The Pope's Body Book

For years now, journalists have engaged in feverish speculation about the health of Pope John Paul II. There is at least as much at stake in his death as in his life, because he is not only himself--he is also the incarnation of the universal Church. This paradoxical quality of a pope's life was first widely discussed in the early Middle Ages. By the 13th century, resolving the tension between the pope's actual and metaphorical body--by prolonging his life and preserving his health--was so important that the papal court became Europe's leading laboratory for the natural sciences. This development is the subject of The Pope's Body, a quirky, intelligent book by Agostino Paravicini-Bagliani, a professor of medieval history at the University of Lausanne. Burial customs, mediaeval optics, and a host of motley subjects are harnessed in service of the book's primary argument: "Once the pope as an institutional figure became ... the incarnation of the universal church as well, the physical aspect of his private person had to be subjected to ever more rigorous ritual and symbolic analysis and control". This is not easy reading: straightforward arguments lie in thickets of allusions to medieval science and theology. Nevertheless, it's worth the work. --Michael Joseph GrossRead More