Table Of ContentChurch, Faith and Culture in the Medieval West
General Editors: Brenda Bolton with Anne J. Duggan and Damian J. Smith
About the series
The series Church, Faith and Culture in the Medieval West reflects the central concerns
necessary for any in-depth study of the medieval Church – greater cultural awareness
and interdisciplinarity. Including both monographs and edited collections, this new
series draws on the most innovative work from established and younger scholars alike,
offering a balance of interests, vertically though the period from c.400 to c.1500 or
horizontally across Latin Christendom. Topics covered range from cultural history, the
monastic life, relations between Church and State to law and ritual, palaeography and
textual transmission. All authors, from a wide range of disciplinary backgrounds, share
a commitment to innovation, analysis and historical accuracy.
About the volume
In this absorbing book, Michael Goodich explores the changing perception of the
miracle in medieval Western society. He employs a wealth of primary sources, including
canonization dossiers, hagiographical texts, theological treatises and sermons, to examine
the Christian church’s desire to create a sounder legal definition of the miracle.
About the Author
Michael E. Goodich was formerly Professor of Medieval History at the University of
Haifa, Israel.
Church, Faith and Culture in the Medieval West
Brenda Bolton with Anne J. Duggan and Damian J. Smith
Other titles in the series:
Edited by John S. Ott and Anna Trumbore Jones
The Bishop Reformed
Studies of Episcopal Power and Culture in the Central Middle Ages
Patrick Healy
The Chronicle of Hugh of Flavigny
Reform and the Investiture Contest in the Late Eleventh Century
Anke Holdenried
The Sibyl and Her Scribes
Manuscripts and Interpretation of the Latin Sibylla Tiburtina c. 1050–1500
Edited by Robert C. Figueira
Plenitude of Power
The Doctrines and Exercise of Authority in the Middle Ages:
Essays in Memory of Robert Louis Benson
John Hine Mundy
Studies in the Ecclesiastical and Social History of Toulouse
in the Age of the Cathars
Susan E. Wilson
The Life and After-Life of St John of Beverley
The Evolution of the Cult of an Anglo-Saxon Saint
Edited by Christopher M. Bellitto and Louis I. Hamilton
Reforming the Church before Modernity
Patterns, Problems and Approaches
Jerome Bertram
The Chrodegang Rules
The Rules for the Common Life of the Secular Clergy from the Eighth and Ninth
Centuries. Critical Texts with Translations and Commentary
Sylvia Schein
Gateway to the Heavenly City
Crusader Jerusalem and the Catholic West (1099–1187)
MIRACLES AND WoNDERS
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Miracles and Wonders
The Development of the Concept of Miracle, 1150–1350
MICHAEL E. GooDICH
University of Haifa, Israel
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LONDON AND NEW YORK
First published 2007 by Ashgate Publishing
Published 2016 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
Copyright © Michael E. Goodich 2007
Michael E. Goodich has asserted his moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act,
1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any
form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only
for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Goodich, Michael, 1944–2006
Miracles and wonders : the development of the concept of miracle, 1150–1350. – (Church,
faith and culture in the medieval West) 1. Miracles – History of doctrines – Middle Ages,
600–1500 2. Church history – 13th century 3. Church history – 12th century 4. Faith
I. Title
231.7’3’094’0902
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Goodich, Michael, 1944–2006
Miracles and wonders : the development of the concept of miracle, 1150–1350 / by Michael
E. Goodich.
p. cm. – (Church, faith, and culture in the Medieval West)
ISBN 978-0-7546-5875-7 (alk. paper)
1. Miracles–History of doctrines–Middle Ages, 600–1500. 2. Canonization–History–To 1500.
I. Title.
BT97.3.G66 2007
231.7’309022–dc22
2006034822
ISBN 978 0 7546 5875 7 (hbk)
Contents
Appreciating Michael Goodich viii
Gary Dickson
Preface x
1 Introduction 1
2 Signa data infidelibus non fidelibus: The Theology of Miracle 8
3 The Miracle in Contemporary Sermons 29
4 ‘Popular’ Voices of Doubt 47
5 Theory and Public Policy: Canonization Records 69
6 Canonization and the Hagiographical Text 87
7 Vidi in Somnium: The Uses of Dream and Vision in the Miracle 100
8 Conclusion 117
Bibliography 122
Index 140
Appreciating Michael Goodich
Gary Dickson
Appreciation begins in loss. Like historians, perhaps we only begin to understand things
retrospectively. Aside from correspondence and emails, I got to know Michael Goodich
best on three occasions. For academics getting on with their lives in different parts
of the world, where we met had to be at conferences. The first of these was truly
memorable. It was held in Erice, Sicily in late September, 1989, at the Ettore Majorana
Centre’s International Workshop on Medieval Societies. There were pleasant dinners in
the town’s restaurants; André Vauchez was a perfect host; and afterwards Marsala wine
was on tap. The conference proceedings, published as Poteri carismatici e informali: chiesa
e società medioevali (1992), included essays by Michael and myself. Michael’s subject was
one which preoccupied him for many years. In this, his last book it comes to fruition –
wonder-working powers, miracles, and those reputed to have performed them. At Erice
he spoke of children and young people as holders of miraculous, charismatic power.
