Redeeming Laughter, 2nd Edition

12 The Folly of Redemption

In many parts of the world madness has been viewed as a sign of holiness. Folly, as has been seen, is a widely diffused if not universal phenomenon. So are holy fools. And, as with (so to speak) mundane fools, the holy fools have been both real madmen (what today would be called cases of mental illness or retardation) and individuals feigning madness (who could be called holy fools ex officio). There are important elements of religiously privileged folly in Taoism and Zen Buddhism, among the wandering sanyasin of India, and in primal religions in Africa and the Americas. Holy fools have appeared in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, often exhibiting very similar behavior, even if the religious rationale of this behavior ...