Hildegard of Bingen
From Free net encyclopedia
Blessed Hildegard of Bingen (alternatively von Bingen or Bingensis) (September 16 1098 – September 17, 1179) was a German magistraTemplate:Fn, monastic leader, mystic, author, and composer of music.
Contents |
Biography
A vita of Hildegard was written by two monks, Godefrid and Theodoric (PL vol. 197).
Hildegard was born into a family of nobles in the service of the counts of Sponheim, close relatives of the Hohenstaufen emperors. Because she was a tenth child, and a sickly one from birth, at the age of eight Hildegard's parents sent her as a tithe to the church. Hildegard was put in the care of Jutta, the sister of Count Meinhard of Sponheim, just outside the Disibodenberg monastery in Germany. Jutta was enormously popular and acquired so many followers a small nunnery sprang up around her. Upon Jutta's death in 1136 Hildegard was chosen magistra of the community, and eventually moved the group to a new monastery on the Rupertsberg at Bingen on the Rhine.
From the time she was very young, Hildegard claimed to have visions. She received a prophetic call from God five years after her election as magistra in 1141 demanding of her, "Write what you see". At first she was hesitant about writing her visions, holding them inside. She was finally convinced to write by members of her order after falling physically ill from carrying the unspoken burden.
The Awakening
Hildegard went to a woman named Jutta to receive a religious education. During all these years Hildegard confided of her visions only to Jutta and another monk, named Volmar, who was to become her lifelong secretary. However, in 1141, Hildegard had a vision that changed the course of her life. A vision of God gave her instant understanding of the meaning of the religious texts, and commanded her to write down everything she would observe in her visions. "And it came to pass ... when I was 42 years and 7 months old, that the heavens were opened and a blinding light of exceptional brilliance flowed through my entire brain. And so it kindled my whole heart and breast like a flame, not burning but warming... and suddenly I understood of the meaning of expositions of the books..." Yet Hildegard was also overwhelmed by feelings of inadequacy and hesitated to act.
"But although I heard and saw these things, because of doubt and low opinion of myself and because of diverse sayings of men, I refused for a long time a call to write, not out of stubbornness but out of humility, until weighed down by a scourge of god, I fell onto a bed of sickness."
The 12th century was also the time of schisms and religious foment, when someone preaching any outlandish doctrine could instantly attract a large following. Hildegard was critical of schismatics, indeed her whole life she preached against them, especially the Cathars. She wanted her visions to be sanctioned, approved by the Catholic Church, though she herself never doubted the divine origins to her luminous visions.
She wrote to St. Bernard of Clairvaux, seeking his blessings. Though his answer to her was rather perfunctory, he did bring it to the attention of Pope Eugenius III (1145-53), who exhorted Hildegard to finish her writings. To determine if her visions were divinely inspired he created a commission which came to visit Hildegard and they declared her to be a genuine mystic and not insane. With papal imprimatur, Hildegard was able to finish her first visionary work Scivias ("Know the Ways of the Lord") and her fame began to spread through the Holy Roman Empire and beyond.
Works
Image:Sthildegard-manuscript.jpg
Recent scholarly interest in women in the medieval church has led to a popularization of Hildegard - and particularly of her music. Approximately eighty compositions survive, which is a far larger repertoire than almost any other medieval composer. Among her better known works is the Ordo Virtutum ("Order of the Virtues" or "Play of the Virtues"), a type of early oratorio for women's voices, with one male part - that of the Devil. Much of her music was created with an evangelical purpose to be performed not only by the nuns of her convent but also by male communities as evidenced by her gift to the Cistercian Abbey at Villers. The text of her compositions uses a form of modified medieval Latin unique to Hildegard, for which she created some invented, conflated and abridged words, while the music itself is monophonic, there is still speculation as to whether or not limited instrumental accompaniment (such as the hurdy gurdy or organ) would have been used. The use of various modes and vocal registers also seem to indicate that the music was not only intended for women's voices. In addition to music, Hildegard also wrote medical, botanical and geological treatises, and she even invented an alternative alphabet, the litterae ignotae, which together with her "unknown language", the Lingua Ignota which consists of about 900 words, makes her a pioneer in the field of constructed languages.
Around 1150 Hildegard moved her growing convent from Disibodenberg, where the nuns lived alongside the monks, to Bingen about 30 km north, on the banks of the Rhine. She later founded another convent, Eibingen, across the river from Bingen. She was often referred to as abbess by the many who wrote to her, although she was never officially recognized as such by officials in her own archdiocese.
