R151: Adelheid von Gandersheim an Hildegard von Rupertsberg
Greeting and Good Fruit
Adelheid greets Hildegard with humble affection and a scriptural image of a good tree known by its good fruit.
Adelheid, abbess to Hildegard. Adelheid, abbess of the church of Gandersheim, though unworthy, to Hildegard. To the beloved mother, from Saint Robert, free bride of Jerusalem. Kisses of the bridegroom. A good tree is known by good fruit.✦
Christ’s Dove, Pure in Heart
Adelheid warns against forgetfulness and praises Hildegard as Christ’s dove, great in heart and pure.
She must not be allowed to fall into forgetfulness. Because in bearing fruit, she has won sweetness. She has earned a genuine love of what is good. And so she will rightly be ranked lower than a brute animal. She who embraces sweet things well, embraces them less well.1 You, then, are Christ's dove, not led astray. But great in heart and pure. As good is to evil.2
Remember Our Bond of Love
Adelheid asks Hildegard to remember their deep bond of love and devotion so that their old spiritual nourishment does not wither.
Light and darkness. Sweet [and] bitter does not make. So you do not slip from my heart. Therefore you too ought to remember me often. How clearly you are joined to me by the closeness of both love and deepest devotion. So I don't want the flower of our old nourishment to wither in your heart. That flower that once flourished between you and me. When you raised me with such tenderness.
Prayer, Visitation, and Sisterhood
Adelheid begs Hildegard’s prayers for herself, her flock, and their sisterhoods, and hints at a future visit.
By the love of Him and the charity of your beloved Bridegroom, I beseech you. And I pray that, for me and for my flock and the place entrusted to me by your permission, your prayers and supplications may be made to God. And may you entrust us to the prayers of all your sisters. I ask also that you obtain fellowship in your sisterhood for my sisters — with those same sisters of yours, nay rather, my own as well. And whenever anyone comes to us through you — by letters sent — this too, and if there's anything else you wish, may you make it known in Christ. For my part, when the time is right — if it pleases God — I won't delay coming to you.
Come, Work Together in the Garden
Adelheid longs to visit, to work good works together, renew ancient fellowship, and greet the sisters with deep affection.
So that we may speak face to face. Let us work together hand in hand for what is good. And so the ancient fellowship will be established. May the love which God establishes in us strengthen this fellowship. You who live in gardens, listen. Greet all your fellow dwellers — namely, my sisters who are yours — from me, with the deepest affection. And gladden me with letters of recommendation.
Read the original Latin
Adelheidis abbatissa. hildegardi. Adelheidis gandemheimnensis ęcclesię abbatissa quamuis indigna. hildegardi. dilectę matri de sancto Roberto. liberę sponsę ierusalem. oscula sponsi. Arbor bona bono ex fructu cognita.
nequaquam duci debet in obliuionem. quia fructificando dulcedinem. dulcem bonorum commeruit amorem. Bruto ergo animali iure inferior habebitur. qui bene dulcia minus bene amplectitur. Tu itaque christi columba non seducta. sed corde magna et munda. sicut bonum malum.
lux tenebras. dulce amarum non facit. ita mihi a corde mihi non excidis. Vnde debes et tu frequenter mei recordari. quam constat et amoris et intimę deuotionis propinquitate tibi coniungi. Nolo igitur ut antiqui nutrimenti flos in corde tuo aruerit. qui quondam inter me et te floruit. cum me dulciter educasti.
Cuius amore et dilecti sponsi tui caritate te obtestor. precorque ut pro me et grege meo locoque mihi tua permissione commisso orationes et obsecrationes tuę fiant ad deum. atque nos committas orationibus omnium sororum tuarum. Oro etiam ut fraternitatis tuę consortium sororibus meis apud easdem sorores tuas immo et meas obtineas. et dum aliquis per uos ad nos transierit. litteris transmissis. id et si quid aliud uolueris in christo innotescas. Ego autem expedito tempore si deo placuerit ad uos non differam uenire.
ut ore ad os loquamur. manu ad manum quod bonum est operemur. sicque antiqua stabilietur societas. quam in nobis confirmet deus caritas. Quę habitas in hortis ausculta. omnesque cohabitatrices tuas scilicet sorores meas ex me quam intime saluta! et litteris commendaticijs me letifica.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Matt.7.17 — So every good tree produces good fruit, but the bad tree produces bad fruit.
Notes
- 1 ↩The paradoxical force of the Latin is compressed: she who handles sweet things 'well' (bene) handles them 'less well' (minus bene). The rendering preserves the paradox but the sense is elliptical.
- 2 ↩The Latin is elliptical — sicut bonum malum — and the full comparison is implied rather than stated. The rendering preserves the compression; the sense is something like 'as good stands to evil' (i.e., in clear contrast).
Epistolae: Letters to Frederick Barbarossa and Henry II of England companion
Read one voice like Hildegard's every morning
Chosen Portion delivers daily excerpts from Hildegard and 77 other historic devotional writers, free on iOS.
Hildegard directed souls through short written portions sent one at a time, and Chosen Portion continues that letter-a-day rhythm as daily devotionals.
- Daily 2-minute readings including Hildegard's letters and visions
- 78 complete historic works, translated into modern readable English
- A weekly email tracing one writer's story in depth