Letter 21: Hildegard to Conrad, Archbishop of Mainz
The Letters
in your way, like an overzealous thresher of wheat?c Such action goes against my will. Therefore, rise up to God, for your time will come quickly.
Note 1. If the prose sounds a little awkward here, it is because we are attempting to preserve Hildegard's pun on auxilhan/exsilium. The entire passage in Latin reads: Posco tamen a Deo quod aiixiliwm mum tibi non sit quasi exsilhmt.
Hildegard to Conrad, Archbishop of Mainz 1162(?) Hildegard congratulates Conrad on becoming the new archbishop of Mainz and exhorts him to rule justly. Conrad was archbishop of Mainz from 1162 to 1165.
Steadfastly refusing to recognize the anti-pope Paschal III, he held with Pope Alexander III in opposition to Barbarossa. As a result of his loyalty to the pope, he lost his see, and never regained it, even after the reconciliation between pope and emperor.
I saw and heard these words in the True Light: The day calls forth the day and puts an end to pestilence, just as it is said: "Day to day uttereth speech, and night to night sheweth knowledge" [Ps 18.3], For God is reason, and all justice is in God. Thus all good and just things have proceeded from Him to mankind and all creatures. And His creative act is pure in Him, as it is written:
"All things were made by Him" [John 1.3]. Day would not be bright if it did not have knowledge, that is, knowledge of darkness which reveals praise of the day. Just so, the malevolence and the faithlessness of the devil reveal God, because neither faithlessness nor grievous wars can prevail against Him. God did not make evil, but He overcame it, making it into his footstool [cf. Ps
109.1; Heb 1.13, 10.13), because "without Him was made nothing" [John 1.3].
You are now, O son of God, at the very invocation of the day. Therefore, take up the shield of faith [cf. Eph6.16], and diligently hold the beautiful justice of God in the embraces of your heart, as you would clasp your dearly beloved to your bosom, and, in all your works, flee from the darkness of injustice, because God is truthful. In doing so, you will become one of the elect, the legitimate son, rather than the son of the concubine injustice [cf. Gen 16, 21.121;Gal4.22ff|.