2 Introduction
INTRODUCTION
states that for so long as the 'ghostly sights' she has just described lasted, the bleeding persisted. She repeats this in chapter 7 of the long text; but the repetition is followed by a considerable addition (311.14313.31), containing a minute description of the size, the changing colour and the persistence of the drops of blood, and the vividness and horror of the sight. Towards the end of the short text's chapter vii she implies that the sight had ceased and now has returned. She again states specifically that this was the face of the crudfixe that hange before me, but that this conveyed some of the afflictions, physical and mental, of the Passion to her (225.21-29, and cf. 324.3, again a more detailed account). Chapter x begins with yet another vision of Christ's face (not, this time, associated with the crucifix in her room), and of its discoloration as he died (233.1-10). This corresponds with the long text's chapter 16; but the rest of that chapter is concerned with details of the Passion not recounted in the short text.
It is only in the long text that these visions are associated with the Vernicle, in chapter 10, parts of which correspond with chapter vii of the short text, as already noted. As there, she describes how she wished that the Holy Face were not so darkly shown, and was answered If god will shew thee more, he shal be thy light; thou nedyth none but him (325.12).
This leads her to reflect on our blindness as we seek God; and this is followed by the passage, already described, deriving from Ecclesiasticus and Psalm 138, concerning the 'drowned soul'. Then she writes that all this second revelation was 'so low and so little and so simple' that she doubted, until, later, she received divine assurance, whether it could be from God. Then, with what reads like abrupt transition, she continues:
It was afygur and a lyknes ofourfowle blacke dede, which that our feyre bryght blessed lord bare for our synne (327.36). 'It' here can only refer to the revelation's beginning, the vision of the Holy Face; and Julian shows that this is so by continuing:
It made me to thynke of the holie vernacle of Rome, which he portrude with his one blessed face, when he was in his hard passion, wilfully goyng to his death, and often chaungyng of coloure, of the brownhead and the blackhead, rewlyhead and leenhead. Of this ymage many marveyled how that myght be stanndyng that he portrude it with his blessed face, which is the feyerest of heauyn, flower of earth and the frute of the maydens wombe. Then how myght this ymage be so dyscolouryde and so farre from feyerhead? I desyre to say, as I haue vnderstonde, by the grace of god (328.38).
We see from this that she had received the Vernicle legend in its most modern form: that she believes that Christ's image was miraculously
VIII JULIAN'S INTELLECTUAL FORMATION
transferred to the kerchief as he went towards Calvary, that it is now preserved in Rome, and that it is there the object of great veneration.
She suggests that her visions may be compared with it, in that she has been filled with the same reverent compassion. To all else, to the Vernicle's wonder-working properties and the indulgences, she seems quite indifferent.
She seems to suggest that the Vernicle itself exhibits what she saw in her vision, often chaungyng ofcoloure, and that one reason why those who see it displayed in Rome are astonished is because they expect a vera ikon to show Christ as the nonpareil of human beauty, as tradition, supported by Scripture, asserts him to be, whereas the Vernicle depicts him jo dyscolouryde and so fane from feyerhead. It is this implication which has encouraged the editors to emend an evidently corrupt passage, later in the chapter, to read:
And ther it seyeth of the vernacle of Rome, it meuyth by dyverse channgyng of coloure and chere, somtyme more comfortable and lyuely, and some tyme more rewfull and deadly, as it may be seen (331.65); and they have pointed out in their annotation how exactly this corresponds with what the art historians tell us of the two conflicting iconographic traditions, 'the first creating a Saviour with noble features, the second ajesus more dead than alive, crowned with thorns, hair dishevilled and blood-spattered face'.
Julian's devotion to the Sacred Heart, and how the literature and iconography of the devotion seem to have influenced her, is less problematical, chiefly because both iconography and literature are much more clearly documented. Despite the popular opinion that the devotion was initiated by Margaret Mary Alacoque, it is found in England as early as Bede, it was well known to Bernard and to the author of the Ancrene Riwle, and was flourishing in Julian's time, as many surviving prayers and pictures testify.158 In chapter xiii of the short text she had written:
Fulle merelye and gladlye oure lorde lokyd in to his syde and behelde and sayde this worde: Loo how I lovyd the, as 3yf he hadde sayde: My childe, 3if thow kan nought loke in my godhede, see heere how I lette opyn my syde and my herte be clovene in twa and lette oute blude and watere, alle bat was thare yn; and this lykes me and so wille I that it do the (242.1).
158 See E. Colledge, The Mediaeval Mystics of England, 11-13, a°d the authorities there cited, notably Ignazio Bonetti: Le stimate della Passione.
