Margaret, Prioress And Mystic Essays - Christian Prayer,

Margaret, Prioress And Mystic Margaret of Oingt was one of the many women living during the Middle Ages who turned to mysticism to become closer to God. Mysticism, unlike scholasticism, takes a direct approach to God using sensory perception, not reason. For this purpose, it allowed women to identify with God on a very personal and spiritual level. This is significant to Margaret's rationalism for writing her visions in a time when women had such a trivial amount of power in the intellectual community; she did not write her visions for others to learn from, but rather as a personal form of worship to God. In her compositions Margaret describes herself as having almost no importance or authority in matters of the church, and this is why her work was graciously accepted as valuable in her time. Because she disclaimed possession to any understanding of reason, the church believed that her writing was given to her directly by God through prophetic visions. This was the only way that she could have any authority to re cord her thoughts, because in her time women were seen to have no understanding of reason, and were therefore incapable of understanding knowledge. Although she was a prioress of a Carthusian convent, she still had to adhere to the regulations that women could not practice scholasticism. Margaret denied that she might understand reason, and by virtue of this, she was free to worship God through her writings. The imagery and language in Margaret's meditations, prayers, and letters, captures the essence of her love and passionate devotion to Christ, and they also act as a window to the understanding of this popular form of piety in her time. The intimate level upon which Margaret identifies with God is strikingly clear in the many ways she addresses Him in her meditations. As a nun, Margaret renounces her earthly family and vows a symbolic marriage to Christ. In a sense, Christ becomes her lover as well her entire family. At times she describes her love for Christ with language that borders along the lines of being erotic. When she thinks of his body lying on the cross, she describes her heart as being on fire. In one of her letter speaks of kissing Christ while he lies on her bed. And when she addresses him she declares when I see you on the cross, I want to be despised and disfigured for your love; and even more, I want to be able to die for your love and for the salvation of those that you so lovingly set free. It was prevalent for nuns to speak of the lord with such passion. In actuality, they vowed to love no other man except for the Lord, and mystics found that referring to God with so much desire defined more prom inent and personal relationships between women and Christ. It also is consequential that, in many instances, Margaret refers to Christ as her mother. Margaret compares the life of Christ to her worldly mother in labor, The mother who bore me labored at my birth for only one day or one night, but you?were in labor for me for more than thirty years. This comparison serves as an insight into the beliefs of female mystics during this period. In Margaret's own time it became common to refer to God as feminine, as well as masculine. Because God was seen by many as sexless, women found that they could identify the term creator to be substantially in common with the term mother. Men occupied most significant roles in the church, and women had a lower level of identification between themselves and God than men did. By incorporating the use of feminine language to describe God, women could identify with God on a much more intimate level than by using masculine language to describe the Lord. Margaret's effective use of language in her imagery describes the intense vivacity of her visions. Her description of hell in her meditations is an ardent example of the senses she uses to depict her visions. She explicates how people will be tortured by demons, There will be burning flames, stinking, sulfur, and devils in the form of snakes who will gnaw