R15: Hildegard von Rupertsberg an Christian I. von Buch
Greeting and Fatherly Praise
Hildegard opens with a humble, affectionate greeting to Archbishop Christian, praising his pastoral role and giving thanks for his mercy and consolation.
Hildegard. To Archbishop Christian. O most gentle father and lord, who in the place of Jesus Christ have been appointed shepherd over the sheep of the Church.✦ To the highest God and to your fatherly devotion we humbly give thanks. For you mercifully received our letter of poverty. And because for us, troubled and distressed as we are, you deigned in your mercy to send letters to our prelates at Mainz. And also for the sweet words of your accustomed clemency, through which, by means of Lord Hermann, dean of the Church of the Holy Apostles in Cologne, we have been so comforted and gladdened. Because in every tribulation and distress of ours, as daughters to a beloved father, we flee confidently to you.
The Burial Controversy and Grief
Hildegard lays bare her distress over the Mainz prelates' order to cast out a dead man from burial, affirming God's command in the true light that he must not be expelled.
And so, good Lord, we your servants, who sit in the sadness of tribulation and distress, prostrate in the spirit of humility at your feet, lay bare the cause of our unbearable grief before you in pure truth and with tears. We do so with the confidence that the fiery love that is God will inspire you to mercifully deign to hear, with fatherly compassion, the lamentable voice with which we cry out to you, afflicted as we are in our tribulation.✦1 O gentle father, since our prelates in Mainz ordered that a dead young man — long absolved from the ban before his own death and fortified with all the sacraments of the Christian faith, just as I had also made known to you before in my letters — be cast out from burial among us in our cemetery, or that we cease from the divine services.2 I looked toward the true light, as I am accustomed to do.✦ And in that light God commanded me that he should never be cast out by my own voluntary consent. God himself has received this young man, whom he was to reckon as belonging to the bosom of the Church, into the glory of salvation.3 Because a darkness of great danger would come upon us from that action. For it would be against the will of the Truth himself.✦4
Obedience Hindered by God's Fear
She explains that fear of God prevented her from obeying the prelates, and that she would have complied had the man not been excommunicated, yet she submitted her vision in writing as commanded.
For if this fear of almighty God had not stood in my way, I would have humbly obeyed them. and whomever they ordered in your name, in which you are Lord and our advocate. to carry out the same dead man. If he had not been excommunicated, I would have granted with willing consent that the church's right be preserved. But when for some time we had ceased, not without great grief and sorrow, in the true vision of my soul, by the highest judge whose command I had not dared resist, I was compelled by the weight of most serious infirmity and came to our prelates in Mainz. And the words that I had seen in the true light, as he himself commanded me, I presented in writing.
Rejected Mercy and Sorrowful Departure
Hildegard recounts seeking mercy with tears from the prelates, being rejected by their hardened eyes, departing in sorrow, yet noting that many others were moved with compassion.
so that they might recognize in those people what God's will was in this matter. Pardon also before those who were then present, seeking with bitter tears. From them I piteously and humbly sought mercy! but since their eyes had become so dim that they could look upon me with no regard for mercy. Full of tears, I departed from them. But since very many men were moved with mercy over us,
Witness of the Archbishop of Cologne
She reports that the archbishop of Cologne came to Mainz with witnesses to prove the man's absolution, and that divine services were resumed in peace until the archbishop's return.
Although they couldn't help us according to their own will. Your faithful friend — that is, the archbishop of Cologne — came to them in Mainz. and with a certain free knight assisting. He wanted to prove it with sufficient witnesses. namely that he himself and the aforementioned deceased man, still living in body, had been equally present at the same departure. Likewise, they had been released from excommunication at the same place, the same hour, by the same priest. The same priest who had absolved them being present, the truth of this matter having been recognized by them, the same prelate obtained from you — presuming on your permission — leave to celebrate the divine services until your safe return, and in peace. Since, however, sweetest lord, we had the greatest confidence in your mercy.
Confident Appeal for Mercy
Hildegard laments the renewed interdict received after the prelates' return, yet resolves in her vision to speak, preferring God's command to human favor, and appeals in the love of the Holy Spirit for mercy.
Through those same prelates of ours, after their return from Rome, we received your letters interdicting divine services, which I trust you would never have sent if you had recognized the truth of this matter. And so, most gentle father, in our former bond we are now established with far greater grief and sorrow by your own command. So it is in the vision of my soul, in which you never troubled me at all by any word, that I am resolved in heart and mouth to speak. It is better for me to fall into the hands of men than to abandon the commandment of my God. Therefore, most gentle father, I beg you in the love of the Holy Spirit that, for the sake of the eternal father's piety— you who for the salvation of humanity sent your Word in sweet greenness into the womb of a virgin—not wishing to despise the tears of your daughters, who, out of fear of God, endure the tribulations and anguish of this unjust bond. May the Holy Spirit pour into you. so that mercy may be moved over us, and that you also, after the end of your life, may obtain mercy for this.
