Water the Miracle Drink
To the saints of the Middle Ages, the texts attribute extraordinary deeds, miracles that follow those of Jesus: healing the sick, multiplying bread, transforming water in wine... But there is a case in which the opposite happens: the hermit Giovanni, who has retired to pray in the Piedmontese Alps, receives a visit from illustrious personalities who arrive thirsty, at the end of their strength. He has only a small ampoule of blessed wine and, to refresh them, he does not hesitate to turn it into water.
If sometimes a miracle is needed to procure water, it is because it is a rare and precious commodity, but indispensable to everyone, and which must always be guaranteed. We read of saints who make it spring in arid places, or even from rocks, like Moses in the Bible. Miraculous gestures that always aim to help others, to promote the interests of the community: quenching the thirst of men and animals, irrigating fields and vegetable gardens.
Water was so precious that it was hard to find it pure. In the Middle Ages there were no artesian wells, which for a couple of centuries have helped men to fish water at great depths. It was also difficult to store: water is easily contaminated, especially when it's hot and there is a greater need for it. Therefore, doctors recommended using rainwater whenever possible; or spring water. And then they recommended taking it with caution, to drink it possibly mixed with wine, or a little vinegar, to disinfect it: posca (water and vinegar) was a typical drink of soldiers on the move, since Roman times, and mixing water with wine was a current practice, so much so that, in medieval Latin, the same word (miscere) serves to indicate both the action of "pouring", and that of "mixing": the two things usually coincided. This ancient distrust of water was reflected in proverbs and sayings, which have sometimes come down to us: "water is bad, wine makes you sing"; "Water rusts the guts."
When it was possible to drink it, water was appreciated for its neutral and clean taste: the non-taste, which meant purity. The Middle Ages came to theorize this taste-non-taste, "inventing" a new flavor, not foreseen by the ancient tradition, which was called insipid. The taste of water, in fact.
We sometimes hear phrases like: "as easy as drinking a glass of water". The historian can assure us that drinking a glass of water has never been as easy as we think: only from the nineteenth century onwards have European cities equipped themselves with aqueducts that transport it, pure and drinkable, to everyone's lips.
In many countries of the world, this has not yet been achieved, also because conflicts are unleashed around water and private interests are encamped that conflict with the sacrosanct right of everyone to drink. The miracle of water would still have much to teach us.
Along with fire, air, and earth, it is one of the four elements and represents a fundamental component of the universe and the human body.
Water symbolically refers to the beatific condition of the origins of man and of the whole of humanity. In Roman times, citizens who were punished with civil death were not allowed to receive water and fire. In the Holy Scriptures, water is a symbol of cleansing and purification from sin, but it can also represent a fearsome natural calamity, as in the Great Flood.
It is the drink that Moses brought out of the rock to quench the thirst of the people. In exegetical writings he represents the Holy Spirit but also Christ and his preaching, as well as the sacrament of baptism. It is also the wisdom of the minds of righteous men and blessed souls, as well as representing loquacity by its flow.
According to Filippo Picinelli, a Milanese abbot of the 600s, water represents human life and its course in adversity, but it is above all a symbol of Christ, since like water he washes, irrigates and fertilizes.The transparent liquid identifies the immaculate and religious soul, while the cloudy is the emblem of the vicious soul. Water as an essential liquid for life is a representation of the concept of benefit, identified in the teacher for those who feel the need to learn.
Meaning, Simplicity, clean soul, Christian teaching, motherhood.Iconography Associated with Moses making water flow from the rock, it also appears in the paintings of Rebekah at the Well, in the wedding at Cana and in the iconography of temperance, since the temperant is the one who abstains from drinking and the water represents the antidote to wine. It also appears frequently mentioned in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century still lifes, both Italian and Flemish.
To the saints of the Middle Ages, the texts attribute extraordinary deeds, miracles that follow those of Jesus: healing the sick, multiplying bread, transforming water in wine... But there is a case in which the opposite happens: the hermit Giovanni, who has retired to pray in the Piedmontese Alps, receives a visit from illustrious personalities who arrive thirsty, at the end of their strength. He has only a small ampoule of blessed wine and, to refresh them, he does not hesitate to turn it into water.
If sometimes a miracle is needed to procure water, it is because it is a rare and precious commodity, but indispensable to everyone, and which must always be guaranteed. We read of saints who make it spring in arid places, or even from rocks, like Moses in the Bible. Miraculous gestures that always aim to help others, to promote the interests of the community: quenching the thirst of men and animals, irrigating fields and vegetable gardens.
Water was so precious that it was hard to find it pure. In the Middle Ages there were no artesian wells, which for a couple of centuries have helped men to fish water at great depths. It was also difficult to store: water is easily contaminated, especially when it's hot and there is a greater need for it. Therefore, doctors recommended using rainwater whenever possible; or spring water. And then they recommended taking it with caution, to drink it possibly mixed with wine, or a little vinegar, to disinfect it: posca (water and vinegar) was a typical drink of soldiers on the move, since Roman times, and mixing water with wine was a current practice, so much so that, in medieval Latin, the same word (miscere) serves to indicate both the action of "pouring", and that of "mixing": the two things usually coincided. This ancient distrust of water was reflected in proverbs and sayings, which have sometimes come down to us: "water is bad, wine makes you sing"; "Water rusts the guts."
When it was possible to drink it, water was appreciated for its neutral and clean taste: the non-taste, which meant purity. The Middle Ages came to theorize this taste-non-taste, "inventing" a new flavor, not foreseen by the ancient tradition, which was called insipid. The taste of water, in fact.
We sometimes hear phrases like: "as easy as drinking a glass of water". The historian can assure us that drinking a glass of water has never been as easy as we think: only from the nineteenth century onwards have European cities equipped themselves with aqueducts that transport it, pure and drinkable, to everyone's lips.
In many countries of the world, this has not yet been achieved, also because conflicts are unleashed around water and private interests are encamped that conflict with the sacrosanct right of everyone to drink. The miracle of water would still have much to teach us.
Along with fire, air, and earth, it is one of the four elements and represents a fundamental component of the universe and the human body.
Water symbolically refers to the beatific condition of the origins of man and of the whole of humanity. In Roman times, citizens who were punished with civil death were not allowed to receive water and fire. In the Holy Scriptures, water is a symbol of cleansing and purification from sin, but it can also represent a fearsome natural calamity, as in the Great Flood.
It is the drink that Moses brought out of the rock to quench the thirst of the people. In exegetical writings he represents the Holy Spirit but also Christ and his preaching, as well as the sacrament of baptism. It is also the wisdom of the minds of righteous men and blessed souls, as well as representing loquacity by its flow.
According to Filippo Picinelli, a Milanese abbot of the 600s, water represents human life and its course in adversity, but it is above all a symbol of Christ, since like water he washes, irrigates and fertilizes.
The transparent liquid identifies the immaculate and religious soul, while the cloudy is the emblem of the vicious soul. Water as an essential liquid for life is a representation of the concept of benefit, identified in the teacher for those who feel the need to learn.
Meaning, Simplicity, clean soul, Christian teaching, motherhood.
Iconography Associated with Moses making water flow from the rock, it also appears in the paintings of Rebekah at the Well, in the wedding at Cana and in the iconography of temperance, since the temperant is the one who abstains from drinking and the water represents the antidote to wine. It also appears frequently mentioned in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century still lifes, both Italian and Flemish.
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