The Grief of God: Images of the Suffering Jesus in Late Medieval EnglandGraphic portrayals of the suffering Jesus Christ pervade late medieval English art, literature, drama, and theology. These images have been interpreted as signs of a new emphasis on the humanity of Jesus. To others they indicate a fascination with a terrifying God of vengeance and a morbid obsession with death. In The Grief of God, however, Ellen Ross offers a different understanding of the purpose of this imagery and its meaning to the people of the time. Analyzing a wide range of textual and pictorial evidence, the author finds that the bleeding flesh of the wounded Savior manifests divine presence; in the intensified corporeality of the suffering Jesus whose flesh not only condemns, but also nurtures, heals, and feeds, believers meet a trinitarian God of mercy. Ross explores the rhetoric of transformation common to English medieval artistic, literary, and devotional sources. The extravagant depictions of pain and anguish, the author shows, constitute an urgent appeal to respond to Jesus' expression of love. She also explains how the inscribing of Christ's pain on the bodies of believers at times erased the boundaries between human and divine so that holy persons, and in particular, holy women, participated in the transformative power of Christ. In analyzing the dialects of mercy and justice; the construction of sacred space and time; sacraments and ritual celebration, social action, and divine judgment; and the dynamics of women's public religious authority, this study of religion and culture explores the meaning of the late medieval Christian affirmation that God bled and wept and suffered on the cross to draw persons to Godself. This interdisciplinary study of sermon literature, manuscript illuminations and church wall paintings, drama, hagiographic narratives, and spiritual treaties illuminates the religious sensibilities, practices, and beliefs that constellate around the late medieval fascination with the bleeding body of the suffering Jesus Christ. |
Contents
Introduction | 3 |
The Dynamics of Divine Appeal The Suffering Jesus in the Literature of Spiritual Guidance | 15 |
The Aesthetics of Suffering Figuring the Crucified Jesus in Manuscripts and Wall Paintings | 41 |
Illustrations | 54 |
Dramas of Divine Compassion The Figure of the Wounded Jesus and the Rhetoric of Appeal in the Mystery Plays | 67 |
Body Power and Mimesis Holy Women as Purveyors of Divine Presence | 95 |
Other editions - View all
The Grief of God: Images of the Suffering Jesus in Late Medieval England Ellen M. Ross Limited preview - 1997 |
Common terms and phrases
audience behalf of humanity believers blood Bodleian Library body Books of Hours British Library Cambridge chapter Christian christological church compassion confession contrition cross crucified Crucifixion death depictions divine mercy divine presence drama Early English Text endurance English Text Society Eucharist evoke Festial fifteenth-century figure flesh forgiveness Fourteenth Century God's haue Holy humanity's humankind images Jesus Christ Julian of Norwich Kempe's late medieval English literature liturgical London manifest Margaret Margaret of Antioch Margery Kempe Mary Middle Ages Middle English Mirk mural N-Town narrative Oignies pain Passion person plays portrayed prefiguring Psalter purgatory relationship religious reminds repentance response sacrament saints scenes sche sermons sinner sins sorrow souls South English Legendary Spalbeek Speculum Sacerdotale spiritual stories suffering Christ suffering Jesus suffering of Jesus theological tion torment torture transformation Trinity Tristram viewers Virgin wall paintings weeping women wounded Jesus York cycle þat þou