The World Of Hildegard Of Bingen

German scholar Heinrich Schipperges outlines the life of the 12th century abbess Hildegard of Bingen, considering her mind and thought from the basis of her understanding of wholeness. He sees her in the context of the political and ecclesiastical events of her time and expounds on her relevance for modern people today.

Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) would have been an extraordinary person in any age. But for a woman of the twelfth century her achievements were so exceptional that posterity has found it hard to take her measure. Barbara Newman, a premier Hildegard authority, brings major scholars together to present an accurate portrait of the Benedictine nun and her many contributions to twelfth-century religious, cultural, and intellectual life. Written by specialists in fields ranging from medieval theology to medicine to music, these essays offer an understanding of how one woman could transform so many of the traditions of the world in which she lived. Hildegard of Bingen was the only woman of her age accepted as an authoritative voice on Christian doctrine as well as the first woman permitted by the pope to write theological books. She was the author of the first known morality play; an artist of unusual talents; the most prolific chant composer of her era; and the first woman to write extensively on natural science and medicine, including sexuality as seen from a female perspective. She was the only woman of her time to preach openly to mixed audiences of clergy and laity, and the first saint whose biography includes a first-person memoir. Adding to the significance of this volume is the fact that Hildegard's oeuvre reflects the entire sweep of twelfth-century culture and society. Scholars and lay readers alike will find this collection a rich introduction to a remarkable figure and to her tumultuous world. With the commemoration of the 900th anniversary of Hildegard's birth in September 1998, the publication of Voice of the Living Light is especially welcome.

Hildegard could see wonderful things inside her head: flowers and flames, and towers and stars, and the whole universe. She trembled with the brilliance of her visions and the pain of holding them inside. But she lived in a time when women were expected only to obey--not to have visions or speak about them. Yet she did speak, and through her courage became one of the greatest mystics and composers of the medieval age. This exquisite book from the creators of Diego honours the story of a woman whose secret world still entrances readers.

Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) was one of the most remarkable and influential women of her time. Blessed with an astonishing array of talents, she was at once a mystic, theologian, scientist, doctor, nutritionist, composer, writer, linguist, and artist. Born to a noble family in Mainz, Germany, Hildegard entered a Benedictine monastery and went on to become abbess of a thriving community near Bingen. From a young age she received extraordinary 'lights' or visions of Heaven, which she described in a book called Know the Ways (of God). Hildegard's collection of imaginative music and poetry includes seventy-seven songs for the liturgical year and a morality play, making her the most prolific composer of early music in Europe. Her pioneering scientific work formed the basis for the study of natural history in Germany, while her holistic medical studies helped to provide cures for numerous diseases. Hildegard was also the author of a cookbook recommending nutritional 'foods of joy' and she even invented a new language! Such was Hildegard's fame and influence that bishops, popes, and kings, as well as humble peasants, sought out her wise counsel. Today, Hildegard of Bingen is recognized as a saint and doctor by the Catholic Church and is also revered by many Lutherans and other Protestants. Find out more about her life in this beautifully illustrated book by award-winning author, Demi.

Green Mass is a meditation on—and with—twelfth-century Christian mystic and polymath Saint Hildegard of Bingen. Attending to Hildegard's vegetal vision, which greens theological tradition and imbues plant life with spirit, philosopher Michael Marder uncovers a verdant mode of thinking. The book stages a fresh encounter between present-day and premodern concerns, ecology and theology, philosophy and mysticism, the material and the spiritual, in word and sound. Hildegard's lush notion of viriditas, the vegetal power of creation, is emblematic of her deeply entwined understanding of physical reality and spiritual elevation. From blossoming flora to burning desert, Marder plays with the symphonic multiplicity of meanings in her thought, listening to the resonances between the ardency of holy fire and the aridity of a world aflame. Across Hildegard's cosmos, we hear the anarchic proliferation of her ecological theology, in which both God and greening are circular, without beginning or end. Introduced with a foreword by philosopher Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback and accompanied by cellist Peter Schuback's musical movements, which echo both Hildegard's own compositions and key themes in each chapter of the book, this multifaceted work creates a resonance chamber, in which to discover the living world anew. The original compositions accompanying each chapter are available free for streaming and for download at www.sup.org/greenmass

Drawing on contemporary sources, the text unfolds Hildegard's life from the time of her entrance into an anchoress's cell--where a woman would remain in pious isolation--to her death as a famed visionary and writer, abbess and confidante of popes and kings, more than seventy years later. Against this background the author explores Hildegard's vast creative work, encompassing theology, medicine, natural history, poetry, and music.

Completed in 1173, The Book of Divine Works (Liber Divinorum Operum) is the culmination of the Visionary’s Doctor’s theological project, offered here for the first time in a complete and scholarly English translation. The first part explores the intricate physical and spiritual relationships between the cosmos and the human person, with the famous image of the universal Man standing astride the cosmic spheres. The second part examines the rewards for virtue and the punishments for vice, mapped onto a geography of purgatory, hellmouth, and the road to the heavenly city. At the end of each Hildegard writes extensive commentaries on the Prologue to John’s Gospel (Part 1) and the first chapter of Genesis (Part 2)—the only premodern woman to have done so. Finally, the third part tells the history of salvation, imagined as the City of God standing next to the mountain of God’s foreknowledge, with Divine Love reigning over all.

Hildegard of Bingen, a Rhineland mystic of the twelfth century, has been called an ideal model of the liberated woman. She was a poet and scientist, painter and musician, healer and abbess, playwright, prophet, preacher and social critic. The Book of Divine Works was written between 1170 and 1173, and this is its first appearance in English. The third volume of a trilogy which includes Scivias, published by Bear & Company in 1985, this visionary work is a signal resounding throughout the planet that a time of healing and balance is at hand. The Book of Divine Works is a cosmology which reunites religion, science, and art, and readers will discover an astonishing symbiosis with contemporary physics in these 800-year-old visions. The present volume also contains 51 letters written by Hildegard to significant political and religious figures of her day and translations of twelve of her songs.