Dragges

When Margery Kempe (c.1373 - c.1438) dictated the story of her mystic experiences, she had no idea that someone would append a recipe to the end of it. The recipe was illegible when the manuscript was found in 1934 until multispectral-imaging technology was used to make the words clear. The reason for adding this recipe to this manuscript has caused some furrowed brows, and there are two theories. Here is a translation:

For Phlegm take –

Sugar candy, sugar plate*, sugar with

Aniseed, fennel seed, nutmeg, cinnamon,

Ginger [...] and licorice. Beat them

together in a mortar and make them in all

manner of food and drinks and dry first and last eat it.

The "For Phlegm" seems clear: this is a recipe for dragges, a sweet mixture intended to be medicinal. At one point in her life, Margery came down with the "flux"; this was probably dysentery. She was so ill that a priest was summoned to give her Last Rites because she feared she was near death. Dragges was intended to be a cure for many ills. A well-meaning scribe may have decided to add this recipe to help people avoid her illness in the future.

There is another credible theory, however, put forth in 2018 by Laura Kalas.

Dr. Kalas' argument is that the reason for the existence of this particular confection becomes clear when you look at the references to "sweetness" in her writing (and the writings of other mystics). Besides her conversations with God, she describes the sensations she experiences during her mystic episodes, which include sensations of sweetness. She asks God how she might make her love of God as swet to þe as me thynkyth þat thy loue is vn-to me ("as sweet to you as I think your love is to me"). She describes her experience with God as "sweet dalliance."

As a recipe for digestive dragges, or dragées, it is rich with sugar and spice, suggesting a wealthy site of monastic holiness and health. It thus offers a lens through which to explore the sweetness of confection and divine love in the Book. The hot spices, used to correct a cold and moist physiological constitution, are at the same time a means of stoking the hot fire of love that is played out in the Book. But the recipe imbues more than metaphorical signification. In the Middle Ages, the moral properties of food were imbricated with its ingestion. In consuming a foodstuff, one would take on some of its associated properties (the Eucharistic wafer as an obvious example). [Link to her article]

So...recipe for flux/phlegm, or reminder of the sweetness connected to spiritual revelation? In a nod to social media memes, "why not both?"

Now I'm thinking of sweet things, and since we are on the leading edge of the holiday season (some would say we are fully embroiled in it), let's look at some sweet medieval recipes for holiday entertaining...next time.

*"sugar plate" was a moldable form of sugar paste. I found an Elizabethan recipe here.

Margery's Travels

Once Margery Kempe decided to dedicate her life fully to religious devotion, she decided a pilgrimage to the Holy Land was in order, inspired by hearing the English translation of the Revelations of Bridget of Sweden. Bridget's work promoted the purchase of indulgences, papal-approved pieces of paper that were intended to reduce your time in Purgatory. Margery bought several indulgences (available at pilgrimage sites) for herself and friends.

Although she spent three months in Venice along the way as well as time in Jerusalem, she records very little of what she saw; she was more interested in telling about conversations she had with Jesus along the way (well, she did mention falling off her donkey because she was so overcome with emotion at the sight of Jerusalem). She stayed in Assisi on the way home, visiting many churches. When she got home, she decided on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.

On these trips (and when home in England) she had several negative reactions to her manner. She engaged in loud prayer and wild gesticulating, and her tears flowed constantly. Some found her actions the symptoms of a madwoman, or simply a public nuisance. The mayor of Leicester called her a cheap whore. accused her of Lollardy, and put her in prison for three weeks. She was later accused of heresy in York, but the archbishop of York cleared her.

She visited many religious figures, such as Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Arundel, and the female mystic Julian of Norwich, where she stayed for several days. Margery claims that Julian supported her and assured Margery that her visions were real and valid and that her tears were a sign of real devotion.

Later in life she made another pilgrimage, this time to Prussia in 1433. Specifically, she went to Danzig to see the Holy Blood of Wilsnack relic, three hosts that survived a fire in 1383 that burned down a church and whole village.

