New Article: “O Jewel Resplendent”: The Virgin Mary and Her Analogues in Hildegard of Bingen’s Scivias

Now published in Religions 14:3 (2023), 342 (21pp), as part of a Special Issue on “The Virgin Mary in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance: Devotion and Iconography.” DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14030342.

Abstract

Despite the lush visual imagery of the twenty-six visions that form the foundation of Hildegard of Bingen’s first work, Scivias, the physical person of the Virgin Mary appears only once, as the Queen of the heavenly symphony in the book’s final vision. The images that coalesce in the musical compositions dedicated to the Virgin in that final symphony, however, resonate throughout the rest of the work, revealing Mary’s constant background presence. Moreover, analogues of traditional Marian imagery in both the text and the illustrations Hildegard designed for the work allow us to see how the Virgin exemplifies the life of the virtues from which Hildegard constructs the City of God. Finally, connections between Scivias and Hildegard’s third work, Liber diuinorum operum, demonstrate that the Virgin Mary models the path of virginity that Hildegard holds up as the singular road to holy perfection for herself and the nuns under her care.

"Sexual Abuse and the Shadows of the Fall"

In this new essay published today at The Church Life Journal, I look at St. Hildegard of Bingen's views on the origins of sexual abuse and the universal #MeToo moment. She notices precisely the ways in which the abuse of power distorts our ability to know and understand reality, and thus distorts our relationships with each other and with God. Her solution lies in the redemption of human nature through Christ's humility.

“Hildegard of Bingen’s Lament for the Environmental Crisis Caused by Human Sin”

For Earth Day, I've got an extended look at the integrated ecological vision of St. Hildegard of Bingen up over at the Church Life Journal of the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame--check it out!

Now published: “Picturing Hildegard of Bingen’s Sight” in The Cambridge Companion to Hildegard of Bingen

Nathaniel M. Campbell, “Picturing Hildegard of Bingen’s Sight: Illuminating Her Visions.” Ch. 12 in The Cambridge Companion to Hildegard of Bingen, ed. Jennifer Bain. Cambridge University Press, 2021, pp. 257-279; access online here.

Summary

This chapter explores the development and purpose of the illustrations in two manuscripts of Hildegard of Bingen’s works: one designed by Hildegard (the Rupertsberg Scivias), the other designed by a later generation of her monastery’s nuns (the Lucca Liber divinorum operum). An overview of her visionary experiences demonstrates the prophetic mission of their detailed images to communicate theological truths. I argue that Hildegard designed the Scivias images to aid that communication and provide visual exegesis of her visions, serving as a teaching tool to guide the reader through the manuscript. The next generation of nuns followed Hildegard’s impulse to illustrate her visions with the later Liber divinorum operum manuscript, but its famous cosmological diagram diverges from the text because the designer did not understand its meaning. The chapter closes with an assessment of the very limited influence of Hildegard’s illustrations in the later Middle Ages, with one story from the preaching of Johannes Tauler demonstrating their liability to reinterpretation.

Now Published: St. Hildegard of Bingen’s The Book of Divine Works

I am pleased to announce that my translation of The Book of Divine Works by St. Hildegard of Bingen is now available from The Catholic University of America Press. This is the first time that the Visionary Doctor’s final and most important visionary work has been issued in a complete and scholarly English translation. The volume includes:

• a Select Bibliography, with editions and translations of Hildegard’s works and secondary scholarship;
• a 22-page Introduction;
• black-and-white reproductions of the ten famous illustrations for the work from the thirteenth-century Lucca manuscript (online color gallery here);
• extensive explanatory notes and references to Scripture, Hildegard’s corpus, and other works of the Christian tradition;
• special indices of Scriptural citations (with exegetical passages marked in bold) and References to Hildegard’s Works.

You can get it directly from CUA Press here; through through Amazon here; European distribution can be accessed here, or email here.

I’ve been working on this project for nearly five years now. My oldest son was born at its beginnings, and my wife’s patience has been tested throughout. I owe my whole family the deepest debt of gratitude and reparations for its burden. Friends, too, have provided invaluable support, especially in accessing research materials unavailable to me. To all those who have helped: a big thank you!

Article Published: The Authorship and Function of the Chapter Summaries to Hildegard of Bingen’s Liber diuinorum operum (JMLat 27)

Campbell, Nathaniel M. “The Authorship and Function of the Chapter Summaries to Hildegard of Bingen’s Liber diuinorum operum.” The Journal of Medieval Latin 27 (2017), pp. 69-106.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1484/J.JML.5.114589

Also accessible online through academia.edu here.

          Abstract

Article Published: "Visio-Theological Designs in Hildegard of Bingen's Rupertsberg Scivias Manuscript"

I am pleased to announce that the full article upon which the paper I presented at the Kalamazoo conference earlier this year was based has now been published in the art history journal Eikón / Imago 4 (2013, Vol. 2, No. 2), pp. 1-68.

"Imago expandit splendorem suum: Hildegard of Bingen’s Visio-Theological Designs in the Rupertsberg Scivias Manuscript" can be viewed on the journal's website here or on my Academia.edu profile here.