Erice is where I got to meet (and dine with) this bright, animated, amiable, youthful-
seeming scholar, a medievalist like myself, and working in a similar area, that of medieval
religion and society. We were both Americans, both lecturing abroad, Michael in Israel,
myself in Scotland. I immediately warmed to his personality and mischievous sense of
humour.
Michael Goodich (1944–2006) was an extraordinarily productive scholar. He was
educated in the U.S. (B.A.,City College of New York; M.A., University of Pennsylvania;
Ph.D. Columbia University), and apart from a couple of early teaching posts in America,
he spent his entire academic career at the Department of General History, University
of Haifa, where he rose through the ranks, becoming professor, chair, and dean. Yet
this was not the whole story, for Michael loved to travel and took up a succession
of visiting professorships at Yale, U.C. Berkeley, Stanford, U.C. Los Angeles, York,
Toronto, as well as resident scholarships at St. John’s University, Collegeville Minnesota
– where he immersed himself in medieval manuscripts, a ruling passion of his – and
Princeton Theological Seminary.
He published more than forty articles in leading journals. overwhelmingly, they
concerned saints, their miracles, and the literary genre devoted to them; hagiography.
The nine books he edited or wrote before this one not only traversed this same territory
which he had made his own; Lives and Miracles of the Saints (2004); Violence and Miracle in the
Fourteenth Century (1995); Vita perfecta: the Ideal of Sainthood in the Thirteenth Century (1982),
but also tackled other demanding topics from The Unmentionable Vice: Homosexuality in the
Later Middle Ages (1979) – a pioneering study – to From Birth to Old Age: the Human Life
Cycle in Medieval Thought (1989). In addition, there were books about people on the edges
of society; Minorities, Heretics and Life on the Margins in the Middle Ages (2007); Voices from
the Bench: the Narratives of Lesser Folk in Medieval Trials (2005); Other Middle Ages: Marginal
Appreciating Michael Goodich ix
Groups in the Medieval Period (1998). These are books I came to know, and what is the
greatest tribute one worker in the field can pay to another, came to use.
It is hard not to see Miracles and Wonders: the Development of the Concept of Miracle,
1150–1350 as a grand synthesis of what had preceded it. The articles were his
watercolours; for this book Michael Goodich chose to paint in oil. Here we have a close
reading of how the miraculous was conceptualized in the Middle Ages, a reading that
is anchored in the sources, most impressively including the manuscript sources. Yet by
no means does the author ignore how the miraculous sheds light on social history. of
great interest as well, is the constant interplay between two Christianities, learned and
popular, Christianity from above and Christianity from below. What the author reveals
most of all is the richness of the material. Miracles and Wonders is certain to be exploited
by those who come after him. It is a shame that others will not now have the chance to
discuss his book and pursue its arguments directly with him.
I met Michael for the second time in 1996 in London at the Anglo-American
conference. Both of us were appearing at a panel organized by Brenda Bolton, when a
hoax alarm sent us scurrying out of Senate House. As we shuffled nervously out of the
building, Michael relieved the tension with witty comments. over dinner that evening
I had a chance to meet his charming wife, Marian. The last time I saw Michael was in
2003 at the Leeds International Medieval Congress. It was for all too short a time. We
were hurrying between sessions. In the corridor we exchanged the usual pleasantries,
news, and gossip about what was happening in ‘our’ medieval world. Michael was in top
form. I came away – and I do not think this was a unique experience – feeling enlivened,
more cheerful for having met him, as if his vivacity was communicable.
Michael’s legacy lives on in an altogether appropriate and tangible fashion. Marian
and their daughter Claudia have generously contributed Michael’s personal library
of medievalia consisting of well over 200 books and manuscripts in facsimile to the
University of Haifa Library, where Michael enjoyed studying, having in great part
helped to build up its medieval history holdings.
Some might think that the immortality reserved for scholars is a poor thing. For
those working in the field it is as close to glory as one gets. It is to be cited in the
literature. Michael Goodich now belongs to that literature.
Gary Dickson
