Sergius Shelonin, who textually studied and selected interpretations from various sources. There are fourteen interpretations in the Vita, which are visually located within the text of the Life immediately after the fragment being interpreted, which necessitates their study in contextual and textual connection. Their semantic and formal connection with the topoi of the Life and its plot and compositional structure is considered. The main purpose of the scholia is to explain to the reader the meaning of particular fragments of the text of the Vita, which, as a rule, represent the key topoi. The analysis of the semantic correlations between interpretations and the Life, with regard to the general structure of the text, allows us to conclude that there are three main functions of the scholia. The first and main function is hagiographic, inherent in most interpretations aimed at explaining the content of the saint’s feat and his image. The interpreter saw his second task as teaching, and in the three interpretations the features of the sermon dominate. The third, stylistic function, is determined by the interpreter’s intention to follow the style of the hagiographer. On the whole, there is a connection between the scholia and the structure of the Vita “bios” as well as the influence of panegyric style. At the same time, there is a certain stylistic and functional heterogeneity of interpretations, which indicates that they belong to different authors. Nonetheless, the semantic role of the scholia in relation to the Life is dominant, as it deepens the reader’s understanding of the Vita’s spiritual content.