The Beguines fueled the engine of the "vita apostolica" together with Francis of Assisi and other commanders. He believes that “the opening style of the vita apostolica is one of the most creative innovations of late medieval religion. 14Sally Thompson, "The Problem of the Cistercian Nuns in the Twelfth and Early Thirteenth Centuries," in Derek Baker, ed., Medieval Women (Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Despite the opposition of the institutional Church, the Beguines took their future into their own hands and moved on. Thus, the relationship of hierarchy and social norms added to the complexity of the Beguine relationship with the community. But the horrors of the Inquisition in its relentless pursuit of witchcraft and extermination of heretics turned many women away from the Beguine lifestyle.
The New Mysticism of the Beguines
Hadewijch of Antwerp
From her letters and poems we infer that she probably died tending to the sick, perhaps lepers, while she continued to write. Paul Mommaers, in the preface to Hadewijch: The Complete Works, affirms that of the two, "Hadewijch. Mommaers explains that "the most striking characteristic of love mysticism" that arose in the second half of the twelfth century.
Mommaers continues: "What she primarily wants to make clear is that her attraction to 'fertile being-one' [a term from Hadewijch] is a sign of non-full growth, and that growing up means something, mystically, that one is able to live completely different aspects of being one with God."32 In fact, Hadewijch considers that one can have a deeply mystical life without having such ecstatic experiences, and even more central is her experience of "violent longing" ( PS 7, 60) to "be one" with God beyond God. She saw the energy of "memory" in the universe, in people and in "Minne", i.e. divine love in the Triune Godhead. In modern idiom we must be fully human and fully divine in order to "be one" in the Godhead.
Just as Jacob came out of the battle with God with a "lame", so will the individual who struggles with. Of Jacob's journey-struggle, Hadewijch speaks of the movement towards the "rhythm of the Trinity" of the Godhead. Her presentation of the Trinity is the Godhead in constant motion: “He rests in nothing but the turbulent nature of his abundantly abundant flood which.
However, this brings the discussion to "one of the most original and difficult aspects of her mystical teaching"40, that of "disbelief". Fruition overtook me as before, and I plunged into the infinite deep, and came forth from the soul at that hour—which can never be spoken of. At this stage, the individual has entered the deep forest of the "Unknowing Cloud". It is the beginning of the "dark night of the soul." This is the place where all the old comforts and "feel good" feelings are gone and where the individual now falls into the abyss of Divinity.
In fact, it is the entrance to the "Cloud of Unknowing", as it is called by the anonymous monk from the end of the 14th century, author of the book of the same title.
Mechthild of Magdeburg
Mechthild was also one of the great mystics of the 13th century, and, in the same light as Hadewijch, she saw herself as a messenger of God. In the Middle Ages, visions were referred to as "apparitions". When individuals like Hadewijch, Angela of Foligno and Julian of Norwich speak of "showing", they speak of visualizations, images or symbols, and words that take over them, and they experience God communicating with them in any or all of these forms. The image of "flow" is very much in line with the Platonic paradigm of the First Principle - that from which all things arise and then return.
Mechthild believed in the preexistence of the soul, that it first existed in the Trinity. Her image was that we live in the Trinity, and when the Godhead can no longer hold us back, we break out into reality here on earth: "When God could no longer contain himself, he created the soul and gave himself to her as her own. from the greatest love" (FL She later says that the whole person, the body and. Mechthild does not use the term "memory" as often as Hadewijch does, but she takes it much further in the sexuality of her images.
She's clear that as great as it is insinuating orgasmic union, it's not the goal, and she knows the "sinking" experience that follows these physical highs. She speaks of the stage of 'estrangement' which resembles Hadewijch's experience of 'unbelief' or what John of the Cross. This is not the joyful enjoyment of the senses, but the feeling of losing intimacy with God, of entering the great darkness; she knows how close she has come to the Deity who is totally unknowable and inscrutable.
Their property was taken to serve pious purposes, to support the inquisitors, or to repair city walls and roads. Stoner relates that "eventually, however, Mechthild's resolve failed; at the age of 62 she fled to the convent of Helfta, a center of German piety." The two great mystics, Hadewijch and Mechthild,.
Marguerite Porete
He says that she was "bold and uncompromising" in her spirituality which eventually led to her execution as a heretic on June But Marguerite's book, The Mirror of Simple Annihilated Souls and Those Who Remain Only in Will and Desire of Love, came back into the mainstream only in the second half of the 20th century, along with many other forgotten mystics. There is a great deal of mystery and consequent ambiguity about the personal lives of the three great Beguines: Hadewijch, Mechthild and Marguerite. The purpose of this article is therefore not to find certainty, because that is impossible; rather, it is to reveal the nature of her work that brought the condemnation of the Inquisition upon her.
Thus, the essential teaching of The Mirror is the most critical and appropriate for this inquiry. McGinn believes that Marguerite was probably referring to Beguines who were "enclosed" (secluded) and who were very uncomfortable with her mendicant and wandering lifestyle. Among the mystical texts written in the vernacular during the Middle Ages, The Mirror was one of the most widely circulated and most controversial texts of its time.
She was caught in the middle of the struggle between the mystical and institutional elements of Christianity, a tug-of-war that is felt to this day. Now this soul is in the stage of the first being, which is her being, and she has left three and has made one of two. Here "Reason" is the opposite of "Love". She affirms that "the ultimate meaning of love is annihilation."58 Marguerite thus confronts the institutional church.
Within her apophatic spirituality, she called God "Father Nagh". God is absently present in his "Far Nearness". Like John of the Cross a century later, "nothingness" is absolutely central to her teachings. And the light from the opening of this book has made me find what is mine and stay in it.
We Can Walk through the Portal in the 21 st Century
Second, they were mindful of their times, but they were not afraid to go against the hierarchy, even if it meant being arrested and sentenced to death. Fear did not dominate their actions, as they were drawn from the inner fire that the three mystics felt in the practice of meditation and in their good works. Yes, they were aware of the plight of those around them, and so they devoted much of their energy to helping the unfortunate.
But they were not activists who merely responded to external circumstances, for they seemed to be driven by their inner life in the face of the Godhead. Fourth, they were not afraid to allow the physical elements of their bodies to enter into their interaction with God. Fifth, they were daring in their understanding of the spiritual stages, which included concepts such as "unbelief", "alienation" and.
Of course, there were mystics of the early Church who spoke in the language of their time, but these women were not ashamed of the disturbance that the use of these words might cause in their environment. From the eroticism of their passion and love, which they saw as the initial stage of interaction with God, they knew that they would "sink", as Mechthild describes, into the "unbelief" of Hadewijch, into the abyss of "nothing". ” where everything is, in the terms of Marguerite Poreta, destroyed, where there is no mind, no emotion, no will and no desire. However, today, with our deeper understanding of the later mystics and avatars of Buddhism, Hinduism, and Sufism, their language is most appropriate.
In the Middle Ages, the three great Beguines mystics were condemned and their works buried by the Church. Hadewijch was banished from society, Mechtild bowed to the male authorities of the Church and retired to a monastery, and Maguerite was executed by fire by the church as a heretic.
You should love nothingness, you should flee something, you should stand alone, you should not go to anyone.
