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FLUIDITY IN STILLNESS: A READING OF HADEWIJCH'S STROFISCHE GEDICHTEN/POEMS IN STANZAS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 October 2018

ANITA MIR
ANITA MIR*
Affiliation:
Fordham University
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Abstract

That women felt and men thought has long been the predominant lens through which medieval Christian writing has been analyzed. The work of the religious women vernacular theologians, or Beguines, who emerged across North Europe from the twelfth to the thirteenth centuries has therefore often been dismissed as affective mysticism. Recent scholarship has begun to re-appraise this work and re-evaluate its place within the Christian tradition. This paper looks at the work of Hadewijch, a thirteenth-century mystical poet from Brabant in the Netherlands who, though less well known than other Beguines such as Hildegaard of Bingen and Marguerite Porete, may, as John Arblaster and Paul Verdeyen argue, “rightly be called the greatest poetic genius in the Dutch language.” It is probable that her work was not widely known during her lifetime (not, that is, directly), but research is strengthening the argument that her theology was transmitted via the works of John of Ruusbroec. This paper will attend both to Hadewijch's poesy and her theology and ask what the dynamic structure in her verse — its shifts of perspective, gender perspective, and non-linear narrative — might lead us to grasp about her theology.

Keywords

Beguinescourtly lovedynamismHadewijchJohn of RuusbroecminneTrinitarian theologyWilliam of St. Thierry
Type
Research Article
Information
Traditio , Volume 73 , 2018 , pp. 179 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University 2018 

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References

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2 As Bruckner, Matilda Tomaryn, “Fictions of the Female Voice: The Women Troubadours,” Speculum 67 (1992): 865–91Google Scholar, at 875, puts it, “the trobairitz is at once femna, domina, and poet through the kaleidoscope of her songs.”

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10 Affective mysticism is linked more readily with women mystics, although some men have also practiced this form of mysticism. Male mystics are, however, usually connected with speculative mysticism. The distinction often made is one between emotional and intellectual spiritual experience. The latter idea proliferated at the male-only schools/universities.

11 Guest, Aspects of Hadewijch's Poetic Form, 3.

12 In Kerr, Fergus, Immortal Longings: Versions of Transcending Humanity (London, 1997), 94Google Scholar.

13 By focusing our attention on a reading of a handful of poems, we hope to be able to attend to the nuances of motifs and themes in a way that a broad sweep of the body of work would not allow.

14 According to Faesen (Private conversation, July 2018), “Van Mierlo has been a more influential scholar in the study of Hadewijch. His studies took into consideration the theological aspects of Hadewijch's works, which Norbert De Paepe did in a much lesser degree. There are also several unfortunate mistranslations in De Paepe's anthology of Hadewijch's works.”

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18 McGinn, The Flowering of Mysticism, 171, says “In this Cistercian nun [Beatrice], as well as in the other women mystics of the thirteenth century who lived in the world of vernacular theology, minne functions not unlike the term esse in contemporary scholasticism, though with a decidedly more personal and existential import. That is to say (metaphysically speaking) minne must be predicated of God, but it also signifies the fundamental reality or power by which all things participate in God and by which they return to him.”

19 Mommaers, Hadewijch, 93.

20 Bouyer, Louis, Women Mystics, trans. Nash, Anne Englund (San Francisco, 1993), 35Google Scholar.

21 Bouyer, Women Mystics, 3.

22 Bouyer, Women Mystics, xxx.

23 The first object being the listener/reader. Eric Auerbach writes, “The theorists have never described or listed the address to the reader as a special figure of speech. That is quite understandable. Since the ancient orator always addresses a definite public — either a political body or the judges in a trial — the problem arises only in certain special cases, if, with an extraordinary rhetorical movement, he should address someone else, a persona iudicis aversus, as Quintilian says.” Cited by Kneale, J. Douglas, “Romantic Aversions: Apostrophe Reconsidered,” English Literary History 58 (1991), 142CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

24 An address, that is, that turns away from addressing empirical listeners (he, she, you) to addressing natural objects, artifacts, or abstractions (the sun, moon, hope, etc.). See the discussion in Culler, Jonathan, “Apostrophe,” Diacritics 7 (1977): 59–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 60.

