The Soul Instructed in Christian Doctrine and Life, Volume Three

Manuscript Borg.tonch.15, “Alma Instruida na Doutrina e vida Christão pello Padre Mestre Manoel Fernandes da Companhia de Jesu, Tomo Terceiro” (The soul instructed in Christian doctrine and life, Volume Three), is the third part of Borg.tonch.13, written in 1699 by Father Manuel Fernandes, SJ, chaplain to King Pedro III of Portugal, and copied by Father Philiphê do Rosario Nguyễn Văn Bỉnh, CO. It was copied in 1811 in Lisbon, Portugal. Unlike the two preceding volumes it opens directly with the Portuguese text and places the Vietnamese table of contents at the end; a short Vietnamese translation of a passage on the fourteen works of mercy follows the Portuguese text. It runs to 526 pages in three chapters, or “capítulos”, with nineteen accompanying sections, each carrying miracles and passages from scripture and the lives of the saints to illuminate Catholic doctrine. The first chapter expounds the Ten Commandments through devotional stories. The second treats the five precepts of the Church binding on the faithful. The last treats the fourteen works of mercy, corporal and spiritual. This is certainly the source Father Bỉnh drew on for the “Gương Truyện”, manuscript Borg.tonch.9. At the end of the volume is a short piece in Portuguese interspersed with Vietnamese, “Escola de Belem. Jesus Nascido no Presepio” (The School of Bethlehem: Jesus born in the manger), a work of catechesis and devotion by the Jesuit Father Alexandre de Gusmão. This manuscript offers scholars of Vietnamese studies further material on the Catholic devotional works then popular among ordinary readers in Portugal.