Her remaining years were very productive. She wrote music and texts to her songs, mostly liturgical plainchant honoring saints and Virgin Mary for the holidays and feast days, and antiphons. There is some evidence that her music and moral play Ordo Virtutum ("Play of Virtues") were performed in her own convent. In addition to Scivias she wrote two other major works of visionary writing, Liber vitae meritorum (1150-63) (Book of Life's Merits) and Liber divinorum operum (1163) ("Book of Divine Works"), in which she further expounded on her theology of microcosm and macrocosm-man being the peak of God's creation, and man as a mirror through which the splendor of the macrocosm was reflected. Hildegard also authored Physica and Causae et Curae (1150), both works on natural history and curative powers of various natural objects, which are together known as Liber subtilatum ("The book of subtleties of the Diverse Nature of Things"). These works were uncharacteristic of Hildegard's writings, including her correspondences, in that they were not presented in a visionary form and don't contain any references to divine source or revelation. However, like her religious writings they reflected her religious philosophy-that man was the peak of God's creation and everything was put in the world for man to use.
Her scientific views were derived from the ancient Greek cosmology of the four elements-fire, air, water, and earth -- with their complementary qualities of heat, dryness, moisture, and cold, and the corresponding four humours in the body -- choler (yellow bile), blood, phlegm, and melancholy (black bile). Human constitution was based on the preponderance of one or two of the humours. Indeed, we still use words "choleric", "sanguine", "phlegmatic" and "melancholy" to describe personalities. Sickness upset the delicate balance of the humours, and only consuming the right plant or animal which had that quality you were missing could restore the healthy balance to the body. That is why in giving descriptions of plants, trees, birds, animals, and stones, Hildegard is mostly concerned in describing that object's quality and giving its medicinal use. Thus, "Reyan (tansy) is hot and a little damp and is good against all superfluous flowing humours and whoever suffers from catarrh and has a cough, let him eat tansy. It will bind humors so that they do not overflow, and thus will lessen."
She collected her visions into three books: the first and most important Scivias ("Know the Way") completed in 1151, Liber vitae meritorum ("Book of Life's Merits") and De operatione Dei ("Of God's Activities") also known as Liber divinorum operum ("Book of Divine Works"). In these volumes, written over the course of her life until her death in 1179, she first describes each vision, then interprets them. The narrative of her visions was richly decorated under her direction, presumably drawn by other nuns in the convent, while transcription assistance was provided by the monk Volmar (see illustration) with pictures of the visions. Her interpretations are usually quite traditionally Catholic in nature. Her vivid description of the physical sensations which accompanied her visions have been diagnosed by neurologists (including popular author Oliver Sacks) as symptoms of migraine; however others have seen in them merely colorful illustrations of the prevailing church doctrine of her time, which she supported, rather than actual visions. The book was celebrated in the Middle Ages and printed for the first time in Paris in 1513.
Hildegard's writings are also unique for they provide the earliest description of sexual pleasure from the point of view of a woman.
"When a woman is making love with a man, a sense of heat in her brain, which brings with it sensual delight, communicates the taste of that delight during the act and summons forth the emission of the man's seed. And when the seed has fallen into its place, that vehement heat descending from her brain draws the seed to itself and holds it, and soon the woman's sexual organs contract, and all the parts that are ready to open up during the time of menstruation now close, in the same way as a strong man can hold something enclosed in his fist.
She also wrote that strength of semen determined the sex of the child, while the amount of love and passion determine child's disposition. According to Hildegard, the worst case scenario occurs when the seed is weak and parents feel no love, leading to a bitter daughter.
Conversely Hildegard's visionary writings maintain that virginity is the highest level of the spiritual life. There are many instances both in her letters and visions which decry the mis-use of carnal pleasures. In Scivias Book II Vision Six.78,
"God united man and woman, thus joining the strong to the weak, that each might sustain the other. But these perverted adulterers change their virile strength into perverse weakness, rejecting the proper male and female roles, and in their wickedness they shamefully follow Satan, who in his pride sought to split and divide Him Who is indivisible. They create in themselves by their wicked deeds a strange and perverse adultery, and so appear polluted and shameful in My sight..."