INTRODUCTION
In chapter 24 of the long text this becomes:
Wyth a good chere oure good lorde lokyd in to hys syde and behelde with joy, and with hys swete lokyng he led forth the vnderstandyng of hys creature by the same wound in to hys syd with in; and ther he shewyd a feyer and delectable place, and large jnow for alle mankynde that shalle be savyd and rest in pees and in loue. And ther with he brought to mynde hys dere worthy blode and hys precious water whych he lett poure out for loue. And with the swete beholdyng he shewyd hys blessyd hart clovyn on two, and with hys enjoyeng he shewyd to my vnderstandyng in part the blyssydfulle godhede as farforth as he wolde that tyme, strengthyng the pour soule for to vnderstande as it may be sayde, that is to mene the endlesse loue that was without begynnyng and is and shal be evyr (394.3).
The notable addition here is the allusion to the wounded Sacred Heart as 'a fair and delectable place, and large enough for all mankind'; and the editors have pointed out how this echoes such devotions as the Anima Christi and the Fifteen Oes. Rosemary Woolf has described and illustrated for us the extremes, sometimes horrific, sometimes mawkish, to which the cult could be taken by writers and limners of inferior taste; that this is a judgment not merely of our own age is shown by Julian's perfect restraint.
Those who read the more violent and intemperate products of the Richard Rolle school only with considerable reservations (and Walter
Hilton and the Cloud-author are to be numbered among such critics) will find Julian as a devotional writer much more to their taste. She was not prepared to trust her own emotions, until probatio counselled her that they would lead her where God wished, to where God was to be found. She understood, as must anyone who seeks for spiritual progress, the need for knowledge: self-knowledge, and knowledge of the traditions established by those who before us have sought for knowledge of God. Her whole book, if it is read aright, shows how she had laboured for such knowledge, and how modestly and unaffectedly she used it when it was given. Very many historians of literature and spirituality have lauded her for the famous conclusion:
What, woldest thou wytt thy lordes menyng in this thyng? Wytt it wele, loue was his menyng. Who shewyth it the? Loue. What shewid he the?
Love. Wherfore shewyth he it the? For loue. Holde the therin, thou shalt wytt more in the same. But thou schalt nevyr witt therin other withoutyn ende (732.15).
When, however, we observe the subtlety with which the colores of the rhetoricians are here fused with the techniques of the philosophers and
IX. 1 THE TEXTS COMPARED
the schoolmen's teachings,159 we must revere her even more. She ends as she has persisted: this is 'her Lord's meaning', and she knows it because she 'was answered in ghostly understanding'. We may learn to esteem her gifts, but she asks us only to esteem what, she truly believed, was given to her from on high.
IX THEOLOGICAL CONTENT OF THE REVELATIONS
i The Short and Long Texts Compared In III it has been shown that there had been 'lateral contamination' between the two versions before in the mid-fifteenth century A was copied. None the less, the distinctions of content in either remain plain.
In their annotations to chapter i, the editors have given their reasons for thinking that this capitulatura was composed by Julian herself (unlike the introductory paragraph of the short text), but before the compilation of the long text's revision, the 'second edition'. That and chapters 2 and 3 serve as prologue, and they correspond with the short text, omitting, however, its reflections on the utility and inadequacies of devotional art-objects, and the allusion to what she had heard 'a man ... of Holy Church' tell of the legend of St. Cecilia.
Revelation I, chapters 4-9 in the long text, dealt with three 'sights': the first is the crown of thorns and the streaming blood, which Julian calls a 'bodily sight'. In chapter 4, she writes that the vision of the blood flowing from under the crown inspired her to rejoice in the Trinity, for wher Jhesu appireth the blessed trinitie is vnderstand; this reflection (294.9296.16) is not in the short text. There, the first paragraph of chapter iv, describing the gastelye sight of his hamly lovynge (212.2-7), the understanding of the all-embracing love of God, is reworked and transferred to the long text's chapter 5 (299.2-8); and in the two texts the accounts of the contemplation of the hazel nut and of Mary are transposed. They are otherwise substantially unchanged, although it is suggested (300.18 note) that But what behyld I ther in? is of the P scribe's own making as a variant to Botte whate is that tome? (213.17), with which SS and W agree.
But the conclusion of chapter 5, And also our good lord... (301.34303.46), with the prayer, God of thy goodnes geue me thy selfe ..., and the meditation on how his goodness fulfils all creation, is not found in the short text; chapter 6, showing how our prayer is better directed to that goodness than to intermediaries, and how goodness totally encompasses us, is original to the long text, as is the opening of chapter 7, which ob159 See the analysis of this passage, 732.15-17 note.