We know all this because in the 1420s she asked a priest to take down her story, producing the Book of Margery Kempe (you can read it on the website of my hometown university here). She continued to have the manuscript amended. A copy was made of it just before 1450 by a monk, after which it disappeared. Margery Kempe died some time after 1438, and was quickly forgotten.

Five centuries later, the manuscript...well, let's wrap this up tomorrow when the 20th century discovered Margery Kempe.

Margery Kempe

Margery Brunham was born about 1373 in Bishop's (now King's) Lynn, Norfolk. Her father was mayor for a short time and a member of Parliament. We do not know anything about her upbringing, but later events suggest clearly that she never learned to read or write. Around the age of 20 she married John Kempe. What we know of her comes from The Book of Margery Kempe, which she dictated later in life. It may be the first autobiography.

After her eldest was born (a son named John), postpartum depression seems to have set in. She went through eight very difficult months in which she imagined herself being attacked by devils who wanted her to abandon her faith; she was even urged to suicide, which sounds like deep depression.

Along with these demonic visions, she had one of Jesus asking her why she had forsaken him? She began to have conversations with Jesus, Mary, God, and other religious figures. She also had visions of being present at both Jesus' birth and Crucifixion. One modern scholar claims she looked for ways to live a chaste life. The definition of "chaste" would have to be very flexible, since she had 13 additional children.

Having finally escaped whatever disturbed state she was in, she got busy. First she began to brew beer, referring to herself later as one of the greatest brewers in town. That business eventually failed when her employees all left her. She then bought two horses and started a grain-grinding business. The horses, however, refused to cooperate, and that business failed.

That is when she decided to devote herself to a more religious life. This would include sexual chastity, but her husband had some thoughts about that. They finally negotiated a chaste marriage, but he had conditions:

1. They share a bed still
2. Margery had to pay all his debts
3. Margery had to make him a fish supper every Friday

This was sufficient for her. #1 was okay, so long as there was no sex (but remember all the children? Yeah, chastity is tough and temptation is easy). #2 must have been possible with Brunham family money, since she was no longer running a business. #3...well, she had to eat supper, too.

She then engaged in her own form of public worship which involved loud wailing. This was very off-putting for onlookers, but at least it made an impression of someone who was in the grip of a powerful religious experience.

She started to "spread the word" in England and on pilgrimages; I'll talk more about that phase of her life tomorrow.

The Book of Holy Medicine

Unlike his contemporaries, Henry Grosmont was very forthcoming about his feelings about religion by writing an autobiographical treatise called Le Livre de Seyntz Medicines, "The Book of Holy Medicines" or "The Book of Holy Doctors."

Written in his early forties, in 1354, he employs the metaphor of his body as a castle and the Seven Deadly Sins as enemies entering through breaches in his defenses, making him ill. To combat this, he needs the services of a doctor in the person of Jesus Christ, who is accompanied by a nurse, the Virgin Mary.

Grosmont is willing in this work to lay bare all of his spiritual failings. As a younger man, he laments that he wishes he had "as much covetousness for the kingdom of heaven as I had for £100 of land" and that his body caused him to sin, as when his feet would bring him wine instead of being willing to go on a holy pilgrimage.

It is an unusual work in that it was written by a layman instead of a cleric or a mystic like, for example, Julian of Norwich or Margery Kempe. Whether it was written by Grosmont himself or he used a "ghost writer" or simply dictated it cannot be known for certain, but that he claimed it as his work is shown by a postscript (seen above, with the name marked in red):

Cest livre estoit comencee et parfaite en l'an de grace Nostre Seignur Jesu Crist MCCCLIIII. Et le fist un fole cheitif peccheour qe l'en appelle ERTSACNAL ED CUD IRNEH, a qi Dieux ses malfaitz pardoynt. Amen.

This book was begun and perfected in the year of grace of Our Lord Jesu Crist MCCCLIIII. And the fist is a foolish sinful sinner who calls him ERTSACNAL ED CUD IRNEH, to whom Gods forgive his misdeeds. Amen.

He humbly hides his name by writing backwards "Henri Duc de Lancastre" as the "fist," the hand that wrote it.