"...a woman who takes up devilish ways and plays a male role in coupling with another woman is most vile in My sight, and so is she who subjects herself to such a one in this evil deed..."
"...And men who touch their own genital organ and emit their semen seriously imperil their souls, for they excite themselves to distraction; they appear to Me as impure animals devouring their own whelps, for they wickedly produce their semen only for abusive pollution..."
"...When a person feels himself disturbed by bodily stimulation let him run to the refuge of continence, and seize the shield of chastity, and thus defend himself from uncleanness." (translation by Mother Columba Hart and Jane Bishop).
Divine Harmonies
Music was extremely important to Hildegard. She describes it as the means of recapturing the original joy and beauty of paradise. According to her, before the Fall, Adam had a pure voice and joined angels in singing praises to God; after the Fall, earthly music was invented and musical instruments created in order to worship God appropriately.
Hildegard wrote hymns and sequences in honor of saints, virgins and Mary. She wrote in the plainchant tradition of a single vocal melodic line, the predominant method of liturgical singing in the 12th century.
Currently her music is undergoing a popular revival and enjoying public success. One group, Sequentia, recorded virtually all of Hildegard's musical output in time for the 900th anniversary of her birth in 1998, including examples of Hildegard's metaphorical writing, imbued with vibrant descriptions of color and light, that occur in her visionary writings.
Significance
Hildegard was a powerful woman by the standards of the Middle Ages. She communicated with Popes such as Eugenius III and Anastasius IV, statesmen such as Abbot Suger, German emperors such as Frederick I Barbarossa, and on one occasion with St. Bernard of Clairvaux who although he reportedly advanced her work at the Synod of Trier 1147/48, seemed to have little regard for her as evidenced from the one letter from him she received. Nevertheless many Abbots and Abbesses asked her for prayers and opinions on various matters. She traveled widely, giving public speeches, a rarity for a woman of the time.
Hildegard was one of the first saints for which the canonization process was officially applied, but the process took so long that all four attempts at canonization (the last was in 1244, under Pope Innocent IV) were not completed, and remained at her beatification. However, she was already called a saint by the people before the canonization attempts. As a result of the long-standing devotion of the people to Hildegard, her name was taken up in the Roman martyrology at the end of the 16th century without a formal canonization process, earning her the title of saint. Her feast day is September 17. The shrine with the relics of Hildegard is in her second monastery in Eibingen near Rüdesheim (on the Rhine).
Notes
- Template:Fnb Hildegard of Bingen was often referred to as an abbess, or Mother Superior, by the many who wrote to her, although she was never officially recognized as such by officials in her own archdiocese.
Bibliography
- Scivias seu Visiones (1141-51)
- Liber divinorum operum simplicis hominis (1163-73/74)
- Liber vitae meritorum (1158-63)
- Solutiones triginta octo quaestionum
- Explanatio Regulae S. Benedicti
- Explanatio Symboli S. Athanasii
- Vita S. Ruperti
- Vita S. Disibodi
- Physica, sive Subtilitatum diversarum naturarum creaturarum libri novem
- Hymnodia coelestis.
- Ignota lingua, cum versione Latina
- Tractatus de sacramento altaris.
- Homeliae LVIII in Evangelia.
- Libri simplicis et compositae medicinae.
Sources
Editions and manuscripts of Hildegard's works
- Wiesbaden, Hessische Landesbibliothek, Hs. 2 (Riesen Codex) or Wiesbaden Codex (ca. 1180-85)
- Dendermonde, Belgium, St.-Pieters-&-Paulusabdij Cod. 9 (Villerenser codex) (ca. 1174/75)
- Hildegardis Bingensis, Epistolarium pars prima I-XC edited by L. Van Acker, Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis CCCM 91A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1991)
- Hildegardis Bingensis, Epistolarium pars secunda XCI-CCLr edited by L. Van Acker, Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis CCCM 91A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1993)
- Hildegardis Bingensis, Epistolarium pars tertia CCLI-CCCXC edited by L. Van Acker and M. Klaes-Hachmoller, Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis XCIB (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001)
- Hildegardis Bingensis, Scivias. A. Führkötter, A. Carlevaris eds., Corpus Christianorum Scholars Version vols. 43, 43A. (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003)
- Hildegardis Bingensis, Liber vitae meritorum. A. Carlevaris ed. Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis CCCM 90 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1995)
- Hildegardis Bingensis, Liber divinorum operum. A. Derolez and P. Dronke eds., Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis CCCM 92 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1996)
- Friedrich Wilhelm Emil Roth, "Glossae Hildigardis", in: Elias Steinmeyer and Eduard Sievers eds., Die Althochdeutschen Glossen, vol. III. Zürich: Wiedmann, 1895, 1965, pp. 390-404.
