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In the 11th–12th centuries, extreme ascetic practices reappeared in Western Europe, in particular, the wearing of hauberks and heavy iron chains, associated with penitence and eremitism. This article discusses the charisma of three ascetic saints of the 12th century: Bernard the Penitent (d. 1182), Wulfric of Haselbury (d. 1154/55), and Godric of Finchale (d. 1170). Their hagiographies were written shortly after their death. The authors emphasize that they were revered as holy men already in their lifetime. Their charismatic power was revealed by miracles of healing and prophecy, sometimes in visions. The manifestations of their charisma continued and even increased after their death and were transmitted and spread through their relics. Their mortifications and the signs of their holiness are comparable to those of the stylites and other hermits of Syria of late Antiquity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contemporary Japan the fame of Mount Yudono (Yamagata prefecture) derives from the high concentration of mummified bodies of ascetics, which are enshrined in various temples of this mountainous area. These taxidermic statues are often interpreted as the final result of a voluntary abandonment of the body in which the ascetic self-interred within a sepulchral underground cell before dying. However, the present article seeks to reconsider these mummies as ad hoc manipulations of the ascetics' corpses, which were executed by disciples and lay devotees after the natural death of the ascetics. Such a rethinking of the mummified bodies of Yudono does not diminish their religious value as cultic objects; rather, it adds complexity by highlighting a creative tension between the historical and meta-historical dimension of these full-body relics. The semantic variety of such mummified bodies results from a continual oscillation between narrative sources, which, on the one hand, depict Yudono ascetics within the ordinariness of their human existence (historical dimension) and, on the other, make them transcend space and time (meta-historical dimension). The article demonstrates that the ascetics of Yudono could extend their charisma beyond the normal lifespan thanks to their mummified corpses, which worked as sensorial supports of the ascetics' power upon which lay devotees could continuously rely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines a fundamental problem in classical Jaina philosophy, namely, the ontological status of dead matter in the hylozoistic and at the same time dualistic Jaina worldview. This question is of particular interest in view of the widespread contemporary Jaina practice of venerating bone relics and stūpas of prominent saints. The main argument proposed in this article is, that, from a classical doctrinal point of view, bone relics of renowned ascetics are valuable for Jainas, if at all, because of their unique physical attributes, rather than the presumed presence of the deceased in the remains as posited in much of the extant literature on relic worship across cultures. The specific focus of the article are Jaina and non-Jaina explanations of the qualities of special matter in terms of karmic and natural processes of transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]