An argument against Grosmont merely hiring a writer to make himself look more pious is that his actions in life also demonstrated piety. He used his vast wealth to support churches and colleges and many clerics. Also, remember that Crusading was a religious act, not just about war. During a battle of the Hundred Years War, when the citizens of Bergerac begged for mercy, Grosmont is said to have replied "who prays for mercy shall have mercy."

Besides being a spiritual work, Le Livre de Seyntz Medicines also grants us a look into what the culture of 14th century England believed about the world. I'll talk more about that tomorrow, and Grosmont's end.

John van Ruysbroeck

John van Ruysbroeck was one of the foremost of the Flemish mystics, and even earned the titles "Admirable Doctor" and "Divine Doctor." He was born in 1293 at Ruysbroeck near Brussels to a very devout mother who stressed his religious upbringing. He did not seem very close to his mother emotionally, however, since the story goes that age 11 he ran away from home to join his uncle who was a priest at St. Gudule's in Brussels.

That uncle, Fr. John Hinckaert, arranged for his nephew's education with the intent for him to join the priesthood. Join the priesthood he did, in 1317, at St. Gudule's. (His mother tracked him down in Brussels and joined a beguinage; she died shortly before his ordination.)

His uncle, and therefore by influence van Ruysbroeck himself, practiced an apostolic austerity that was becoming popular among lay people such as the Beguines. The groups that followed this lifestyle often developed their own tenets that clashed with the preferences of the Church. van Ruysbroeck wrote pamphlets against some of these "heresies," especially to counter the writings of a particular Brussels woman in the Brethren of the Free Spirit named Bloemardinne. van Ruysbroeck was not opposed to these groups and their desire to live a more simple and saintly life—he followed that urge himself—but he did not want those doing so to stray from orthodoxy.

His own desire for a less worldly life led him away from the Cathedral of St. Gudule. (Partly he seems repulsed by how his own writings against Bloemardinne kicked off a persecution of her.) He, his uncle, and his uncle's close friend, a fellow canon named Francis van Coudenberg, left the Cathedral to form a hermitage in 1343, in Groenendael. The Groenendael hermitage became very popular, and drew so many followers that the three had to organize it into a regular congregation, of which it became the motherhouse.

van Ruysbroeck did most of his writing during this period, including twelve books, all in Middle Dutch. One of them, The Twelve Beguines [link], discusses "different notions of the Love of Jesus" in a conversation between 12 Beguines. This book, so complimentary to the Beguines, as well as his reputation as a mystic, explains why he was at one time considered to be the author of A Mirror for Simple Souls, when its true author, Marguerite Porete, was temporarily unknown.

He passed away on 2 December 1381, leaving behind a massive reputation for holiness and wisdom. He was honored as a saint and his relics preserved, although they were lost during the French Revolution. He was beatified on 1 December 1908, although the pressure to have him canonized has abated. The illustration above is a common image for him: writing alone in the woods while caught up in mystical ecstasy.

And now for something completely different, to combat my own ignorance. While writing the opening sentence of this post, I found myself questioning the word "Flemish" and realizing that I did not have a firm grasp on its meaning. What does/did it mean to be Flemish? Does it refer to a language, a people, a place? I know very well there is no "Flemland." What did the Middle Ages consider to be Flemish? Let's find out together, tomorrow.

The Cloud of Unknowing

Many works of Christian mysticism in the Middle Ages are biographies or autobiographies of mystics, sharing their revelations, their visions, and their interpretations of such. In the 2nd half of the 14th century, an anonymous author wrote a manuscript called "The Cloud of Unknowing" which was a guide aimed at a student on approaching God through mysticism.

The author shared three forms of prayer: reading, ordinary prayer, and contemplative prayer. Reading referred to contemplative or pious reading (in Latin, lectio pia). Ordinary prayer would be praying out loud or silently.

The last, contemplative prayer, inspired what is now called Centering Prayer, a form of Christian meditation with a strong emphasis on internal silence. The idea is to be more "present" and open to God.

Indeed, the point of the "Cloud" seems to be to avoid specific images and works and thoughts of God's attributes, and realize that God is not really knowable, that there is a vast "cloud of unknowing" between you and God. One must surrender all thought of specific aspects of God and open oneself to allow a glimpse of the true indescribable nature of God. This abandonment of trying to know God by specifics is the apophatic method, mentioned when discussing Maimonides' explanation of what God is by discussing what God is not.

