This Is My Body: Representational Practices in the Early Middle Ages

328 Pages·2002·21.219 MB·English

by  Michal Kobialka

THIS IS MY BODY

THIS IS MY BODY
Representational Practices
in the Early Middle Ages
MICHAL KOBIALKA
ANN ARBOR
THE llNIvERSlTr OF MICHIGAN PREss
Copyright © Michal Kobialka 1999
All rights reserved
Published in theUnitedStatesofAmericaby
TheUniversityofMichigan Press
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2002 2001 2000 1999 4 3 2
Nopartofthis publicationmay bereproduced,
storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted inany form
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without thewritten permissionofthepublisher.
A elPcatalogrecordfor thisbookisavailablefrom theBritishLibrary.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Kobialka, Michal.
This is my body: representationalpracticesin theearly
MiddleAges/ [Michal Kobialka}.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographicalreferences(p. )and index.
ISBN0-472-11029-2 (acid-freepaper)
I. Christiandrama, Latin(Medievaland modern)-Historyand
criticism-Theory,etc. 2. Liturgicaldrama-Historyand
criticism-Theory,etc. 3. Body,Human-Religious
aspects-Christianity. 4. Lord'sSupperinliterature. 5·
Sacramentsinliterature. 6. Mimesis in literature. 1. Tide.
PA80n K63 1999
872'.03093823--dC2I 99-6023
CIP
ISBN13 978-0-472-11029-2 (cloth)
ISBN13 978-0-472-08938-3 (paper)
ISBN13 978-0-472-02436-0 (electronic)
Contents
Preface Vlt
Acknowledgments IX
Introduction 1
Chapter I. TheRegularisconcordia:
"Qui facit veritatem venit ad lucem" 35
Chapter 2. "Whom DoYouSeek?";
Fides quaerensintellectum 101
Chapter 3. Hocestcorpus meum:
TheTernaryMode ofPresence 147
Chapter4. Ecclesia universalis:
"This IsMy Body" 197
Afterword 217
Notes 219
Selected Bibliography 287
Index 307

Preface
Whetherornotwescholarsthinkthat medievaldramaandtheaterorig
inated in the Eastermonastic practices in the tenthcenturydepends on
how we understand the notion ofrepresentation as well as the conven
tionsthatdescribewhatdramaand theaterare. Postmodernhistoriogra
phy teaches us, however, that such an approach needs to be comple
mented by (I) the investigation ofthe past and present rationalizations
behindthepracticesthatdefined representationin theMiddleAgesand
dramaand theater in the twentieth centuryas well as (2) the analysis of
how these practices manifested themselves in different venues at differ
ent times. Rather than talking about our notion of representation or
dramaandtheater,Isuggestthat themedievalconceptofrepresentation
had littletodowithaprevailing tradition in Westernculturethatcon
siders representation in terms of(I) the imitation of nature (Aristotle
Physics 199a)or the process ofdoubling ofthe "one that becomes two"
(PlatoPhaedo),delimited by hierarchismofopticalgeometry,that is, by
LeonBattistaAlberti's 1435 rulesofasingle-pointperspectiveordering
a transfer of objects from a real space to an imaginary stage; (2) the
processofmaking thesubjecttransparent tothemonocularvisionofthe
identified community to which it belongs, that is, the nation, the city,
the ethnic group, and so on; or (3) in terms oftoday's taxonomies that
express the typology ofChrist'spassionas dramaand theater. Icontend
that the medieval concept ofrepresentation was enshrined in the inter
pretationofHocestcorpusmeum[This is my body]-thewordsspoken by
Christ at the Last Supper and repeated by a priest every time he cele
brates the sacrament ofthe Eucharist during the Mass-and in estab
lishing the visibility ofthe body that had disappeared both for women
at the tomb and for the faithful gathered on Easter Sunday for the
moment ofresurrection:
PREFACE
Quemquaeritis? [Whomdoyouseek?]
Ihesum Nazarenum.
Nonest hie. Surrexit sicutpraedixerar. [He is not here. He has risen justas it
waspredicted.}
Themedievalconceptofrepresentation(anditspractices), however, was
neverstable butalways in flux and always crossed bydifferent modesof
seeing until it was, as I argue in this book, stabilized by the constitu
tionsoftheFourthLateranCouncilin I2I5. This bookfocuses precisely
on this lack ofhomogeneity and on these moments when the idea of
whatitmeant torepresentwas underdiscussion-theRegularisconcordia
(97ox973), the Berengar-LanfrancEucharistcontroversy(I049-79),the
ternary mode of the Eucharistic sacrament (twelfth century), and the
Fourth Lateran Council (I2I5). By drawing attention to these episte
mological fragments, I hope to disclose representational practices that
might have been erased by us in the pursuit ofobjects caught in the
mirror that weplaced in front ofourselves.
Vll1