SOURCE: Zum Brunn, Emilie, and Georgette Epiney-Burgard. “Hadewijch of Antwerp: Introduction.” In Women Mystics in Medieval Europe, translated by Sheila Hughes, pp. 97-139. New York: Paragon House, 1989.

[In the following excerpt, Zum Brunn and Epiney-Burgard relate what is known of Hadewijch's life and survey the spiritual themes of her written works.]

LIFE AND WORKS

After having been acclaimed and quoted in the fourteenth century by John Ruysbroeck and his disciple, John of Leeuwen,¹ Hadewijch's works, of which only four manuscripts remain, were more or less entirely forgotten until they were rediscovered in the nineteenth century by medieval specialists, as well as by the great poet Maeterlinck.² Her writings appeared in a critical edition in 1920, thanks to the arduous labors of J. Van Mierlo.³

In our own times, each year brings in such a harvest of studies, both literary and spiritual, that we can say that Hadewijch is much better known today than during her lifetime.⁴ On the other hand, the exterior facts of her life remain obscure for, unlike Beatrice, she did not find a biographer, doubtlessly because, being a Beguine, she lived outside the monastic milieu. Only one manuscript has preserved her name, together with a geographical indication: “Blessed Hadewijch of Antwerp.”

It is thought that the period of her literary production can be included in the second quarter of the thirteenth century. In the “List of the Perfect” which follows on the “Fourteenth Vision,” she mentions a Beguine who had been condemned to death by Robert le Bougre “on account of her just love.” Now this inquisitor was responsible for persecutions in Flanders from 1235 to 1238.⁵

As regards other biographical details, we can glean them only in her Letters and in certain poems where she appears as “mistress” or spiritual guide to an unorganized group of Beguines whom she addresses with authority. According to certain allusions she makes, she was exposed to opposition coming from both outside and inside her community of Beguines. Threatened with banishment and even imprisonment (if we take her assertions literally), she realizes she must leave her beloved friends: Sara, Emma, and Marguerite, from whom attempts are made to separate her, although she still manages to correspond with them.⁶ At the same time, she has devoted herself to a charitable activity, probably care of the sick, as was the custom of the Beguines of her time.⁷

It has been thought that Hadewijch was of noble lineage, since she used so many courtly expressions in her poems. To what extent was she formed and influenced by a certain cultivated social milieu? It is impossible to give an answer to this question, but there is no doubt that she had an astonishing degree of culture, both profane and theological. She knew Latin and was conversant with the rules of prosody and rhetoric as well as with the art of letter writing. The use of numerous French words is certainly the result of her familiarity with the poetry of the trouvères of Northern France. From the religious point of view, she gives proof of an extensive knowledge of the Scriptures, liturgy, and theology. She cites, without mentioning their names, Richard of St. Victor (“L. [Letter] X” and William of St. Thierry (“L.XVIII”) and also quotes from a Trinitarian hymn attributed to Hildebert of Lavardin (d.1134) (“L.XXII”). In “Vision VIII” she is led by a guide who is a scholastic theologian; he cannot accompany her to the summit of union because he has put intellect before love. This tells us that Hadewijch moves in a spiritual universe very close to that of Beatrice, the Cistercian, although she gives a more important place to intelligence. In fact, to her friends she recommends attention to their intellectual progress as a source of spiritual progress. They must seek information, pose questions and study! All this presumes they lived in a cultured setting, in communities, with priests capable of answering their questions, as she herself says, “In Latin and in Flemish” (“L.XXIV”).

Hadewijch's works, the chronology of which is difficult to establish, is composed of Poems, Visions, and Letters, literary forms very different from one another but all showing the richness and variety of her literary genius.⁸

POEMS

With her poems, Hadewijch may be considered one of the creators of Dutch lyrical poetry. They are divided into two groups: forty-five Poems in Stanzas (Strofische Gedichten) and sixteen Poems in Couplets which are often rhymed letters (Mengeldichten).

In her poems, Hadewijch uses an infinite variety of rhyme schemes. We find this also in courtly poetry, with its traditional forms and its repertory of recognized clichés.⁹ Hadewijch follows the patterns of this courtly poetry and initiates the majority of her poems with a stanza on the seasons, generally the Spring, following the “reverdies” of the trouvères in which they sing of the rebirth of nature, either to identify themselves with her, or else to flee her, so strongly does the poet's suffering clash with the joy of earth's renewal.¹⁰

Her stanzas are divided into three parts, with two or three alternate or enclosed rhymes; the last stanza, the envoi, sums up the whole poem, or stresses the main idea. In this rather conventional framework, Hadewijch is capable of handling lines, which are sometimes long and sometimes short, in order to express the intensity, the emotion and all the existential drama of her relation to herself and to God, a relation that is described, exalted, and repeated with many variations.¹¹