25 Kneale, “Romantic Aversions,” 143.

26 Willaert, De Poëtica van Hadewijch (n. 4 above).

27 Bernard McGinn, The Flowering of Mysticism, 229.

28 Van Mierlo, Jozef, Hadewijch: Strofische Gedichten; Text een Commentaar (Leuven, 1947), 14Google Scholar. This is the Dutch text I reference throughout, though I also provide cross-reference, when applicable, to the text in De Paepe, Norbert, ed., Een Blomelezing Uit Haar Werken (Amsterdam and Brussels, 1979)Google Scholar, here at 154.

29 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 15. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 155.

30 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 54. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 166.

31 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 55. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 167.

32 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 55. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 167.

33 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 61. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 171.

34 Murk-Jansen, Saskia, “The Use of Gender and Gender-Related Imagery in Hadewijch,” in Gender and the Text in the Later Middle Ages, ed. Chance, Jane (Gainesville, FL, 1996), 58Google Scholar.

35 In this poem Minne is not at first identified with Christ (as so often in other poems) but with the Virgin — who is both maiden and queen. According to Bynum, “The recent quantitative study of 864 saints by Weinstein and Bell establishes conclusively that the devotion to the human Christ was a ‘female’ theme in a way devotion to Mary was not” (Bynum, Caroline Walker, Harelle, Steven, and Richman, Paula, eds., Gender and Religion: On the Complexity of Symbols [Boston, 1986], 294Google Scholar).

36 It is worth noting in this context that the Christ, as the model of the “true lover,” is the perfect embodiment of the de-individualized, detached and celibate individual.

37 Miri Rubin argues that “In the vernacular literature a strong bond was created between the eucharistic body reborn at the mass and the original body born from a virgin womb, to produce the powerful image linked both to crucifixion and to nativity in the Virgin Mary. But the child was never without his mother, Mary herself was augmented in the eucharistic context” (Rubin, Miri, The Eucharist in Late Medieval Culture [Cambridge, 1991], 142Google Scholar).

38 Landy, Francis, “The Song of Songs,” in The Literary Guide to the Bible, ed. Alter, Robert and Kermode, Frank (Cambridge, MA 1990)Google Scholar, 131: “In 4:9 the Beloved, through ravishing her lover's heart, gives him a heart, since the rare verb employed, libavtini, may mean both; it also echoes the word Lebanon (Levanon) in the previous verse. It is as if Lebanon is infused in his heart. In 5:1, as we have seen, possession is mutual. The exercise of power transmits power and is thus an image of the sexual relationship.”

39 Do we see in this idea of “conquering” a reference to the Italian tertiaries, the northern Beguines, and their male confessors who called on both men and women to be virile? See Bynum, Caroline Walker, Fragmentation and Redemption. Essays on Gender and the Human Body in Medieval Religion (New York, 1992), 156Google Scholar.

40 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 15. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 155.

41 See Rudy, Mystical Language (n. 6 above).

42 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 16. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 155–56.

43 “Whoso eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life” (John 6:54).

44 See Frater's introduction to Mommaers, Hadewijch (n. 5 above).

45 Heinrich von Veldeke writes, “In den aprillen do di blumen springen / so louven di linden ende grunen di buken, / so heven bit willen di vogele here singen (In April when the flowers spring, / the lindens leaf out, the beeches turn green, / with a will the birds begin to sing) (in Walsoe-Engel, Ingrid, ed., German Poetry from the Beginnings to 1750, trans. Goldin, Fredrick [New York, 1992], 36)Google Scholar.”

46 As the birds can have no such knowledge of dread or expectation, the “dramatic expectation” we here speak of is ours.

47 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 14. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 154.

48 We understand choice as both discernment and movement, a matter of intellect and the will: to “see” the “good” and then to move towards it.

49 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 14. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 154.

50 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 14. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 154.

51 Hadewijch, , The Complete Works, trans. Hart, Columba (New York, 1981), 131Google Scholar.

52 Guest, Aspects of Hadewijch's Poetic Form (n. 3 above), 192.

53 This dynamic willingness is what Willaert (De Poëtica van Hadewijch [n. 4 above], 307) says also distinguishes the audience of the minnelyrics from Hadewijch's audience: “In de profane minnelyriek … dit public is uitgesproken statisch… . Hadewijchs public is echter gekenmerkt door een dynamische bereidheid tot de minne.”

