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From: <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, May 08, 2000 1:20 PM
Subject: Re: BVM and Last Judgement
> But I think there may be more going on than this. The emphasis on Christ's
> wounds (and remember this painting was over the chancel arch and would at
> one time have surmounted the rood screen with its carving of the
> Crucifixion) suggests that it is through those wounds that we are saved.
> Breast milk was described in some medieval treatises as a specialised form
> of blood (there are references to this in e.g. Clarissa Atkinson's The
> Oldest Vocation. So in a way Mary is displaying her own wounds, showing
how
> she shed her own blood as part of the miracle of the Incarnation. There is
> also a Welsh poem which describes her weeping tears of blood at her son's
> sufferings, and a pervading idea that her vicarious suffering was in
itself
> a form of martyrdom.
>
> Maddy
Dear Maddy:
A Florentine panel (ca 1402) shows Christ and the Virgin kneeling before the
Father. Christ shows Him the wound on his side and Mary one breast. Both are
here depicted as pledging mercy to the Supreme Judge. (B. Newman, From
Virile Wome to Woman Christ, fig. 3). This is a curious change in the "use"
of Christ's wounds: usually He appears as the Judge, displaying them, as
stating that His Passion confers Him the authority to judge the humankind.
Newman cites C. W. Bynum's Holy Feast... for more similar images. I vaguely
recall having "scanned" it, but have it not handy
Carlos
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