Table Of ContentImagining Mary
Imagining Mary breaks new ground in the long tradition of Christian
mariology. The book is an interdisciplinary investigation of some of the
many Marys, East and West, from the New Testament Mary of Nazareth
down to Our Lady of the Good Death in the twentieth century. In Imagining
Mary, Professor Rancour-Laferriere examines the mother of God in her
multireligious and pan-historical context.
The book is a scholarly study, but it is written in a clear, straightforward
style and will be comprehensible to an educated – and, above all, intel-
lectually curious – general audience. It will appeal to anyone who has ever
wondered, for example, about the flimsy scriptural basis of many beliefs about
Mary; or the tendency of many mariologists to depict Mary as an incestuous
“bride of Christ”; or the theological notion of Mary’s “loving consent” to
her son’s crucifixion; or the idea that Mary was a “priest” officiating at the
sacrifice of her son; or the unfortunate association of Mary with Christian
anti-Semitism; or the curious appeal of Mary to the terminally ill; and so on.
Special attention is given to the psychology of representations of Mary, such
as: the psychological basis for promoting Mary to the status of a “goddess”;
the psychology of Mary’s compassion for her son at the foot of the cross; and
the psychological conflict in Mary’s personal relationship with her son Jesus.
These topics are admittedly diverse, but they all have long been on the
minds of mariologists. The author takes a questioning approach to received
wisdom about marian themes – including the assumption that one has to be
a theist in order to understand the great appeal of Mary down the centuries.
Indeed, Imagining Mary may be regarded as a first step in the direction of an
atheist mariology.
Daniel Rancour-Laferriere was born and was baptized into the Roman
Catholic Church in 1943, grew up a devout Catholic, and served as president
of his Newman Club in college. Since receiving a PhD in Slavic Languages
and Literatures from Brown University in 1972, Rancour-Laferriere has
published numerous scholarly articles, as well as a dozen books, including
The Slave Soul of Russia (1995), Tolstoy on the Couch (1998), Tolstoy’s Quest
for God (2007), and The Sign of the Cross (2011). As Emeritus Professor
at the University of California, Davis, Rancour-Laferriere continues his
psychological research on Christian themes.
Imagining Mary
A Psychoanalytic Perspective on
Devotion to the Virgin Mother of God
Daniel Rancour-Laferriere
First published 2018
by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
2018 Taylor & Francis
The right of Daniel Rancour-Laferriere to be identified as author of
this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77
and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Rancour-Laferriere, Daniel, author.
Title: Imagining Mary : a psychoanalytic perspective on devotion to
the Virgin Mother of God / Daniel Rancour-Laferriere.
Description: 1 [edition]. | New York : Routledge, 2017. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017029616| ISBN 9781412865067
(hb : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781315121550 (eb : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Mary, Blessed Virgin, Saint.
Classification: LCC BT603 .R36 2017 | DDC 232.91—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017029616
ISBN: 978-1-4128-6506-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-12155-0 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Swales & Willis Ltd, Exeter, Devon, UK
Contents
List of Figures ix
Preface xi
1 Introduction: From a Humble Mother of Nazareth to
“Our Lady of Everywhere” 1
Mary in Scripture 1
Early Elaboration 2
“New Mother-Goddess of the Christians” 6
Mary’s Virginity and Her Son’s Paternity 9
Mary’s Virginity and Her Incestuous Relations in the
Light of Psychoanalysis 12
Mary’s Post-Scriptural Grandeur 18
Many Marys 20
2 Mary and the Foolishness of Wisdom 32
Appropriating the Old Testament Figure of Wisdom 32
The Representation of Christ as Wisdom 35
Mary’s Unbelief, According to Origen 39
Mary the Mother of Wisdom 41
Containing Wisdom 46
3 Mary Dies and Goes to Heaven 56
Pope Pius XII Makes an Infallible Pronouncement 56
In the Roman Catholic West Mary Was Assumed
into Heaven 58
In the Orthodox East Mary’s Dormition Culminated in
Her Deification 62
But She Will Never Leave Us 64
vi Contents
4 Daughter Zion, Mother Church 68
The Protoevangelium 68
Supersessionism 69
Daughter Zion 71
Ark of the Covenant 73
Burning Bush 75
Mother Church 77