INTRODUCTION
serves the relevance of this contemplation of divine goodness to the vision of Mary's spiritual greatness. Chapter 7 continues with an account of the bleeding caused by the crown of thorns. This begins
(311.12) as does chapter v in the short text (217.1); but what is there merely two clauses has been in the long text expanded to occupy the rest of the chapter: the vivid description of the drops of blood, leading to the meditation upon God's 'marvellous homeliness'. Chapter 8 resumes the short text's account of the 'six things' which reflection on the first showing had revealed to Julian. In the annotations to chapter v, it is pointed out how these topics have been reordered in the long text according to their modes: 'bodily sights', 'ghostly in bodily likeness', and 'ghostly sights'. The rest of chapter 8, her remark to those at her bedside that this was Doomsday for her, her explanation of the remark, and her application of her entire narrative to the spiritual situation of every Christian, follows, with some reworking, the short text. Chapter 9 begins with the observation found in the short text, chapter v, 'For the showing I am not good unless I love God the better'
(220.11, 321.2), but whereas in the short text this is followed by a reiteration that these revelations are for the profit of all, in the long text this is turned into an address to you that be symple. In either text there follows the statement that Julian does not claim for herself more love from God than the lest soule tliat is in grace, and her appeal to the unity of charity. Then, in the short text, there follows a passage, And thus wille I love ... Jhesu that ys techare of alle (221.33-222.52), her expostulation that she is an ignorant woman who is not teaching but merely repeating what has been revealed to her of divine love, not found in the long text. The significance of this omission has been remarked on (222.40 note). But both texts then continue with her affirmation of faith in the teachings of Holy Church (222.52-223.56,
323.20-28), after which chapter vii begins, Revelation I ends with her description of the 'three parts' in which the revelations were received, and of the inadequacy of her accounts of the 'ghostly sights'. The matter which then follows in the short text, her application of the revelations to all Christians (224.8-11), and her saying that this day was to be her judgment day (224.14-225.20), has, it has been seen, been moved forward in the long text to chapter 8.
Chapter vii of the short text ends and Revelation II, chapter 10, begins with the 'bodily sight' of the crucifix, relating its dolorous aspect.
Julian could see this only with difficulty and asked for more light, and she was answered: 'If God wishes to show you more, he will be your light' (225.28, 325.12). Then, in the long text only, there follows a
IX. I THE TEXTS COMPARED
lengthy passage (325.14-335.96), the rest of Revelation II, containing her meditation on 'our common working in this life', seeing and seeking
God, having him and wanting him, her account of the 'drowned soul' finding safety in God's keeping, the description of her perplexity over the seemingly commonplace nature of such showings, and the assurance she later received that they were divinely revealed. With this assurance she then interprets the vision of the crucified Christ with which Revelation II began as 'a figure and likeness of our foul black death ...', which, she says, made her think of the Vernicle at Rome, which astonishes those who venerate it by the lack of physical beauty in the Man of Sorrows. This leads her to another meditation on man as the image of the Trinity, and the Son of Man taking on him that image as man had befouled it. She refers to a coming passage in which she will write more of Christ's likeness, and she seems to assert that the Vernicle itself changes colour and appearance as did the Lord in her vision. Such fluctuations typify for her the 'seeing and seeking, having and wanting', all of which is according to God's will. We must wholly resign ourselves to that will; all of us must seek, joyfully, patiently, trustfully.
Revelation III, chapter 10, begins with her account of how she saw God in a poynte, how she saw him as omnipotent but failed to discern the nature of sin. This corresponds with the opening of chapter viii in the short text; but what is there concerning divine providence and prescience (226.5-7) has been expanded (337.8-16), in a passage which may owe something to Chaucer's Boethius, attributing to human ignorance or blindness any denial of providence. Similarly, the next sentence in the short text, Wharefore me behovede nedes grawnte that alle thynge that es done es wele done, and I was sekyr that god dose na synne (226.7), has been augmented: Thus I vnderstonde in this shewyng of loue,for well I wott in the syght of our lord god is no happe ne aventure; wherfore me behovyd nedes to grannt that alle thynges that is done is welle done, for our lord god doth all. For in this tyme the workyng of creatures was nott shewde, but of our lord god in the creatures; for he is in the myd poynt of all thynges, and all he doth. And I was sewer that he doth no synne; and here I saw verely tliat synne is no dede,for in alle thys, synne was nott shewde (337.16). Nothing in the short text has been deleted, but the reference to divine omnipotence has been added, she points out that the revelation is not concerned with human acts but with divine action upon humanity (which is why she could write in the short text that synne is noujt, here carefully rephrased as synne is no dede), and so leads with greater cogency to the demonstration that he doth no synne. Then in the long text comes the etymologizing remark on the 'two fair properties' of ryghtfulnes, after which both texts promise an ac-
INTRODUCTION
count of a further revelation in which sin will be described. The rest of Revelation III, her fuller reflections on divine prescience and beneficence, and the affirmation of this by repetitio, See, I am god ...
(340.51 e.s.) are not found in the short text.
