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{{short description|13th-century Dutch poet and mystic}}
{{About||the film|Hadewijch (film)}}
{{About||the film|Hadewijch (film)}}
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[[Image:Brabant map.png|300px|thumb|Contours of the Duchy of Brabant of Hadewijch's time, drawn on a 20th-century map of [[Belgium]] and the [[Netherlands]].]]
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'''Hadewijch''' ({{IPA-nl|ˈɦaːdəʋɪx}}), sometimes referred to as '''Hadewych''' or '''Hadewig''' ('''of''' '''Brabant''' or '''of Antwerp'''),{{efn|Note that in the modern state of Belgium [[Antwerp]] (the city) lies not in [[Brabant (province)|Brabant]] (the Belgian province) but in the [[Antwerp (province)|province of Antwerp]]. The "of Brabant" and "of Antwerp" identifications of the 13th century Hadewijch are apparently primarily intended to distinguish her from [[Hadewych of Meer]]. Part of the evidence for her origins lies in the fact that most of the manuscripts containing her work were found near Brussels. The Antwerp connection is mainly based on a later addition to one of the manuscript copies of her works, that was produced several centuries after her death.}} was a 13th-century poet and [[mysticism|mystic]], probably living in the [[Duchy of Brabant]]. Most of her extant writings are in a [[Brabantian dialect|Brabantian]] form of [[Middle Dutch]]. Her writings include visions, prose letters and poetry. Hadewijch was one of the most important direct influences on [[John of Ruysbroeck]].


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==Life==
{{Christian mysticism}}
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No details of her life are known outside the sparse indications in her own writings. Her ''Letters'' suggest that she functioned as the head of a [[beguine]] house, but that she had experienced opposition that drove her to a wandering life.<ref>''Letter'' 29.</ref> This evidence, as well as her lack of reference to life in a convent, makes the nineteenth-century theory that she was a nun problematic, and it has been abandoned by modern scholars.{{efn|The 19th century understanding (based exclusively on her visions and poetry) that she would have been a nun, as described for instance in [http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_vad004vade02_01/index.htm C.P. Serrure (ed.), ''Vaderlandsch museum voor Nederduitsche letterkunde, oudheid en geschiedenis'', II] (C. Annoot-Braeckman, Gent 1858), [http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_vad004vade02_01/_vad004vade02_01_0011.htm pp. 136-145], was later abandoned. That she could be identified with an abbess that presumably died in [[Aywières]] (the convent where also [[Saint Lutgard]] lived around the same time) in 1248, is considered even more unlikely in recent scholarship. For more on this, see, for instance, the writings by Paul Mommaers mentioned in the references section below.}} She must have come from a wealthy family: her writing demonstrates an expansive knowledge of the literature and theological treatises of several languages, including [[Latin]] and [[French language|French]], as well as French [[courtly love|courtly poetry]], in a period when studying was a luxury only exceptionally granted to women.


== Beguine Life ==
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'''Hadewijch''' (sometimes referred to as '''Hadewych''', '''Hadewig''', ... '''of Antwerp''', or ... '''of Brabant''')<ref>Note that in the modern state of Belgium [[Antwerp]] (the city) lies not in [[Brabant (province)|Brabant]] (the Belgian province) but in the [[Antwerp (province)|province of Antwerp]]. The "of Brabant" and "of Antwerp" identifications of the 13th century Hadewijch are apparently primarily intended to distinguish her from the 12th-century German prioress Blessed Hadewych ([http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07104a.htm]). Part of the evidence for her origins lies in the fact that most of the manuscripts containing her work were found near Brussels. The Antwerp connection is mainly based on a later addition to one of the manuscript copies of her works, that was produced several centuries after her death.</ref> was a 13th-century poet and [[mysticism|mystic]], probably living in the duchy of Brabant.<ref name=Bjork2010>Bjork, Robert E. The Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages. 4 vols. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. Print.</ref> Most of her extant writings are in a [[Brabantian dialect|Brabantian]] form of [[Middle Dutch]]. Her writings include visions, prose letters and poetry. Hadewijch was one of the most important direct influences on [[John of Ruysbroeck]].
{{Main|Beguines and Beghards}}
Beguines were women during the thirteenth century who had a deep love for Jesus Christ, but unlike nuns, did not take formal vows and were free to leave at any time. Their development was slow at first, however, in the year 1216, [[Pope Honorius III]] granted them the right to live in common and encourage others to join them. With that, beguines lived together in a home referred to as beguinages. Several larger towns had more than one beguinage. The movement was not solely for women. However, men were not known as beguines, but rather, called themselves beghards.


Hadewijch was a beguine mystic who had lived during the thirteenth century in the Low Countries, specifically in the city of Antwerp which was in the region of Brabant at the time. She shared a house with some friends, for whom she was a spiritual leader.<ref>[https://www.poetryinternational.com/en/poets-poems/poets/poet/102-13070_Hadewijch "Hadewijch", Poetry International]</ref> Hadewijch is known for her poems, letters, and visions that she had described in writing.
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==Life==