The author felt that his approach was not for just anyone. At the start of the prologue, he says:

I charge thee and I beseche thee, with as moche power and vertewe as the bonde of charité is sufficient to suffre, [...] neither thou rede it, [nor] write it, [nor] speke it, [nor] [yet] suffre it be red, wretyn, or spokyn, of any or to any, bot yif it be of soche one or to soche one that hath (bi thi supposing) in a trewe wille [...] to be a [perfect] folower of Criste,

There are a few other works that are possibly written by the same author. One of them seems certain: "The Book of Privy Counseling" is only half the length of his most famous work, and explains further the concepts in "Cloud." The "Cloud" has 17 known manuscripts, and was clearly not as popular as the works of Richard Rolle, but interest grew in the 20th century.

One paragraph stands out for some thinkers:

If you want to gather all your desire into one simple word that the mind can easily retain, choose a short word rather than a long one. A one-syllable word such as "God" or "love" is best. But choose one that is meaningful to you. Then fix it in your mind so that it will remain there come what may. This word will be your defence in conflict and in peace. Use it to beat upon the cloud of darkness above you and to subdue all distractions, consigning them to the cloud of forgetting beneath you. [Chapter 7]

Some see in this a strong similarity to Buddhist meditation and modern transcendental meditation, which got me thinking: was Buddhism known in medieval Western Europe? Let's find out tomorrow.

Heat, Sweetness, Sound

Richard Rolle's career as a hermit left him plenty of time for writing. He chose a wide variety of topics—although Psalms figured heavily—and wrote in Latin early on; after 1340 he mostly wrote in English, perhaps trying to aim his words of wisdom at a wider audience.

Incendium Amoris ["The Fires of Love"] was one of his most popular in later years. We still have 44 copies, one-third of them from outside England. In it he describes the stages of mystical experience that he perceived, the first of which was the purgative stage he called "open door." In it one has to purge oneself of all worldly thoughts that would stand between yourself and the divine. Then came the stages of calor, canor, and dulcor.

Calor was the first experience of mystic contemplation, what they called illumination; it is a glimpse of heavenly glory felt as heat:

I call it fervour when the mind is truly ablaze with eternal love, and the heart similarly feels itself burning with a love that is not imaginary but real. For a heart set on fire produces a feeling of fiery love. [Penguin Classics, translator Clifton Wolters]

Canor, or song, became the most constant and important to him. As he first described it in "The Fires of Love":

I call it song when there is in the soul, overflowing and ardent, a sweet feeling of heavenly praise; when thought turns into song; when the mind is in thrall to sweetest harmony. [Ibid.]

Last was dulcor, always a part of the other two:

This twofold awareness is not achieved by doing nothing, but through the utmost devotion; and from these two there springs the third, for unspeakable sweetness is present too. Fervour and song bring marvellous delight to a soul, just as they themselves can be the product of very great sweetness. [Ibid.]

Some of his other works:

* Readings in the Office of the Dead taken from the Book of Job. It was popular enough to be printed in 1483 in Oxford and was used by clergy in York in the 15th century. It survives in 42 manuscripts.

*Commentary on the first 2.5 verses of the Song of Songs, of which we still have 30 manuscripts.

*Twenty manuscripts exist of Commentaries on the Psalter, in both Latin and English. The English version was for Margaret Kirkby, and was the only English translation of (part of) the Bible for 200 years.

*The Form of Living, written as a guide for Margaret Kirkby, exists in 30 manuscripts. 

His writing was enormously popular, copied and shared for several generations.

Not all authors of mystic writing are known to us; some maintained anonymity, whether through humility or simple obscurity. One such author, writing shortly after Rolle, produced a work of Christian mysticism with the evocative title, The Cloud of Unknowing. That will be next.

Richard Rolle

Richard Rolle (c.1300 - 30 September 1349) was born to a North Yorkshire farming family. He showed promise as a young man and was sponsored by the Archdeacon of Durham to attend Oxford to study philosophy. He gravitated more toward theology and biblical studies, but left Oxford while still in his teens to become a hermit.