54 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 17. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 156.

55 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 18. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 157.

56 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 55. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 167.

57 Sells, Michael, Mystical Languages of Unsaying (Chicago, 1994), 155Google Scholar.

58 The word “lazy” is a strange antonym for “courage.” We see then, that courage is more than fortitude. It is also persistence.

59 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 16. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 155–56.

60 Levinas, Emmanuel, The Levinas Reader, ed. Hand, Sean (Oxford, 2002), 43Google Scholar.

61 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 18. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 157.

62 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 133.

63 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 18. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 157.

64 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 18. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 157.

65 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 133–134.

66 Guest (Aspects of Hadewijch's Poetic Form [n. 3 above], 11) argues that “life,” a word Hadewijch uses frequently, “means variously the Beloved, the human lover, and also the emotion or experience of love.”

67 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 55. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 167.

68 “And so freely pe mynde sweitly is borne in to pat it lufys” (Rolle, Richard, The Fire of Love and the Mending of Life or the Rule of Living, ed. R. Harvey from MS ccxxvi in Corpus Christi College, Oxford [London, 1896], 84Google Scholar).

69 Iris Murdoch calls this freedom from “empty choice.” See Murdoch, Iris, The Sovereignty of Good (London, 1990), 40–41Google Scholar.

70 See Hannah Arendt's chapter on Duns Scotus in The Life of the Mind (New York, 1978), especially at 130. Duns Scotus says: “The essential characteristic of our volitional acts is … the power to choose between opposite things and the power to revoke disappears once the volition has been executed.” Arendt adds to this, “Precisely this freedom which is manifest only as a mental activity — the power to revoke disappears once the violation has been executed — is what we spoke of earlier in terms of a brokenness of the will.”

71 Brunn, Emilie Zum and Epiney-Burgard, Georgette, Women Mystics in Medieval Europe, trans. Hughes, Sheila (St. Paul, MN, 1989), 110Google Scholar.

72 This poem and Poem 33, I should note, are not included in De Paepe's edition.

73 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 217.

74 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 224.

75 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 217.

76 In courtly love lyrics the first stage of love is usually one of rapture, not bitterness. Bitterness is equated with a parting from the lover, as in J. W. Thomas's poem: “So wol dir, summerwunne!? Daz vogelsanc ist geswunden:/ als ist der linden ir laip/ jarlanc troubent mir ouch” (in Walsoe-Engel, ed., German Poetry [n. 43 above], 18).

77 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 224.

78 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 217–18.

79 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 224.

80 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 225. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 215.

81 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 218.

82 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 225.

83 Bart goes on to argue that a shift of perception is required so that man sees himself as abstractly limited but limited by God. See the chapter on Karl Barth in Kerr, Immortal Longings (n. 12 above), particularly 37–45.

84 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 220.

85 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 220.

86 Rudy, Mystical Language (n. 6 above), 79.

87 Mommaers, Hadewijch (n. 5 above), 114.

88 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 153.

89 Cocque, Andre La and Ricoeur, Paul, Thinking Biblically: Exegetical and Hermeneutical Studies (Chicago, 1998)Google Scholar, 245.

90 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 62. Cf. De Paepe, Bloemlezing, 172.

91 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 153.

92 Kerr, Immortal Longings, 109.

93 “Although we do not know whether the songs as we have them are in chronological order … I am inclined to believe that they are” (Guest, Aspects of Hadewijch's Poetic Form [n. 3 above], 11).

94 Van Mierlo, Hadewijch, 214.

95 Hart, trans., Complete Works, 223.

96 Fraeter argues that the “wij” is not an expansive category and that it therefore refers only to the select community members who were Hadewijch's readers/listeners. I think he is pointing to those who have been initiated into mystical knowledge (Private conversation at a Dominican conference, Rome, June 2005).

97 Murk-Jansen, “Use of Gender” (n. 34 above), 53.

98 Rudy, Mystical Language (n. 6 above), 69.

99 Bouyer says Augustine describes the Divine Persons as “relationes substantiae: relations by which, in which, they subsist, the one in the other, the one for the other.” Bouyer, Women Mystics (n. 20 above), 64.

100 See Zum Brunn Epiney-Burgard, Women Mystics in Medieval Europe (n. 71 above), 62.

101 See the introduction to Hart, trans., Complete Works.