Hildegard Of Bingen Essay

Hildegard of Bingen was a great mystic who was able to understand the natural world through her visions. She lived during the 11th and 12th centuries, 1089 to 1179, and was a significant figure during this medieval period because she was able to gain recognition during a male oriented time frame of the Catholic Church (Singer 57). During her childhood she spent the majority of her time among the Benedictines, and was educated in the convent of Disibodenberg (Singer 57). Therefore, Hildegard was destined to become a great Catholic thinker from a young age because she was able to gain spiritual knowledge at an influential stage of her life. She was said to have her first visions at the age of three, but decided hide this unique gift until she could properly manifest the ability at a later age (Ramos-e-Silva 316). Later she became abbess at the very same convent where she spent most of her youth, and at the age of forty nine she left with some fellow nuns to establish a convent in Bingen, which is …show more content…
Boyce-Tillman argues, “Hildegard welds tune and text in the tradition of the woman singer/song-writer for whom the song represents an intensification of her own feeling and beliefs” (34). Her music was directly related to cosmic order, because Hildegard held the belief that singing helped one to enter a deep connection with their very own essence, the Holy Spirit (Boyce-Tillman 28). Thus, it is clear that she thought the soul and the human body were in sync with one another, and should be treated with dignity. In terms of cosmology, she believes that there is “an essential similarity and relationship between the qualities of the soul, the constitution of the external cosmos, and the structure of the body” (Singer 77). Music and writing are two of the ways that Hildegard was able to express the beliefs that she gained from her