Love (Minne) is sung of from many aspects which reflect the multiple attributes of this denomination. Love (feminine in Dutch, as in German), is presented as a person to whom one can speak: a lady, a queen whose strength and richness are praised and who imposes laws. To this theme of personified love are added images of chivalrous life: adventure (avonture), horse riding, jousting,¹² as well as hunting, when love pursues and at the same time is pursued. There also appear enemies whom courtly poetry calls losengiers, scandalmongers who try to destroy love and who, with Hadewijch, have a deeper meaning, being considered aliens (vremde) who refuse to recognize love and wage battle against those who serve Her.¹³

But as Lady Love is also Divine Love,¹⁴ Hadewijch's experience will evolve within her own human quest, love of Love and the transcendence of a Love who gives Herself wholly but at the same time escapes from the grasp of the lover. At the beginning of her spiritual discovery—as is the experience of all those who seek for God—she is as if inebriated by the gifts which are offered her in such abundance (“S.G. [Strofische Gedichten] XVI”):

In the days of my youth
When Love first fought against me,
She showed me a wealth of advantages:
Her goodness, her wisdom, her force, and her riches;
.....Thus Love deceived me,
Showing me a table laden
With many a dainty dish
By which novice youth is nourished
And finds renewed delight. …

Then arrives the moment when she comes into conflict with her own insufficiency. From consolation, she passes to desolation: her lack (ghebreken) clashes with the hope of fruition (ghebruken) and causes all kinds of suffering and rebellions which had already been a prominent feature of Beatrice's spiritual way. Hadewijch often reaches the point of the “madness, or rage of love” (orewoet) and of those brutal antitheses, signs of man's inherent impotence and insufficiency, stirred up by desire (“S.G.V”):

Sometimes burning and sometimes cold,
Sometimes timid and sometimes bold,
The whims of Love are manifold. …
Sometimes gracious and sometimes cruel,
Sometimes far and sometimes near. …
Sometimes light, sometimes heavy,
Sometimes sombre and sometimes bright. …(15)

One of the features of Hadewijch's quest is the constant “recharging” caused by the novelty of love (nuweheit). There is convergence of several themes: eternal creation coming from the Father, the renewal of life in Christ, the re-creation of man according to Ephesians 4:24, as well as the theme of grace considered as a perpetual rejuvenation. We might say that Hadewijch's nuweheit is not very far removed from Hildegard's viridity. However, it is mingled with a more subjective element: associated with desire, this novelty of love reveals the infinite dimensions of spiritual life; at the same time, there is suffering delving always deeper and an urge to penetrate into a mystery becoming more and more profound.¹⁶

Novelty and freedom are associated with other notions, such as dignity and nobleness, and all these qualities are features of the “fine amour” of the trouvères of Northern France or the hoghe minne (high Love) of the Minnesänger (love singers). Among various definitions, we might mention this one: “fine amour—I am led to understand fine in virtue of a certain alchemical connotation: affined, refined, purified of all which is not of this love, brought back to its quintessence.”¹⁷

The troubadours and trouvères sing of an inaccessible love which demands of the lover an unreserved pledge which governs his moral life,¹⁸ and this corresponds closely to Hadewijch's conception of Minne. However, if we give credit to recent interpretations concerning the troubadours and trouvères, it is not so much the woman loved as the song itself which sustains the poet's love, for the sentiment expressed passes wholly into the poem.¹⁹

In Hadewijch's poetry, metaphors can be interpreted at several levels, as can be seen in “Poem XVI” of the Mengeldichten in which love is successively called Bond, Light, Charcoal, Fire, Dew, Living Source, Hell.²⁰ Her songs express an experience which allows Hadewijch to give enthusiasm and enlightenment to those who wish to follow her along the path of her spiritual “adventure.”²¹ This adventure leads to something beyond the poem, in a transcendence experienced as a loss, darkness, abyss, as expressed in these admirable lines:

Her deepest abyss is her highest form …,

followed by the image of silence as the end of the experience:

Her deepest abyss is her highest song.(22)

THE VISIONS

The Visions²³ would seem to belong to Hadewijch's youth (in one of them she makes mention of her nineteenth year) when she must have been more marked by paranormal phenomena. What here appears most “juvenile” or rather, let us say, less stripped of all else, is the acute awareness that she has of herself and of her vocation, an attitude which gives way to a greater sobriety in the Letters.²⁴ However, the composition of the Visions might be dated much later if we consider, on the one hand, their depth and maturity and, on the other, the numerous similarities which can be found with the Letters.

Of the fourteen texts contained in the collection, only eleven are actually visions and in them the visual element is relatively slight and not very original: the lamb, the eagle, New Jerusalem, all of which symbols are borrowed from the Apocalypse. In “Vision I” there is the allegorical theme of the gardener and his trees. One of these trees is upside down and constitutes a symbol of the knowledge of God.

Hadewijch is often led by an angel (“Vis.I,” “IV,” “V,” “VI”) or by the guide already mentioned.

As with Beatrice, each of the visions is linked to a liturgical event: Easter, Pentecost, or one of Our Lady's feasts.

