A year ago, on the occasion of the VIII Centenary of the Cathedral of Burgos, the then magazine Palabra dedicated a special issue in which it covers, in detail, all the aspects of this celebration that will take place on July 20, 2021 and that will be celebrated on July 20, 2021. you can read the full article in this link if you are a subscriber of our magazine.
On this occasion, we offer the text of Juan Álvarez Quevedo, Heritage Delegate of the Diocese of Burgos who splendidly introduces us to the marvelous catechesis of 800 years of history through its most significant elements.
When a person approaches the Cathedral of Burgos, he/she does it for a very specific reason; but this can be so diverse that the conjunction of all of them can serve to formulate a sociology treatise. Throughout the celebrations and events taking place on the occasion of the VIII Centenary of the laying of the first stone, many people have approached the Cathedral, who have been impressed by the act celebrated, by what was contemplated in relation to the Heritage or by the memory of an event that continues to be living history in the life of the Church, both diocesan and of the society of Burgos.
Tourists, faithful of the diocesan Church, pilgrims on their way to Santiago de Compostela, heritage lovers, architecture scholars, devotees of the Christ of Burgos, music and theater lovers, zealous collaborators of the dialogues, representatives of public and private organizations..., all this variety of people have approached the cathedral of Burgos in recent months.
Many others have participated in this temple for different activities for other reasons. It is very difficult to find a uniform motivation that has moved them all to come to this emblematic place. Soon there will be one more motivation that will fill the chapels and naves of this Cathedral; it is the celebration of the Jubilee, which throughout a whole year will allow us to contemplate it with the eyes of faith, with a different motivation. Surely, when some of the aforementioned protagonists have come to this temple, they have not forgotten this motivation: it is a building that serves to contemplate God on earth.
An anecdote about the stonemasons
When a group of children or young people approach the cathedral, at the door of the Sarmental, when they have before their eyes some open doors to access the interior, I usually ask them: where are we?
The answers are very diverse, so I take this opportunity to tell you: it is a very important, sacred place, and I do so by telling you an anecdote, real or fictitious. It is the following: When they were building this cathedral, back in the thirteenth century, a very restless neighbor saw the stonemasons climbing on the scaffolding; the first day he passed by he asked a worker "What are you doing there, my good man?" The latter replies, "Enduring the heat of the day and the hard hours of work." The occasional visitor went home, thinking about the hard work of the stonemasons. The second day passed and he asked another worker: "Is the work going well?" He replied: "Here I am earning bread for my children, who need it so much". Finally he returned on the third day and with the scaffolding a little higher, he asked a third one: "What is the work you are doing?" And he answered: "I am building a cathedral". With this I say to the young people: the doors are open to us; we are invited to enter a cathedral, to be the protagonists of it, as were those artists of the 13th century.
To discover the real reason for our entrance to the Cathedral we have to understand what a Catholic temple is, what we are taught in it, what it was made for. In this way we will find not one more or different motivation to go to the Cathedral, but that will be the basis or the reason for our visit or our entrance to this place.
To do this I will briefly look at some small details of the art of our cathedral and how we are all witnesses of the message it contains and thus we will become protagonists of this temple. These small and extraordinary details make us discover this protagonism and the religious message of the temple. The rest of the studies on the history, the art or the restorations of the Cathedral are already analyzed by other people who know these technical details to perfection.
Santa Maria and the Forgiveness doorway
The Cathedral of Burgos seen from the outside has three very significant facades that introduce us to some mysteries that are celebrated inside.
Juan Álvarez Quevedo
For example, if an apse is decorated with an altarpiece of the highest quality or with stained glass windows that allow us to discover the mysteries through the light and, in addition, it has a kind of exterior altarpiece on the façade, we find ourselves before an ensemble of double value, which shows the mysteries of Salvation from the inside, but prepares from the outside that impact to invite the visitor to enter into contemplation.
