Material Culture and Religion: Towards a Mediatic Approach to Relics
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5433/2176-6665.2024v29n3e49738Keywords:
Relics , Catholicism, Cult of the Saints, Communication , Material CultureAbstract
In the Middle Ages, relics were not merely objects of worship and veneration; they were the medium through which the sacred manifested itself in a privileged way and around which social life was built. The purpose of this article is to present a communicative interpretation of relics, which implies understanding them as res sacrae, as a medium of the sacred. To accomplish this, the article unfolds into five complementary reflective axes: the role of relics in the emergence of the cult of saints; the question concerning the materiality of relics; the capacity of relics to evoke the mobility of the sacred; the question of the social life of relics; and finally, a discussion on the controversies and decline of relics. The elements that emerge from this reflection suggest that the relic, as a medium, is not merely a neutral instance used as a tool of power by religious elites, but rather a mediating element whose materiality was crucial in shaping the religious imagination of the time.
Downloads
References
AGUIAR, Carlos. La sacralité numérique et la mystique de la technologie. Sociétés, Louvain-laNeuve, v. 139, n. 1, p. 97-108, 2018. Disponível em: https://www.cairn.info/revue-societes-2018-1-page-97.htm.
APPADURAI, Arjun. Introduction: commodities and the politics of value. In: APPADURAI,Arjun (org.). The social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 2010. p. 3-63.
AUGUSTIN, Saint. La cité de Dieu. Paris: Gallimard, 2000. Oeuvres II.
BOIRON, Stéphane. La controverse née de la querelle des reliques à l'époque du concile de Trente:
(1500-1640). Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1989.
BROWN, Peter. Cult of the saints. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982.
BYNUM, Caroline Walker. The sacrality of things: an inquiry into divine materiality in the Christian Middle Ages. Irish Theological Quarterly, Thousand Oaks, v. 78, n. 1, p. 3-18, 2013. DOI10.1177/0021140012465035.
CALVIN, Jean. Les luttes: avertissement sur les reliques. Paris: Gallimard, 2009.
D'AQUIN, Thomas. Somme théologique, le verbe incarné. Paris: Editions du Cerf, 2002.
DURAND, Gilbert. Les structures anthropologiques de l'imaginaire: introduction à l'archétypologie générale. Paris: Dunod, 1992.
ELIADE, Mircea. O sagrado e o profano: a essência das religiões. São Paulo: Martins Fontes, 2008.
FABRE, Pierre-Antoine. Décréter l'image?: La XXVe session du concile de Trente. Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2013.
GEARY, Patrick. Sacred commodities: the circulation of medieval relics. In: APPADURAI, Arjun (org.). The social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. p. 169-194.
GOODY, Jack. La peur des représentations: l'ambivalence à l'égard des images, du théâtre, de la fiction, des reliques et de la sexualité. Paris: La Découverte, 2006.
HEIDEGGER, Martin. La chose. In: HEIDEGGER, Martin. Essais et conférences. Paris: Gallimard, 1980. p. 194-223.
JOBLIN, Alain. L'attidude des protestants face aux reliques. In: HELVÉTIUS, Anne-Marie; BOZOKY, Edina; LOBRICHON, Guy (org.). Les reliques: objets cultes, symboles. Turnhout: Brepols, 2000. p. 123-141.
MACCULLOCH, John Arnott. Relics (primitive and western). In: HASTINGS, James (org.). Encyclopaedia of religion and ethics. New York: New York Scribner, 1913. v. 10. p. 213-289.
MENEZES, Renata; TONIOL, Rodrigo. Religião e materialidades: novos horizontes empíricos e desafios teóricos. Rio de Janeiro: Papéis Selvagens, 2022.
MEYER, Birgit. Religion as mediation. Entangled Religions, Bochum, v. 11, n. 3, p. 1-21, jan. 2020. DOI: https://doi.org/10.13154/er.11.2020.8444.
MORGAN, David. The thing about religion: an introduction to the material study of religions. Chapel Hill: UNC Press Books, 2021.
PERNIOLA, Mario. Del sentire cattolico: la forma culturale di una religione universale. Bologna: Il Mulino, 2001.
PETERS, John Durham. The marvelous clouds: toward a philosophy of elemental media. Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, 2015.
SALLMANN, Jean-Michel. La relique dans le monde catholique de la contre-réforme. In: BORGEAUD, Philippe; VOLOKHINE, Youri. Les objets de la memoire: pour une approche comparatiste des reliques et de leur culte. Bern; New York: Peter Lang Pub. Inc, 2005. p. 267-284.
SNOEK, Godefridus J. C. Medieval piety from relics to the eucharist: a process of mutual interaction. Leiden; New York: E. J. Brill, 1995.
TATSCH, Flávia; NASCIMENTO, Renata. Relíquias e relicários na idade média: arte e história. Mosaico, Goiânia, v. 15, n. 2, p. 57-66, dez. 2022. DOI: https://doi.org/10.18224/mos.v15i2.12663.
WHARTON, Annabel Jane. Relics, Protestants, things. Material Religion, London, v. 10, n. 4, p. 412-430, 2014. DOI 10.2752/175183414X14176054221283.
WIRTH, Jean. Image et relique dans le christianisme occidental. In: BORGEAUD, Philippe; VOLOKHINE, Youri. Les objets de la memoire: pour une approche comparatiste des reliques et de leur culte. Bern; New York: Peter Lang, 2005. p. 325-344.
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Carlos Eduardo Souza Aguiar
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Copyright on articles published in Mediações belongs to the author(s): in the case of partial or entire republication of the original publication, we ask author(s) to indicate the original publication in the periodical.
Mediações uses the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license, which allows Open Access, enabling any user to read, download, copy and disseminate its content so long as adequately referenced.
The opinions expressed by the author(s) are their sole responsibility.
