From Heavenly Harmony
The Harmony of Celestial Revelations
by Ken Myers
In 1146, the abbess of a small Cistercian convent in the Rhineland sent a letter to the abbot of a large and influential Cistercian monastery in Ville-sous-la-Ferté in northeastern France. The nun was both comforted and disquieted by a series of visions she had experienced, visions that conveyed to her a deep theological understanding of the Scriptures, which she was laboring to set down in writing. But she did not want to be presumptuous in transmitting this knowledge to others. As she was only an unlearned nun, was her assumption of the role of teacher an expression of unseemly pride?
The poetic disposition of this humble mother superior must have made an impression on the letter's wise and worthy recipient. As her appeal for counsel intensified, she implored him "by the sacred sound through which all creation resounds" and "by the Word from which all the world was created, by the height of the Father who through the sweet power of green vigor sent the Word to the Virgin's womb where it took on flesh like the honey in the honeycomb."
When Bernard of Clairvaux encountered this metaphor for the Incarnation, he could not have anticipated the nickname that his own eloquence would much later confer on him: Doctor Mellifluus, the Honey-Sweet Doctor (his emblems include a pen and bees). Foreshadowing was also present in this letter's invoking of the authority of sacred sound with its creative power and beauty. The letter's writer, Hildegard of Bingen, eventually became a vessel to the Church of spiritually engaging musical works as well as theological insights in which music played a significant role.
Teutonic Prophetess
Bernard soon became her advocate: at the Synod of Trier in the winter of 1147–1148, portions of Hildegard's early work-in-progress entitled Scivias ("Know the Ways") were read aloud to the assembled cardinals and priests by Pope Eugenius III, who, encouraged by Bernard, gave approval for the publication of her writings. In a short time, she was known to her contemporaries as the "Teutonic prophetess."
A Teutonic pope, Benedict XVI, has long been a champion of Hildegard's gifts to the Church. In a 2010 homily, he proclaimed that Hildegard
was distinguished for her spiritual wisdom and the holiness of her life. . . . With the characteristic traits of feminine sensitivity, Hildegard develops at the very heart of her work the theme of the mysterious marriage between God and humanity that is brought about in the Incarnation. On the tree of the Cross take place the nuptials of the Son of God with the Church, his Bride, filled with grace and the ability to give new children to God, in the love of the Holy Spirit.
In 2012, Pope Benedict declared Hildegard a saint, and later that year named her a Doctor of the Church.
Celebrated Music
Thirty years earlier, the name of Hildegard of Bingen was celebrated in musical circles when a landmark recording of some of her remarkable sacred songs was released. The pieces featured on A Feather on the Breath of God were selected by musicologist and conductor Christopher Page from Hildegard's sizable collection of music and poetry, The Symphony of the Harmony of Celestial Revelations. Page's newly founded ensemble Gothic Voices invited soprano Emma Kirkby to add her uniquely crystalline voice to theirs in this collection of meditative chant.
Also in 1982, the group Sequentia released their recording of Ordo Vitutum, a 90-minute morality play composed by Hildegard sometime around 1151, in which the virtues and the devil engage in spiritual battle for the possession of a single female soul. Throughout the 1990s, Anonymous 4, Ensemble Organum, the Oxford Camerata, and other groups added to the catalog of recordings of works by Hildegard, which prepared the way for festive celebrations of her 900th birthday in 1998.
Ken Myers is the host and producer of the Mars Hill Audio Journal. Formerly an arts editor with National Public Radio, he also serves as music director at All Saints Anglican Church in Ivy, Virginia. He is a contributing editor for Touchstone.
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