Hadewijch describes three stages in her visions. First of all there is the affective turmoil before ecstasy; she feels as if a force were drawing her towards her inner being, just before she is snatched away. On one occasion she says: “During the Epistle, my senses were attracted towards my inner soul; an awe-inspiring spirit, like a strong tempest, made me retreat from the exterior to within myself. And from this inward self I was carried upwards in spirit” (“Vis.IV”). And again: “I drew close to God (in the Eucharist). He enveloped me from within, in my powers, and took me away in spirit” (“Vis.III”).

This stage of introversion is followed by the vision itself and its message, which is the essential part. Then the visionary is raised up “beyond her spirit” (that is, into ecstasy), “far from myself and from everything I had seen of Him, beyond all concepts, all knowledge, all intelligence, apart from that of being united to Him and of having fruition of Him” (“Vis.VI”). Then she returns to herself, once again delivered to normal life.

The visions deal with three themes. Like Beatrice, Hadewijch is invited to become aware of God's action in the world. Always with an implicit reference to Eph. 3:18, our mystic enters the dimensions of divine love. God's countenance is surrounded by three pairs of wings: “The higher wings fly in the height where God enjoys the highest power of love, the two middlemost ones fly in the vastness of Love's perfection while the two lowest ones fly in the fathomless deep, there where He engulfs all beings” (“Vis.XIII”). Divine love is here described as the principle of ad extra works, of the perfection of virtues, while the dimension of depth englobes essential union.

In the depths of the abyss, she sees all beings in their truth: “I saw an infant being born within those souls who love in secret, those souls hidden from their own eyes in the profound abyss of which I speak, to whom nothing is wanting, but that they should lose themselves in You” (“Vis.XI”). Here we have the theme of the “birth of God within souls” which, for Hadewijch, is more often than not associated with Mary's maternity and her own spiritual maternity. The nuptial union (“your blessed soul,” God says to her, “is the bride in the City”) is fecundity. The soul is “spouse and mother” (“Vis.X”).

The different stages of union are described in “Vision VII”: Christ gives Himself to Hadewijch under the Eucharistic species, then He comes to her as a person, with His heart and His humanity, and she feels Him in all her body. Then this beautiful form fades away and she cannot perceive it outside of herself. As He has become entirely and inwardly hers, she is now assimilated to Christ: “It is as if we were one, without any difference.”

Even if the depth of the Divine Essence appears to her to be an abyss in ebullition, God nevertheless remains for her Being and Love. She unites the definitions of Exodus 3:14 and 1 John 4:8, in a striking formula: “You shall have fruition of Me as the Love that I am”. (“Vis.III”). Ecstasy is merely a passing moment, whereas in daily life she will be marked by the humanity-divinity of Christ. In suffering and in toil, she will feel the most intimate presence of Christ Who refused consolations. As she is a human being, she must live as a human being and, in the perfection of virtues, “one becomes God and remains so for all eternity” (“Vis.I”).

It is in the very midst of life upon this earth, in exile and misery (the two meanings of the word ellende) that one can possess Love in fruition, expressed by the beautiful metaphor which concludes the “First Vision.” After describing the upside-down tree with all its branches, Hadewijch reaches the quintessence of the message. Christ says to her: “If you want to do [what I have told you], take away with you the leaves of this tree, for they symbolize knowledge of My will. And if you are saddened, pick a rose from the top of the tree and pluck one of its petals: that symbolizes Love. And if you can no longer bear things, take the heart of the rose: then you will feel My presence. Continuously you will know My will, you will feel My love and, in your distress, you will enjoy fruition.”

THE LETTERS

Of Hadewijch's thirty-one Letters,²⁵ some are personal missives addressed to those she directs and whom she calls affectionately “dear child, sweet child,” while others are little treatises on spiritual life as, for example, “Letter XV” on the nine Pilgrimage Rules or “Letter XX” on the “Twelve Nameless Hours.” It is in her Letters that Hadewijch puts to best use all her linguistic resources and her wealth of spiritual theology.

Whence comes the soul and whither is she going? The whole of life evolves between these two questions. According to the exemplarist doctrine which Hadewijch shares with Beatrice, the soul has been in God from all eternity and in this consists all her nobleness and freedom, her very wealth. The task of man is to find once again that fundamental being that he has in God, the presence which he feels (even if only in an obscure manner) in the depths of his soul: “If you wish to possess finally all that is yours, give yourself entirely to God and become what He is” (“L.II,” ll.163-165). It is necessary to let oneself be “re-created” by God (“L.XI,” l.15). “If you wish to attain your being in which God created you, in all nobleness, you must not refuse any difficulty; with all hardiness and pride you must neglect nothing, but valiantly seize the best part, I mean the Totality of God, as your own wealth.” (“L.VI,” ll.191-196).

The soul is summoned by an inner commandment (manen) to find again this original dignity in accordance with the model of Christ: “And so it is that He has raised us up and drawn us by His divine power and His human justice towards our original dignity, rendering us the freedom in which we were first created and loved by God, thus confirming His call and establishing our election in which he had foreseen us from all eternity (cf. Gal. 5:13, Eph. 1:4-5) (“L.VI,” ll.338-343).

