Extremes - Reflections on Human Behavior

Fourteen essays explore extremes of human nature and behavior from medieval times to the twentieth century. Cannibalism is seldom done for food, for nutriotional reasons; it is almost invariably a matter of ritual and involves offerings, head-hunting, or the expropriation of an enemy's strength and spiritual power. Sometimes the mythology of creation and fertility is invoked, of gods who devour mortals and become one with them, as in the Greek legends. Cannibalism then acquires a sacred significance. Did not the medieval mystics and saints in their transports partake of the body of Christ, whose flesh and blood areliterally present in the sacrament of the Eucharist? And did not Catherine of Siena, in her hallucinations, drink blood from the wound in the side of the crucified Christ? Anthropologists speak of magic and aggression, protein deficiency and sadism, but the motives and circumstances of cannibalism differ widely. Few savages are left in a world penetrated everywhere by civilisation. But it does not follow that ritual human sacrifice no longer exists. It has merely changed its style and dimensions. The altars are now called Gulag, Auschwitz, Cambodia...