- Analecta Sanctae Hildegardis, in Analecta Sacra vol. 8 edited by Jean-Baptiste Pitra (Monte Cassino, 1882).
- Patrologia Latina vol. 197 (1855).
Literature
- Joseph L. Baird (trans.), Radd K. Ehrman. The letters of Hildegard of Bingen. New York : Oxford University Press, 1994. ISBN 0195089375
- Mother Columba Hart and Jane Bishop (1990). "Scivias", The Classics of Western Spirituality. New York/Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1990. ISBN 0809131307
- Audrey Ekdahl Davidson, ed. (1992). The "Ordo virtutum" of Hildegard of Bingen : critical studies. Kalamazoo, Mich.: Medieval Institute Publications, Western Michigan University, 1992. ISBN 1879288176
- Sabina Flanagan. Hildegard of Bingen, a Visionary Life. Routledge, London, 1989. ISBN 0760713618
- Matthew Fox. Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen. Santa Fe, N.M. : Bear & Co., 1985. ISBN 1879181975
- Bruce W. Hozeski, trans. Hildegard of Bingen : the Book of the rewards of life (Liber vitae meritorum). New York : Garland Pub., 1994. ISBN 0195113713
- Barbara Newman. Sister of wisdom : St. Hildegard's theology of the feminine. Berkeley : University of California Press, 1987. ISBN 0520066154
- Barbara Newman, trans. Symphonia: A Critical Edition of the "Symphonia armoniae celestium revelationum. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press, 1988.
- Barbara Newman. God and the Goddesses. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 0812219112
- Ingeborg Ulrich. Hildegard von Bingen : Mystikerin, Heilerin, Gefahrtin der Engel. Munich: Kosel, 1990. ISBN 3466342546
- Andrew Weeks. German mysticism from Hildegard of Bingen to Ludwig Wittgenstein : a literary and intellectual history. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993. ISBN 0791414191
- Maud Burnett McInerney, ed. Hildegard of Bingen: A Book of Essays. New York: Garland Pub., 1998. ISBN 0815325886
- Whitney Chadwick, Women, Art, and Society, Thames and Hudson, London, 1990. ISBN 0500203547
- Harris, Anne Sutherland and Linda Nochlin, Women Artists: 1550-1950, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Knopf, New York, 1976. ISBN 0394733266
- Anna Silvas (trans). Jutta and Hildegard: the Biographical Sources (Brepols Medieval Women Series). Penn State University Press, 1999. ISBN 0271019549
- June Boyce-Tillman. The Creative Spirit: Harmonious Living with Hildegard of Bingen, Harrisburg, PA: Morehouse Publishing, 2000. ISBN 0819218820
Related links
External links
- Hildegard of Bingen Documents, History, Sites to see today, etc..
- Source
- Discography
- Biography and Prayers of Hildegard
- Another discography
- Church of St. Hildegard in Eibingen, Germany with Informations about Hildegard von Bingen and the Eibinger Hildegardisshrine
This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition{{#if:{{{article|}}}| article {{#if:{{{url|}}}|[{{{url|}}}}} "{{{article}}}"{{#if:{{{url|}}}|]}}{{#if:{{{author|}}}| by {{{author}}}}}}}, a publication now in the public domain.bg:Хилдегард от Бинген ca:Hildegard von Bingen da:Hildegard af Bingen de:Hildegard von Bingen es:Hildegard de Bingen eo:Hildegard de Bingen fr:Hildegarde de Bingen ia:Hildegard von Bingen it:Santa Ildegarda di Bingen he:הילדגרד פון בינגן lb:Hildegard vu Bingen nl:Hildegard van Bingen ja:ヒルデガルト・フォン・ビンゲン no:Hildegard von Bingen nn:Hildegard von Bingen nds:Hildegard von Bingen pl:Hildegarda z Bingen pt:Hildegarda de Bingen sk:Hildegard von Bingen sl:Hildegard von Bingen sr:Хилдегард фон Бинген sh:Hildegard od Bingena fi:Hildegard von Bingen sv:Hildegard av Bingen