Igor Eh. Ivanov, PhD Student of the Faculty of Philology, Lomonosov Moscow State University, 1st building of humanitarian faculties, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory, GSP-1, 119991, Moscow, Russia. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0009-0001-8192-2589
This article investigates the medical theme in the Life of Joseph of Volokolamsk, compiled by an unknown scribe. The anonymous hagiographer, commonly identified as the Serbian scribe Anikita Lev Filolog, actively employs medical vocabulary and images associated with healing in the hagiography of the Volokolamsk abbot. The Life develops an image of Saint Joseph as a spiritual physician who heals not only the monastery’s monks and people who come to him for aid but also the country from heretical teachings, which is particularly significant in the context of the spread of prohibited knowledge at the turn of the 15 th and 16 th centuries. For the unknown author, a fundamental antagonism between secular medicine and spiritual healing does not exist, which relates to the 16 th century revision of the traditional system of relationships between members of the opposition “spiritual healing” – “secular medicine.” At the same time, the heightened interest in medicine might be linked to the declaration of the importance of the social role of the church within the Josephite circle.
Joseph Volotsky; Old Russian Hagiography of the 16 th Century; Josephites; medical topic; poetics; Galenovo on Hippocrates, The Life (Vita) of Joseph Volotsky.
12.01.2025
25.02.2025
Ivanov, I. Eh. “Spiritual Healing versus Worldly Healing in the Anonymous Life of Joseph Volotsky”. Literaturovedcheskii zhurnal, no. 2(68), 2025, pp. 85–98. (In Russ.)
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