The Cathedral of Burgos seen from the outside has three very significant covers that introduce us to some mysteries that are celebrated inside, it is a summary of a History of Salvation written in stone in three chapters, and that invite those who contemplate them to enter into the message.
The façade of Santa Maria that opens onto the square of the same name is the doorway of Forgiveness, a place where pilgrims and jubilarians who wish to obtain this grace enter. It is the one that serves as a reference for the whole Cathedral: Mary is the titular of the temple, it houses in its interior a series of chapels dedicated to her mysteries and takes us into the History of Salvation, because they are the beginnings of this great project of God, who wants to count on Mary, his Mother, to give the fullness to this plan.
As the center of this story is rooted in the People of Israel, which is a harbinger of the Church, we have in the center of the façade the Star of David, which serves to frame the rose window. Mary and her People are the initial frame of this story, they are the protagonists of this first façade that is completed with eight statues of different sizes; according to some authors they represent characters of the people of Israel and are related to the Virgin.
But at the top of the center we find the image and the explanatory text of the cover: the image of the Virgin with the Child and the moon under her feet; at her sides appears the text referring to her: "Pulchra es et decora"(You are beautiful and beautiful). The addition of the spires, made in the 14th century with the mottoes of the bishops Alonso de Cartagena and Luis de Acuña, "Pax vobis" y "Ecce agnus Dei"It helps to link the façade to another moment in the History of Salvation, which is the Church, but which is concretized in the work and labor of the bishops in the local Church.
The Sarmental, Christ
The next façade reveals another moment of this history and is accessed from the Plaza de San Fernando. It is the Portada del Sarmental, where Christ is the central protagonist; in it and in a very reduced space, but with an incomparable richness, four moments are described, the last one prolonged in History. They are the following. In the center, Christ, the protagonist of this cover, appears seated, blessing with his right hand and with the book of the Gospels open; he is the Incarnate Word, who brings and preaches Salvation through his Word. Next to Him are the evangelists, in their period desks and with their attributes, are collecting that message in writing; it is his Word transmitted.
Below this group are the twelve apostles with their book of the Gospels, who decide to preach it; and finally the fourth moment, the figure of the bishop, as successor of the apostles, who brings the message of Salvation to this earth; this message is represented so that the Word spreads in history throughout the centuries. The liturgy of the Church is shown in the archivolts of this façade, with angels, musicians and elders, and in the upper finish also with angels carrying candles and candelabra.
The Coronería, the apostles
The third important exterior doorway is that of the Coronería, located at the north end of the transept and called of the Apostles, to imply that they accompany us in this process of Salvation. It is located on Fernán González Street. It is the third chapter of this process in which all believers become protagonists. It is about the final examination, since, if in the bench are the twelve apostles, in the tympanum is represented the Final Judgment, that is to say, the analysis of the life of the believers previous to the participation of the life of God. Christ appears as Judge, accompanied by the Virgin and Saint John the Evangelist and in the lower section, under the canopy, the narrow door through which it is necessary to pass, with some on the right and others on the left, following the text of Mt. 25:41. It is a whole story that involves the protagonists and makes us all participants in it.
Message from the Choir
The first choir of the Cathedral of Burgos was located at the head of the central nave, but by the end of the 15th century the idea arose to enlarge it and replace it with another of the artistic quality of the time. For this reason, the primitive one was removed, and from 1506 work began on the new one, a work that lasted until 1610, with several outstanding authors working on it.
What interests us at this point is the description of a part of it, in accordance with the purpose of this study. The number of seats amounts to 103 and, since it is in the center of the cathedral to raise praises to God, it is developed in three levels: the lower one presents reliefs with biblical and hagiographic themes of daily life; in the upper one, based on the stories of Genesis, there are reliefs of scenes from Genesis interspersed with images of saints and biblical characters. But what stands out the most is the set of reliefs of the upper gallery, where the life of Christ is narrated, from the Annunciation to the Resurrection.