At first he tried to live simply near his family's home, but became worried that they would disapprove and try to "reclaim" him. One day he encountered a former fellow Oxford student, John Dalton, who was willing to set him up in a cell with the necessary provisions.

A few years after leaving Oxford, while living an ascetic life on Dalton's property, he had his first mystical experience. He expressed the feeling of mystical experience as calor, canor, and dulcor. Calor was a feeling of heat. Canor was an experience of sound. Dulcor was a sweetness that accompanied both the feelings of calor and canor. A combination of these feelings was with him always after that, about which he says "I did not think anything like it or anything so holy could be received in this life."

Having attained this level of mystic expression, he left Dalton's cell and started to travel. We know he spent time in Hampole, sharing his experience with a Cistercian convent. He also visited Margaret Kirkby, whom he had set on the path to the anchorite life. He was able to cure her seizures by his presence.

He stayed near the Hampole convent for the rest of his life. He died there in 1349, possibly having succumbed to the Black Death, although by fall of that year the worst of the plague was over. He was originally buried in the convent cemetery, but later moved to his own chapel space because of the attention his grave drew: visitors and supplicants came to pray and make offerings; miracles were claimed to result.

In the 1380s, canonization proceedings were begun; many of the details of his life (other than details he included in his many writings) came from recording the anecdotes from people who knew him or had heard of him during the process of preparing a biography as part of the canonization process. The process was never completed, however, so he never became Saint Richard Rolle, although the Church of England commemmorates him on 20 January. In the Episcopal Church in the USA, he is commemorated on 28 September along with the mystics Margery Kempe and Walter Hilton.

His writings were so popular that over 450 manuscripts survive that were produced between 1390 and 1500. His writings were more popular than Chaucer. We can look at some of them next.

Margareta Ebner

Tomb of Margareta, at the Monastery
Church of Mary Medingen

To wrap up a week of religion and mysticism, we turn to Margareta Ebner, a German nun who was born to a wealthy family at Donauwörth in 1291 and entered the Dominican Monastery of Mary Medingen near Dillingen. In 1312 she became terribly ill, and her health was extremely poor for the next decade. For the rest of her life, she spent a great deal of time sporadically bedridden.

As was the case with Christina Ebner (no known relation), the illness led her to a more intense devoutness. She abstained from wine and fruit and even bathing in order to satisfy her desire for penance. She had to abandon the convent and return home when the Great Papal Schism caused war between different factions of Europe. The convent was loyal to the pope in Rome, and when Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV chose to support the pope in Avignon, Margareta left Dillingen and returned to her family. While there, the death of her nurse upset her greatly. She became unfocused, until Henry of Nördlingen in 1332 contacted her and started to guide her.

His correspondence with her has been preserved, the earliest known set of personal letters in the German language. Henry sent her a copy of the works of Mechthild of Magdeburg. He also urged her to start writing down visions and revelations that she experienced. These included dialogues with the Baby Jesus. Her Revelations are in a manuscript in Medingen, at the Monastery that also houses her tomb. She died on 20 June 1351.

Mechthild of Magdeburg

And God said to the soul:
I desired you before the world began.
I desire you now
As you desire me.
And where the desires of two come together
There love is perfected.
—Mechthild of Magdeburg*

Mechthild (Matilda) of Magdeburg has been mentioned a couple times this week as an exemplar of mysticism whose story was translated and shared by Henry of Nördlingen with other mystics.

She was born about 1210 in Saxony. At the age of 12, the Holy Spirit made her acquaintance and visited her daily. Her interactions with the Holy Spirit prompted her to leave home about 1230 and go to Magdeburg to join the Beguines, a group of lay Christians who lived in semi-monastic communities and vowed not to marry.

Her visions and revelations continued, and she was convinced by her confessor, Henry of Halle, to record them. She wrote a book which God wanted her to call Fliessende lieht miner gottheit in allu die herzen die da lebent and valscheit ["Light of my divinity, flowing into all hearts that live without guile"], but is now known as 

 Das fliessende Licht der Gottheit ["The Flowing Light of Godhead"], which became an inspiration for other mystics in the decades to follow. Her writing is interspersed with the occasional poem, such as the one above.