It next describes her vision of the Flagellation (227.14). This is recounted in even more painful detail at the beginning of Revelation IV, chapter 12 (342.3-343.12). Both texts pass immediately to the meditation on the plentiful waters created for our service, and on the Precious Blood (227.20-24, 343.13-19), where the long text's rewriting bears witness to Julian's now heightened literary skills. The further meditation on the Precious Blood which is the rest of Revelation IV is not found in the short text.
Revelation V, chapter 13, corresponds with the rest of chapter viii in the short text, apart from the closing sentence there; but there are important additions. Both texts have the locution, Here with ys the feende oner commynn (227.28, 346.7), and the assurance that the devil is powerless and that he sorrows on that account. But in the long text
Julian continues: But in god may be no wrath ... and do against goddes wyll (347.18-348.23). In both texts we have the same account of Julian's laughter as she sees God despising the impotent fiend, but the long text omits her wish that all Christians might see and laugh as she did, and, after the statement that she did not see Christ laugh, it adds that her laughter was solely for the sight, and qualifies what she had written of scornyng, lest it seem to contradict what she had written of there being no anger in God, with And ther I sawe ... which is durable (349.31-35). The account of 'game, scorn and earnest' follows in either text, but, again, in the long text scornyd is given a further explanation.
Chapter viii of the short text concludes with the locution: / thanke the of thy servyce and of thy trauayle, and namly inpi^ough (229.53), which is the opening in the long text of Revelation VI, chapter 14 (351.3); but what there follows, And in thys my vnderstondyng ...fulfyllyth alle hevyn ofioy and blysse, is a new addition. Thereafter the beginning of chapter ix and what follows in the long text agree, though the 'exsample', A kyng ...is mech incresyd (352.24-26), and For I saw ... all her lyfe (353.32-36) are also additions.
Revelation VII, chapter 15, quite unlike any of the first six, telling only of the alternation of spiritual joy and depression, and seeming to describe her state of soul at this point in the sequence of revelations, corresponds with 230.18-233.1O in the short text. The variants between the two are minimal.
Revelation VIII, consisting, as it has been edited, of chapters 16-20,
I X.I THE TEXTS COMPARED
has much more matter than any before; it opens, as does chapter x, with a showing of the Holy Face and all the sufferings of the Passion which that conveys. But soon Julian begins to rewrite. A long passage, and the swete body ... so longe sufferde he (357.11-358.24) is introduced, as also the sentence And ther I say ... contynually dyeng (359.26). Thereafter chapter 17 takes up the course of the short text again with the meditation on 'I thirst'; but the entire passage for I vnderstode that for tendyrnes (360.9) ... and that other slow with dyngyng and dryeng (364.45) is new. There is omitted from the short text the allusion to Philippians
2.5, and the narrative of how her mother made to close Julian's eyes, thinking her dead. The rest of the chapter follows the short text. Chapter 18 begins with the same announcement as in the short text (235.43) of the vision of Mary, this time as the Mother of Sorrows; but it adds the remarks about the 'kind love most fulsomely shown in his sweet mother' (366.6), and the sentence For ever the hygher... that he lovyd
(366.8). The sentence Here saw I... sufferyd with hym (367.14) is from the short text (235.49); but the rest of chapter 18 is original. The narrative concerning 'Denis of France' probably derives from reading undertaken after the short text's completion. In chapter 19, the account of how she was commanded (she does not say by whom) 'Look up to heaven to his
Father', and of how she was taught to chese Jhesu only to.my hevyn in wele and in woe (370.2-371.20) follows the short text (236.57-237.6); but the rest of the chapter is new. The beginning of chapter 20, And thus saw I... and vtterly dyspysed (374.2-375.9) is from the short text (237.6-238.15); but the rest of this chapter and the beginning of Revelation IX, chapter
21 (as it is edited) are original.
With sodenly I beholdyng (379.6), correspondence with the short text (239. i) resumes; but the meditation, beginning / vnderstode ttwt we be now in our lordes menyng ... (379.11), and the rest of chapter 21 are not found in the short text. The opening of chapter 22, from Then seide oure good lorde askyng (382.2) to in his properte and in hys wurkyng (383.13), corresponds with the short text, chapter xii (239.6-17), and, after one interpolated sentence, That is to sey, I saw in Crist ttiat the father is, the correspondence continues (239.17-240.25; 383.14-384.23). The next sentence in the long text, And this was a syngular marveyle ... (384.22) is new; what follows corresponds again (240.26; 384.24-385.28), but the rest of that paragraph (385.28-31) is new. The first sentence of the next paragraph follows without omission the short text (240.31-33; 385.3233). Again, new matter is introduced (385.34-386.46). Then The hue that made hym ... shall be without ende (386.46-387.49) introduces what came earlier in chapter xi (238.15-19). The conclusion of the chapter, begin-