La cueva y su interpretación en el cristianismo primitivo
Abstract
This article studies the cave as a primitive Christian symbol for the complementary opposition between death and life, and as the symbol of physical and spiritual regeneration. The Christian recognition of the cave as such soon appears linked to the Messiah's birth and to the identifi cation of the Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus, as fertile earth. Her womb is precisely the symbol of the cave. Christ's resurrection doesn't avoid the symbolization of the cave as a place of regeneration; this idea is widely expressed in the iconography. But the Christian concept of caves must be understood in relation to the wider Christian image of Nature as the eternal expression of God's will. This relationship of the cave and of Nature as whole is present in the very first phase of monasticism and in the origins of rock monasticism.
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