Although her works never entirely disappeared from view, over the centuries they became more and more the property of Catholic Church scholars and antiquarians. As far as the general public was concerned, she ceased to exist, and it was not until the twentieth century that she was “rediscovered.” Music had a prominent role in this rediscovery. to the work of scholars interested in the contributions of women in music, Hildegard’s musical works began to be published and recorded from about the late 1980s onward. Those recordings generated interest in other aspects of Hildegard’s work, and today Hildegard’s influence continues to grow. There are now three Hildegard personae, with influences on three different audiences: the historical Hildegard, the popular Hildegard, and the fictional Hildegard.
The Historical Hildegard
The historical Hildegard is beginning to emerge with some clarity. We have learned a great deal about her life, not only from her autobiographical statements, but also from hagiographies of those who lived with her and shortly after. We also have her works, available in good editions and translations in greater and greater number as time goes on. Her visionary works give us insights into aspects of medieval culture that were previously unknown, based on sources not previously available: the nature and influence of the visionary experience and of mysticism on all aspects of medieval religious practice, and the role of women in medieval Catholicism. Her scientific works show us something of the knowledge of the natural world in the twelfth century, and of how that knowledge was put to use in medical practice. Her musical works show us much about the composition of sacred music beyond Gregorian chant, and recordings of them are now much more historically informed than the earliest attempts. Her letters, published now in translation, offer the most accessible entrance into many of the daily events of her life.
The Popular Hildegard
The second influence is that of her works on various corners of popular culture. For some decades now, there has been ongoing interest in holistic medicine, homeopathic cures, folk remedies, spiritual healing, ecology, and the like. Hildegard is now used as a touchstone, and Physica and Causae et curae are often cited as forerunners of this interest. There is at least one website devoted to “healing chants,” using four pieces by Hildegard, including the antiphon “O mirum admirandum” given above.16 There is also a variety of books devoted to Hildegard’s medicine, her healing plants, and spiritual remedies, all derived from either Physica or Causae et curae. However, a “Note to the Reader” on the copyright page of Priscilla Throop’s translation of Physica warns:
This book is intended as an informational guide. The remedies, approaches, and techniques described herein are meant to supplement, and not to be a substitute for, professional medical care or treatment. They should not be used to treat a serious ailment without prior consultation with a qualified health-care professional.
At the same time, there has been interest in women’s spirituality, and Hil-degard again figures prominently in both scholarly and popular print and online publications.17 These often take the form of musical improvisations on texts by Hildegard or artwork derived from Hildegard’s descriptions of her visions.
Early recordings of her music, and some more recent ones, presented the chants in a way that Hildegard would never have imagined. Accompaniments of various sorts have been invented, even electronically generated backdrops. These have nothing to do with the chant environment in which Hildegard grew up; they are instead re-imaginings of the repertory, intended to attract a wider audience. Jennifer Bain has provided a summary of the recording history of Hildegard’s music and shows how marketing strategies have often blurred the actual nature of the music.18
Finally, Hildegard finds a place in the health-food movement as well. It is possible to find websites devoted to recipes attributed to Hildegard, the most frequently encountered being the one for the so-called Cookies of Joy, a very spicy cinnamon cookie. Although Physica contains recipes involving plants, birds, and fish, they are meant as medicinal cures, not dishes. Yet there is a cookbook, From Hildegard’s Kitchen, containing many of the recipes from Physica modified to serve for modern dining.19
The Fictional Hildegard
A third influence may be described as the use of Hildegard to create a mythical medieval person who behaves in the way modern writers think she should. This persona is often found among groups of people who have taken on the techniques of women’s studies, gender studies, literary studies, deconstruction, and postmodernism and used those techniques for their own purposes.
There have been speculations about her sexuality, especially with regard to the Richardis affair, and there is even a website devoted to lesbian saints, with this fictional Hildegard as a member.20 The reader should recall Mad-docks’s cautionary remarks given above about “exaggerated importance” and “misconstrued nature.” There have also been suspicions about Hildegard’s relationship with Volmar. None of these notions recognizes the importance Hildegard and her contemporaries placed on the vows they took, and any suggestion that she did not understand the erotic nature of her relationships put the whole topic beyond any sort of rational discussion. In the end, all of this is irrelevant to Hildegard’s creative work itself.
