A vallásos mese mesélője : vázlat

The aim of my paper is to summarize the results of previous Hungarian researches and to give a few hints to further studies as regards the storytellers of religious folktales in Hungary. We are at the very beginning of studying separately of this important topics, thus it was necessary to sum up the achievements hitherto gained. Despite of the very vivid researches on religious folklore in Hungary, in our new handbooks (e. g. Magyar néprajz, a multi-volume series by the Ethnographic Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences) the story-teller of religious folktales is not mentioned. Speaking on folk religions or on homo religious persons from the Hungarian folk, they do not mention their folk narratives. On the other hand, while describing various genres of folk narratives (religious folktales, saints legends, parabiblical lore etc.) they do not pay attention to their story-tellers in separate chapters. The by and large ready Hungarian tale-type index, (Magyar népmesekatalógus) referring to hundreds of religious folk narratives, does not single out the beststory-tellers ofsuch tales. Our (not complete) lists of names mentioned in Hungarian folktales (Tulajdonnevek a magyar népmesékben, four issues hitherto) could be used as checking list for thousands of Hungarian folktales with religious character: simply by looking to names as God, Jesus Christ, St. Peter, Holy Virgin Mary, or even to Jerusalem, Heaven, Hell, Devil etc. Thus there is a possibility for finding easily the large majority ofreligious folktales collected and published from true Hungarian folk traditions. (A few of such tales has been translated into other languages, too, including English and German too.) In spite of pioneering studies by Gyula Ortutay and Sándor Bálint, the Hungarian story-tellers of religious folk narratives have been neglected. We need thorough description of their lives, writings, religious activites, a complete register of their narratives, with references to their function, audience, tradition etc. The „organizers" of folk religion activites („saints" in a local sense of the therm) use the beauty and the power of religious folk narratives. The stories are of immense age and widely distributed. Their study must be of psychological, comparative and historical character. Hungarian folklore research must write a summarizing work on that genre, so rich and powerful in our folk traditions