Sex and the City : Intercourse in Holy Week

• The last days before Easter are called Holy Week or Passion Week in most Christian calendars. The early history of these pre-paschal days is, however, obscure, and their historiography leaves much to be desired. This is particularlytrue of Holy Week observance in late ancient Constantinople. Was there even something that could be called a Holy Week in the imperial capital? The relative silence of liturgical handbooks regarding these days have led some liturgical scholars to give a negative answer to that question. This article revisits the problem, but approaches it from a different angle: What do hymns written for the week before the celebration of the resurrection tell us? Focusing on Monday to Wednesday, the present study demonstrates that singers and congregations intoned remarkable and dramatic songs between Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday. Yet, rather than bewailing the imminent crucifixion or praising the resurrection, the hymnographers labored to read existential struggles of life and death in the sexual bodies of the congregated late ancientcity dwellers.

Nyckelord

Byzantine hymns

Byzantine homilies

erotics

sexuality

Holy Week

Constantinople

liturgy

Church History

Kyrkohistoria

Literature

Litteraturvetenskap

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

art (ämneskategori)