Mystic · Medieval

St. Hildegard of Bingen

1098–1179 · Benedictine visionary theology

Doctor of the Church Latin

Equivalently canonized and declared Doctor of the Church by Benedict XVI in 2012.

Benedictine abbess of the Rhineland, Hildegard recorded her visions in Scivias and the Book of Divine Works, composed liturgical chant, wrote on medicine and the natural world, and corresponded with emperors and popes. Her theology sees the whole cosmos as alive with “viriditas,” the greening power of God, and the human person as the microcosm in which creation is summed up and redeemed in Christ.

Why he matters: She is a witness that prophecy, science, music and doctrine can live in one Catholic mind, and the first woman whose theological authority was publicly approved by a pope (Eugene III at Trier, 1147).

Reading

Scivias

St. Hildegard of Bingen · Her first and most systematic vision-book (Classics of Western Spirituality).

Journal
Selected Writings

St. Hildegard of Bingen (trans. Mark Atherton) · A good Penguin sampler of visions, letters and songs.

Journal
Apostolic Letter proclaiming St. Hildegard a Doctor of the Church

Benedict XVI, 2012 · Why the Church counts her a teacher.

Journal

Documented positions

Where this thinker stands on each dispute the test covers.

Settled teaching Its center Open question Beyond teaching, not condemned Condemned error

God and Being · What is, and whence it is.

Can reason know that God exists? Natural theology

Fideism or agnosticism Natural theology

How is God related to the world? Creation from nothing

Pantheism or emanation Creation from nothing

Is the world governed by purpose? Providence and final causes

Chance and mechanism Providence and final causes

How should we speak of God? Cataphatic (analogical) way

Apophatic (negative) way Cataphatic (analogical) way

How does creation speak of God? A book of signs and vestiges

Natures studied in their own right A book of signs and vestiges

Faith, Reason and Truth · How we know, and whom we trust.

Faith and reason: who has the last word? Fideism

Rationalism Fideism

Where does knowledge begin? Illumination and innate ideas

Senses and abstraction Illumination and innate ideas

Is truth objective? Objective truth

Relativism and pragmatism Objective truth

Who interprets revelation? Living Tradition and Magisterium

Private judgment Living Tradition and Magisterium

How should Scripture be read? Fundamentalist literalism

Critical reductionism Fundamentalist literalism

What is theology for? A wisdom ordered to loving

A science ordered to knowing A wisdom ordered to loving

Are the world's learning and arts a danger or a gift? A gift to be baptized

A danger: Athens has nothing to do with Jerusalem A gift to be baptized

III

The Human Person · Soul, body, freedom and the Fall.

Is there a spiritual soul? Immortal spiritual soul

Mind is brain Immortal spiritual soul

Is the body really you? Body–soul unity

Dualism Body–soul unity

Are you free? Free will

Determinism Free will

How fallen is human nature? Totally depraved

Totally depraved Basically good

The body and its desires Desire as its own law

Contempt for the flesh Desire as its own law

Marriage, sex and the body's meaning Given by nature and grace

Given by nature and grace Defined by consent and identity

What is suffering for? A share in the Cross

An evil to be relieved A share in the Cross

The Moral Life · Law, virtue, conscience and the good.

What is happiness? Beatitude in God

Earthly flourishing Beatitude in God

What is heaven's happiness, at its heart? The will's love and enjoyment of God

The intellect's vision of God The will's love and enjoyment of God

Grace and Salvation · How God saves, and whom.

What is salvation for? Deification

Pardon and escape Deification

Would the Word have become flesh had Adam not sinned? Christ was willed first (absolute primacy)

Christ came to redeem sinners Christ was willed first (absolute primacy)

Where does your eye rest in Christ: His divinity or His humanity? The eternal Word made flesh

The eternal Word made flesh The man Jesus of Nazareth

Church and Society · Authority, the state, wealth and the nation.

Church and state Social kingship of Christ

Laicism Social kingship of Christ

VII

Worship, Prayer and the Two Lungs · Liturgy, icons, the Spirit, and the See of Peter.

Liturgical development Receive and develop organically

Reconstruct and innovate Receive and develop organically

Icons and images Veneration of images

Iconoclasm Veneration of images

The office of Peter Universal and immediate primacy

Conciliarism Universal and immediate primacy

What do the sacraments do? Efficacious ex opere operato

Signs only Efficacious ex opere operato

When the Pope speaks Every word binds

Resist and judge Every word binds

Contemplation or action? Contemplation: the one thing needful

Action: the apostolate and the works of mercy Contemplation: the one thing needful