The Sacred Text Doesn’t Exist

Abstract

The hypothesis supported in this study is that in semiotics the
sacred doesn’t exist in itself, that there is no sacrality of the text
(in the semiotic sense of the word) but only that which can be
demonstrated starting from the marks which are not universal
but cultural (at least in the sense of a certain level of analysis).
In order to sustain the hypothesis, two examples of a possible
work on marks will be considered successively: one, taken from
the paintings by El Greco, tends to identify the paradigmatic
function of certain elements and certain nudes in particular. The
other, starting from the series of The Life of San Francisco
painted by Giotto in Assisi, shows throughout the twenty eight
frescos how a certain conception of the sacred is constructed
sintagmatically.