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At 02:46 12.02.99 +0000, you wrote: >I one account of her vision Angela da Foligno points out that Christ had >a body of perfect sensitivity. She also remarks that his imagination, >through its divine power, could sharply apprehend every detail of the >forthcoming Passion. Although this seems to me a very obvious implication >of the `humanity' of Christ, I wonder whether the specific theme of the >senses, sensitivity and rational faculties of Christ has been extensively >treated in religious literature. Dear Franc,ois, You could try the third book (De incarnatione Verbi) of Peter the Lombard's _Sententiae_ (and its commentary tradition), where you will find discussed, among other things, the cognitive or rational faculties (sapientia, scientia, see also Hugh of St. Victor, _De sapientia animae Christi_, PL 175,845-856) and the human passions (timor, dolor, see also Hugh of St. Victor, _De quatuor voluntatibus in Christo_, PL 175,841-846) of the incarnated Word, yet I am not sure if it contains also much on sensual perception and imagination. The commentary tradition most certainly does. Maybe better for you: in the third part of Aquinas' _Summa theologiae_, you can find an extensive discussion of his rational faculy and knowledge (III, qu. 9-12, including knowledge acquired through the senses and the problem of imagination and phantasms) and of his passions (III, qu. 15), and also a discussion of his prophetic gifts (III, qu. 7, art.8) which should be of interest for you. Discussions of his human passions and of their bodily expression (trembling, weeping) are frequent also in commentaries on the Gospels, and I think that this is where I have also noticed passing remarks on his bodily needs (hunger, thirst). I have a vague memory of a passage in Aquinas (?) where his vegetative/nutritive faculties are discussed (even the question of his 'defaecatio'), but I seem unable to trace it in my files (I thought it was _Super Mattheum_, XV, 17 "quod omne quod in os intrat etc.", but looking it up I find that the discussion of secretion here only regards the question if really *everything* leaves the body, or if a part of the digested food is converted "in humanam naturam" and will thus be part of the resurrected body). Best, Otfried ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Otfried Lieberknecht, Schoeneberger Str. 11, D-12163 Berlin phone & fax: ++49 +30 8516675, E-mail: [log in to unmask] Homepage for Dante Studies: http://members.aol.com/lieberk/welcome.html Listowner of Italian-Studies: http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/italian-studies/ Listowner of Medieval-Religion: http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%