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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture From: John Dillon <[log in to unmask]> >For Conon on pilgrim's tokens see now Matthew J. Dal Santo, "Text, Image, and the “Visionary Body” in Early Byzantine Hagiography: Incubation and the Rise of the Christian Image Cult", _Journal of Late Antiquity_ 4 (2011), 31-54, p. 34. available for reading and/or downloading on the "Project Muse" website http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/journal_of_late_antiquity/v004/4.1.dal-santo.html (which might require a subscription --if so, a copy might be had by writing to a Certain Member of this list Off Line) abstract: This study reasserts the importance of images for the Christian saints’ cult during the sixth and seventh centuries, and draws attention to the abundant extant pilgrims’ eulogiai that that have been largely overlooked heretofore. In particular, it highlights the existence of a fiercely contested debate in early Byzantium about the visibility of the disembodied human soul, and specifically the role that images of the Christian saints and angels played in adjudicating the claims of the various parties to this controversy. It contends that references to images of the saints in pre-iconoclastic hagiography should not be automatically dismissed as anachronistic interpolations, but viewed from the perspective of a debate about the nature of the saints’ “visionary body.” It also argues that the widespread availability of images of the saints in contexts of worship formed an established of the saints’ cult in the early Byzantine period, especially in incubatory shrines. i assume that "incubatory shrines" here refers to the OED's definition 4 of "INCUBATION: 4. Ancient Greek Hist. The practice of sleeping in a temple or sacred place for oracular purposes," as in "Familiarity with a saint’s image was the _sine qua non_ for a pilgrim’s ability to receive an apparition of a saint, to 'picture' in a bodily likeness the disembodied holy subject in a vision." [p. 45] an interesting idea. which might be somewhat inverted, thus: The _sine qua non_ for the creation of a "saint’s image" [or, by extension, any "image"] is the ability to "picture" the disembodied holy subject in a vision. doesn't that sound like a reasonable corollary? c ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html