== Context ==
While little details of her life are known outside of her writings, Hadewijch may have been born in the southern part of the Flemish province of Brabant around 1200.<ref name=Bjork2010>Bjork, Robert E. The Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages. 4 vols. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. Print.</ref> Through her "Letters", it is suggested that she functioned as the head of a [[beguine]] house prior to 1250.<ref name=CUA2003>Catholic University of America. New Catholic Encyclopedia. 2nd ed. 15 vols. Detroit
Hadewijch's writings explored themes of divine love, spiritual experiences, and the union of soul with God. Hadewijch was one of the first mystic writers to put her text in Dutch. Each of her visions have the commonality of Hadewijch ascending to Jesus Christ while experiencing strong emotions that are almost euphoric. Another common theme throughout the visions is the agony she would describe when it came to the end of the vision. The visions that Hadewijch would experience, along with every other mystic, were a metaphor for the deep love that these women had for Christ.{{cn|date=June 2024}}
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Washington, D.C.: Thomson/ Gale; Catholic University of America, 2003. Print.</ref> There, she experienced opposition that drove her to a wandering life.<ref>"Letter" 29.</ref> Among this evidence, Hadewijch herself even reflects on the possibility of a future imprisonment or exile after she writes on being exiled from other beguines named Sara, Emma, and Margriet.<ref>Hart, Columba. "Introduction". "Hadewijch The Complete Works". Preface by Paul Mommaers. The Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle in the State of New York, 1980.</ref> This evidence, as well as her lack of reference to life in a convent, makes the nineteenth-century theory that she was a nun problematic, and thus it has been abandoned by modern scholars.<ref>The 19th century understanding (based exclusively on her visions and poetry) that she would have been a nun, as described for instance in [http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_vad004vade02_01/index.htm C.P. Serrure (ed.), ''Vaderlandsch museum voor Nederduitsche letterkunde, oudheid en geschiedenis'', II] (C. Annoot-Braeckman, Gent 1858), [http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_vad004vade02_01/_vad004vade02_01_0011.htm pp. 136-145], was later abandoned. That she could be identified with an abbess that presumably died in [[Aywières]] (the convent where also [[Saint Lutgard]] lived around the same time) in 1248, is considered even more unlikely in recent scholarship. For more on this, see, for instance, the writings by Paul Mommaers mentioned in the references section below.</ref> Her writings suggest she received an education in [[Latin]] and [[French language|French]], as well as an expansive knowledge of religious figures including [[Saint Augustine]].<ref name=Bjork2010 />


==Works==
==Works==
[[Image:Hadewijch gedicht1 HsGent f49r.jpg|thumb|Medieval manuscript page of a Hadewijch poem<ref>{{Cite web|title=Brieven, visioenen, strofische gedichten, mengeldichten[manuscript]Hadewijch.|url=https://lib.ugent.be/viewer/archive.ugent.be:C0997942-3DC9-11E1-8757-94673B7C8C91#?c=&m=&s=&cv=51&xywh=317,44,4018,2552|access-date=2020-08-20|website=lib.ugent.be}}</ref>]]

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Most of Hadewijch's extant writings, none of which survived the [[Middle Ages]] as an [[autograph (manuscript)|autograph]], are in a [[Brabantian dialect|Brabantian]] form of [[Middle Dutch]]. Five groups of texts survive:<ref>Bernard McGinn, ''The Flowering of Mysticism'', (1998), p200.</ref> her writings include poetry, descriptions of her [[vision (religion)|vision]]s, and prose letters. There are two groups of poetry: ''Poems in Stanzas'' (''Strophische Gedichten'') and ''Poems in Couplets'' (''Mengeldichten''). Finally there is the "Lijst der volmaakten" ("list of the perfect ones").
[[Image:Hadewijch gedicht1 HsGent f49r.jpg|thumb|right|Medieval manuscript page of a Hadewijch poem]]

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Most of Hadewijch's extant writings, none of which survived the [[Middle Ages]] as an [[autograph]], are in a [[Brabantian]] form of [[Middle Dutch]]. Five groups of texts survive:<ref>Bernard McGinn, ''The Flowering of Mysticism'', (1998), p200.</ref> her writings include poetry, descriptions of her [[vision (religion)|vision]]s, and prose letters. There are two groups of poetry: ''Poems in Stanzas'' (''Strophische Gedichten'') and ''Poems in Couplets'' (''Mengeldichten''). Finally there is the "Lijst der volmaakten" ("list of the perfect ones").


===''Poems in Stanzas'' (''Strophische Gedichten'')===
===''Poems in Stanzas'' (''Strophische Gedichten'')===
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Her forty-five ''Poems in Stanzas'' (''Strophische Gedichten'', also ''Liederen'', "Songs") are lyric poems following the forms and conventions used by the [[trouvère]]s and [[minnesinger]]s of her time, but in Dutch, and with the theme of worldly courtship replaced by sublimated love to God.<ref>{{citation|author=Rozenski, Steven|url=http://www.maneyonline.com/doi/abs/10.1179/104125710X12730486676225|title=The Promise of Eternity: Love and Poetic Form in Hadewijch's Liederen or Stanzaic Poems|journal=Exemplaria|volume=22|issue=4|year=2010|pages=305–325|doi=10.1179/104125710X12730486676225|s2cid=218668701 }}.</ref> Many of them are [[Contrafactum|contrafacta]] of Latin and vernacular songs and hymns, leading to a Dutch edition renaming them "Liederen" ("Songs") and including audio recordings of performances.<ref>Hadewijch, ''Liederen,'' edited, introduced, and translated by Veerle Fraeters & Frank Willaert, with a reconstruction of the melodies by Louis Peter Grijp (Groningen: Historische Uitgeverij, 2009).</ref>