It is the Gospel in scenes, which is offered to all visitors to the Cathedral, especially to young people, so that they can discover the most important characters at the center of the History of Salvation.
JuanÁlvarez Quevedo
It is the Gospel in scenes, which is offered to all visitors to the Cathedral, especially to young people, so that they can discover the most important characters at the center of the History of Salvation and who are associated with it by sitting on these seats. These visitors, as well as the people who attend the celebrations or other cultural or religious events, associate themselves with the most brilliant and outstanding moments of the evangelical life. They can take a retrospective photograph of the places they have occupied throughout their lives in this choir.
The dome
"In medio templi tui laudabo te et gloriam tribuam nomini tuo qui facis mirabilia."In the midst of your temple I will praise you and give glory to you because you do wonders. This is the inscription that appears on the base of the last work that, among many others, can be analyzed to understand the meaning of the representations of the witnesses. This phrase is the one that the artists could leave written in block letters to imply that, when they carry out this activity, they are continuing God's work in creation.
Commissioned by Bishop Acuña, Juan de Colonia erected a dome in the transept in the form of a third tower around 1460-1470. Striking, elegant and sumptuous, and with a bold structure, it was adorned with many columns and crowned by eight spires. As it was built over the original structure, which only maintained a simple roof, on the night of March 3 to 4, 1539, after its pillars on the north side gave way, it collapsed completely, dragging down the nearby vaults as well.
The chapter decided to rebuild the dome that same day, commissioning it to Juan de Vallejo, who was inspired by a design by Juan de Langres, a disciple of Philippe Bigarny. In 1555 it was almost finished, but it was not completed until 1568. This current design presents a tall octagonal prism structure divided into two bodies, with four attached towers topped by slender spires that reinforce the visual impact of the central drum.
In the heart of the Cathedral
The artist wants to give back to God what he has received, he wants to continue with the work of the creator and therefore rises up and praises him and gives glory from the temple.
Juan Álvarez Quvedo
We are in the heart of the cathedral. The imagination goes to the top and sees the light that radiates throughout the dome, from sunrise to sunset. Philip II already said that this seemed more the work of angels than of men. The hand of God hovers over these reliefs, over the windows and, as a human work, descends to the pavement of the temple, a place destined for human repose.
The artist wants to give back to God what he has received, he wants to continue the work of the creator and therefore he rises up and praises him and gives him glory from the temple; thus he has continued with this work of the Creator. If in the beginning he said let there be light, and the whole universe shone, now man glorifies him with his artist's hand, fulfilling the mandate of work. The talents that God has placed in the mind of man make him the artist of the universe, who completes creation and befriends God. The fretwork vault, typically Burgos, opens the openings for prayer and the incense opens the feelings of divinity. Man and God work in this artistic marvel.
Conclusion
If we can dream, we can see cathedrals full of light, white as the first day, because they have been fully restored; we can imagine temples that are well consolidated and full of tourists; we can contemplate a marvelous goldsmithery behind the showcases, and we dream of routes full of dreams and full of jewels that fill the geography and the landscape. If it is only this, we have not yet discovered the fullness of light, we have not yet seen the wonders of God that these jewels contain.
The true glory of God is also that cathedrals serve as meeting points for the Christian people, that churches be centers of parish and community gatherings, that monstrances, processional crosses and chalices with their luminous glow lead us to God.
It does not matter whether our museums are visited by many or few tourists, it is more urgent that they be an itinerary of faith and questions, that art serve the world of culture and serve tourists pastorally; that each of the temples be a hotbed of peace and solidarity for a world that continues to need and seek God.
All the protagonists of the Cathedral, reflected in images and reliefs, become today men and women of the 21st century, who continue to write their history, in order to be protagonists of their stellar moment in this Way of Salvation.
Delegate of Patrimony of the Diocese of Burgos, Vice-president of the Cabildo of the Cathedral.