Man's response to what is authentically predestination, or eternal vocation (Eph. 1:5) is manifested in him by “unspeakable desires” which thrust the soul into the infinite space of divine life. There is no doubt that it is in her Poems that Hadewijch has best evoked the agony of this desire which clashes with human finiteness,²⁶ while what she longs for is nothing less than the Totality of God, the plenitude of Love which demands in return the totality of the person.

If spiritual experience is first of all marked by a kind of illumination, love needs time to attain its perfection. The word “growth” (wassen, volwassen) appears on many occasions in Hadewijch's writings. In them we can trace a gradual development, a real pedagogy of time. This spiritual growth is continuous and, using a very feminine metaphor, she says that, if it was interrupted, it would be like “stopping the labour of a woman in confinement” (“L.XXI”). In one of her poems has she not compared spiritual life to the nine months' gestation, in this case referring to the growth of Jesus in Mary's womb? (“MD [Mengeldichten] XIV”)

The path of this growth is through suffering: “Unless you suffer, you do not grow” (“L.II”) “All misery, all exile that one bears willingly for the love of God is agreeable to Him and draws us close to the totality of His nature” (“L.II”).²⁷

Inward suffering, outward suffering provoked by the incomprehension of “aliens,” must not hinder the practice of the virtues. Ceaselessly Hadewijch insists upon the necessity of devoting oneself to works of mercy towards one's fellow men, of living in harmony with the rest of one's community.²⁸ But as all virtuous acts are not necessarily the expression of a pure love, she lays down a few rules about discernment of spirit and clearly unmasks the counterfeits of virtue. By reason of the exceptional psychological insight she shows here, she well deserves to be called “mistress.” To give an example: she tells us that a zeal to devote oneself to others may be untimely and may upset everybody (“L.V”). In human relationships one must not expect from others what they cannot give: fidelity, for example (“L.VI”). In all cases we must avoid fear, anger, and preferences. Knowledge of oneself must not give rise to a false sense of shame, but rather to sincere recognition and acceptance of one's weaknesses (“L.XXIV”) and this is Hadewijch's personal goal (“L.XV”). Moreover, the search for spiritual sweetness, for graces that can be felt, also takes us farther from our final aim (“L.X”). Prayer for others, especially for sinners, must be detached! Its efficacy will be in relation to the love one has for God (“L.VI”).

In this search for detachment, reason plays an important role, at several levels of conscience. First of all it must keep our discernment in a state of wakefulness and give us knowledge of the virtues.²⁹ Then it intervenes to stir up the soul's ardor when it is in a state of abandonment. With Hadewijch, reason is tied to metaphors of light:³⁰ it is reason enlightened by love that “lights up all the paths along which we follow the cherished will of Love” (“L.XII”). It is illuminated reason that enables contemplative life to perceive in some obscure manner how admirable God is and how “He is all things to all, and wholly in all” (Cf. 1 Cor. 15:28), and to glimpse at His mystery which is fascinating and terrifying at the same time. (“L.XXII”). In “Letter XVIII,” she takes textually a piece from William of St. Thierry's treatise Of the Nature and the Dignity of Love³¹ which deals with the “two eyes of love,” integrating this text perfectly with her own thought. Love and reason go hand in hand: the latter teaches the former which, in turn, enlightens reason. But reason can touch God only in what He is not (that is, reason sees by means of images, arguments, and symbols, all of which can express His Being only in an imperfect manner). Love, on the other hand, touches the very Being of God, insofar as it abandons itself to Him, plunging into the abyss hidden from each creature, where fruition is reached. By adding this word “abyss,” Hadewijch extends William's reflection in a sense that will be developed by later Rheno-Flemish mystics.

The rest of this letter, although concerned more specifically with Love, nevertheless contains a sapiential knowledge in which vision plays the chief part. This is perhaps a continuation of her meditation on the two eyes of Love. In fact, her advice is to fix one's gaze on the Beloved and to read His judgments on His face, and this presumes an activity that is as much intellectual as affective.

This vision of the Divine Countenance, a mystery which is at the same time overwhelming and fearful, revealing as well as concealing, leads to a penetration of God's depths, there where all reason must be abandoned, for at this stage it remains powerless (“L.XII,” “L.XX”).

“The eighth nameless hour is when the nature of Love makes itself known, in the most marvellous manner, in Her countenance. Faces are what generally reveal most but, in the case of Love, it is the face that remains most secret, for this is Love Herself in Herself (“L.XX,” ll.81-85).”³²

It seems that, as one gradually progresses in the reading of the Letters, one becomes aware that Hadewijch delves more and more deeply into mystery. Before “becoming God with God,” she has still to experience despair (wanhope), a paradoxical unfaith (ontrouwe) lanced like a sort of challenge: “This unfaith is above a too easy faith, or a trust which rests on its laurels before reaching pure knowledge and is satisfied by the present moment. … This high challenge is such that it constantly nourishes the fear either of not loving enough or of not being loved” (“L.VIII,” l.33ff.).