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Her forty-five ''Poems in Stanzas'' (''Strophische Gedichten'', also ''Liederen'', "Songs") are lyric poems following the forms and conventions used by the [[trouvère]]s and [[minnesinger]]s of her time, but in Dutch, and with the theme of worldly courtship replaced by sublimated love to God.<ref>{{citation|author=Rozenski, Steven|title=The Promise of Eternity: Love and Poetic Form in Hadewijch's Liederen or Stanzaic Poems|journal=Exemplaria|volume=22|issue=4|pages=305–325|year=2010|doi=10.1179/104125710X12730486676225}}.</ref> Many of them are [[Contrafactum|contrafacta]] of Latin and vernacular songs and hymns, leading to a Dutch edition renaming them "Liederen" ("Songs") and including audio recordings of performances.<ref>Hadewijch, ''Liederen,'' edited, introduced, and translated by Veerle Fraeters & Frank Willaert, with a reconstruction of the melodies by Louis Peter Grijp (Groningen: Historische Uitgeverij, 2009).</ref>


===''Poems in Couplets'' (''Mengeldichten'' or ''Berijmde brieven'')===
===''Poems in Couplets'' (''Mengeldichten'' or ''Berijmde brieven'')===


The sixteen works in ''Poems in Couplets'' (''Mengeldichten'', also ''Berijmde brieven'', "letters on rhyme") are actually letters that repeat the same ideologies of 12th century [[France|French]] [[spirituality]].<ref name=CUA2003 /> Although, not all of them are considered authentic.
The sixteen ''Poems in Couplets'' (''Mengeldichten'', also ''Berijmde brieven'', "letters on rhyme") are simpler [[Didacticism|didactical]] poems in letter format, composed in rhyming couplets, on [[Christianity|Christian]] topics; not all of them are considered authentic.


===Visions (Visioenen)===
===''Visions'' ===


Hadewijch’s "Book of Visions" ("Visioenenboek"), the earliest [[vernacular]] collection of such revelations, appears to have been composed in the 1240s. It prominently features dialogue between Hadewijch and [[Christ]] in visionary speech, an early example of this mode of vernacular religious instruction.<ref>Bernard McGinn, "The Flowering of Mysticism", (1998), p200., {{Citation| last=Zimbalist|first=Barbara|title=Quotation and Imitation in Hadewijch's ''Visioenen'': the Visionary and the Vernacular Voice of Christ|journal= Ons Geestelijk Erf | year=2012| volume=83 |url=http://poj.peeters-leuven.be/content.php?id=2182882&url=article| issue=3| pages=216–42}}.</ref>
Hadewijch's ''Book of Visions'' (''Visioenenboek''), the earliest [[vernacular]] collection of such revelations, appears to have been composed in the 1240s. It prominently features dialogue between Hadewijch and [[Christ]] in visionary speech, an early example of this mode of vernacular religious instruction.<ref>Bernard McGinn, ''The Flowering of Mysticism'', (1998), p200., {{Citation| last=Zimbalist|first=Barbara|title=Quotation and Imitation in Hadewijch's ''Visioenen'': the Visionary and the Vernacular Voice of Christ|journal= Ons Geestelijk Erf | year=2012| volume=83 |url=http://poj.peeters-leuven.be/content.php?id=2182882&url=article| issue=3| pages=216–42}}.</ref>


===Letters (Brieven)===
===''Letters''===


Thirty prose letters also survive:<ref>Bernard McGinn, ''The Flowering of Mysticism'', (1998), p200.</ref> here Hadewijch explains her views, and they give some context to her life.
Thirty-one prose letters also survive.<ref>Bernard McGinn, ''The Flowering of Mysticism'', (1998), p200.</ref> Here, Hadewijch explains her views, which gives some context about her life. Hadewijch writes that she experienced "such passionate love" from God which can be ascertained as the beginning of her form of mysticism in the physical sense.<ref>Hadewijch. "Letter 11". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> The letters continue to describe her concept of ''minne'' by detailing her reaction to life events. In her twenty-fifth letter, Hadewijch addresses her reader to send messages to various women who are perhaps those whom she lived with. She also declares that: "[Sarah] may well leave me to my wandering."<ref>Hadewijch. "Letter 25". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> The wandering that Hadewijch mentions can be read as either a literal physical wandering or it could be read as a theoretical wandering as Hadewijch explores her own beliefs. Reading Hadewijch's twenty-fifth letter as autobiographical is problematic because later in the same letter she writes that there is an "us" to be lived with, as she pleads to the reader to speak with a woman named Margriet about the dangers of pride.<ref>Hadewijch. "Letter 25". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> In letter twenty-six, however, Hadewijch continues writing as though she is still part of a community (assumably the one she priorly belonged to) despite her literal wandering about.<ref>Hadewijch. "Letter 26". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> Due to this, it seems clear that Hadewijch belonged to a specific group of fellow believers and that she left either by exile or her own volition. Through these letters which give minor autobiographical details, Hadewijch offers a mystical didacticism to dealing with concerns including pride, loneliness, and love.


===Lijst der volmaakten===
===''List''===
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The ''Lijst der volmaakten'' ("list of the perfect ones"), is joined to the ''Visions'' in some manuscripts, but to the ''Poems in Stanzas'' in a more recent one. It lists several saints, like [[Bernard of Clairvaux]], but some entries are more remarkable, like a [[beguine]] who had been condemned to death by the [[inquisition]].


'''What Scholars Say'''
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The "Lijst der volmaakten" ("list of the perfect ones"), is attached to the "Visions" in some manuscripts, and to the "Poems in Stanzas" in more recent ones. It lists several saints, such as [[Bernard of Clairvaux]], but some entries are more remarkable, like a [[beguine]] who had been condemned to death by the [[inquisition]].