Some of her ideas were enlightening for the Middle Ages trying to understand the afterlife:

She divides hell into three parts; the lowest and most horrible is filled with condemned Christians, the middle with Jews, and the highest with Pagans. Hell, purgatory and heaven are situated one immediately above the other. The lowest portion of purgatory is filled with devils, who torment the souls in the most horrible manner, while the highest portion of purgatory is identical with the lowest portion of heaven. Many a soul in the lowest Purgatory does not know whether it will ever be saved. [Catholic Encyclopedia]

Some have suggested that her vision of the three helped to inspire Dante's Divine Comedy. In Canto XXVIII of Purgatorio, there is a Matilda gathering flowers. This figure is usually identified as Matilda (1046-1114), a Grancontessa of Tuscany, who supported several popes, but a "Matilda" who lived much closer to Dante and was known for her religious visions might be a better identification.

In 1270, she joined the Cistercian nuns at Helfta, and was respected by all. Some think she lived until the 1290s, but there are no definitive records of her after 1282.

*From Teachings of the Christian Mystics, edited Andrew Harvey

Christina Ebner-Mystic Writer

From the Church of St. Sebald in Nuremberg;
Christina Ebner stands to the side of the Virgin and Child

Christina Ebner was born on Good Friday (26 March) 1277, to a well-off Nuremberg family. Her mother taught her to be very devout, and from the age of seven Christina asked to be allowed to become a nun. At the age of twelve she was granted her request, and her parents took her to the Dominican nuns of the Monastery of St. John the Baptist in Engelthal (near Nuremberg).

After one year there, however, she was taken with an illness that recurred thrice per year for the next decade, and then frequently thereafter. Difficult for her, but during her illnesses she had visions, which she was encouraged to write down by her confessor, Father Conrad of Füssen.

She consequently wrote a biography that recounts her whole life, and she kept writing right up until 1353 (she died 27 December 1355/6). Her first account was called Leben und Offenbarungen [Life and Revelations]. She also wrote a book that recounted mystical visions experienced by other nuns in her monastery, called Schwesternbuch [Book of Sisters], and later another book of revelations called Offenbarungen [Revelations]. In this last book, she also recorded her impressions and ideas on certain historical events, such as the 1348 riots in Nuremberg, an earthquake, and the conflict between the papacy and the Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV.

Christina's fame drew several visitors to her, including Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV. Another was Henry of Nördlingen, priest, traveler, and spiritual advisor, who gave her a book by the mystic Mechthild of Magdeburg. In fact, Henry deserves his own entry, which he will get tomorrow.

God as Mother

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious is making news, and my desire to make this blog not just interesting and varied but also relevant prompts me to talk about Julian of Norwich.

Mystics—people who attain knowledge of the divine not by rational study but by a direct connection or intuition, often during a state of ecstasy—are known in all faiths and all eras.

Julian of Norwich was an anchoress (a female anchorite, a hermit; she lived a life of religious seclusion) who had a series of mystic visions of Jesus in 1373 (she was about 31 years old) while on what was thought to be her deathbed. She recovered on May 13, and wrote down a short version of the visions. In about 1393 she wrote a much longer version, Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love, possibly the first book written in English by a woman.

One of her most controversial habits is to refer to God and Christ as Mother as well as Father. One such passage:

And thus I saw that God rejoiceth that He is our Father, and God rejoiceth that He is our Mother, and God rejoiceth that He is our Very Spouse and our soul is His loved Wife.
...
God is Very Father and Very Mother of Nature...

Church authorities at the time did not challenge her. This cannot be because she wrote in obscurity: there are plenty of contemporary references to her, and she was operating in Norwich, the second most populated city in England. Either the church did not consider her ideas likely to become influential, or they were not shocked by them. After all, she did not say God was solely mother; she simply allowed for feminine qualities as well as masculine. Perhaps this all-inclusive approach was sufficiently non-threatening to be accepted as non-heretical. Perhaps the Middle Ages was willing to embrace the importance of the feminine along with the masculine.