Read the original Latin
Hildegardis. Ad archiepiscopum Cristianum. O mitissime pater et domine qui in uice iesu christi super oues ęcclesię pastor constitutus es. summo deo et paternę pietati tuę gratias humiliter agimus. pro eo quod litteras paupertatis nostrę misericorditer suscepisti. et quod pro nobis tribulatis et angustiatis in misericordia tua litteras ad prelatos nostros moguntiam mittere dignatus es. et etiam pro dulcibus uerbis solitę clementię tuę quibus per domnum hermannum ęcclesię sanctorum apostolorum in colonia dechanum ita consolatę et letificatę sumus. quod in omni tribulatione et angustia nostra sicut filię ad te dilectum patrem secure confugimus.
Vnde bonę domine nos famulę tuę quę sedemus in tristicia tribulationis et angustię in spiritu humilitatis pedibus tuis prouolutę causam intollerabilis doloris nostri in pura ueritate lacrimabiliter tibi aperimus. ea fiducia quod ignea caritas quę deus est tibi inspiret ut cum paterna pietate lamentabilem uocem qua in tribulatione nostra afflicte ad te clamamus misericorditer exaudire digneris. O mitis pater cum prelati nostri moguntini mortuum iuuenem ante mortem suam a banno diu absolutum et omnibus christianę fidei sacramentis munitum sicut etiam ante in litteris tibi insinuaui aput nos sepultum a cimiterio nostro eicere nos uel a diuinis nos cessare iussissent. ego ad uerum lumen ut soleo aspexi. et in illo deus mihi precepit ne umquam uoluntario consensu meo eiceretur. quem ipse a sinu ęcclesię in gloriam saluationis deputandum susceperit. quoniam nigredo magni periculi nobis inde proueniret. eo quod contra uoluntatem eius ueritatis esset.
Si enim iste timor omnipotentis dei michi non obstitisset. eis humiliter obedissem. et quemcumque in nomine tuo qui dominus et aduocatus noster es. eundem mortuum iussissent efferre. si excommunicatus non esset seruandum ius ęcclesię grata uoluntate concessissem. Cum autem per aliquod tempus non sine magno dolore et tristicia cessassemus. in uera uisione anime meę a summo iudice cuius precepto resistere ausa non fui pondere grauissimę infirmitatis coacta ad prelatos nostros in moguntiam ueni. et uerba quę in uero lumine uideram ut ipse mihi precepit scripta representaui.
quatenus in illis cognoscerent. quę uoluntas dei in hac causa esset. Veniam quoque coram ipsis qui tunc aderant amaris lacrimis petens. ab eis flebiliter et suppliciter misericordiam quesiui! sed cum oculi eorum ita caligassent. ut nullo respectu misericordię me respicere potuissent. plena lacrimis ab eis discessi. Sed cum plurimi homines super nos misericordia mouerentur.
licet pro uoluntate sua nos adiuuare non possent. Fidelis amicus tuus scilicet coloniensis archiepiscopus ad ipsos in moguntiam uenit. et quodam milite libero homine assistente. qui sufficientibus testibus probare uoluit. quod ipse et predictus mortuus adhuc in corpore uiuens cum pariter in eodem excessu fuissent. pariter etiam a banno eodem loco eadem hora ab eodem sacerdote soluti essent. eodem sacerdote etiam qui eos absoluit presente ab eis cognita huius rei ueritate idem presul de te presumens licentiam celebrandi diuina usque ad reditum tuum secure et in pace obtinuit. Cum autem dulcissime domine maximam fiduciam in misericordia tua haberemus.
per eosdem prelatos nostros post reuersionem suam a roma sinodo litteras tuas diuinorum interdictorias accepimus quas ut paternę pietati tuę confido numquam misisses si ueritatem huius rei agnouisses. sicque mitissime pater in priori ligatura multo maiori dolore et tristicia tuimetipsius iussione constitutę sumus. Unde in uisione animę meę in qua numquam in aliquo uerbo turbasti iussa sum corde et ore dicere. Melius est mihi incidere in manus hominum quam derelinquere preceptum dei mei. Ergo mitissime pater obsecro te in amore spiritus sancti ut propter pietatem eterni patris. qui pro salute hominis in suaui uiriditate misit uerbum suum in uirginis uterum dolentium et plorantium filiarum tuarum lacrimas despicere non uelis quę ob timorem dei tribulationes et angustias huius iniustę ligaturę sustinemus. Spiritus sanctus infundat tibi. ut ita super nos misericordia mouearis ut etiam tu post finem uitę tuę pro hoc misericordiam consequaris.
Scripture echoes
- ↩John.10.11 — I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
- ↩1John.4.8 — The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
- ↩John.1.9 — The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.
- ↩John.14.6 — Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'
Notes
- 1 ↩ignea caritas quę deus est — 'the fiery love/charity that is God' echoes 1 John 4:8, 16 ('God is love'). Rendered to preserve the identification of caritas with God's own nature.
- 2 ↩The sentence is syntactically complex: the main verb iussissent ('had ordered') governs two infinitives, eicere ('cast out') and cessare ('cease'), with the object nos ('us') repeated. The young man is the one to be cast out from the cemetery; the community is ordered to cease from divine services.
- 3 ↩a sinu ecclesiae — 'from the bosom of the Church' — a standard patristic and medieval expression for full membership in the community of the faithful.
- 4 ↩ueritatis — 'of the Truth' — capitalized in sense, referring to God as Truth itself (cf. John 14:6). Rendered with possessive 'himself' to preserve the personification.
Epistolae: Letters to Frederick Barbarossa and Henry II of England companion
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