In the 20th century a question that was being asked about mysticism and the visions that Hadewijch had described considered what events led up to each experience, and also, were these encounters actually seen or only felt within the mystics.
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==Minne==
Minne is Hadewijch's central concept, and it acts as the focal point of her belief system. Scholars have debated as to what minne refers to, and some views identify the word as a conception of a divine entity.<ref>Vanderauwera, Ria. "The Brabant Mystic Hadewijch." ''Medieval Women Writers''. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> She writes in her eleventh letter that she first experienced minne in the tenth year of her life.<ref>Hadewijch. "Letter 11". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> Hadewijch describes the love as something so powerful that she feels as though she could have died without being given a special power to withstand it by God. Hadewijch's minne is a nuanced form of love because it cannot come without a secondary power being conferred to tolerate its energy; at the same time, minne is not simply a state of being for Hadewijch, because it must be achieved through specific deeds because its presence is not a given through the deeds and charity of the desirer. The attainment of minne is always in question, as well, because although Hadewijch writes about her experience in minne, her stanzas often address the believer to put their "trust in love" which suggests minne is an unreachable end and not an experiential state.<ref>Hadewijch. "Stanzaic Poem 8". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> Despite minne sounding like an experience, Hadewijch directly writes that "love is all" which seems to suggest minne is present in all things, or that the capacity to see or engage minne is within all things reflexively.<ref>Hadewijch. "Letter 25". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.'</ref> In the sixteenth letter, Hadewijch writes that minne is the "glue that binds" God to the soul and that God's energy is an invitation offered to existence to experience his love.<ref>http://hadewijch.net/minne/</ref> Hadewijch uses the word "orewoet" to conceptualize the feeling of having once been affected or tied to the feeling of minne through God in the desire for its re-attainment.<ref>Mommaers, Paul and Elisabeth Dutton. "Introducing the Writer". ''Hadewijch: Writer, Beguine, Love Mystic''. Peeters, 2004.</ref>


Agatha Anna Bardoel suggests that the visions described by Hadewijch were a result of nothing other than a deep meditation, that, when done on a regular basis, what she was experiencing came to be quite simple and easily repeated. Based on an experiment done by [[Arthur J. Deikman]] over the course of several weeks that was related to stages of meditation, Agatha found similarities between that and the experiences described by Hadewijch. Each encounter that Hadewijch had with a higher power was indistinguishable from that of a young child experiencing something for the first time. Put simply, Hadewijch had indescribable moments within each vision much like all children do in the early years of their lives.
===Gender Transferal===


While Bardoel focused on the visions of Hadewijch to come to her conclusions, others have viewed her visions in relation to Hadewijch’s other works to form a narrative. Mary A. Suydam takes this approach from a feminist perspective. According to Suydam, Hadewijch believed that the power held by mystics within the experiences they have had essentially outranks the hierarchy. Suydam argues that women have a better understanding and connection with their spirituality because of the experiences they have had, and that can be, and has been, overlooked without looking at Hadewijch’s work as a whole.
Hadewijch refers to a masculine lover throughout her letters and poems, but the masculine gender changes to the feminine when she describes the power of God. In one passage she writes: {{quote|Love, you were God's counsel when He made me man, but now you let me perish in misery and I blame you for all that comes over me. I once believed that I was loved by love, but now it seems that she has rejected me.<ref>Hadewijch. "Poem 8". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.</ref>}}


==Influence==
Hadewijch writes that she is "man" but that the God she is writing of is also a He. Through her writings, she maintains that the love that exists within and from God is a She. Hadewijch writes that the divine "He" is not the experience that she desires because she instead wants to be entwined with the "she" (the love). Hadewijch's mysticism becomes an experiential devotion that does not directly desire God, but the experience of Love that exists within all, and is thus Godly in its own conception because of her gendered distinctions. Through the use of gendered pronouns, Hadewijch also gives judgment-centered agency to both Love and God for they both have the ability to reject the believer due to their own conditions.<ref>Hadewijch. "Poem 35". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.</ref> As a result, Hadewijch's mysticism gives agency, dualism, and gender transferal, to her God.
Hadewijch's writings influenced [[Jan van Ruusbroec]] both as a theologian and a mystic.


==Sexuality==
==Influence and contemporary scholarship==
Some of Hadewijch's letters have been interpreted as alluding to same-sex attraction or desire.<ref>Matter, E. Ann. “My Sister, My Spouse: Woman-Identified Women in Medieval Christianity.” ''Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion'', vol. 2, no. 2, 1986. pp. 81–93. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25002043.</ref> In ''Letter 25'' she describes her powerful, unrequited feelings for a woman named Sara, as well as her close relationship with two women named Emma and Margriet:


{{blockquote|Greet Sara also in my behalf, whether I am anything to her or nothing. Could I be fully all that in my love I wish to be for her, I would gladly do so; and I shall do so fully, however she may treat me. She has very largely forgotten my affliction, but I do not wish to blame or reproach her, seeing that Love [Minne] leaves her at rest, and does not reproach her, although Love ought ever anew to urge her to be busy with her noble Beloved. Now that she has other occupations and can look on quietly and tolerate my heart's affliction, she lets me suffer. She is well aware, however, that she should be a comfort to me, both in this life of exile and in the other life in bliss. There she will indeed be my comfort, although she now leaves me in the lurch.
Hadewijch's writings influenced [[Jan van Ruusbroec]] both as a theologian and a mystic. Along with scholarly and theological influence, Hadewijch has also been placed within many anthologies of Dutch literature and is considered part of the country's literary canon.<ref>Vanderauwera, Ria. Hadewijch. "The Brabant Mystic Hadewijch". ''Medieval Women Writers'. Edited by Katharina M. Wilson. University of Georgia Press, 1984.</ref>