HER SPIRITUAL DOCTRINE

So that the soul should find her being in God, Hadewijch tells us to love Him with the love with which He loves Himself, in order to become one single being with Love, “one single spirit” (1 Cor. 6:17), that is, “To become God with God”.³³ Hadewijch's concept of this union is the same as William of St. Thierry's, that is, total adhesion to God's will: “When the soul has nothing else but God, when she has no other will than that of God alone, and when she is brought to nought and wills all that God wills with His will, when she is engulfed in Him and reduced to nothing—then He [here Christ] is raised above the earth and draws all things to Him and the soul thus becomes with Him all that He Himself is” (“L.XIX,” ll.52-61).³⁴

Union does not make the person disappear but, through divine action, instead of being dissimilar, God and the soul are equal in oneness (“L.XXII,” l.73). It is from God Himself that we receive our being, absorbed, but not destroyed, by divine light, as Hadewijch explains with a beautiful image: the soul can be compared to the moon which, receiving all its light from the sun, disappears from the sky at sunrise (“L.XIX,” ll.64-74; cf. 2 Cor. 3:18).

The preparation for union involves a stripping of everything else. Hadewijch rarely uses the words naked (bloet) and intact (ongherijnleect) which, with Hadewijch II, are signs of a refusal of forms and images, but she employs much more often the word gheheel: whole, integral, referring rather to a reintegration of the powers—“the searching mind, the thirsting heart, the loving soul”—in the abyss of Love (“L.XX”) through the elimination of everything that is not Love. In spite of this negative ascetic phase, Hadewijch's mysticism seems to us to be more a mysticism of plenitude than of void: “I have integrated all that was divided within me” (“L.XXVIII,” l.252). It consists of a widening of the soul to the dimensions of God.³⁵ In “Letter XXII,” she refers to a hymn attributed to Hildebert of Lavardin³⁶ who sings of the paradoxes of divine nature: “God is above everything without being raised up; below everything without being lowered, in everything without being circumscribed, outside everything and yet wholly comprised.” That is where proud souls are invited to enter and Hadewijch is only too anxious to accept. It is from a Trinitarian point of view that she comments on the plea contained in the Lord's prayer: that His kingdom may come (within us). We ask the Father to let us participate in His “power and rich essence,” to make us love the Son with the Father and be the Son Himself with the Spirit. (“L.XXII,” l.47ff.).

Taking up again the Augustinian ternary of memory, intelligence, and will, Hadewijch applies it in a dynamic manner to the relationship between the One and Trine God and the human soul. We must love each of the Persons with the faculty which corresponds to the other Persons: the Son with the memory (attributed to the Father); the Father with enlightened reason (that is, the Son); the Holy Spirit with the “high inflamed will,” which refers to the love uniting Father and Son.

Hadewijch's life reflects this fundamental experience of participation in the intra-Trinitarian mysteries. With their apparent paradoxes, “Letters XVII” and “XVIII” show, at the same time, the consequences of union with the Trinity and the necessity of an overpassing into Unity. With the Father and His all-powerful work, the merciful Son and the Holy Spirit—the source of virtues—one must remain in the service of Love in all circumstances of life. But on the other hand, just as the Father, considered as the Origin and Essence of the Persons in Unity, so the soul must refrain from all action other than repose—or fruition—in Love.³⁷ Although at the end of “Letter XVII” Hadewijch seems to dissociate repose and activity, we notice that in the opening couplets of the same letter she shows that these two phases must be simultaneous; to act, but with detachment; to repose in God without ceasing to be active, to the image of a God Who is “manifold in His unity and onefold in His multiplicity” (“L.XXVIII,” l.82).

It is in this sense that we can speak of an overpassing of the virtues. As does Marguerite Porete later on, Hadewijch talks of “abandoning the virtues,” because Love overpasses these virtues and activities and nourishes them, She Herself receiving no other sustenance than Her own plenitude. In “Vision I” we pass from the multiplicity of virtues (represented by the lowest of the three highest branches of the tree of wisdom) to the unique and total virtue (represented by the very highest branch): “The third branch means being constant and thus wholly united to Love, beyond the multiplicity of virtues in the unique and total virtue that engulfs the two lovers together and casts them into the abyss where they will seek and find eternal fruition” (ll.170-175).

Union with the Trinitarian Persons in active and contemplative life leads to fruition in Unity. While developing the same spirituality as the previous ones, “Letters XXVIII,” “XXIX,” and “XXX” are more strongly marked by abstraction. In “Letter XXVIII,”³⁸ having announced the divine names: Presence in the Son, Overflow in the Holy Spirit, Totality in the Father, and having stated the attributes of each Person (power, wisdom, goodness, etc.), Hadewijch describes the ultimate experience of her union with God. Beyond what she has felt with her spiritual senses—sight, hearing and taste—she is now swept above all intellectual or affective perception. In excess (verweentheit), she is led to repose and silence “in accordance with the nobleness of my overpassing into Unity.” And so, when one is gathered inwardly, away from multiplicity of gifts, one becomes “all that That is and it is then that Unity has what it demanded.” The One, Being, and Love are here wedded in the unification of the soul. In this secret place, the soul finds her true freedom,³⁹ having overpassed inner conflicts and dominated the whole universe, as a king rules his kingdom.