5 Class Considerations 88
Mary, Voluntary “Slavewoman of the Lord” 88
No Feminist, No Liberationist 89
Imagining Mary’s Intercession on Behalf of the Poor
and the Oppressed 92
Like Mother, Like Son 94
6 The Eucharist as Maternalized Son of Mary 99
The Trees in the Garden of Eden 99
Two Referents for the Title “Tree of Life” 102
Searching for the Tree of Life: An Anonymous
Medieval Poem 105
The Eucharist in the Poem 107
Drinking the Blood of a Maternalized Christ 111
Not the Tree of Life, but Its Fruit 114
7 Mary’s Dispute with Her Son’s Cross: A Poem by
Philip the Chancellor 121
Mary Lodges a Complaint with the Personified Cross 121
The Cross Gets Overly Defensive 123
When in Doubt, Blame the Jews 124
Skepticism about the Eucharist 128
Mary Speaks Her Mind 130
8 Back to Scripture: A Son’s Grievance against Mary 133
Was Mary a Disciple? 133
Jesus Speaks to Mary from the Cross 136
A Note on Retaining the Crucifixion Accounts 138
9 Jesus at the Breast 141
A Recognizable Visual Image 141
Messy Taxonomies 143
Contents vii
Rehabilitating Maternity with Images of Mary
Breastfeeding Jesus 146
Textual Representations of the Divine Nursing Couple 149
What Would Jesus Say? 154
10 Marian Laments and the Psychology of Compassion 160
Marian Lamentation in the Orthodox East 160
Mary at Her Son’s Passion in the West 164
First Prose Text: Meditationes vitae Christi 166
Second Prose Text: Quis dabit 168
Mary Laments in a Passion Play: Planctus ante nescia 173
Mary Laments in an English Mystery Play:
The N-Town Crucifixion 178
Stabat mater: Mary’s Compassion, Our Guilt 181
Reproaching Gabriel 187
11 Time Future, Time Past 196
Improper Annunciations 196
Bilateral Icons, Diptychs, and the Passion Madonna 198
Textual Representation of Mary’s Proleptic Knowledge 203
Anamnesis 207
12 Theologizing Mary at the Foot of the Cross 214
Mary’s Theologically Correct Rejoicing in the Later
Medieval Period 214
Mary’s “Loving Consent” to Her Son’s Crucifixion in the
Twentieth Century 217
Hans Urs von Balthasar: Mary’s Son as a Sadist
at Golgotha 219
13 Mary of the Eucharist 228
Mary’s Child in the Host 228
“Birth Done Better” 236
Transubstantiation as the Priest’s Couvade 239
14 Mary the Priest 251
Mary as Sacrificial Altar 251
Mary as Sacrificial Oven 254
Mary and Her Sacrificial Manger 257
The New Eve as Priest 260
Sacerdotalist Mariology 264
viii Contents
Mary as Coredeemer 268
Marian Sacerdotalism in the Papal Magisterium 272
Feminist Considerations 275
15 Our Lady of the Good Death 286
Death and the True Body in the Host 286
Marian Societies of the Good Death 289
Mary at One’s Deathbed, and After 292
Saint Alphonsus de Liguori 294
Blessed Daniel Brottier 294
Bibliography 299
Index of Biblical References 342
Subject Index 345
Figures
1.1 Mary and Christ enthroned in the apse mosaic of
Santa Maria in Trastevere (mid-twelfth century), Rome
(Verdon 2005, 37, fig. 31) 15
2.1 Majestas Sapientiae. Horloge de Sapience (detail), mid-fifteenth
century. Brussels, Bibliothèque royale ms. IV III, f. 13r
(Monks 1990, 135) 43
2.2 Opening Virgin (Vierge ouvrante) from Morlaix, Brittany,
ca.1400, closed (Radler 1990, fig. 54) 47
2.3 Same Opening Virgin, open (Radler 1990, fig. 58) 48
3.1 Dormition of the Virgin, mosaic, Church of Matorana,
Palermo (Maguire 1981, fig. 65) 62
9.1 Madonna of Humility (detail), Andrea di Bartolo, ca.1400.
Washington, DC, National Gallery (Williamson 2009,
157, fig. 36) 144
11.1 Robert Campin, Mérode Altarpiece, center panel (detail),
Metropolitan Museum of Art (Cloisters), New York
(Lane 1984, 40, fig. 25) 197
11.2 Double-sided icon, Mary holding her child in Hodēgētria
fashion, front side. Byzantine, late twelfth century.
Byzantine Museum, Kastoria, Greece (Evans and
Wixom, eds. 1997, 126, fig. 72) 199
11.3 Same double-sided icon, dead Christ represented as the
Man of Sorrows (Akra Tapeinosis), back side (Evans and
Wixom, eds. 1997, 126, fig. 72) 200
11.4 Panagia Arakiotissa, late-twelfth-century fresco (detail),
Lagoudera, Cyprus (Pentcheva 2006, fig. 70) 202
11.5 Thrēnos fresco (detail), 1164, Saint Panteleimon Church,
Nerezi, Macedonia (Belting 1980, fig. 1) 209
13.1 Amnos (Lamb) lying on a paten near the eucharistic chalice,
Serbian monastery of Hilandar, Mount Athos, beginning
of the fourteenth century (Vloberg 1946, 51) 230
Description:Imagining Mary breaks new ground in the long tradition of Christian mariology. The book is an interdisciplinary investigation of some of the many Marys, East and West, from the New Testament Mary of Nazareth down to Our Lady of the Good Death in the twentieth century. In Imagining Mary, Professor Ra