And you, Emma and yourself-who can obtain more from me than any other person now living can, except Sara-are equally dear to me. But both of you turn too little to Love, who has so fearfully subdued me in the commotion of unappeased love. My heart, soul, and senses have not a moment's rest, day or night; the flame burns constantly in the very marrow of my soul.
===Re-emergence===


Tell Margriet to be on her guard against haughtiness, and to be sensible, and to attend to God each day; and that she may apply herself to the attainment of perfection and prepare herself to live with us, where we shall one day be together; and that she should neither live nor remain with aliens. It would be a great disloyalty if she deserted us, since she so much desires to satisfy us, and she is now close to us-indeed, very close-and we also so much desire her to be with us.
Hadewijch's work was lost to scholarship after the mid-16th century.<ref>https://www.encyclopedia.com/women/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/hadewijch-fl-13th-c</ref> In 1830, historian and professor Franz Mone discovered two of Hadewijch's manuscripts in the Royal Library of Brussels. <ref>Fraeters, Veerle. "From Medieval Dutch Writer to French Film Character. The Presence of Hadewijch, the movie (2009). ''Doing Double Dutch: The International Circulation of Literature from the Low Countries''. Edited by Brems, Retheyi, and Ton Van Kalmthout. Cornell University Press, 2017, pp. 113-131.</ref> Due to the hybridity of styles throughout her body of work, several sources have identified Hadewijch's work as a central component of the national literary canons in the Netherlands and in Flanders.<ref>Fraeters, Veerle. "From Medieval Dutch Writer to French Film Character. The Presence of Hadewijch, the movie (2009). ''Doing Double Dutch: The International Circulation of Literature from the Low Countries''. Edited by Brems, Retheyi, and Ton Van Kalmthout. Cornell University Press, 2017, pp. 113.</ref> Internationally, Hadewijch's work as a Medieval Mystic became the center of contemporary scholarship after a complete edition of her work was published in 1980 through Paulist Press.<ref>Fraeters, Veerle. "From Medieval Dutch Writer to French Film Character. The Presence of Hadewijch, the movie (2009). ''Doing Double Dutch: The International Circulation of Literature from the Low Countries''. Edited by Brems, Retheyi, and Ton Van Kalmthout. Cornell University Press, 2017, pp. 114.</ref> As a result of Hadewijch's emergence in contemporary scholarship, many popular theorists including the psychoanalyst [[Jacques Lacan]] have specifically referenced and quoted her.<ref>Fraeters, Veerle. "From Medieval Dutch Writer to French Film Character. The Presence of Hadewijch, the movie (2009). ''Doing Double Dutch: The International Circulation of Literature from the Low Countries''. Edited by Brems, Retheyi, and Ton Van Kalmthout. Cornell University Press, 2017, pp. 116.</ref>


Once I heard a sermon in which Saint Augustine was spoken of. No sooner had I heard it than I became inwardly so on fire that it seemed to me everything on earth must be set ablaze by the flame I felt within me. Love is all!|Hadewijch, ''Letter 25''<ref>Mother Columba Hart, ed. and trans., ''Hadewijch: The Complete Works'' (New York: Paulist Press, 1980), pp 105-106.</ref>}}
Jacque Lacan's reference to Hadewijch came during [[Seminars of Jacques Lacan|Seminar XX]] in which he discusses [[jouissance]]. In the Lacanian system, [[Lack (manque)|manque]] is a concept in which desire is present due to a lack. In Seminar XX, Lacan explains that much like the project within his ''[[Écrits|Ecrits]]'', Hadewijch and other female mystics of her type are engaged in a jaculation that comes from beyond the pleasure principle.<ref>Lacan, Jacques. ''On Feminine Sexuality: The Limits of Love and Knowledge, Encore 1972-1973 (Seminar of Jacques Lacan, Book 20)''. Translated by Bruce Fink. W.W. Norton & Co Inc., 1998. </ref> From this, desire is experienced on the part of the mystic to return to the state of presence; the subject, or believer, is always at odds with having or being within the experiential.


==Veneration==
==Notes and references==
In 2022, Hadewijch was officially added to the [[Calendar of saints (Episcopal Church)|Episcopal Church liturgical calendar]] with a feast day on 22 April.<ref>{{Cite web |title=General Convention Virtual Binder |url=https://www.vbinder.net/resolutions/24?house=HD&lang=en |access-date=2022-07-22 |website=www.vbinder.net |archive-date=2022-09-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220913143652/https://www.vbinder.net/resolutions/24?house=HD&lang=en |url-status=dead }}</ref>
<references />

