crimson_dove wrote:
the spear that a roman used to pierce christ's side...
Hi Paula,
Warm greetings for the new year.
The Spear of Longinius is a fascinating topic all on it's own, but the thing pupporting to be it is in a museum, having been owned by the Hapsburg family, and has also been dated to c. 7th century (I think), so is therefore fake. If it were the real spear, assuming such a thing exists, then this might have some ritual significance, but as always I think the key word here is "shameful" (to the Catholic faith, and to Catholic European monarchy). I'm not sure that such a description could be applied to a relic of the (pre-christian) Roman era. But still a great topic.
Roger said this, in respect of the relic or object (9th December, 1744 hrs):
"... while the distant origin of the "object" is undeniably interesting, I doubt very much it can be ascertained with any precision at this time ..."
The clear inference is that this is something very old, that pre-dates Christianity, and possibly written records as well, so much so that it is doubted that its
distant origin can ever be determined. A very ancient relic that would appear to have been appropriated in some way by a particular faith, or branch of a faith, and from which (perhaps) certain monarchs have derived or been demonstrated to possess the right to kingship. And also from which Sauniere was able to derive some favour or advantge subsequent to either discovering or recovering or acquiring it - either by selling it on to whoever has it now, or more likely by using the relic in some form of ceremony, leading to all the religious donations from all corners. As has been alluded, the key to finding out what the relic is may lie in determining the specific beliefs and practices of those orders who donated money.