"Secreti perfettissimi" (Very Perfect Secrets): Ippolito Desideri as Witness and Narrator of Wonders

Ippolito Desideri, SJ, visited Tibet in the early eighteenth century, seeking to refute the local religious tradition and convert the country's inhabitants, starting from high-ranking lamas. To accomplish his mission, the young Jesuit studies the difficult texts of Tantric Buddhism and is a critical witness of local traditions, but his Relazione also contains an account about an extraordinary event that he thinks can only be explained as an intervention of the Christian God. This event, which took place during a large celebration in Samye, is the object of this article. I set out to offer an explanation blending performance theories with a number of insights from quantum physics.