⚫
==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{reflist|30em}}


==Sources==
==Sources==


===Editions, translations, and recordings===
===Editions, translations, and recordings===
*{{citation|author=Columba Hart (ed. and translator), preface by Paul Mommaers|title=Hadewijch: The Complete Works|publisher=Paulist Press|year=1980|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GrIRnLDAr8EC|isbn=9780809122974}} {{ISBN|0-8091-2297-9}}
*{{citation|editor=Hart, Columba|title=Hadewijch: The Complete Works|publisher=Paulist Press|year=1980|isbn=9780809122974|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GrIRnLDAr8EC}} {{ISBN|0-8091-2297-9}}
*{{citation|author=Marieke J. E. H. T. van Baest (essay and translations), preface by [[Edward Schillebeeckx]]|title=Poetry of Hadewijch|publisher=Peeters|date=1998}} {{ISBN|90-429-0667-7}}
*{{citation|ref=none|author=Marieke J. E. H. T. van Baest (essay and translations), preface by [[Edward Schillebeeckx]]|title=Poetry of Hadewijch|publisher=Peeters|date=1998}} {{ISBN|90-429-0667-7}}
*{{citation|author=edited, introduced, and translated [into modern Dutch] by Veerle Fraeters & Frank Willaert (with a reconstruction of the melodies by Louis Peter Grijp and recordings)| title= Liederen | publisher= Historische Uitgeverij|year= 2009|isbn=978-90-6554-478-0}}
*{{citation|author1=Veerle Fraeters|author2=Frank Willaert| title= Liederen | publisher= Historische Uitgeverij|year= 2009|isbn=978-90-6554-478-0}}


===Studies===
===Studies===
*{{cite book|ref=none| author= Bardoel, Agatha| title=Vision or union? : mystical expression in the visions of Hadewijch of Brabant, c. 1250.| year= 1992| publisher=University of Toronto| url=http://central.bac-lac.gc.ca/.redirect?app=laccat&id=29795970&lang=eng}}
* Swan, Laura. ''The Wisdom of the Beguines: the Forgotten Story of a Medieval Women's Movement'' (BlueBridge, 2014).
* Swan, Laura. ''The Wisdom of the Beguines: the Forgotten Story of a Medieval Women's Movement'' (BlueBridge, 2014).
*{{cite book| author= Dailey, Patricia| title=Promised Bodies: Time, Language, and Corporeality in Medieval Women's Mystical Texts | chapter=Living Song: Dwelling in Hadewijch's ''Liederen''|year = 2013| pages=123–56| publisher= Columbia University Press}}
*{{cite book|ref=none| author= Dailey, Patricia| title=Promised Bodies: Time, Language, and Corporeality in Medieval Women's Mystical Texts | chapter=Living Song: Dwelling in Hadewijch's ''Liederen''|year = 2013| pages=123–56| publisher= Columbia University Press}}
*{{cite book|author= Fraeters, Veerle| title=A Companion to Mysticism and Devotion in Northern Germany in the Late Middle Ages|chapter=Hadewijch of Brabant and the Beguine Movement|publisher= Brill|year=2013|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7BFMAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA49|pages=49–72}}
*{{cite book|ref=none|author= Fraeters, Veerle| title=A Companion to Mysticism and Devotion in Northern Germany in the Late Middle Ages|chapter=Hadewijch of Brabant and the Beguine Movement|publisher= Brill|year=2013|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7BFMAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA49|pages=49–72| isbn=9789004258457}}
*{{cite book|author=McGinn, Bernard | title= The Flowering of Mysticism | year= 1999| pages=200–244}}
*{{cite book|ref=none|author=McGinn, Bernard | title= The Flowering of Mysticism | year= 1999| pages=200–244}}
*{{citation|author= Mommaers, Paul| others= Elisabeth M. Dutton, trans.|title=Hadewijch: Writer&nbsp;– Beguine&nbsp;– Love Mystic|publisher=Peeters|date=2005|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o2zvnQEACAAJ&dq| isbn= 9789042913929}} {{ISBN|90-429-1392-4}}
*{{citation|ref=none|author= Mommaers, Paul| others= Elisabeth M. Dutton, trans.|title=Hadewijch: Writer&nbsp;– Beguine&nbsp;– Love Mystic|publisher=Peeters|date=2005| isbn= 9789042913929|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o2zvnQEACAAJ}} {{ISBN|90-429-1392-4}}
*{{citation|author=Rozenski, Steven|title=The Promise of Eternity: Love and Poetic Form in Hadewijch's ''Liederen'' or ''Stanzaic Poems''|journal=Exemplaria|volume=22|issue=4|pages=305–325|year=2010|doi=10.1179/104125710X12730486676225}}
*{{citation|ref=none|author=Rozenski, Steven|url=http://www.maneyonline.com/doi/abs/10.1179/104125710X12730486676225|title=The Promise of Eternity: Love and Poetic Form in Hadewijch's ''Liederen'' or ''Stanzaic Poems''|journal=Exemplaria|volume=22|issue=4|year=2010|pages=305–325|doi=10.1179/104125710X12730486676225|s2cid=218668701 }}
*{{cite book|author1=Suydam, Mary|chapter=Beguine Textuality: Sacred Performances|editor1-last=Suydam|editor1-first=Mary|editor2-last=Ziegler|editor2-first=Joanna|title=Performance and Transformation: New Approaches to Late Medieval Spirituality|pages=169–210|date=1999}}
*{{cite book|ref=none|author1=Suydam, Mary|chapter=Beguine Textuality: Sacred Performances|editor1-last=Suydam|editor1-first=Mary|editor2-last=Ziegler|editor2-first=Joanna|title=Performance and Transformation: New Approaches to Late Medieval Spirituality|pages=169–210|date=1999}}


==External links==
==External links==
*{{commons category-inline}}
*{{wikiquote-inline}}
*{{wikiquote-inline}}
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20060212074421/http://www.bartleby.com/65/ha/Hadewijc.html Hadewijch in the Columbia Encyclopedia]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20060212074421/http://www.bartleby.com/65/ha/Hadewijc.html Hadewijch in the Columbia Encyclopedia]
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{{Authority control}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Roman Catholic mystics]]
[[Category:Flemish Christian mystics]]
[[Category:Dutch-language poets]]
[[Category:Dutch-language poets]]
[[Category:Middle Dutch writers]]
[[Category:Middle Dutch writers]]
[[Category:13th-century women writers]]
[[Category:13th-century women writers]]
[[Category:13th-century writers]]
[[Category:Beguines and Beghards]]
[[Category:13th-century Christian mystics]]
[[Category:Medieval women poets]]
[[Category:Medieval women poets]]
[[Category:People from the Duchy of Brabant]]
[[Category:Anglican saints]]
[[Category:Women mystics]]
[[Category:Women mystics]]

Latest revision as of 14:32, 5 July 2024

For the film, see Hadewijch (film).
Contours of the Duchy of Brabant of Hadewijch's time, drawn on a 20th-century map of Belgium and the Netherlands.

