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“So the satiated man hungers, the drunken thirsts” The Medieval Rhetorical Topos of Spiritual Nutrition
- Author(s):
- James Smith (see profile)
- Date:
- 2015
- Group(s):
- History, Medieval Studies, Philosophy, Religious Studies
- Subject(s):
- Twelfth century, Thirteenth century, Fourteenth century, Middle Ages, Literature, Medieval
- Item Type:
- Article
- Tag(s):
- 11th to 14th century, Medieval, Medieval history, Medieval literature
- Permanent URL:
- http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/M6VV28
- Abstract:
- This article explores the representation of hunger and thirst as faculties within medieval spiritual allegory that existed at two forms. In their bodily form, hunger and thirst represented a feeling of lack indicating the need for sustenance. In their figurative moralised form these needs came to represent a longing for that which was missing within the soul, an abstraction of human nutrition. In order to discuss this idea, this article presents two heavily interrelated forms of bodily need rendered as spiritual experience: a greedy longing for wealth with negative moral valance and a spiritual and transcendent hungering and thirsting after lasting spiritual foods. It concludes with the proposal that the abstract qualities of nutritive need (namely hunger and thirst) featured in a rhetorical formula when abstracted and mobilised for the purpose of moral allegory.
- Metadata:
- xml
- Published as:
- Journal article
- Status:
- Published
- Last Updated:
- 6 years ago
- License:
- All-Rights-Granted
- Share this:
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