Let us notice how admirably Hadewijch's language expresses this superabundance of spiritual experience, through the alternating use of negation and hyperbole: “without God because of an excess of God, unstable because of an excess of stability, ignorant because of an excess of knowledge” (“L.XXVIII,” ll.227-230). Words can do no more than show the abyss between the experience of spiritual plentitude and the manner of expressing it. That is why such words must not be uttered or, at the most, communicated only to those who are capable of receiving them.

Although she has experienced the highest stages of union with God, Hadewijch admits she does not possess this union in a lasting manner. As in the case of Mechthild, her most precious treasure is “the suffering of being deprived of fruition” which is far dearer to her than “the blessedness of being lost in the fruition of Love” (“L.XXIX,” ll.80-82). As long as she does not possess in her very being the fruition of Love which belongs to her in her eternal being, she will remain a “human creature who must suffer in loving with Christ, until death” (“L.XXIX,” ll.89-90).

This state between eternity and time, so admirably evoked by Beatrice in her Seventh Manner, is compared to Hell in Hadewijch's “Poem XVI” (MDXVI, ll.160-164):

To see oneself devoured, engulfed
In Love's abyssal essence,
Ceaselessly to founder in ardour or in coldness
In the profound and lofty darkness of Love:
This indeed surpasses the torments of Hell.

Notes

1. Jan van Leeuwen, VII tekene der sonne (The Seven Signs of the Zodiac) cited by J. Van Mierlo, De Visioenen van Hadewijch, II (Leuven: 1925), p. 137: “Thus also speaks a saintly and glorious woman of the name of Hadewijch, a true ‘mistress’ [of spirituality]. For the books of Hadewijch are certainly good and just, born of God and revealed by Him. … But Hadewijch's teachings are not equally profitable to all, for there are many who cannot understand them: those whose inner eyes are too dimmed, not yet opened by the love that adheres to God in the nakedness and silence of fruition.”

2. In the Revue Encyclopédique of Paris, July 1897, Maeterlinck wrote an article on Flemish mysticism, ten years after publishing his translation of Ruysbroeck's Spiritual Espousals. Referring to Hadewijch, he wrote: “Among the mystical spirits of that age, she is one of the most curious and the most powerful.” Cited by R. Pouillart, “Maurice Maeterlinck and Flemish Mysticism. Complementary Notes,” Dr. L. Reypens-Album, Studien en Tekstuitgaven van Ons Geestelijk Erf, 16 (Antwerp: 1964) pp. 281-302.

3. There are three manuscripts in Middle Dutch of the 14th century: Brussels, Bibl. roy. cod. 2879-80; cod. 2877-78; Ghent, Bibl. univ. cod. 941 (the earliest one). These three manuscripts contain Hadewijch's four works. An early 16th century manuscript (Ruysbroeck-Genootschap, Antwerp, cod. 385) contains almost all the poems, but not the letters. Critical editions: J. Van Mierlo (ed.), Visioenen I (text); II (Introduction), (Leuven: 1924-25), (cited Visioenen); Strofische Gedichten I (text); II (Introduction), (Leuven: 1924) (cited SG); Brieven I (text); II (Introduction) 1947, (cited L.); Mengeldichten, (Leuven: 1952), (cited MD).

4. Complete bibliography: F. Willaert, in G. Jaron Lewis Bibliographie zur deutschen mittelalterlichen Frauenmystik (Bibl. zur deutschen Literatur des Mittelalters 9, Berlin: 1984).

5. The List of the Perfect, edited after Vision XIV. It contains the names of 85 persons, some dead, some still living “clothed as love,” among whom “a Beguine whom Maître Robert killed, on account of her just love, the 29th” (Visioenen, p. 125). On this woman, cf. H. Grundmann, Religiöse Bewegungen im Mittelalter. … Historische Studien 267, (Berlin: 1935) p. 189. Hadewijch also cites: “Hildegard who saw all her visions, the 28th” (p. 189), “A recluse called Marie, the 22nd, who before was a nun … and Madame de Nazareth knew her well” (p. 188). Perhaps this is a reference to Beatrice of Nazareth.

   The List of the Perfect is interesting not so much for the historical information that can be gleaned from it as for the fact that it traces a network of the “friends of God” in the 13th century, a network which is not confined to the Netherlands, but spreads to Cologne, Thuringen, Bohemia, Paris, Jerusalem, and England.

   As to the difficulty in giving precise dates for Hadewijch, cf. J. Reynaert, “Over Hadewijch naar anleiding van 3 recente publikaties,” Ons Geestelijk Erf 54, pp. 280-292.