Hadewijch (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈɦaːdəʋɪx]), sometimes referred to as Hadewych oder Hadewig (of Brabant oder of Antwerp),[a] was a 13th-century poet and mystic, probably living in the Duchy of Brabant. Most of her extant writings are in a Brabantian form of Middle Dutch. Her writings include visions, prose letters and poetry. Hadewijch was one of the most important direct influences on John of Ruysbroeck.

Leben

[edit]

No details of her life are known outside the sparse indications in her own writings. Her Letters suggest that she functioned as the head of a beguine house, but that she had experienced opposition that drove her to a wandering life.[1] This evidence, as well as her lack of reference to life in a convent, makes the nineteenth-century theory that she was a nun problematic, and it has been abandoned by modern scholars.[b] She must have come from a wealthy family: her writing demonstrates an expansive knowledge of the literature and theological treatises of several languages, including Latin and French, as well as French courtly poetry, in a period when studying was a luxury only exceptionally granted to women.

Beguine Life

[edit]
Main article: Beguines and Beghards

Beguines were women during the thirteenth century who had a deep love for Jesus Christ, but unlike nuns, did not take formal vows and were free to leave at any time. Their development was slow at first, however, in the year 1216, Pope Honorius III granted them the right to live in common and encourage others to join them. With that, beguines lived together in a home referred to as beguinages. Several larger towns had more than one beguinage. The movement was not solely for women. However, men were not known as beguines, but rather, called themselves beghards.

Hadewijch was a beguine mystic who had lived during the thirteenth century in the Low Countries, specifically in the city of Antwerp which was in the region of Brabant at the time. She shared a house with some friends, for whom she was a spiritual leader.[2] Hadewijch is known for her poems, letters, and visions that she had described in writing.

Context

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Hadewijch's writings explored themes of divine love, spiritual experiences, and the union of soul with God. Hadewijch was one of the first mystic writers to put her text in Dutch. Each of her visions have the commonality of Hadewijch ascending to Jesus Christ while experiencing strong emotions that are almost euphoric. Another common theme throughout the visions is the agony she would describe when it came to the end of the vision. The visions that Hadewijch would experience, along with every other mystic, were a metaphor for the deep love that these women had for Christ.[citation needed]

Works

[edit]
Medieval manuscript page of a Hadewijch poem[3]

Most of Hadewijch's extant writings, none of which survived the Middle Ages as an autograph, are in a Brabantian form of Middle Dutch. Five groups of texts survive:[4] her writings include poetry, descriptions of her visions, and prose letters. There are two groups of poetry: Poems in Stanzas (Strophische Gedichten) and Poems in Couplets (Mengeldichten). Finally there is the "Lijst der volmaakten" ("list of the perfect ones").

Poems in Stanzas (Strophische Gedichten)

[edit]

Her forty-five Poems in Stanzas (Strophische Gedichten, also Liederen, "Songs") are lyric poems following the forms and conventions used by the trouvères and minnesingers of her time, but in Dutch, and with the theme of worldly courtship replaced by sublimated love to God.[5] Many of them are contrafacta of Latin and vernacular songs and hymns, leading to a Dutch edition renaming them "Liederen" ("Songs") and including audio recordings of performances.[6]

Poems in Couplets (Mengeldichten or Berijmde brieven)

[edit]

The sixteen Poems in Couplets (Mengeldichten, also Berijmde brieven, "letters on rhyme") are simpler didactical poems in letter format, composed in rhyming couplets, on Christian topics; not all of them are considered authentic.

Visions

[edit]

Hadewijch's Book of Visions (Visioenenboek), the earliest vernacular collection of such revelations, appears to have been composed in the 1240s. It prominently features dialogue between Hadewijch and Christ in visionary speech, an early example of this mode of vernacular religious instruction.[7]

Letters

[edit]

Thirty prose letters also survive:[8] here Hadewijch explains her views, and they give some context to her life.

List

[edit]

The Lijst der volmaakten ("list of the perfect ones"), is joined to the Visions in some manuscripts, but to the Poems in Stanzas in a more recent one. It lists several saints, like Bernard of Clairvaux, but some entries are more remarkable, like a beguine who had been condemned to death by the inquisition.

What Scholars Say

In the 20th century a question that was being asked about mysticism and the visions that Hadewijch had described considered what events led up to each experience, and also, were these encounters actually seen or only felt within the mystics.

Agatha Anna Bardoel suggests that the visions described by Hadewijch were a result of nothing other than a deep meditation, that, when done on a regular basis, what she was experiencing came to be quite simple and easily repeated. Based on an experiment done by Arthur J. Deikman over the course of several weeks that was related to stages of meditation, Agatha found similarities between that and the experiences described by Hadewijch. Each encounter that Hadewijch had with a higher power was indistinguishable from that of a young child experiencing something for the first time. Put simply, Hadewijch had indescribable moments within each vision much like all children do in the early years of their lives.