A film purporting to cover a part of the life of Hildegard has this as its description:21
Hildegard of Bingen was one of the most remarkable women of the
Middle Ages—an abbess and woman of God, a visionary, naturalist,
Playwright, mystic, political moralist and composer. Yet, despite her outpouring of religious creativity, her visions were called into question, and she was put on trial by the Church in 1148. This is the story of the events leading up to that trial and of the trial itself.
The setting is the monastery of St. Disibod on the Rhine in central Germany. Hildegard’s befriending of a young persecuted girl and the care she shows for a dying crusader eventually lead her into conflict with her Abbot. She is placed under an interdict, which results in Hildegard and her nuns being forbidden from taking communion and singing the divine service. After enduring the punishment for some time, Hildegard protests, and it is her subsequent examination and trial by the Archbishop of Mainz around which the story revolves.
Very little of this description after the first sentence applies to the real Hil-degard. She was never given the title of abbess, remaining always under the jurisdiction of the abbots of Disibodenberg. Also, before 1148 there was no “outpouring of religious creativity.” She had just begun to write Scivias at that point, at the instigation of Volmar and Kuno. Her “outpouring” would come only in the future. Third, her visions were not “called into question.” On the contrary, both Volmar and Abbot Kuno validated them locally, and those two men brought them to the attention of the pope with the intent of having them validated universally. Fourth, the Synod of Trier was not a trial. It had a number of goals, only one of which was the review of the incomplete Scivias to see if the opinions of Volmar and Kuno were correct.
Finally, as the second paragraph accurately describes, the film contains events from Hildegard’s life, but so grotesquely shuffled in time and so completely distorted that one has no idea of what actually occurred when and for what reasons. The “young persecuted girl” is indeed named Richardis, but this Richardis is completely unrecognizable as the Richardis known from the records. Her mother, the Margravine Richardis, was not the harsh critic of Hildegard portrayed in the film, but a strong supporter. The episode of the buried excommunicant took place in the late 1170s at Rupertsberg, not in the early 1150s at Disibodenberg. An interdict was indeed imposed, but in the late 1170s by the prelates of Mainz, not in the 1150s by the abbot. All of this took place after the founding of Rupertsberg, not before as in the film, and not a single one of these events led up to the “trial.”
The Hildegard of this film is a fictional character, whose life events have been extracted from the life of the real Hildegard and distorted for dramatic effect. This is not a problem if one knows the true state of affairs, but it is a very great problem if the film is taken to be a historical record. Unfortunately the producers seem to want the viewers to do just that, to judge by the flier accompanying the film. One question asks if the death of Richardis could have motivated Hildegard to found the Rupertsberg convent, when in fact it could not, because Richardis died after the move to Rupertsberg. Absolutely pointless! The last discussion question on the flier asks: “What have we learned
About the medieval church and Christian faith in that era?” The answer must be “absolutely nothing that is reliable.”
Far more nuanced and deserving of serious attention is the 2009 German film Vision: From the Life of Hildegard von Bingen (original title Vision: Aus dem Leben der Hildegard von Bingen), directed by Margarethe von Trotta and featuring Barbara Sukowa as Hildegard.22
Daniel DiCenso, in the wonderfully clear and convincing article “Hildegard on Trial: A Note Regarding the Narrow Reception of a Medieval Abbess-Composer,” describes appearances in print of the fictional Hildegard, illustrates the unreliability of the stereotype this persona represents, shows the number of scholarly publications that adopt the stereotype unquestioningly to their peril, and warns that relying on this stereotype obscures the real contributions Hildegard made.23 Happily, cautionary views like this one are on the increase. In the end, the fictional Hildegard is not really necessary. As has been seen, the real Hildegard is interesting enough.
World History