6. In Letter I, she expresses herself with authority: “I exhort you, I command you, I order you” (19-21). Cf. L.XV, l.52ff.; L.XXIX, l.8ff. On the separation from her friends: “Others would willingly attract you to them in order to separate us: it is our fidelity that they cannot bear” (L.XXIII, ll.23-25). Cf. L.XXV, L.XXIX. At times it would seem that these trials were imposed not by some authority, but by a “competitive” group: “Above all, I order you, beware of the eccentricities which are very numerous there” (L.XXIII, ll.12-16). This is obviously a warning.

7. On assistance to one's neighbor, to the sick: L.II, L.XVI, L.XXIV. On her own ascesis: “I have had little to do with men's customs, as regards eating, drinking or sleep; I have not concerned myself with clothes, colors or outward splendor.” (L.XXIX, ll.28-33). Let us note that, if Hadewijch speaks much of the suffering of being separated from Love, the “suffering body” is hardly ever mentioned. Hadewijch seems to differ from Beatrice and the contemporary Beguines by the moderation of her ascesis, which is shown as wholly inward.

8. Cf. Bibliography, Hadewijch, the Complete Works, Translation and Introduction by C. Hart, OSB. Preface by P. Mommaers. (New York: 1980; London: 1981).

9. P. Zumthor, Essai de poétique médiévale, Paris: 1972. R. Dragonetti, La technique poétique des trouvères dans la chanson courtoise. Contribution à l'étude de la rhétorique médiévale. (Bruges: 1960).

10. “Although the winter is still cold / the days short and the nights long, proud summer is hastening on, to free us of our sadness, / behold the new season / the hazelnut trees are in bloom, / no sign is more faithful. …” (SGI)

11. On the poetic art of Hadewijch and its links with contemporary courtly poetry: N. De Paepe, Hadewijch. Strofische Gedichten, Een studie van de minne inhet kader der 12e en 13e-eeuwse mystiek en profane minnelyriek, (Ghent: 1967); F. Willaert, De pöetica van Hadewijch in de “Strofische Gedichten.” (Utrecht: 1984.)

12. “My shield has received so many blows / that there is no room for another stab.” (SG III, st. 3)

13. “The cruel aliens / afflict me without limit / in this weary exile / by their false counsels; they are pitiless towards me / and have often frightened me: / they condemn me in their blindness, and never will be able / to understand the love / the desire of which holds me captive” (SG XXIV, st. 8).

14. Cf. SG XXIX. Cf. William of St. Thierry: “… You her guest, O God, Who are Yourself her love in her, let her love You through You, O You her love, love Yourself through her and do all through and in her.” Exposé sur le cantique, ed. J. Dechanet, SC 82, par. 131, pp. 278-279. This corresponds with the last verse of MD XV:

    “Ah, sweet Love, were I but love, and could love you, Love, with love itself!
    Ah! Sweet Love, grant me for Love's sake
    That love may fully know love!”

15. Cf. MD XVI, verse 3 (live ember); verse 4 (fire).

16. Cf. SG I, last stanza; SG VII, supra, p. 115. L. XXX: In the intra-Trinitarian relationships, the flux in the Persons and the reflux in Unity are a constant renewal: “This demand which is eternally new, eternally one in possession and in being” (ll.54-56).

    This insistence on novelty caused Hadewijch to be accused of belonging to the sect of the New Spirit (De novo spiritu). B. Spaaken refutes this accusation: “Hebben onze 13de-eeuwse mystieken iets gemeen met de broeders en zusters van de vrije geest?” Ons Geestelijk Erf 40, 1966, pp. 369-391; “The Movement of the ‘Brethren of the Free Spirit’ and the Flemish Mystics,” Revue d'ascétique et de mystique, t. 42, 1966, pp. 423-437. On the patristic and medieval sources of the novitas, cf. J. Reynaert, Beeldspraak, pp. 392-401.

17. P. Zumthor, Poétique médiévale, p. 206.

18. H. I. Marrou, Les Troubadours, (Paris: 1971), pp. 161-163.

19. R. Guiette, D'une poésie formelle en France au Moyen-Age (Paris: 1972), p. 69: “The aim of formal poetry is not to express something (a subject), but to reveal a form in its development.”

20. For a study of these symbols and their sources, cf. J. Reynaert, Beeldspraak, ch. I to ch. VIII, particularly pp. 175-186.