While Bardoel focused on the visions of Hadewijch to come to her conclusions, others have viewed her visions in relation to Hadewijch’s other works to form a narrative. Mary A. Suydam takes this approach from a feminist perspective. According to Suydam, Hadewijch believed that the power held by mystics within the experiences they have had essentially outranks the hierarchy. Suydam argues that women have a better understanding and connection with their spirituality because of the experiences they have had, and that can be, and has been, overlooked without looking at Hadewijch’s work as a whole.

Influence

[edit]

Hadewijch's writings influenced Jan van Ruusbroec both as a theologian and a mystic.

Sexuality

[edit]

Some of Hadewijch's letters have been interpreted as alluding to same-sex attraction or desire.[9] In Letter 25 she describes her powerful, unrequited feelings for a woman named Sara, as well as her close relationship with two women named Emma and Margriet:

Greet Sara also in my behalf, whether I am anything to her or nothing. Could I be fully all that in my love I wish to be for her, I would gladly do so; and I shall do so fully, however she may treat me. She has very largely forgotten my affliction, but I do not wish to blame or reproach her, seeing that Love [Minne] leaves her at rest, and does not reproach her, although Love ought ever anew to urge her to be busy with her noble Beloved. Now that she has other occupations and can look on quietly and tolerate my heart's affliction, she lets me suffer. She is well aware, however, that she should be a comfort to me, both in this life of exile and in the other life in bliss. There she will indeed be my comfort, although she now leaves me in the lurch.

And you, Emma and yourself-who can obtain more from me than any other person now living can, except Sara-are equally dear to me. But both of you turn too little to Love, who has so fearfully subdued me in the commotion of unappeased love. My heart, soul, and senses have not a moment's rest, day or night; the flame burns constantly in the very marrow of my soul.

Tell Margriet to be on her guard against haughtiness, and to be sensible, and to attend to God each day; and that she may apply herself to the attainment of perfection and prepare herself to live with us, where we shall one day be together; and that she should neither live nor remain with aliens. It would be a great disloyalty if she deserted us, since she so much desires to satisfy us, and she is now close to us-indeed, very close-and we also so much desire her to be with us.

Once I heard a sermon in which Saint Augustine was spoken of. No sooner had I heard it than I became inwardly so on fire that it seemed to me everything on earth must be set ablaze by the flame I felt within me. Love is all!

— Hadewijch, Letter 25[10]

Veneration

[edit]

In 2022, Hadewijch was officially added to the Episcopal Church liturgical calendar with a feast day on 22 April.[11]

Notes

[edit]
  1. ^ Note that in the modern state of Belgium Antwerp (the city) lies not in Brabant (the Belgian province) but in the province of Antwerp. The "of Brabant" and "of Antwerp" identifications of the 13th century Hadewijch are apparently primarily intended to distinguish her from Hadewych of Meer. Part of the evidence for her origins lies in the fact that most of the manuscripts containing her work were found near Brussels. The Antwerp connection is mainly based on a later addition to one of the manuscript copies of her works, that was produced several centuries after her death.
  2. ^ The 19th century understanding (based exclusively on her visions and poetry) that she would have been a nun, as described for instance in C.P. Serrure (ed.), Vaderlandsch museum voor Nederduitsche letterkunde, oudheid en geschiedenis, II (C. Annoot-Braeckman, Gent 1858), pp. 136-145, was later abandoned. That she could be identified with an abbess that presumably died in Aywières (the convent where also Saint Lutgard lived around the same time) in 1248, is considered even more unlikely in recent scholarship. For more on this, see, for instance, the writings by Paul Mommaers mentioned in the references section below.

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Letter 29.
  2. ^ "Hadewijch", Poetry International
  3. ^ "Brieven, visioenen, strofische gedichten, mengeldichten[manuscript]Hadewijch". lib.ugent.be. Retrieved 2020-08-20.
  4. ^ Bernard McGinn, The Flowering of Mysticism, (1998), p200.
  5. ^ Rozenski, Steven (2010), "The Promise of Eternity: Love and Poetic Form in Hadewijch's Liederen or Stanzaic Poems", Exemplaria, 22 (4): 305–325, doi:10.1179/104125710X12730486676225, S2CID 218668701.
  6. ^ Hadewijch, Liederen, edited, introduced, and translated by Veerle Fraeters & Frank Willaert, with a reconstruction of the melodies by Louis Peter Grijp (Groningen: Historische Uitgeverij, 2009).
  7. ^ Bernard McGinn, The Flowering of Mysticism, (1998), p200., Zimbalist, Barbara (2012), "Quotation and Imitation in Hadewijch's Visioenen: the Visionary and the Vernacular Voice of Christ", Ons Geestelijk Erf, 83 (3): 216–42.
  8. ^ Bernard McGinn, The Flowering of Mysticism, (1998), p200.
  9. ^ Matter, E. Ann. “My Sister, My Spouse: Woman-Identified Women in Medieval Christianity.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, vol. 2, no. 2, 1986. pp. 81–93. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25002043.
  10. ^ Mother Columba Hart, ed. and trans., Hadewijch: The Complete Works (New York: Paulist Press, 1980), pp 105-106.
  11. ^ "General Convention Virtual Binder". www.vbinder.net. Archived from the original on 2022-09-13. Retrieved 2022-07-22.

Sources

[edit]

Editions, translations, and recordings

[edit]

Studies

[edit]
[edit]
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