St. Hildegard of Bingen was a rarity. Her mind was rare, her brilliance stretching across virtually all disciplines of knowledge, from music to medicine and poetry to philosophy. Her ingenuity was likewise rare, seen in her work as a monastic founder and reformer; she was an innovator whose singular genius flashed throughout her life. But perhaps rarest of all were her divine visions, a direct gift from God granted to her from childhood. It was God who, in 1141, when she was “42 years and seven months old,” commanded her in a vision to “Write, what you see and hear! Tell people how to enter the kingdom of salvation!” That same year she began work on her book “Scivias,” in which she portrayed for others the visions she had received from God.
We can and should be startled at the visions Hildegard received. They are rare. The vast majority of us do not receive such visions, and certainly not in the quantity, variety and vividness Hildegard experienced. But while it is true that no one can make such visions happen, it is also true that preparing for such depth and clarity of perception is in fact a matter of study, discipline and practice. What Hildegard saw is glorious, but who she was as the seer of the visions is also glorious. She reflected the glory she perceived, and she was prepared for that reflection.
If we study her visions, we can learn not only about God, but also about how to become people who know God better, who are capable of seeing God more fully, who are open to receiving God more generously. In the case of one of her visions of the triune God, it is a matter of Scripture and doctrine informing and interpreting the imagination.
A vision of the triune God
In Part 2 of “Scivias,” Hildegard records one of her visions in the follow way, with an illustration accompanying her words:
Line 1: I saw a very bright light, and inside it there was a person who was the color of sapphire.
Line 2: This person was completely surrounded by a very pleasant fire of reddish color.
Line 3: The very bright light completely surrounded this fire of reddish color, and at the same time this fire completely surrounded the light. Both the fire and the light surrounded the person, existing as one light with one force of potentiality.
(All quotations from “Scivias” come from the 1995 reprint translation by Bruce Hozeski, published by Bear & Co.)
What does Hildegard see here? This is a vision of the triune God, with the Word incarnate at the center. How do we know that is what she is seeing? Because she tells us so. As she records her vision, she also provides interpretation. And the interpretation is what reveals something further to us: the formation of her mind and imagination in the faith of the Church and specifically in the trinitarian doctrine.
The first interpretation
After line 1, Hildegard offers this interpretation:
“The bright light signifies God who is without blemish of illusion, defect and falsehood. The person signifies the Word who is without blemish of hard-heartedness, ill will and unfairness. The Word was begotten before time according to the divinity of God, but the Word was made flesh afterwards in time according to the humanity of the world.”
Elements of the declarations of the Council of Nicaea are here present. The Word is “begotten,” but this begottenness is not an act of creation; rather, begottenness is part of the eternal mystery “according to the divinity of God.” This is what was declared against the heretic Arius at Nicaea in 325. It was Arius who taught that the Son was “begotten” in time, thus making him a creature (like us in that respect, though better than us). As Hildegard interprets the figure in her vision, he is indeed better than us (“without blemish”) but he only becomes like us “in time.” In other words, from all eternity this person is not first of all like us. He “was made flesh afterwards.” By his nature he shares “the bright light” of the one from whom he comes — God. He is, therefore, “light from light,” as we profess each Sunday in the creed. This divine person is the one who comes to share all things with us, even to resemble us.
The second interpretation
After line 2, Hildegard continues her interpretation:
“The fire signifies the Holy Spirit who is without any blemish of dryness, death and darkness. The Only-Begotten of God was conceived in flesh from the Holy Spirit and was born with time from the Virgin — the light of true brightness poured out into the world.”
The echoes of Scripture and especially Gospel proclamations are most evident here. The spirit which hovers over the dark abyss in Genesis 1, the water that moistens the parched land in Genesis 2 and the life that overcomes death in Ezekiel 37 are identified with the Holy Spirit, who fell upon the apostles in tongues of fire to revive them from dryness, death and darkness.
But even more, this fire does not appear on its own; instead, the “Only-Begotten of God” is arrayed in its warmth and glow. This is a vision of the conception of Jesus in Mary by the Holy Spirit, as St. Luke attests: “The holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God” (Lk 1:35, NAB). St. John’s proclamation reverberates in this image, too: “What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (Jn 1:3-5, NAB). Scripture is what makes the vision intelligible; Hildegard’s mind is filled with Scripture and Scripture informs her seeing.
The third interpretation
Finally, after line 3, Hildegard teaches in this way:
“This signifies that God, the Word and the Holy Spirit are inseparable in the majesty of their divinity. … For God is not without the Word, nor the Word without God, and neither God nor the Word are without the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is not without God and the Word. All of these three persons exist as one in the whole divine of majesty. The unity of the divinity flourishes in God — neither God nor the Word without the Holy Spirit, not the Holy Spirit without them. These three persons exist as one in the whole divinity of majesty, and the unity of divinity flourishes in these three inseparable persons because divinity is shown through the Word, the Word through the birth of creatures, and the Holy Spirit through the Word being made flesh.”
Hildegard sees at once the unity and the distinction of the triune God. There is no Father (God) without the Son who is the Word, no Word without the Father, no Spirit without either. To know, love and worship one is to know, love and worship the three in their divine relations. For those who truly know the Word incarnate, what do they know? They know the Father of the Son, and they know the Spirit who is “the unity of divinity.” Even more, they know themselves as the ones who are created in the image of this Word Incarnate.
What at first glance might appear a relatively simple image becomes an inexhaustible mystery in the eye of the one whose beholding of the image is trained in the faith of the Church. The more one is schooled in the trinitarian doctrine — which itself emerges from reflection on God’s work in creation as testified to in Scripture — the more one is capable of seeing the glory communicated in this sacred image. Hildegard sees and interprets at once. For us to see fully what she shows us, we must learn more and more the terms of interpretation, terms offered in the teaching of the Church.
Developing our ability to see
The fullness of reflection for the Christian far exceeds exercises of detachment and removing oneself from the hustle-and-bustle, as necessary as such actions are for any chance of true reflection. In full, Christian reflection demands and builds upon the study of sacred Scripture, the enlivening participation in the sacramental life and the habits of devotional observance. Seeing and knowing God is above all a matter of love, but you cannot love what you do not know.
What we receive in Hildegard’s reflections are not only visions of the mystery of the triune God — as splendid as these visions are — but also and crucially a testament to a sanctified imagination. Hildegard is herself so conformed to Christ and so shaped in the life of the triune God that what we see in her and with her and through her is a reflection of our own destiny as saints. Indeed, the holy ones will see more of what she glimpses but, even more, the holy ones will become the kind of persons capable of beholding and cherishing such awesome beauty.
Visions of God change the eye of the beholder, and the beholder must change so that the eye can receive such visions.