21. F. Willaert, Poëtica, pp. 388-391.

22. MD XIII. These were the lines that aroused Maeterlinck's enthusiasm.

23. On the interpretation of the visions: B. Spaapen, “Hadewijch en Het vijfde Visioen” (“Hadewijch and the Fifth Vision”), Ons Geestelijk Erf 44, 1970, pp. 1-44, 113-141, 353-404; 45, 1971, pp. 129-178; 46, 1972, pp. 113-199. These important articles are a study of the whole of Hadewijch's spirituality. H. Vekeman, “‘Angelus sane nuntius,’ een interpretatie van het visionnenboek van Hadewijch” (“An Interpretation of the Book of Hadewijch's Visions”), Ons Geestelijk Erf 50, 1976, pp. 225-259. P. Dinzelbacher, “Hadewijchs mystische Erfahrungen in neuer Interpretation,” Ons Geestelijk Erf 54, 1980, pp. 267-279. F. Willaert, “Hadewijch und ihr Kreis in den ‘Visionen,’” Abendländische Mystik im Mittelalter, ed. K. Ruh (Stuttgart: 1986), pp. 368-387, insists on the didactic and exemplary character of the visions, teaching for those whom Hadewijch directed.

24. F. Willaert, Hadewijch und ihr Kreis, stresses the fact that Hadewijch's exaltation is closely connected to her apostolic mission.

25. Translations of the Letters, cf. Bibliography. Special mention of C. Hart, Hadewijch, the Complete Works, pp. 43-121.

26. In the Letters, particularly, Hadewijch adds to this theme that of a debt (scout) which cannot be paid to God (doubtlessly a ref. to Rom. 8:12). L.IV, l.55: “Hope leads them to rely on the things they will never attain, for they are too lazy and do not pay their debt to God, nor towards love to whom we owe our pains till death.” This debt is a debt to the Divine Unity and the Son has been acquitted of it (L.VI, ll.109-114; L.XXX, l.64ff.).

27. A. M. Haas, “Trage Leiden geduldiglich, Die Einstellung der deutschen Mystik zum Leiden,” in Lerne leiden, Leidensbewaltigung in der Mystik, (Karlsruhe: 1985).

28. The community “helps to love Love”: “As you are one of those [in the community] who at present can favor or retard this progress towards the common good, I advise you to be attentive and to devote yourself in all things to the kingdom of just love.” (L.XII, ll.145-150). We give to the expression int ghemeyne vorderen the sense Beatrice gave it (Cf. supra, n. 32), the same sense it will have with Ruysbroeck.

29. Cf. MD XVI, ll.181-182:

    Light teaches us the customs of love,
    And reveals her will in all its forms.

30. J. Reynaert, Beeldspraak, pp. 82-88.

31. William of St. Thierry, De la nature et de la dignité de l'amour, ed. M. M. Davy, paras. 25-26, pp. 100-102. J. van Mierlo; “Hadewijch en Willem van St-Thierry,” Ons Geestelijk Erf 3, 1929, pp. 45-59; P. Verdeyen, “De invloed van Willem van St-Thierry op Hadewijch en Ruusbroec,” Ons Geestelijk Erf 51, 1977, pp. 3-19. L.XX, ll.81-85.

32. J. Reynaert, Beeldspraak, pp. 191-198, on the various meanings of the word anschijn and their sources.

33. This expression is often used by Hadewijch who, however, shows that it is impossible to reach this state unless we first suffer with Christ. “We all wish to be God with God, but there are few of us who wish to be men with His Humanity (L. VI, l.230ff.). On the success of this expression in Rhenish mysticism, E. Zum Brunn and A. de Libera, Maître Eckhart. Métaphysique du Verbe et Théologie négative, Bibliothèque des Archives de philosophie, 42 (Paris: 1984), pp. 31-70.

34. William of St. Thierry, Letter to the Brethren of Mont-Dieu, ed. J. Dechanet (SC 223) par. 258, pp. 348-350: “To wish what God wishes is already to resemble God; to be incapable of wishing other than what God wishes is already to be what He is: for Him, in fact, to be and to wish are the same thing.”

35. In Hadewijch, among others, MD XVI, ll.90-91: “Who never received the intimate touch of this fire finds nothing too wide or too narrow.”

36. This hymn is the “Alpha et O, magne Deus,” PL 171, 1411, of which Abélard's authorship has been refuted. For this source and others, cf. F. Willaert, “Hadewijch en Maria-Magdalena” (in press).

37. The definition of the Father as Origin goes back to the Councils of Tolède (638 and 675). It was taken up again by William of St. Thierry; P. Verdeyen, “The Mystic Theology of William of St. Thierry,” Ons Geestelijk Erf 52, 1978, pp. 160-161.

38. The authenticity of this letter has been questioned. F. Willaert, “Is Hadewijch de auteur van de XXVIIIe brief?” Ons Geestelijk Erf 54, 1980, pp. 26-36, concludes in favor of its authenticity. For its interpretation, cf. H. W. J. Vekeman, “Hadewijch, een interpretatie van de Br.I,II,XXVIII,XXIX als documenten over de strijd rond de wezenmystiek,” Tijdsschrift voor Ndl. Taal- en Letterkunde 90, 1974, pp. 336-366.

39. “The soul is a free way for the passage of God from His profound depths; again, God is a way for the passage of the soul into her freedom, that is to say, into the abyss (grond) of the Divine Being which can be touched only by the abyss (diepheit) of the soul” (L.XVIII).