A medieval German abbess, visionary mystic, poet, musical composer, dabbler in herbs and medicines, inventor of her own private language, and possibly a visual artist, she was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church in 2012. Today, she is revered as the patron saint of musicians and writers.
The Scivias, short for Scito vias Domini meaning “know the ways of the Lord,” is a record of the visions she received as she entered her 43rd year of age. She’d been having visions since she was a child, which caused great distress as they grew in strength. While they lasted, she was immobilized in a trance-like state and felt them as physically painful. They were so intense that, when she describes them, she does so in the third person, writing that she “suffers in her inmost being and in the veins of her flesh.” It seems as though the pain, or maybe the vision, carried her momentarily away from herself.
The resulting descriptions of what she saw are powerful and poetic.
In order to capture more of the fullness of the visions, the community of religious sisters who lived with St. Hildegard decided to accompany the words with images.
The Scivias, short for Scito vias Domini meaning “know the ways of the Lord,” is a record of the visions she received as she entered her 43rd year of age. She’d been having visions since she was a child, which caused great distress as they grew in strength. While they lasted, she was immobilized in a trance-like state and felt them as physically painful. They were so intense that, when she describes them, she does so in the third person, writing that she “suffers in her inmost being and in the veins of her flesh.” It seems as though the pain, or maybe the vision, carried her momentarily away from herself.
The resulting descriptions of what she saw are powerful and poetic.
In order to capture more of the fullness of the visions, the community of religious sisters who lived with St. Hildegard decided to accompany the words with images.
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Short film